“You should have thought of that before this time of your life. Out with him,” his honorable vulture face cuts the gavel and again clears the room of sound, followed by an uproar at the verdict. The jackals eating jeer and hurl food and wine at the man in white while he's being led away in shackles.
“If he's innocent why are they leading him away,” she asks, interrupting Edwards boisterous shouting of condemnation.
“Don't you know anything dear girl, this is justice.”
“And what will happen to him, I didn't hear a sentence.”
“There needn't be, you see the sentence for innocence, is death my dear.”
“Next case.” the gavel concurs the case.
“That's me, I suppose,” Edward says.
“Good luck,” Cider says laughing. The room rises to their feet in silence as an unabashed Edward makes his way to the defendant’s podium. The honorable vulture face judge then says, “The honorable sir Prime Minister Edward Watertop,” smiling to a grinning Edward.
“A lovely day is it?” Edward says smirking.
“For the multiple crimes of kidnapping, extortion, bribery, blackmail, fraud, arson, operating innumerable gambling dens, countless dens of thieves, brothels, drug trafficking, larson, conspiracy to commit murder, murder, public lewdness, misappropriation of public funds, endangering the sweeps by use of supplying them with high powered military grade armaments stolen from the barracks by the Prime Minister himself” A mix jeers and lung heaving cheers rises after each crime mentioned.
“Those sweeps are good kids I say,” Edward says to a clamor of laughter.
“I continue,” the judge continues “Snatching the crown off the Queen's head and playing keep away with other members of the house. Knocking over three jewelry stores and then further looting during a riot, that was itself caused by civil unrest that some argue is due to your rhetoric, that you yourself have fermented it for your own political gain. Political corruption, espionage, and corruption of hearts and minds of the masses.” The judge continues reading off a long unrolling scroll, making notes with a quill pen until he finally comes to “Jaywalking and forty three million worth of past due parking fines. What say you Minister?”
“Absolutely, without equivocation, immeasurably, undoubtedly, without a shadow of one actually. Duly and truly, I may add there is of course much more that remains unsaid,” Edward boasts, punctuating his words and gesturing grandly as though giving a speech at a rally, before gleefully grinning and “Guilty,” spills from his drooling lips. The vulture faced judge regretfully, with a single tear dripping from his eye chops his gavel to the delight of the room.
“I must,” he sniffles, “regretfully accept your plea of guilty on all charges mentioned. Well done Minister, you continue to be a beacon of justice and moral virtue to your district and to the people of this Alto. May you continue on your endeavors unimpeded.”
“Thank you your honorable sir vulture face. May your polished baldness reflect the enlightened light cast upon you, upon us. A Round of rib eye for the house, on me,” he says waving his hat to a standing applause. The last slam of the judge’s gavel spills the octopus inkwell of the peckish stenographer next to him, splashing black over the counter and across the floor.
“We'll be going now,” Edward whispers to the two.
Anna baffled at the reaction to the verdict, trails behind Cider and Edward out of the courthouse. While the minister shakes hands, kisses baby's and hugs political allies. Hamming it up for the flashing cameras and answering questions for the press with long winded words. It takes twenty minutes to descend the stairs to the car. The Prime Minister drunk with power and on thorn apple blathers on about how the future is hinged on whether or not the whole duck population be placed in the ponds next to the poppy fields. The limo doors clap shut, Edward is deflating like a blowfish, losing a hundred pounds as he exhales, fanning air to his fat hot face as she sits quizzically thinking of the verdict.
“At times it could be hard to keep up the ol' public image, at times. I'm actually a sweetheart ya know, soft to the touch.”
“Filled with jelly I bet,” Cider says.
“So you didn't actually do all those things?”
“Oh yes, of course I have,” Edward says dabbing sweat from his forehead and hanging chin.
“Then how? if you are guilty and that man was innocent.”
“Guilty of what? my dear sweet Anna, innocent of what? of good intentions?”
“All those crimes, that was almost an hour of just naming them.”
“Of which I am inexcusably guilty,” the minister says smoothly “and gluttonously indulgent in doing so. Caught red handed with the other hand in the cookie jar. Why? would you rather be innocent with bad intentions?” The minister asks the pondering Anna.
“One can be guilty of good intentions,” Edward adds wagging his finger at her as the limousine cruises away with a police escort.
“Right then, back on to what we were doing?” asks Cider sipping his smoke.
“I don’t mean to be impolite in asking, but why would people want such a savage criminal as their prime minister?” she asks.
“Oh so naive. Innocent people can't lead. They're far too, well, innocent you see, to make the decisions demanded when the wielding of that sort of power.”
“I don't know if entirely agree with that,” she says.
“Whoever said you’re supposed to agree with anything my dear. Opinions don’t matter much to me, only what actually happens seems to have any point,” Edward says, and Anna sits pondering his verdict vainly, but for making vague her idea of virtue to herself.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Soots
Stopped at a stoplight sitting in the comfort of the spacious white leather interior of the minister’s big black limousine. With silk drapes shaking as the windows and seats tremor to the murmurs of far off instruments being played by a four man band on a rooftop. Whose melodic sounds are as faintly visible as they are heard, appearing as asymmetric semispherical sound waves emanating from the their source. Growing as overlapping spectral growth rings that are colored according to the chord struck and the note played. Each reverberating far outward and filling the air and streets, and rattling through the black whale of a Saoutchik limousine as though it were its sub woofer as they near.
Driving forward is to delve deeper into an orchestral strum of guitars over a slow low bass backed by ambidextrous drumming humming sweetly to their eyes. With each consecutive pluck of their strings and tap of the skins, the band is propagating their souls as sound in concurrent waves of transparent color. Spilling from the rooftop to street level and rolling through the city as ghostly glowing bubbles spreading for miles in every direction. Transparently glazing every surface of the city and the people and their clothes as they flow past. The paint of all the walls shift with the strumming of bands nimbly struck chords. Anna watches through the window, entranced by the hue's bouncing off buildings and interacting with each other in the open air.
The whole city is shaking and rattling as the sound waves spread for miles in every. Dominating the ambient with prismatic radiant amplifying resonance that begins rippling into wave interference everywhere she looks. Illustrating the heart melting melodies of the sixties pop music serenading her ears, eyes and bones with good vibrations. The closer they come to the band, the more the earth quakes, thunderously thumping through their cushioned seats and rhythm swept swaying spines. A single song mixes with the rhythms of another so frequently they become another frequency all together. Then blending with another, and the notes melding seems to be never ending as new tunes and tones emerge and amplify with each passing second. Inside the limo is filled with the smoke of Edward’s cigar. The smoke is acting as a slowing medium, illustrating clearly the interacting notes and merging melodies. The same is happening throughout the city and its every surface, incessantly canceling and complimenting each other while pullulating intensely. Rising in opacity as the waves continually colliding,
creating vaguely cylindrical vibrating nerve like shapes infinitely intermingling, and destroying each other while constructing powerfully pulsating flashes of eye staining sound. The three sit mesmerized, as though snakes charmed by a swami’s flute, unable to think of anything but the blinding chords of the heart string hypnotizing sixties pop quartet permeating through their perceptions. Blankly staring while bobbing their heads to the bass and knowing of nothing but sounds of love to their eyes and ears as they do so in bliss.
The car keeps moving until the ambient blue disappears entirely to the sight of mixing melodies. Coal black clouds start crowding closer together as they near the Soots. Lightly dusting the windows and ground with soot falling like snow. At first the soot moves to the soul resonating melodies of the music, like dust dancing in the wind. Riding the layers of bubbling growth rings of the band’s strumming hands, and taking on the spectrum of glowing spectral colors. A few blocks later muting the tones and smothering the songs until they are tattering whispers. She watches sadly as the sight of sound vanishes in the rear view mirror, snuffed out by the now densely falling soot, already wanting to feel the sound of the music again and again.
Nearing their drop off in the slums of the sweeps dwelling, the Soots, Edward breaks a long silence with his slow, attention drawing sinister sort of speaking.
“I'm letting you out here. Watch your wallets and watches out there. Those Sweeps are crafty ones. Remember not to forget it.”
“And you remember yourself as none of those things?” Cider asks.
“Of course. Anyway, when you get out of the car be sure to be mindful of them. I have gotten you a ride out, though you must get to a lovely little place called Beth and Barnaby's by noon.”
“Where's that?”
“I suppose you should follow this very street, and you'll come to it. Eventually.”
“Yeah, and what happens then?” asks Cider.
“You'll be met by an acquaintance of mine, a man by the name of Cinni. He'll set you up nicely I’m sure.”
“What do you mean set you up nicely?” She asks suspiciously.
“It's a figure of speech dear, like the shape a tongue takes when one speaks,” Edward says.
“No worries Anna, we'll be fine on the way out, we can trust him,” Cider assures her.
“I know you can, well enough to drink with him and leave me in the lurch at least,” she says.
“Ha! the girl has humor, a desirable trait in a lover. Sadly though, I must be on my way. I’m due at parliament for Prime Minister’s questions., it will be on the tele and the radio. It’s a public appearance for which I am already late,” Edward says, observing his silver embossed pockets powder blue pocket watch.
“Been good seeing you old friend, again sometime I hope.”
“And you, until next time,” says Cider.
“Of course,” Edward says. The two friends sip a last drink of gin, then shake hands and share a nod of a friend’s farewell.
“A pleasure to meet you Anna, take care of him will you, he can be a bit of a fool. Very much so, but don’t worry I think you'll do fine.”
“Thank you, it’s been nice to meet you, though is it hard to breathe in that smog?” she asks.
“It isn’t. It isn’t smog either, it’s soot. I do hope you survive,” Edward says as his window rolls up and his big black whale of a limousine speeds out of sight, diving back into the depths of colorfully flowing sound. Leaving the two alone at an intersection of a soot covered gas lamp lit slum. The soot feels like hot sand underfoot and is up to their shins. The two march along sweating in a dry heat that sucks the moisture from their mouths and eyes. Anna is feeling more like a canary in a coal mine with each shortening breath and waded step through the soot blizzard as she struggling to lift her knees over her hips high enough to clear the rising bluish soot drifts.
The narrow street they're on is sparsely lit by yellow candle light glowing through the windows speckling the cobbled brick walls. The glowing warm yellows of dim gas lamps flicker and glimmer, showing the soot whirling as it falls. She picks a far off window to be to her as a lighthouse, a beacon of her own perseverance to be reached with dream of leg lightening relief. Traversing the smoky storm blanketing the stone and wood cobbled together into a winding maze of small interceding streets, with livestock and free roaming foxes chasing loose chickens.
The blinking eyes of crawling and creeping soot covered people are sweeping around in the shadows. She gasps through the dust covered scarf that she’s been covering her filth covered face with. The pulverulence creeps between her teeth and coats the inside of her nostrils, leading to sudden outbursts of sneezing fits between shared by the two. Making them have to squint to see as camels do when crossing a desert, they saunter onward with almost a pound of powder in each shoe. Eventually they stumble from stolid soot drifts onto the solid cobbled ground of an empty intersection. They shake themselves out of their coating of dust like wet dogs shake off water. He lights a smoke as they carry on watching the soot mix in the silence of their footsteps and howling air
“How can you puff on that in this, we're covered head to toe?” she coughs.
“What? the rough part's behind us, I think,” he says. The sandy soot fades from sifting at the whim of skin weltering winds above. Minutes later they come to a stone faced sweep youth standing at his post on a corner posing as a paperboy, waving the daily rag and shouting in a mousy tone at preoccupied passersby.
“Here's your opinions, read all about em,” the youth recites the catchphrase of the front page loudly.
“Hey kid.”
“A Paper?” the sweep asks like he's begging.
“You mean our pockets?” Cider says to the child, who smiles ear to ear.
“So what’s it then? Sir” the kid says sarcastically, welcoming at least a dozen more smiles to spill slowly from the shadows. Surrounding the two with smirking steel shanks like hyenas encircling their prey.
“We’re looking for a place.”
“We know you are, you must be lost.”
“What makes you assume?” Anna asks.
“You’re here,” the kid replies.
“By that logic you're lost too.”
“Yes I suppose I am ma'am. Much like your wallets will be,” the sweep says to a chorus of children snickering, now completely around the two.
“Don't be so sure,” Cider says calmly.
“What if we buy a paper,” she asks.
“Naive she is huh. The front page is a cover lady, and pretty good fireplace fodder too.” Just as the sentence ends a sweep swiftly passes behind her, swiping the coins from her front pockets. She spins vainly to evade, though the swift sweep is already back to being just a smirking shank in the shadows.
“Anna!” Cider says upset with her.
“What? I got robbed?” she cries.
“I know that's the problem, a vault knocker getting robbed by a pickpocket. That's just terrible,” he says.
“You’re a vault knocker? My daddy was a vault knocker,” the youth says, his face brightening as he talks. Holding a purposeful leer to Cider, who snaps around and snatches a soot patched youth trying for his pockets like he was catching a catfish. He holds the boy by the scruff of his scruffy neck.
“You don't have a dad,” he says frankly.
“Cider, that was horrible,” she says.
“Not really ma'am it's true, it is.”
“Rough candle stick jumping kids eh,” Cider says.
“Kids stealing candy from grownups, that's right,” the sweep says devilishly. Signaling the pack of dusty thieves to close in, tip toe closer like wolves careful not to scare off their prey.
“I'm gonna start shooting them,” he says.
“Okay,” she agrees to his surprise.
“What?” he asks, with the ruffians rolling their tongues over their sharp teeth and showing their smiling steel blades.
“Hey! HEY!” a man’s voice thunders. Drawing everyone's attention is
a bronze skinned man standing twelve feet away in a spotless cream and silver hued suit. All but one of the sweeps pause in place, petrified with terrified expressions, they scurry like roaches out of the light.
“What are you bothering these people for?” The tall dreadlock crowned man speaks quickly with a thick island accent.
“Working? What’s it to you?” the boy says and the man gives him a look that straightens his posture and steals his steel nerves.
“You don't know who this man is?” the man asks.
“Why? Who is he? I thought it was a turkey dinner,” the two laugh. Cider joins them, earning a stern stare from Anna.
“No, they are not, not to you anyway,” the man silences the boy for a second.
“Awww why not” the soot faced kid says throwing a thrashing temper tantrum and stomping circles in the soot while waving his hands in a flurry.
“This is a friend of Edward’s,” the wool haired man says pointing to Cider, “and this is a friend of his, Cabbage.”
“What is..Cabbage?” asks a confused Anna.
“A leafy green vegetable, and you are Cabbage, are you not?” the man says.
“You mean Carrots?” Cider says to shared laughter.
“Oh ahahaha, yes good for the eyes I see,” the man says smoothly.
“And who are you?” Asks Carrots.
“Me, you come to me for a favor, and you don't even know what I am known as? what were you looking for, nothing, losing your place and yourselves as well.”
“Minni?” he says.
“No Cinni,” she says.
“Right, yes Cinni,” Cider repeats to feign remembrance.
“I know who you are, no worries though, Cider from the wanted posters and nightly news” Cinni says.
“See Carrots, good news travels fast,” Cider says smiling.
“And far,” she adds.
“A righteous man is Edward, and he says you’re looking for a ride out,” Cinni says.
“Edward says you don't say,” Cider says.
“I did,” Cinni says.
“Yes we are,” Anna says desperate to get out of the lung smothering soot.
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