“Ho, ho! Oh, Persephone, darling, your grace and charm are only matched by your good form under fire. You’re a cool lass indeed, for I see no surprise in your eyes at my appearance with old pals. Know that this suite is now formally boarded and under the command of Smiling Johnny Goldbuckets. To prevent any loose tongue wagging, we thought we’d put ashore and scuttle you, you loose-lipped little barge while still in the docks. You follow?”
“I follow no one. If your intention is to determine whether I understand the inference of your colourful sea-jargon, then you may rest easy, trusting in the capacity of my requisite crypto-analytic abilities.”
“Yarr, you don’t act like a woman with three killers in her hotel room, and having just been told that they are on a mission to slay her.”
“Eh hem, yes, well, begging your pardon, of course, but it’s just that, I don’t really trust that my assigned executioners are quite up to the task, you see?”
“Bilge-water! What do you mean by that, you perfumed wallflower? You don’t think you can fight all three of us, do you?”
“Ah, Miss Bracegirdle. Or do you prefer Dottie? Yes, I think I prefer that. Dottie. Dot. Ee. Yes, it’s a very satisfying name to pronounce. Dottie. No, you see, it is that I fear I command an advantage over your three to one numerical advantage, due to the nature of your various handicaps, eh hem?”
“Wot did you say?!? Wot handicaps?!?”
“Why, Johnny has but one leg; you Azrael, are still favouring your right arm where I have apparently left a lasting impression on your joints from our encounter last week, and Dottie is obviously hampered by an unavoidable depth perception impediment. Really, I almost feel insulted. Are you sure you wouldn’t rather go assemble a larger assaulting party before continuing this misadventure? No one would blame you.”
“Oye’ve ‘ad enough of this mouthy wench! Draw ye’re pistols! Broadside this frilly frigate!”
“Aye! Aye!”
“Fire!”
~BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!~
“Arrr! The nimble gel dodged away from our slow-firing, flintlock pistols.”
“I say, why do you not upgrade your weapons to more modern standards, eh hem?”
“Wot? It’s tradition! Pirates always uses flintlocks. It wouldn’t be right, otherwise. What do we look like, a bunch of cowboys?”
“Anybody got an extra loaded pistol?”
“No, arrr.”
“Arrr, no.”
“Then it’s cutlasses! We’ll cut the girl to shreds!”
“Aye!”
“Forgive me, but once again, I am impelled to resist” ~swish, swish~ “your attempts.”
“Arr, I didn’t know this crazy woman was armed with those cutlasses! Why were we not informed she had them blades hid up under her skirts?”
“Yargh! I’ve not seen anyone handle two swords like that, since that old Swedish pirate, wot worked a Viking gimmick. Wot was his name? Oh, yeah, ‘Berzerker Bjørn’.”
“Encircle the target, mateys. Blockade her escape.”
“My escape? Gentlemen and Lady, I suggest you consider your own withdrawal, whilst you still maintain the ability.”
“Arrr! Belay, that bilge! Grappling hooks are engaged! We’re coming aboard!”
“I say, do not be surprised, if your attempts are met by vigorous repulse, eh hem?”
“Arrr! Ayeeiii! The gel is a demon! Watch out for those flying blades!”
“Arrr! The double-bladed whirling dervish nearly took me hand!”
“Azreal, pick that sword back up and kill that wench!”
“But Johnny, Oye don’t want to wear no hook! Wot sort of stereotypical pirate do you take me for? Johnny, look out! Here she comes!”
“Yipe! She nicked me! I’ve lost me own sword! Dottie, it’s up to you to handle the crazy Plumtartt female!”
“Aye, leave her to me, boys. I suppose it takes a good woman to dispose of a good woman.”
“What would you know on the subject, eh hem?”
“Yar!”
~cling, clang, clish, clash!~
“Ah, yes, ‘The Greater Middlesex School for the Training of Proper Ladies’ is renowned for producing championship fencing teams, of which, I am proud to say, One was once a captain.”
“Yeah, well, I was captain of the ‘Barnacle’s Caress’, the most feared pirate vessel in the Mediterranean while you were in school. We weren’t fighting for a championship trophy: we were slinging steel for keeps.”
“Azreal, grab the other side of this bedspread. We’ll net this little aristocratic beehive like a school of fish!”
“Aye, aye, Johnny!”
“That is most unsporting, gentlemen. Oh! [Oumph!]”
“We bagged us a sack of booty, here, Johnny. Come on, Dottie, run this noisy wench through with your blade and let’s slip this hotel’s harbour.”
“Aye, Azreal.”
“Belay, that order, Black Dottie. This is a valuable piece of hostage material, should it come to it. You can’t be too careful. Why throw it away, when we can maintain a bit of insurance. We’ll bring her along to the Newling works. Once we are at sea, we can fire her out of a torpedo tube.”
Chapter Nine.
Battle.
“Ohhh, Miss Plumtartt, I’m so sorry. Please come back-ack-ack.” ~sob. sniff.~ “I was a big jerk face! I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings! Please, Miss Plumtartt, please come back.”
“Ohhh, it ain’t no use. Miss Plumtartt was the one person in the whole wide world that still wanted to be my friend, and I ran her off in the meanest way possible. I guess I really am a cad.”
“Ohhh, how could I be so stupid?”
“Ohhh, how could I be so mean to Miss Plumtartt?”
“Ohhh, I’m so scared and lonely. I wish somebody, anybody, would come see me. I am so lonesome, there ain’t nobody I would turn away.”
~sniff.~
“Ohhh, I hear somebody stirring around.”
“Hey, it sounds like somebody is coming this way.”
“Oh! It is somebody! Miss Plumtartt, is that you? I’m over here! Oh, please be Miss Plumtartt. Please, be Miss Plumtartt...”
“Hunh! Oh, no, not him! Please, no, anybody but him! He ain’t even the last person I want to see. He is the only person in the whole world that I don’t want to see at all!”
“Eee-yulk. The things I have to go through to follow up on an experiment. This is disgraceful. To think that an eminent scholar like myself should have to schlep around in such distasteful quarters is unimaginable. The papers say the little rascal has been locked up in here somewhere but I can’t find him anywhere. Attention, Ichabod Temperance; come out, come out, wherever you are. Rattle a chain or run a tin cup across the bars if you cannot speak, just let me know where you are. Perhaps you are in this disgusting cell? No. Are you here? No. Are you here? No. Are you here? Yes! Hiding under the bed, I find. Shame on you, Temperance. Get out from under that disgraceful bunk and face me. I want to talk to you.”
“Go away, Professor Diddlefudde, I am put out with you. I don’t want to talk to you. You and me ain’t pals, no more. You were mean! You played a dirty trick on me and now I am in big trouble. Please go away. I don’t want to see you, sir.”
“Are you babbling on about something? I did not say that I want to talk with you, I said that I wanted to talk to you. When will you learn to listen and do as you’re told? It’s a good thing I know how to automatically ignore you and disregard anything that comes from your mouth. Now then, I wish to tell you some important news!”
“Gee, I’m sorry, Professor, what did you want to tell me?”
“Good news! It’s Persephone Plumtartt! She is crazy about me! The experiment was a success! She now recognizes the depths of my sexiness and the magnificence that is my intellectual capacity! You have fulfilled your job as my test subject and won for me the affections of Miss Persephone Plumtartt. Who would have thought that such a pathetic specimen as you would work out to accomplish my mission?”
&n
bsp; “Oh.”
“‘Oh’? Is that all you can say is, ‘oh’? You are so selfish! All you care about is yourself! Did you ever stop to think about how your lack of cooperation has foiled me at every turn? I could kill you for not recognizing how humane I am!”
“I’m sorry, Professor.”
“Save your apologies! Do you think I want to hear them? Stop! Don’t answer! Sorry I asked. I can’t stand the sound of your voice. It interferes with the sound of my own voice.”
“Sorry Prof...”
“Enh, enh, enh! Shush! I would not be here to endure your insufferable presence if this were not a pressing matter. Little girlie Plumplum is in trouble!”
“Oh my Goodness, what has happened?”
“She has been kidnapped by a ruthless gang, no, band, yes, I like that better, a ruthless band of pirates. Any-who, they are holding the pretty girl hostage until safely at sea, at which time she’ll be fired from a torpedo tube, whatever that is, presumably unto her death. As I wish to be in intimate relations with Persephone, I want her to be rescued at once.”
“Why don’t you go to the police?”
“I don’t want to get involved.”
“Where do you suppose they have taken her?”
“To a dry-dock, ship building facility that is connected to the Newling Nautical Works. The fiends have a vessel hidden there, constructed in secret, ready to launch and prepared to hold the ports and navies of the world hostage.”
“How do you know this?”
“Because I was sitting in my hotel room, ruing my disaster since contact with you, when who comes knocking on my door but Persephone Plumtartt herself! I say, ‘Persephone, I was just thinking of you, please come into my hotel room’. I think she is accustomed to finer accommodations than mine, so she invites me up to her place. Did you hear that Temperance? Persephone Plumtartt invited me up to her hotel room! Va-va-va-voom, baby! Yeah! I’m all in, sister! What are we waiting on, let’s get this party started! She is playing it coy, and continues to babble on about having me as a material witness in your trial, or some such nonsense. It was all just so much feminine gas-baggery. You know she just wanted to get a hold of my faculties. It was about to happen when three bandits attacked our love-nest! I had the good sense to stand behind a window curtain, as soon as they burst in. Persephone fought them off in an effort to save me, but in the end, it cost her freedom, probably her life, and worst of all, a sexy good time with me, but I overheard the cads revealing their plans. It’s a good thing that I was able to stay quiet the entire time. You may not believe this, but some people have trouble being quiet. Like you. I can almost hear you wanting to speak. I don’t dare let up with my constant converse, lest I have to endure a single Icha-syllable. As it is, I bravely maintained my silence the entire time, while Persephone fought three pirates, single handedly.”
“Well, what can I do, Professor Diddlefudde? I am locked up in the most famous, most inescapable prison on Earth.”
“Precisely, what can you do? Nothing. You are of absolutely no use to me or this situation.”
“Um, I don’t get it. Then why are you here?”
“Because there is one man here that can help. There is one man locked up here in the Tower of London that is the only man that can help. I say to you, you little inchworm, that only one man can escape this prison and rescue Persephone Plumtartt. She will immediately recognize that my brutal intelligence was the key to her salvation.”
“Hunh?”
“Pay attention! Why am I having to repeat myself? Is it because I love the sound of my own voice? Maybe. That’s part of it, and little wonder, for I do have a rather soothing and pleasing measure to my dulcet tones.”
“No, I mean, who is going to save Miss Plumtartt?”
“Hmm? What is wrong with you? Am I not being perfectly clear? Do I have to spell it out for you? No, that will probably make it worse. Here, this is as direct as I can manage. I. Need. Doc. Tor. Ick. Y. To. Save. Per. Se. Pho. Ne.”
“Hunh?”
“You drive me bananas, you little imbecile! Only Dr. Icky can save Persephone!”
“Hunh? Do you mean you want me to take that serum voluntarily?”
“No, I assumed that I would have to trick you, like this!”
“Woah! You tried to stick me with that dang old hyperdermic needle again! Nossir! I done told you that I ain’t taking part of your experiment no more!”
“Come back over here to the bars and take your injection like a good little monkey.”
“Nossir!”
“Oh well, then I guess I am doomed to be lonely. Shame on you. This was my best shot at a lasting relationship with a female that I could, in time, learn to tolerate.”
“Gee, do you really think she is in mortal danger?”
“Without the fruits of my labours coming to the rescue? Certainly.”
“Aw, fiddlesticks, I don’t reckon I got me much choice in the matter. All right, Professor Diddlefudde, I’ll take that nasty medicine one more time, for Miss Plumtartt’s sake.”
“You are being ridiculous, of course. This is for my sake, but, if it makes you feel better about the coming suicide mission, then so be it.”
“Yessir.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m rolling up my sleeve for the injection.”
“Wrong. Drop your trousers. This one goes in the hieney.”
“What? Oh, no, please, can’t it go in the arm?”
“No, it goes in the buttocks, now be a man and drop your pants.”
“Yessir.”
“Augh! What are you doing? Pull your pants back up! I was just kidding! It goes in your arm!”
“Professor Diddlefudde!”
“Sheesh, what a party-pooper. Now don’t move, this won’t hurt a bit.”
“Ow! That hurt! How long until it begins to werrrrck? Rrr...”
“Oh, not very long. Now then, you must hurry and force yourself through the bars while your bones are in a malleable state. This will not be for long, so don’t dilly-dally. Hurry up and squeeze through. How ironic that for you, getting your head through is the greatest challenge. You better hurry and squeeze that little cantaloupe through the bars before the trans-mutational malleability wears off! While you are doing that, please remember, you must establish your noble character over the base to maintain focus on the objective. Your objective is to win Persephone’s freedom and bring her back to me. Keep that in your conscience. You will be conflicted. By that I mean that your self-identifying, inner id is challenged by the release of a primal driven counterpart. Only one of you will want to save the Plumtartt girl. Seize control of that mind, boy! Perhaps I should have instilled this part of the protocol in the subject before he scampered away up the hall.”
~ * * * ~
“Hey, Sergeant, did you hear that? It sounded like a disturbance coming up from the cells. It sounds like the prisoners are screaming!”
“I hear screaming, but it’s not the prisoners. Those screams are from our brother Tower Guards! Sound the alarm, Beefeater Gin, there is an escape!”
“Yes, Sergeant!”
~Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!~
“Guardsmen, take up pole arms and form ranks to prevent anyone from passing this posi...Eek! There he is! It’s Dr. Icky, he has escaped!”
“Bleh-Rargh!”
“Augh! He has bowled over our defense! Eek! He has snatched away me weapon!”
~Snap!~
“Hey! You little beast! I had to buy that halberd meself! You awful git, now I’m going to have to buy a new one since you’ve snapped that one in half!”
“Bleh-Rargh!”
~Cuff!~
~Clout!~
~Clobber!~
“Oi! Oye’ve been cuffed upside me ‘ead!”
“Oh, such a clout, I’ve never been struck!”
“What are you two sobbing about? I would gladly trade one of your cuffs or clouts for the terrible clobber I received!”
“He
’s outside, in the courtyard!”
“Eek! It’s the Warden, just leaving his quarters for a night at the opera. I can tell by his silken cape and top hat. He is unaware of the danger. Warden Beefbutte, look out!”
“Aiee! We’re too late! Jackie the Spring-Heeled Stripper has already stripped the Warden of his theater accouterments!”
“Ignite the arc-lights!”
“Is the power on?”
“I don’t know, did you pay the bill?”
“Hunh?”
“Of course the power is on, you filthy idiot! You are a disgrace to that ridiculous uniform! You can put yourself on report, just as soon as those blasted search-light cannon are burning!”
“Roight, Sergeant! Arc-light crews, stand by! Ready.... ig... noight!”
~purrrrrrrrrrr~
~purrrrrrrrrrr~
~purrrrrrrrrrr~
“Well, where are my search light beams?”
“It takes a tic for ‘em to warm up, right?”
~purrrrrrrrrrr-hmmmmmm~
~purrrrrrrrrrr-hmmmmmm~
~purrrrrrrrrrr-hmmmmmm~
“Almost, there...”
~mmm-kuhhh-WHOOMP-PUH!!!ZZZZZZZZZZZZ~
~mmm-kuhhh-WHOOMP-PUH!!!ZZZZZZZZZZZZ~
~mmm-kuhhh-WHOOMP-PUH!!!ZZZZZZZZZZZZ~
“Augh! Those lights are blinding! The piercing, blue-white light is unbearable!”
“There he is! It’s Dr. Icky! Our blazing search beams have dazzled and discombobulated the well-dressed primate.”
“Cudgeoals,... Ho!!!”
“Ho!!!”
~Whappity-Bappity!~
~Whappity-Bappity!~
~Whappity-Bappity-Whonk!~
“Bleh-Rargh!”
~Cuff!~
~Clout!~
~Clobber!~
“Watch out! That little monkey is doynamoite!”
“Bleh-Rargh!”
“You men have chased that monster around the central tower twice already. Quit running around in a figure eight across the courtyard and capture that prisoner!”
“He’s climbing up the Black Tower! He’s atop the ramparts! The only thing capturing Dr. Icky now are the arc-lights. He has taken a moment to savour their piercing glare. There he goes! He’s gone! Great Bovine Stew, Dr. Icky has escaped the Tower of London! Ichabod Temperance is on the loose!”
The Two Faces of Temperance Page 15