The Mechanical Messiah and Other Marvels of the Modern Age

by Robert Rankin

  And looking now smugger than one might have thought humanly possible, the clerk handed his dip-pen to the colonel.

  Colonel Katterfelto observed the clerk’s smug smile and raised one of his own.

  ‘Take the dip-pen, Humphrey,’ he said to Darwin, ‘and sign your name for the mice gentleman.’

  Darwin leapt up onto the desk and signed the name

  Cameron Bell watched this scene with amusement and wondered just what he was actually seeing. He cast a professional eye over the shoes and suitings of both man and monkey and drew a surprising and accurate conclusion.

  ‘Excuse me, Colonel,’ said Cameron Bell, when the old soldier, chuckling softly, had concluded his own signing of the register, ‘but might I trouble you for a word or two?’

  ‘Ah, detective fellow,’ said the colonel. ‘Balls, isn’t it?’

  ‘Bell,’ said the detective fellow. ‘Cameron Bell.’

  ‘Yes, that would be it. What do you want?’

  ‘I just need a word or two in private, if you will. I wish to draw upon your experiences as a space traveller.’

  ‘Small world,’ said the colonel. ‘Going up again tomorrow night.’

  ‘Then I am lucky to have caught you. Over there perhaps?’ Cameron Bell indicated a sofa that was neither grand nor down at heel, but somewhere in between.

  ‘Darwin,’ said the colonel. ‘I mean, Humphrey, dear boy. Would you engage the services of a porter and have our belongings taken up to our room? I will meet you shortly in the bar.’

  Humphrey Banana snapped his fingers at a porter.

  The colonel stifled further mirth and joined the detective on the sofa.

  ‘Interesting fellow, your nephew,’ said Mr Bell. ‘One of a kind, I am thinking.’

  The colonel puffed as the colonel did. ‘What’s on your mind?’ he asked.

  ‘I am continuing my investigations into the deaths at the Electric Alhambra,’ said Cameron Bell.

  ‘Well well well,’ said the colonel, beaming mightily. ‘Come to the right fellow, you did. Gleaned a bit of info on the cases myself, one of them at least.’

  ‘Go on please,’ said Cameron Bell.

  The colonel now spoke in whispered tones. ‘That Harry Hamilton,’ he whispered. ‘Turns out, not a real fellow at all. Impostor. Damned Venusian. Cleverly disguised to look like one of us.’

  ‘I knew it,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘But how did you learn of this?’

  ‘Met one of his chums, so to speak. Let the pussycat out of the bag, as it were. Hamilton used to lead hunting parties on Mars. Retired after an injury to his hand. Disguised himself as an Englishman. Became a sensation. Was to lead a hunt tomorrow, but someone zapped him. Pop! With a ray gun, as I told you before.’

  ‘And more likely it is looking by the minute,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘I am very grateful for this information. I think I have these cases all but put to bed.’

  ‘You wanted to ask me something,’ said the colonel. ‘What is it, then?’

  ‘I came into the possession of an object.’ Cameron Bell’s voice became soft and conspiratorial. ‘It is in safe keeping now but I am at a loss to know what it is. It is not, how shall I put this, of this Earth.’

  ‘Alien trinket then,’ gruffed the colonel. ‘What of it?’

  ‘I was hoping you might know what it is. It is about this long,’ Cameron indicated the length, ‘this wide and composed of a diamond-hard material. It resembles a crystal from a chandelier but at its centre—’

  Colonel Katterfelto raised a finger. ‘Something moves,’ he said, in a quavery voice.

  The private detective took off his hat and nodded his baldy head. ‘Something moves indeed,’ he said. ‘And you know what it is. You have seen such a thing before.’

  ‘I have,’ said the colonel. ‘I certainly have. Though I truly wish to God that I had not.’

  27

  enomorph,’ the colonel said. ‘As dangerous as they come.

  ‘From Venus?’ asked Cameron Bell.

  ‘From Mars,’ said Colonel Katterfelto. ‘Used to have a pop at them on the big-game hunts I led there. But the hunters were never keen to shoot ‘em. Look too much like children from a distance.’

  Cameron Bell could understand that. ‘And dangerous, you said?’ he asked.

  ‘Ferocious, come at you like a mad dog. Lost a few Jovian hunters. Went up to pet the blighters. Damn near got torn all to pieces.’

  ‘And the crystals are their eggs?’

  ‘They self-reproduce. Always carry their young with them. But listen, if you got to see an egg, how so? Did you bag one of the blighters yourself?’

  ‘Actually yes,’ said Cameron Bell.

  ‘Then bravo, old chap. But here? You shot the blighter here?’

  ‘In London, yes.’

  ‘And where is the egg?’

  ‘At the London Hospital. Sir Frederick Treves is examining it.’

  ‘Queen’s physician, eh?’ The colonel did fiddlings with his mustachios. ‘Then you had best tell him to toss it in the furnace. Damned impossible to break open with a hammer or whatnot. Xenocryst is a kind of crystal, d’you see? Your Xenomorph is protected pretty damn well. Until it’s time to hatch. Then — snap-snap-snap. Horrible mess. Give ‘em the business end of a ray gun. That puts a stop to the devils.’

  The colonel had quite exhausted himself with so much conversation. And as Humphrey Banana had returned from the best room in the hotel, which was not as good as others, but better than some at a pinch, the colonel excused himself from the company of Cameron Bell and took himself off to the bar.

  Alice Lovell appeared in the company of her luggage. But happily, in the opinion of Cameron Bell, not in the company of her kiwi birds.

  ‘The gentleman at the pet shop is prepared to pay five shillings a day to exhibit the kiwi birds in his front window. And he will look after them at night into the bargain.’

  ‘What excellent news,’ the detective said. ‘You could, if you so wish, cancel your reservation here and return to the guest bedroom at my humble abode.’

  ‘Dear Cameron,’ smiled Alice. ‘You are too kind. But I would not trouble you further.’

  ‘It would be absolutely no trouble, I assure you.

  ‘No, I would not hear of it.’ Alice Lovell smiled a smile.

  Cameron Bell did not.

  ‘Well, thus and so,’ he said at length. ‘I have certain matters to attend to. But I will return this evening to watch you take your much-deserved place at the top of the bill.’

  ‘I will wave if I see you,’ said Alice. ‘And if I do not. Then thank you once more for your kindness and I am sorry that my naughty birds made a mess in your house.’

  More than just a mess, thought Cameron grimly. But he beamed at Alice, bowed politely to her, told her to ‘break a leg’ as one must to superstitious artistes and promised that he would see her later.

  And with that he left the Adequate, with thoughts of Alice in his head and heart.

  Before returning home to bathe and change for the evening’s performance, Cameron steered the flatulent horse back into the grounds of the Crystal Palace. Here, at the box office, he purchased a ticket for the very best seat in the house. And from the florist’s shop in the great glazed entranceway, a dozen red roses to be delivered with a handwritten note to the dressing room of Miss Alice Lovell. ALICE AT THE PALACE as was.

  Satisfied with this, he returned to the trap, whipped up the horse, covered his nose and returned at a pace to London.

  At the London Hospital he spoke with Sir Frederick Treves.

  ‘You again, Bell,’ said that man, heaving out a kidney from a well-carved cadaver. ‘I have nothing new, I am afraid.’

  ‘I do,’ said Cameron. ‘Two things, in fact. The hurty finger is indeed that of a Venusian.’

  Sir Frederick Treves took to weighing the kidney. ‘You’d get three square meals out of this,’ he said distractedly.

  ‘Pardon?’ asked the detective.

  ‘Noth
ing at all. But Venusian, you say. I will write up a full report. Definitely more plant than mammal. Interesting species.’

  ‘And the crystal—’ Cameron Bell began.

  ‘Yes, what larks,’ said the surgeon, surreptitiously licking his fingers.

  ‘Larks?’ queried Cameron Bell.

  The surgeon nodded and smiled. ‘1 told Merrick I would give him a bag of humbugs if he could get it open. What a carry on, I confess that I wet myself watching him try.’

  ‘Oh my dear dead mother,’ cried Cameron Bell. ‘It is the egg of something called a Xenomorph. A very nasty, vicious creature. It must be destroyed.’

  ‘Oh joy of joys,’ crowed the Queen’s physician. ‘I will bet there will be some howling from Merrick should he break it open.’

  And, as if upon cue, there came such a howling.

  ‘Arm yourself’ cried Cameron, drawing out his pistol.

  Sir Frederick Treves took up the big bone saw.

  The Elephant Man came staggering into the morgue, then collapsed in a heap on the cold tile floor.

  Cameron Bell leapt forwards, pistol cocked. ‘Where does it have you?’ he yelled. ‘Is it fastened upon your innards? Where?’

  Mr Merrick peered up in some puzzlement.

  ‘Where?’ shouted Cameron Bell. ‘And be prepared with a scalpel, Sir Frederick, we may have to cut it out.’

  ‘Stop now,’ said Joseph Merrick. ‘This is not funny. You are frightening me.

  ‘Better we cut it out of you than let it eat you alive.’

  ‘Please stop, I must insist.’ The Elephant Man dragged himself to his misshapen feet. Or misshapen foot. As the right one was a perfect size eight. ‘Stop pointing your pistol at me, it is not polite.’

  ‘But the Xenomorph—’ said Cameron Bell.

  ‘This?’ replied Mr Merrick, displaying the unfractured crystal egg.

  ‘But you howled,’ said Sir Frederick Treves.

  ‘And you would too,’ Mr Merrick complained. ‘I pricked myself on the pointy end. I’ve got a really hurty-finger.’

  Cameron Bell looked to Frederick Treves.

  Who said, ‘Go on then.’

  Cameron Bell smiled at Mr Merrick.

  Then knocked him unconscious with his pistol.

  ‘Hurty-finger!’ said he.

  ‘The hurty-finger fellow and the smelly fellow, too,’ said Commander Case, as he received Mr Cameron Bell into his office at Scotland Yard. It was not one of the better offices, blessed with tall casement windows, a carpet and a fine oak desk. It was little more than a cupboard really. Cameron Bell had quite some trouble even squeezing in.

  ‘Decorating,’ the commander explained. ‘I have a very big office, you know. I am having it specially refurbished. Japanese silk wallpaper, Afghan carpet. Desk inlaid with ivory, they are sending one over from the V and A.’

  Cameron Bell studied the room, the carpet. The desk and the occupant who sat behind it. As his shoes were visible beneath, the private detective studied these, too.

  The conclusions drawn from observations of these separate sources produced a sum total within the mind of Cameron Bell. Commander Case had inhabited this cupboard for three years, five months and four days.

  The exact period of time that had elapsed since the commander accidentally released the prime suspect in a string of copy-cat Jack the Ripper murders. A suspect who was later brought to justice by Mr Cameron Bell.

  ‘I felt I should report to you what I know,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘Should you wish to use the information I pass on to you, it might, how shall I put this, speed up the decoration of your office.’

  As his arms were somewhat jammed beneath his desk, Commander Case just nodded his head and said, ‘I made it quite clear to you that you were no longer on this case.’

  ‘All right,’ said Cameron, attempting to shrug, but finding it somewhat difficult. ‘I am sure you must have it all under control. Hundreds of constables scouring the stalls of the Electric Alhambra for clues.’

  ‘Just the four,’ said the commander. ‘But we’ll get there in the end.’

  ‘I am sure that you will. But it behoves me to tell you what I know, in the hope that it will avert further deaths. It would not sit easily with me if more folk were to die, when a word from me to yourself could have saved them.’

  ‘Tell me what you have, then,’ said Commander Case.

  ‘Harry “Hurty-Finger” Hamilton was a Venusian,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘A Venusian criminal, on the run from whatever law enforcement agency exists upon that far planet. He had stolen something from one of their High Magicians. A ring, referred to as the Ring of Moses. The whereabouts of this ring are presently unknown. I had it in my possession, but it was stolen from me by Aleister Crowley. Crowley came to a fitting end. Did the ring survive? I do not know the answer.

  ‘A third party also seeks this ring. A sinister figure responsible for the murder of at least one young woman in the East End, and the abductions of several more. He to my opinion is also Venusian, but he is the one that you must focus your attention on. Forget about Harry Hamilton and also Charlie Belly. The big prize for you is the sinister figure. He means to commit atrocious acts upon the people of this world. He is probably the most evil creature that has ever walked abroad upon the streets of London.’

  Cameron Bell paused after this.

  Commander Case nodded his head.

  ‘And that is what you have?’ he said at length.

  ‘I believe my own life to be in danger,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘I believe this sinister figure will draw the conclusion that I have the Ring of Moses. He stole the possessions of Harry Hamilton believing the ring to be amongst them. It did not occur to him that Harry would carry the ring on his person.’

  ‘Splendid,’ said Commander Case. ‘Absolutely splendid. What sterling work you have dome, Mr Bell. Murdered prossies in the East End.’

  ‘Not prossies. Virgins. Required for a magical ritual.’

  ‘Oh yes. Let us not forget the magic. A magic ring, is it not? And assassins from Venus out to off a Music Hall star who isn’t a man at all but a Venusian in disguise? Well, it has the lot really, does it not? A penny dreadful if ever there was one. Or one of that Johnny Frenchman Verne’s flights of fancy.’

  ‘Perhaps I am not making myself clear,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘I require police protection. And if this evil creature is not brought to book, it is my belief that he will destroy us all.’

  ‘No no no.’ The commander did violent shakings of the head. ‘It is full of holes. What, for instance, of Smelly Charlie Belly? Why was he killed? Another Venusian, was he? Are all our Music Hall performers off-worlders in disguise?’

  ‘I have some loose ends to tie up,’ said Cameron Bell.

  ‘Out!’ the commander ordered. ‘Out of my office and out of Scotland Yard. I have theories of my own. Far less fanciful than yours. Dogged police work will pay off this time, you mark my words.’

  ‘A single constable,’ pleaded Cameron Bell, ‘to stand guard outside my home. It only occurred to me on the way over here as to just how much danger I am in. I am not a man to beg, but alone I am not a match for this evil one.’

  ‘Evil one, even better,’ crowed Commander Case. ‘The very Devil himself, I have no doubt. Find yourself a priest who makes house calls, Bell, and waste no more of my time.’

  And with that said, Mr Bell was ushered from both the office and the building and stood by his hired horse feeling very glum.

  The horse let free with a sound like tearing rags, but this time it elicited no comment or interest from the detective, who climbed aboard the trap and drove the foetid creature back to its owner.

  It was nearly seven o’clock now and Cameron knew that he would have to make considerable haste if he wanted to reach the Crystal Palace in time to watch Alice Lovell perform. It did not matter to him about the other acts and he felt that, as he knew what he knew to be basically correct, he did not believe that she was in any danger. Although there did see
m to be a lot of possible alternatives. And there were times, and this was one of them, where Cameron Bell found cause to doubt his logic and intuition. But for now he only thought of Alice. He would bathe and dress and hail a cab and probably be there by nine.

  Cameron reached his door and took out his key and then felt once more that sickening feeling deep in the pit of his stomach. The front door was open and he had not left it so.

  Cameron Bell drew his pistol, checked it and pushed open the front door. Devastation awaited. The hall, its fixtures, fittings, furnishings and whatnots had been torn into shreds. Thoroughly destroyed.

  Cameron edged forwards, gun at the ready. He had never seen such absolute destruction. Treasured items were scarcely recognisable. Paper was ripped from the walls.

  His study— Cameron pushed open the door. Saw the horror within.

  Then gasped as something took him, spun him around. He was aware of a dark, brooding figure, a noxious hideous odour breathed upon him, a hand gripped his throat and then he knew no more.

  28

  r Bell awoke to utter darkness. He clutched his throat and vomited, his eyes rolled in his head. Struggling to his feet, he lurched about. Finding a wall before him, he leaned his weight upon it. Cameron patted about at himself for his case of lucifers. He could feel that his pockets had been torn from his jacket, but his watch chain remained dangling from a waistcoat buttonhole and on it his watch and silver match case. A feeling of dread all but consuming him now, he edged along the wall. Found a gas mantle, turned it up, fumbled with the match case and struck a lucifer.

  And revealed a world gone mad.

  His beautiful study had been completely destroyed. Books and treasures brought to devastation. Down, it seemed, to the smallest item, ravaged, decimated, torn asunder.

  Cameron Bell sank back against the wall, now clutching at his heart. It was gone. All gone. Everything that mattered to him. That brought memories. His childhood bits and bobs and those of his father before him. Items gathered by his forebears upon the Grand Tour. Irreplaceable photographs in silk-bound albums. Glass that his mother had loved. And that he had loved, too.