The Lord of the Ring Roads

by Robert Rankin

  If Jim Pooley had owned a watch he would no doubt have consulted it now. Certainly he did have a pocket full of money, but he had missed his allotted session on the library computer and possibly too the arrival of the Goodwill Giant. Talking with these two idiots was simply too exhausting.

  ‘I’ll go elsewhere,’ said Jim. ‘I’m sure there are other builders less busy than yourselves.’

  ‘I doubt that,’ said knocker John. ‘How much does this job pay?’

  Jim handed him the list. ‘There’s ten roads that need the tarmac upping from them. You must not damage the cobblestones beneath, but you can keep all of the tarmac.’

  ‘But how much does it pay?’

  ‘Shall we say, one hundred pounds a road?’

  Knocker John counted on his fingers. ‘That’s ten thousand pounds,’ he said.

  ‘That’s one thousand pounds,’ said Jim. ‘But if the job is done quickly and well, you’ll get a bonus of another five hundred pounds.’

  Hairy heads nodded in a manner that signified agreement.

  ‘So when do you want this job jobbed?’ asked hurty-finger.

  ‘The day after tomorrow at ten o’clock. Prince Charles will be coming to the High Street at nine o’clock to officially declare the ring road open. And after the ceremony is finished, you can begin work.’

  ‘Prince Charles?’ said hurty-finger. ‘The Prince Charles?’

  ‘That very fellow,’ said Jim.

  ‘Wow,’ said hurty-finger. ‘I have all his albums, Purple Rain and—’

  ‘I must be off,’ said Jim. ‘If I give you two hundred pounds now, do you promise me you will turn up in the High Street at ten o’clock sharp on the day after tomorrow and begin the job?’

  Both the Johns stuck out their hands. ‘We promise,’ they agreed.

  When Norman made a promise he kept it. He had promised Old Pete a new hearing aid and Old Pete was going to get a new hearing aid.

  Although Norman had availed himself of much Quasimodo during the previous evening, he had not, like other drinkers thereof, awoken without a hangover. Because Norman had not awoken at all, which is to say that he had not yet been to sleep.

  Perhaps there had been something about that beer. Something that fuelled creativity. But whatever it was, when Norman had returned from the Swan he had not felt a need for sleep. And so he had laboured throughout the hours of darkness upon the hearing aid.

  And now it was finished.

  And ready, in Norman’s opinion, for a bit of a test run.

  Norman beheld his latest creation and found it good to gaze upon. Mighty fine it seemed to Norman. Mighty fine indeed. It greatly resembled a pair of World War Two aviators’ headphones, but with many extra flourishes of brasswork and coggery. Little lights blinked here and there and tiny cogs engaged. Curious things went on inside the gubbins, for much of the mysterious innards of the Bunson Necromunicator had been employed in the construction.

  The device was, perhaps, a tad bulky and somewhat weighty too, but Norman felt certain that the improvement in Old Pete’s hearing would be so great that the antiquated horticulturist would be overjoyed at the result and consider a bit of neck-ache a small price to pay.

  A very small price to pay for something free.

  Norman nodded his head and smiled a contented smile. ‘A job well done,’ he said to himself. ‘Now all it needs is Old Pete.’

  Whatever Old Pete needed was generally catered for by the produce he raised upon his allotment and the multiplicity of pensions he received due to a malfunction in the Post Office computer.

  And as a multi-seasoned drinker for so many, many decades it would have been necessary for him to consume his own weight in alcoholic potables before feeling any ill-effects upon the morning after.

  So thus it was that upon this fine and sun-shiny morning all was well with Old Pete.

  He hobbled across the allotments, grumbling in that manner which so endears the old to the young, striking at all and sundry with his stick and occasionally uttering, ‘good boy there,’ to Chips his canine companion.

  He was almost half way along the path that equally divided the well-tended plots when he espied something that brought him to a standstill.

  There was a lump to be seen ahead, a lump, or a hump, or a hillock. Something big and bulksome was blocking Old Pete’s passage.

  It was covered by tarpaulin and Old Pete’s first thoughts were that it might be a newly-delivered consignment of manure. His second that as the owner was nowhere to be seen, he should help himself to a bucket or two as compensation for having to walk around it.

  But manure this mound was not. As the oldster stopped to view it with a weak and rheumy eye he became aware that the mound was gently heaving. Moving up and down it was, slowly and rhythmically, up and down and up and down and up again.

  Young Chips bared his teeth and growled then sought refuge behind his ancient master. Old Pete hobbled forward and poked the big tarpaulin with his stick.

  A rumbling sound was heard, although but faintly to Pete. The trembling of the ground, however, had the elder stepping back apace.

  Then with a rush and a thrust and a tumble the tarpaulin was flung aside and from beneath a massive figure emerged. He was a veritable titan, broad at the Herculean shoulders and with the noble head of a Grecian God. He stretched wide his gargantuan arms, yawned terrifically and rose to his feet.

  Towering over the ancient and his dog, the Goodwill Giant, for it was indeed he, yawned again and looking down said, ‘hello Uncle Peter, I haven’t seen you in a while.’

  8

  The origins of the 65 bus route are, like so many other things, lost in the mists of time.

  From Ealing Broadway in the north, through Brentford, Kew, Richmond and Kingston onwards to terminate in Chessington far to the south, it is a route much travelled. Famously celebrated by the Beatles in their song ‘Baby You’re a Richmond’, artefacts uncovered at various locations along the way date back to the Palaeolithic period and have been described as “ritual objects”, which is the technical term for “we haven’t got a clue what these are”.

  Historical documents suggest that its beginnings might be that of the ritual or sacred pathway, but this is purely speculation.

  Many a post chaise and stage coach passed along it during the 18th and 19th centuries and many a notorious highwayman plied his trade. The nineteen-thirties saw the first red London Transport fifty-two seaters brought into service, prompting John Betjeman to compose one of his most poignant pieces of verse. Reproduced below through the courtesy of his estate.

  When I was young I made a fuss

  To travel on the big red bus

  But mater took me by the hand

  And said, John you must understand

  That common people ride these buses

  They’re not for the likes of us(es).

  Now though, I feel most alive

  When riding on the 65.

  Awww, lovely stuff.

  Jim Pooley feared the 65. It led, no matter in which direction you took it, to places away from the haven of Brentford. To what were essentially foreign parts.

  Jim stood in the queue at the bus stop opposite from the dreaded McDonald’s eatery and worried quietly to himself. Having left the dwelling of the two Johns he had only two more pieces of Goodwill Landscaping Company business to conclude before a lunchtime drink might be taken at the Swan.

  A trip to Ealing Broadway to deposit five hundred pounds, yes five hundred pounds, in his bank account and then a visit to the internet café to order the new street signs from Amazon.

  Omally had pressed upon him the urgency of doing this today and Jim’s pleadings that he could certainly do the internet stuff tomorrow at the library when his turn on the computer came up again, fell upon deaf Irish ears.

  Today it must be.

  So Jim stood at the bus stop.

  And sighed a sorrowful sigh.

  A lady in a straw hat overhearing this turned and asked
Jim what the trouble was.

  ‘Oh, just things,’ said Jim.

  ‘Things is it?’ said the lady. ‘Don’t start me off on things.’

  ‘I promise I won’t,’ said Jim.

  ‘I was darning my old man’s socks the other day,’ the lady went on. ‘And he was screaming away as he always does.’

  ‘Why?’ Jim asked.

  ‘Well, because he was wearing the socks and I’m not such a dab hand with a needle as I used to be, so—’

  ‘Is that the bus coming?’ Jim asked.

  ‘No,’ said the lady. ‘So, in between the screaming my husband says to me, lady in a straw hat, he says, because that’s his special name for me. Lady in a straw hat, whatever became of those things that we used to see in the sweet shop? And I said, what things? But he couldn’t remember because he once had his head run over by a cricket pitch roller and some of his brains came out of his nose.’

  Please come, 65, prayed Jim.

  ‘Anyway,’ said the lady. ‘I ascertained eventually that the things he meant were pharaoh jars, do you remember them?’

  ‘I do,’ said Jim. ‘They looked just like regular jars of sweets when they were full, but as they slowly emptied as the sweets were sold, you got to see the face of a pharaoh at the back of the jar. It was a sticky-out-face, papier-maché or something, I believe.’

  ‘That’s the things,’ said the lady. ‘I never liked them, did you?’

  ‘No,’ said Jim. ‘There was something creepy about the way the eyes looked at you over the remaining sweets before you saw the whole head.’

  ‘But you never did get to see the whole head,’ said the lady.

  ‘Actually no,’ said Jim. ‘Where is this leading?’ he asked.

  ‘My husband said that when he was a kiddie, he and a little boy called Joey broke into the sweet shop one night, it was old Mr Hartnell’s then, before he died and young Norman took over. And they stole one of those jars and carried it down to the Memorial Park, hid in the bushes and between them ate all the sweets. So there.’

  ‘So there?’ asked Jim.

  ‘No, there’s a bit more. When they had eaten all the sweets and the jar was empty they could see all of the pharaoh’s head and in the moonlight it looked well evil, so my husband said. And Joey put his hand into the jar because there was one sweet left and the eyes of the pharaoh head glared at him and the mouth opened wide and—’

  ‘And?’ said Jim.

  ‘Here comes the bus,’ said the lady. ‘And two of them together as usual, typical isn’t it?’

  The lady with the straw hat settled herself downstairs on the first bus. Jim took the second and went upstairs for a smoke. He was sure that he’d heard that story before somewhere. Although a bit differently. Didn’t the boys break the jar and the pharaoh rise up from the pieces and carry them off to some terrible place? Jim shuddered.

  ‘Fares please,’ said the clippie.

  ‘Ealing Broadway please,’ said Jim. ‘And I have the right money and everything.’

  Ealing Broadway has a long and colourful history, but as the telling of it here will not advance the plot, we shall simply pass over it and move on with our tale.

  The man behind the counter at the bank made big round eyes that mirrored the shape of his mouth.

  ‘Mr Pooley,’ he said. ‘Five hundred pounds to deposit? FIVE HUNDRED POUNDS?’

  ‘And plenty more to come,’ said Jim.

  ‘And there was I about to start bouncing your cheques. Again!’

  ‘No, it will all be onwards and upwards from now, onward and upward,’ said Jim. ‘I have joined a business partnership to transform Brentford town centre into an elegant pedestrianised plaza. One that will indeed bear my name.’

  ‘Pooley Plaza?’ said the man behind the counter.

  ‘Indeed,’ said Jim.

  ‘Would you mind waiting here whilst I tell my work colleagues?’ said the man. ‘A jolly good laugh at this time of the day would cheer them up no end.’

  ‘Just give me a receipt,’ said Jim. ‘I have pressing business to transact.’

  ‘Pooley Plaza,’ said the man and he tittered foolishly.

  The man with the extensive beard and the natty man-bun also tittered. He ran the internet café and like unto his ilk, who worked as baristas in coffee houses or served behind the counters of independent record shops, he knew just who belonged in his establishment and just who didn’t.

  ‘You sure you’re in the right place, granddad?’ he said.

  Granddad? Jim was appalled. He wasn’t that old. He was relatively young. Relatively still young. Youthful. Mature yet youthful. Something of the kind. How old was he now anyway? Jim did mental calculations. Probably old enough to be this arrogant young man’s father. This dawned gloomily on Jim.

  ‘Impertinent upstart,’ said Pooley. ‘I suggest you keep a civil tongue in your head.’

  ‘Priceless,’ said the bearded one. ‘And for your information, in case you were thinking to, you can’t get porn on these desktops, they’re all blocked.’

  ‘Porn?’ said Jim. ‘You can get porn on the internet? Really?’

  The beardy shook his head. Jim felt certain that he was wearing make-up. ‘Number three,’ the beardy said, ‘here’s the password and it’s twenty quid for half an hour.’

  Jim sighed and parted with a twenty pound note. Settled himself down before the computer and determined that he would do everything with absolute correctness to avoid further ridicule. ‘I hate Ealing,’ thought Jim.

  The new electrically driven 65s no longer rumble like the old petrol ones did. They sort of swish as they roll along. Quite a few had swished their way past the internet café and an hour and a half had expensively passed also before Jim had to concede defeat and ask for the young man’s assistance.

  The young man, with a sneery smile beneath his beard, leaned over Jim’s shoulder and tapped at the keys.

  ‘You’ve logged in as Jim Pooley,’ he said.

  ‘I have,’ said Jim.

  ‘Not to be confused with the other Jim Pooley, I suppose?’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘The one in the books.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Jim.

  ‘The P.P. Penrose books,’ said the bearded boy. ‘The Brentford Octology. All those far-fetched fictional adventures with John Omally. Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of them.’

  ‘Books?’ said Jim. Rightly baffled. ‘Books about Jim Pooley?’

  ‘And Norman and Neville and the professor and all that lot.’

  Jim looked up at the beard. ‘There are books about me?’ he said.

  ‘Yeah, well not you obviously. A heroic Jim Pooley. A dashing young hero, you might say.’

  ‘And where can you buy these books?’ Pooley asked. ‘In the bookshop up the road, do you suppose?’

  ‘Probably not,’ came the voice from the beard. ‘I think they’re pretty much out of print now. Do you have a Kindle?’

  Jim almost said that it was just the way his trousers hung, but he did not. Instead he said, ‘no, but I’ve been thinking of getting one.’

  ‘Right,’ said he of the beard and bun. ‘I can let you have one cheap, if you want. Then you can get The Brentford Octology in eBook format from Amazon and read all about yourself.’ Titters came once more from the beard’s direction.

  ‘Thank you then,’ said the somewhat bewildered Jim. ‘Actually I was trying to log into Amazon, I do have an account and I need to order some things.’

  ‘Here then,’ and click, click, click went keys and Jim was all set up.

  ‘I’ll go and charge up the Kindle,’ the beardy man said and went off merrily tittering.

  Jim viewed the screen and then, almost furtively, as if he was about to do something altogether wrong, he typed in P.P. Penrose. The Brentford Octology.

  Now Jim knew the works of P.P. Penrose well enough. What Brentonian didn’t! He was Brentford’s most famous author after all. The creator of the internationally best-selling seri
es of Lazlo Woodbine thrillers. And the less than even moderately successful Adam Earth science fiction novels.

  Jim discovered that there were eight books in the Brentford Octology, which although in itself came as no surprise, the names of these books and the brief summaries of their contents set him back on his heels somewhat, even though he was sitting down.

  The books all had appalling punning titles, Pooley viewed at random one named Rule Brentannia.

  “John and Jim and the lads from

  the Flying Pig once more take on

  the forces of darkness. When a

  wasp’s nest on the allotments proves

  to be a rear entrance to a world where

  time marches backwards and—”

  Pooley typed personalised street signs into the search box. ‘That’s quite enough of that,’ said he, proceeding with his business.

  At length, after much puffing and blowing and a caution from the bearded bun-bearer not to assault his computers, Pooley completed his task. The virtual basket was bulging and Jim paid that little bit more for a tomorrow delivery. Pleased that he could now call it a day and return to the borough of his birth, Jim logged out.

  ‘I’ve downloaded the entire P.P. Penrose collection into your Kindle said the man behind the beard. ‘So with all the extra time we’ll call it at two hundred quid, or one-eighty for cash.’

  Jim paid one-eighty for cash.

  At precisely twelve-thirty Norman entered the Flying Swan. A great big smile upon his face and a carrier bag in one hand.

  ‘Good afternoon to you, Neville,’ said Norman. ‘A pint of Quasimodo please and has Old Pete been in?’

  ‘No and no,’ said Neville.

  ‘No?’ said Norman.

  ‘No Quasimodo,’ said Neville. ‘You blighters drank the pub dry of it last night.’

  ‘You too if I recall,’ said Norman.

  ‘Indeed,’ agreed Neville ‘and I never thought I would utter these words, but we only have Large today.’