by Kerrie Noor
DJ had to act quickly or his chances of knowing more about the women on the other end of the plugulator were slimmer than an empty crisp packet. DJ grabbed Pete’s arm and whispered into his ear, “We’ve not got much time, the ol’ girl was on a promise . . .” He nodded towards the elderly woman from the Tube and began a barrage of ESP to confuse the crowd . . .
“That explains everything.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“Yes, it does.”
“Sorry, my problem.”
“No, it’s her problem.”
“His problem.”
“No, it’s their problem.”
Even the Identities were confused . . .
“Sorry, what did you say—always the quiet ones?”
“Never the quiet ones.”
“He’s a quiet one?”
“Aye, it’s a shit tan,” muttered a woman inches from Pete.
The women stared as DJ’s thoughts raced from one thing to another.
And when he started to ESP about chord changes in the next song, the Identities gave up, putting his outburst down to artistic temperament.
“What are you on about?” muttered one woman.
“Yes,” said another, “we came here for dancing and you’re spoiling it.”
THE TWO BAND MEMBERS, sensing a crisis of some sort, took over. They had no idea what was going on, but DJ needed help and it was up to them to give it.
“Us musicians stick together,” ESP-ed Hamish, who began to play “Will You Stop Yer Ticking, Don” extra loud, while Nick threw everything he had into a drumroll. When this had little effect, Hamish thought on his feet (not something he was known for) and began his much-talked-about, almost pornographic heel kicking, surprising everyone, including DJ and the drummer. Hamish hadn’t kicked his heels in years.
“Higher, Hamish, higher,” shouted a few mercenary women.
Hamish looked at DJ. “Go—my back will be done by the chorus,” he ESP-ed as the drummer in mid drumroll gestured to the secret “let’s have a fag” exit.
The exit was known only to the band, Jimmie the owner, and a voluptuous blonde from the shopping channel, who one evening smuggled a bottle of vodka in and, after “arsing it,” shouted, “This Legless shit gets on me tits and more.” And as no one wanted to know what the more was, she was spirited though the secret door.
THE TRIO STOOD ON THE pavement outside the exit as the rain pelted down. The women’s cheering echoed down the street, but no one was listening. Woody and DJ began to talk about making a run for it, both unaware where to and both thinking that it was their idea. while Pete was still trying to turn off the ringtone on his phone. They were so engrossed they didn’t even hear a taxi screeching around the corner like something out of an American TV cop show.
BUNNIE HAD TAKEN CHARGE. Organizing illicit getaways was something she knew a thing or two about, and she thought it was time she put the jumped-up leather granny in her place . . . after all, this was her pad. She grabbed Mex’s H-Pad with both hands and shouted in her best posh voice, “Get me Don’s number—now!”
“Connection’s made, ma’am.”
“Can you get to Jimmie’s Tea Shop in five?” she shouted at Don.
“Is the Pope Catholic?” he shouted back.
DJ AND WOODY BEGAN to argue about who was who when the taxi dramatically screeched onto the footpath, spraying both Woody and DJ with water.
“Get in,” shouted the cabbie, his engine still running.
“What?”
“Get in.”
“Just do what he says,” shouted Bunnie from Don’s phone, and no one argued.
Chapter Twenty-Seven—Hilda Rules
“RULES ARE MEANT TO be broken, but only if you make them.” —Manifesto the Great
Beryl was sitting in her limo, staring at the pumpkin head painted on the glass partition. She was on borrowed time, and the only solution she could think of was punching the pumpkin head for as long as it took to hurt her hand. Not that it was really a solution, more an animalistic reaction that she had seen Legless do when he thought she wasn’t looking.
Beryl seethed. What else has flathead Hilda planned, apart from calling an “impromptu meeting”?
After hearing the radio show, Beryl plunged into a deep despair of chocolate-eating and staring at the stars. The worst had happened; Hilda, it seemed, had found out everything, hinting to all who listened that Beryl had been “economical with the truth and more than overly ambitious about the planet’s energy levels.” And to make worse, Hilda began to talk of “the stationary” and how it “may take time to bring the bike back.”
Beryl spent the night in the dark with the curtains closed and emerged two days later with a “no comment” stance . . . not that anyone asked.
“Once more around the block,” Beryl shouted in the vain hope that some sort of solution would come to her—even though her reputation was now smashed to pieces like broken eggshells. And the limo, as if to rub it in, chose the courtyard of greatness as the only possible block to drive around—yet again. Beryl gave up arguing and instead grimaced into the dark at the statues of past leaders lit up for the masses to pay homage to with plastic flowers—hers was now covered in a veil of calico, flapping in the wind, with all the flowers removed and a “No Flowers” note nailed to the bottom.
All those years down the tubes . . .
If only she could find out who the snitch was, how they managed to snitch, and, more importantly, if there was there a duplicate you-shag-me-and-I-shag-you note—and, if so, where?
“Is there nothing secret in this pickled egg of a place anymore?” she said to the pumpkin head.
“Ma’am.”
“In this place, is everything fair game?”
“Ma’am, there is nothing gamey about a pickled egg.”
Beryl stared out of the limo as it drove around the back of the shed, cursing Vegas and her perverse limo driver programme, when she noticed H2 sulking behind the shed on her moped—a machine completely new to Beryl.
“Stop,” shouted Beryl.
The limo, not used to such a decisive command, did exactly that—screeching on the gravel like something out of a TV police drama. “What is a Hoover doing at the backside of the Operators’ shed?” Pause. “That is a Hoover, isn’t it?”
“Ma’am, Hoovers do not facilitate sitting; they are more for the pushing.”
H2 WAS SITTING IN THE back of the shed chewing on a pizza crust left for those prone to sulking. She was putting off going in.
H2 had driven into work contemplating her future. And as her scooter bumped over potholes, her anger grew. All those years of helping Gran cut her toenails, putting rollers in her hair, while telling her tales about the shed, what the Operators got up to. For what? To be laughed at like a useless puppy doing stupid puppy tricks?
Since the radio show, Hilda and Gran had developed the sort of relationship that involved bantering and insults, all at the expense of H2. Hilda had been back several times. It hadn’t taken her long to learn that reading hieroglyphics was not for the fainthearted, so she bribed Gran instead and ended up enjoying herself.
“Don’t mind her, she’s phallically challenged,” Gran had said more than once with a glance at H2.
Hilda’s responses varied from an “inability to rise to the challenge” comment to more unrepeatable suggestions that always made Gran laugh.
Her gran had been bought and paid for with a coffee machine, a cream puff, and the promise of a nonexistent reader’s seat in the room with a view. And H2 was totally fed up. Working in the shed had now become unbearable; no one was speaking to her, and her chances of moving up to the dashboard were as slim as Hilda’s promises.
“No one likes a snitch.”
“Us comrades should stick together.”
“Not crawl up the sleeve of leaders.”
“That H2 has gone too far . . .”
H2 stared across the courtyard and saw Beryl’s limousine circling several time
s. She watched it screech to a halt and Beryl, with a fair amount of tutting, eased her giant beehive out of the car.
Beryl walked toward H2 with a stare that did not avert as her hair reverted back into its pillar. It was a walk of someone whose shoes not only fitted properly but cushioned the sole, with an erect back loosely covered in silk so posh it didn’t crease no matter how many times you sat on it.
H2 was impressed; Beryl had been sliced, diced, and thrown to the lions and still she walked like a leader—although she was way too old to be intimidating, unlike Hilda.
“DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING about spark plugs?” said Beryl.
H2 shook her head.
“Thought not, no one does in this quality-control haven.” Beryl looked at the sky and quickly calculated from the position of the sun; she had five minutes to arrive at her meeting.
“My gran says there is still a library left with everything about everything in it.”
Beryl looked hopeful.
“From fixing fan belts to bleeding the brakes, from how to ice a cupcake to how to eat without spilling, from uniforms for tall people to cleaning a fire with no mess, from—”
“I get the picture.”
“But she’s not telling and I’m not asking.”
Beryl glanced at the pint-size Operator dressed in hand-me-downs from some past life where coordination had never been discovered. She recognized the voice, the voice from the back of the shed—always in the right place with the right answers.
“Why are you here?” said Beryl.
“No one will speak to me when I go in there.” H2 pointed to the shed.
“Backed the wrong team?” said Beryl with an I-know-the-feeling sigh.
“I’ll be making cups of tea until I’m as old as Gran.”
“How much?” said Beryl, scanning her square nails.
“What?”
“How much? Everyone has a price.”
H2 tossed her pizza crust across the gravel with impressive force. “You cannot put a price on dignity.”
“How about revenge?” said Beryl.
H2 said nothing.
“You know,” said Beryl. “It doesn’t take much to flap a Voted In, just a faint whiff of a crisis such as turning the clocks back, a fly breaking through one of the wired office orifices, or even a footman behaving . . . oddly. Any will have them flapping like hens in a storm.”
H2 sighed. Everyone knows that.
“Well,” said Beryl. “If you can find me the head footman . . .”
“You mean the oldest.”
“Well, yes. Then it is possible we could get a little even.”
H2 didn’t argue and was off, quicker than it took for Hilda to take Beryl’s chair.
HILDA WAS LIKE A WOMAN in the know, like a child who just discovered there was no Santa Claus and was going to milk it for all it was worth. She could have sent out plans, accusations, and set the whole planet into a panic . . . but she didn’t. Instead she called a meeting, giving Beryl no idea what she had planned, a move so smart even Beryl was impressed.
Beryl stood outside the room with a view—she had to time it right.
She dislodged the receptionist who, like the limo driver, was a voice-operated silhouette, although a bit more convincing, having been designed by an ex-hairdresser, and took up an incognito position behind the desk as the head footman arrived.
Beryl looked at the footman—a first for many years—and she was taken aback. His skin looked like the paper you wrapped your garbage in. And his face was pale, the sort of pale better suited to corduroy than silk. When had he gotten so gray and old-looking? When had his uniform become so tatty; it hung on his shoulders like an extra-large blanket.
Were all footmen like that?
She had stupidly assumed that the Voted In had taken care of the footmen. It was in their job description. And they were happy enough to spend a fortune on a phallic-shaped chandelier so big it took all morning to clean; surely a properly fitting uniform would have been thought of first? How wrong was she to assume. There had been budget meetings and the usual talk of the cost of coordinating silk trouser with patent leather, for what? Nothing, by the looks of things; the footman uniforms dated back to the days of stationary energy.
She was just about to make a few “discreet” inquiries when, through the door, she could hear Hilda begin one of her boring speeches.
Chapter Twenty-Eight—Which Way Did They Go?
“ONE PERSON’S EXIT IS another’s entrance.” —Hilda’s first speech
Don drove to Bunnie’s “incognito style,” as Mex suggested. That is, he took the long route, retraced halfway, and then took the short route—just in case anyone was following. Donald, whose life revolved around the bookies, the Argyll, and whatever was on Sky Sports, was happy to embrace Bunnie’s urgent message.
“Like old times,” he said, remembering when they used to smuggle those known to the public in through the back door. And it was exactly the same back door that had seen politicians (regional), royalty (minor), and the odd game-show host. Bunnie’s secret entrance had seen many faces. Not now. The porch was no longer an entrance for any secret visitors, more a place for plants that she liked to think were illegal.
Mex opened the door, and Donald greeted her with a big smile. “Cavalry has arrived,” he said, which was received with a bark from Izzie followed by a growl.
Don followed the others into Bunnie’s inner sanctum, which was now, according to Bunnie, no longer an inner sanctum but more of a bus shelter—a comment ignored by all but Don, or “Donnie,” as Bunnie liked to call him. He stared at his old flame and muttered something about time being kind. Bunnie laughed, stating that time had also been kind to him, and offered him a catch-up drink when all this “business” was over with.
Mex and Pete looked at each other—a catch-up drink, with a man?
Bunnie walked Don to the door, soothing his concerns, and soon he was purring about their next meeting. “You are delicious,” she whispered, and Don let out a chuckle and pecked her on the cheek.
Mex coughed. “We need to press on,” she shouted, and Bunnie waved Don goodbye. “I’ll call you when you’re needed, I promise,” Bunnie said.
Mex watched. “Was that absolutely necessary?”
“Oh, definitely—never rub a cabbie up the wrong way. You never know when you need one; besides, he didn’t charge me.”
Pete wondered about the cabbie; he had suspicious feelings in his insides, yet another sensation completely new to him. There was something about this Don he couldn’t quite grasp, and it wasn’t his overly friendly patting on Pete’s behind (as Woody suggested) or his mildly amusing stream of banter about the rain pissing people off. . . there was something else. He wondered if Mex sensed it, but as he broached the subject, Mex, with a flick of her wrist (another irritating habit), told him to be quiet.
“We need to reconvene in the porch,” she said, and Woody, under the insistence of Pete, followed.
HILDA’S VOICE COULD be heard across the hallway and down the stairs. She was doing her most caustic imitation of Beryl yet; even the footmen were embarrassed.
“I was merely trying to point out that we have a potential disaster on the verge of imploding and you lot”—pause for added drama—“seem hell-bent on turning our meeting into some sort of seventies sitcom.” Hilda strode about the room, waving a flyswatter to emphasize her point. She slapped the swat on the table—a few jumped. “Honestly, we get rid of all the men and then we turn into them.”
“Hear, hear,” muttered a few; others laughed uncomfortably as Hilda made herself comfortable in Beryl’s seat . . .
“So soon?” muttered some. “Her seat’s not even cold.”
Beryl, unable to take much more, queued with H2, who knocked on the door and pushed the footman wearing a “do I have to” expression into the door. The footman stumbled inside. “I think Our Sirness was speaking metaphorically,” he said, causing a rumble of confusion from the Voted In: A footman sp
eaking?
Hilda was unmoved and began a speech about “speaking when spoken to” when the footman interrupted with a tired, flat voice. “Do you still want this to go?”
Hilda eyed him. “What?”
“The Legless information . . . to the place where you said.”
“I didn’t give any placement orders . . .”
“It’s just that—” The footman stopped, feigning embarrassment. “I need some shoes to complete the mission.”
All eyes turned to Hilda.
“Why would he have no shoes?”
“And why had she not noticed?”
“Beryl would have noticed, she noticed everything . . .”
Hilda looked around at her gaggle of Voted Ins. “Mission?”
“Ma’am, I can’t deliver with no shoes.”
Beryl is behind this, thought Hilda, playing me like a pack of CDs. Hilda, thinking on her feet, which she seemed to do daily, was on the verge of a few “discreet” inquiries when all hell broke loose. The shoeless footman began to fumble and then crashed to the ground.
H2 slipped into the room and began to shout, “Footman going down . . . footman going down,” sending the Voted Ins into a frenzy of confusion.
“Mind the cushions,” said one.
“And the carpet,” said another.
“There’s blood,” shouted H2.
Hilda looked about to see who had spoken.
H2 grabbed her chance; she jumped in, ordering like a leader in the Brownies. “Tea, girls, come on, get with it—tea with sugar.”
“What, tea?” said Hilda. “Who has tea at a time like this?”
At which point another footman handed Vegas a cup of tea—lukewarm—and she enthusiastically tossed the tea (milk unknown) into the face of the footman, dislodging his wig and causing him to splutter.