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Sally watched her. ‘Teena?’
‘Uh huh?
‘How many cows have you coated?’
She shrugged. ‘A few hundred.’
‘A few hundred!?!’
‘Maybe a few thousand. Frankly, after the first eight hundred, cows all start to resemble each other. I may have coated some twice.’
‘And that’s what you’ve been doing all day?’
‘What else would one do on one’s holiday?’
‘Most people go down the beach.’
Teena looked at her like she was talking to a simpleton. ‘Sally, there are no cows on the beach.’ Striding forward, she gave the cow a firm slap on the flanks. The impact sent water flying from it.
It mooed, startled.
Teena opened the front door of the office and prepared to go inside. ‘Coming?’
Sally watched the sodden cow, its ears at half mast. ‘I don’t care how indestructible she is, I’ll still worry about her.’
‘That’s because you’re a non-scientist. You view cows as people. They’re not. A cow’s a cow, and she won’t appreciate being treated otherwise. Now come on indoors and you can show me your fridge.’
Sally stepped forward, feet splashing in puddles. Water leaked into her trainers, soaking her toes. She ignored it. When she reached the cow, she stopped. With some difficulty she pulled the cow’s mouth open and placed the umbrella handle in it. Robbed of the umbrella’s cover, she was instantly soaked, her clothes clinging to her like cold octopus tentacles, rain pummelling her like the skies were out to dump the world’s oceans on her. With yet more difficulty she clamped the cow’s jaws shut around the handle.
Teena said, ‘Sally, what’re you doing?’
‘The umbrella’ll keep her head dry.’
‘Are you trying to make me look silly?’
‘What? As opposed to smearing cows with anti-gravity cream and tying them to doorknobs?’
‘That’s different.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s science.’
‘Now then, Daisy–’
‘Daisy?’ Teena protested. ‘Her name’s Clytemnestra.’
Sally still held the jaws shut. ‘Just keep hold of this umbrella all night, and you’ll be fine.’
‘She’s my cow, you know.’ Teena still held the door open.
‘We don’t listen to the nasty woman, do we, Daisy? She slaps people and accuses them of wanting to eat her.’ And she released Daisy’s jaw.
The umbrella hit the mud at Sally’s feet.
‘Sally, it won’t work. Cows don’t understand umbrellas.’
Sally picked it up, wiped its handle clean on her soaked sweater, forced Daisy’s jaws apart then placed the umbrella handle between them. She pressed the jaws shut. She released the jaws. Daisy dropped the umbrella.
Teena tutted.
Sally picked it up, wiped its handle clean and put it in Daisy’s mouth.
She released Daisy’s jaw.
And this time …
… The cow held onto it.
‘Sally?’
‘Yeah?’ With great difficulty she bit a generous length of masking tape from a roll. It tasted foul.
‘I’d like to thank you for putting me up for the night.’ Teena lay on the top deck of Sally’s bunk bed, having refused the bottom one.
‘Don’t mention it.’ Sally stood beside her, on the bunk’s ladder. She took Teena’s right wrist, the one nearest her, and wrapped tape around it. She yanked the wrist against the nearest bed post, held it there, and bound wrist to post.
Teena said, ‘Only, some women seem to find my presence intimidating.’
‘You know, that’s how they feel about me.’ She bit off another strip then leaned across and wrapped the tape round Teena’s other wrist.
‘Sally?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What’re you doing?’
‘Strapping you down.’ Having to stretch to reach, she pressed the wrist against its nearest bedpost and bound them together.
‘Sally, it’s not that I’m actively opposed to bondage. As a social scientist I appreciate its therapeutic value. Lesbianism has its place also. However, as we’ve established that you’re not attractive and I’m engaged–’
‘Engaged. Engaged. You’re always saying you’re engaged. For someone who claims she’s a man magnet, you seem remarkably impressed with yourself for having pulled. My God, even I’ve been engaged once. It’s not that big an achievement.’ She’d been engaged to Barry Sping, the paper boy, when they were both eleven. Cthulha’d put them up to it. She’d thought it cute.
Teena said, ‘Look in my coat pocket.’
‘For what?’
‘A wallet.’
Annoyed at the disruption to her work, she finished binding wrist to post then stood up as best the ceiling allowed. Teena’s camouflage jacket hung drying on the bed post. Sally felt in the pocket and retrieved a wallet.
‘Open it,’ Teena said.
She opened it.
‘What do you see?’
‘Credit cards, old tickets, taxi firm numbers, a photo–’
‘Take the photo and look at it.’
She did so.
And … ‘Jesus Christ!’ She almost fell off her ladder with shock. ‘What the hell’s that!?!’
‘My fiance.’
‘But … but he’s huge!’ The photographer (who Sally assumed to be Teena) had only managed to fit half of him into the photo. You could have fitted Barry Sping into a photo and have had room left over for the Brighouse and Rasterick brass band.
Teena said, ‘Huge? He’s positively Olympian.’ It wasn’t clear whether she meant an athlete, a Greek god or the mountain. Sally suspected she meant all three.
‘But he’s got no clothes on!’ said Sally.
Teena said, ‘When one owns a work of art, one doesn’t leave it covered up.’
‘But that … that thing he’s got–’
‘Perhaps now you know why I’m pleased with myself?’
Sally tried to prise her gaze from it. He could have wrapped it round his neck if it had looked in any way shape or form flexible. ‘But … but … there are more important qualities in a husband than a …’ she imagined being on its receiving end, ‘… knob.’
‘I can’t think of one.’
‘What about personality?’ She tried to prise her gaze from it.
‘All men have a personality. It’s their personalities that’re the problem.’
‘But your husband should be your best friend.’ She tried to prise her gaze from it.
‘No. Your best friend should be your best friend. A husband’s job is to satisfy his woman whenever and however she demands it.’
‘And he does?’
‘What do you think?’
‘Jesus.’ Almost feeling sorry for him, and almost afraid to touch it, she slipped the photo back into the wallet. She closed the wallet and put it back in the jacket pocket. Fingers still trembling from the sight of him she took the roll of tape from the mattress where she’d left it. ‘Anyway, I’m not binding you to the bed for kinky purposes.’
‘Then why are you doing it?’
‘For your safety.’
‘My safety?’
‘Look at me.’
Teena looked at her.
‘What do I look like?’
Teena looked non-plussed.
‘I’m an entertainer’s assistant. That’s what I’ve always been.’
Teena studied her bindings. She clenched a fist and flexed an arm to test the tape’s strength but no way was she was getting free. ‘So this is some sort of magic trick?’
‘My last job in entertainment was six months ago. Know what I was?’
‘No.’
‘Assistant to Magic Keith, He Can Outrun Bullets.’
Teena frowned. ‘Magic Keith?’
‘I had to wear the assistant’s costume; you know, with the ostrich feathers and sequins. I looked a total prat.’
‘Your boss could outrun bullets?’
‘No. But I didn’t discover that till I pulled the trigger.’
‘You shot him?’
‘In the back, point blank. The bullet went clean through and lodged in a stage hand.’
‘You killed them both?’ People always used that mortified tone when they said that.
Sally said, ‘The police were very understanding. They accepted it was an accident.’
‘And it didn’t occur to you that this Keith couldn’t outrun bullets?’
‘Of course it did. All the time were were rehearsing – without bullets – I kept saying, “Magic,” he liked to be called Magic. “Are you sure you can outrun bullets?” He’d give a knowing wink, tap the side of his nose and say, “There’s a knack.”
‘What possible knack can there be to “outrunning” bullets?’
‘Acceleration. Jesse Owens could outrun horses over a hundred feet because humans accelerate faster than horses. Keith reckoned it was the same with bullets. That doesn’t make sense does it? Bullets are launched by an explosion, and horses aren’t. But I figured he was the boss, he must know what he’s doing.’
‘And?’
‘Three days later we buried him.’ Roll of tape in hand she descended the ladder then unhooked it from the top bunk’s safety rail. She carried it round to the foot of the bed and hooked it onto the rail there. ‘It was the same with Madam Tallulah.’ After rattling it to check it was safe, she climbed the ladder until level with Teena’s bare feet. She resisted the urge to tickle them while she was helpless.
‘Madam Tallulah?’ Teena asked.
‘The World’s Greatest Escapologist. Except she wasn’t. She was just some idiot. She told me to weld her into an iron casket then tip it in the river. Again the police were understanding but this is a small town, word gets round. Now no decent employer will touch me.’
‘Have you considered leaving town?’
‘You don’t watch ITV?’
‘Never.’
‘Then you didn’t see When Gun Stunts Turn Bad.’
‘No.’
‘Or When Escapology Turns Bad.’
‘No.’
‘Or The World’s Worst Welding Incidents.’
‘No.’
‘Or When Hang Gliders Collide.’
‘No.’
‘Or When Big Things Fall On Small Entertainers.’
‘No.’
‘Or When–’
‘All right, Sally. I get the idea.’
She wrapped tape around Teena’s ankle and pressed it against the safety rail. She bound one to the other. ‘Every job I do, someone ends up dead. And those shows make sure everyone knows it. But I’ll prove them all wrong. I can go two weeks without killing anyone. I know I can. That’s why I’m strapping you to the bed; you might roll over in your sleep and fall to your death.’
‘From a bunk bed?’
‘You might land on your head.’
‘With safety rails in the way?’
‘You might roll over them.’
‘Isn’t that unlikely?’
‘You can’t be too safe.’ She bit off more tape and bound Teena’s other ankle. ‘Rest assured that while you’re staying here I’ll be doing all I can to keep you alive.’
‘Sally?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Have you ever seen the movie Misery?’
‘Oh my God, that terrible woman. Can you imagine what it must be like to be trapped in a place with someone like her?
‘And what’s this?’ Last thing that night, Archie Drizzle the Dullness Inspector paid Safe Joe Safe’s Caravan Park a surprise visit. He stood in the offices’ bedroom, a middle-aged man with a brown suit, a Bobby Charlton comb-over and a Gladstone bag and watched a man who was bound, gagged and chained to a bunk bed.
Stood beside Drizzle, the manager said, ‘He was passing the camp, whistling. Before he could react, we grabbed him, coshed him and chained him to the bed so he can’t fall over and hurt himself. We at Safe Joe Safe’s are holding numerous people hostage who might otherwise hurt themselves. I think you’ll agree we’ve taken every possible precaution to make this the safest camp not just in Wyndham but in the whole world.’
‘I’ll be the judge of that.’ Drizzle thrust his bag into the chest of the manager, who took hold of it while Drizzle stepped forward and inspected the captive’s bonds. They seemed firm enough, and the gag was tight enough to muffle whatever it was the prisoner was frantically trying to say.
But then …
… Drizzle realized what the man was wearing.
‘You fool. Don’t you realize what this is?’
The manager looked blank.
Drizzle said. This is a scientist.’
He still looked blank.
‘Denied, by you, the chance to express itself through mad experimentation, his subconscious may create monsters from the id which will run loose and destroy us all.’
‘Isn’t that a little unlikely?’
Before the manager could react, Drizzle slapped a sticker on his forehead.
That sticker said FAILED.
nine
Morning woke Sally with the warmth of a rising sun and the twittering of birds. Her eyes opened with a string of tired blinks, adjusting to the light, and she stretched out in a yawn that extended her to her limits.
Then she relaxed, letting herself sink into a mattress that felt like love. She felt great. She felt more than great. She felt harmless. And beside her on the pillow Mr Bushy stretched out in a great long yawn that exactly mirrored her own. He held the pose then relaxed into a ball, snuggling his warm fur against her cheek. And she smiled. Could paradise be any better?
But then a thought struck her. She rolled onto her side, Mr Bushy scampering out of her way. She looked over the side of the bed. And she sighed with relief at not finding Teena on the floor dead.
Another thought struck her. She rolled over and looked over the other side of the bed, relieved at not finding Teena dead.
She rolled onto her back, and again sank into the mattress that felt like love. Smiling she watched the wooden slats of the bunk above and gently, so as not to wake her, asked, ‘Teena? Are you awake?’
No reply. Some people had the luxury of sleeping all day. Sally had no such luxury. She had a job to do; lives to save. She sat up, cast her legs over the side of the bunk, and planted both feet on the carpet. After leaning forward for one last yawn, she stood then turned a half circle. On her toes, hands on the safety rail, she checked the top bunk, ready to see Teena asleep.
Instead, she saw a nightmare.
The bunk was empty.
‘All right, Mr Landen, you’ve had your fun, now let me in. I’ve no intention of spending another night in that madwoman’s home.’ Early morning, Teena stood on her mobile home’s front steps, her knuckles machine-gun rapping its door.
The only reply she got was the rumble of objects being moved around.
She knocked again. ‘I know you’re awake, I can hear you pushing furniture up against the door.’
‘No, Dr Llama.’
‘No?’ She gazed at the door. ‘What do you mean no?’
‘I mean no. You should understand what that means. You are, after all, the expert linguist. You know how to say no in more languages than anyone else alive.’
‘I’m fully aware of the word’s general meaning. What does it mean in the context of you not letting me into my own mobile home?’
‘It means you can’t come in till you let me marry my bunny.’
‘Marry it?’ She frowned at the door. ‘That bunny’s a boy bunny. Since when have you liked boys?’
‘I don’t care. I love my bunny and won’t let you take him off me.’
Lepus called out, ‘Help me, female! Help me! He makes me eat celery.’
She watched the door, non-plussed.
Just to make her morning complete, Landen called, ‘Help me, Dr Llama! Help me! My bunny’s just sat on me.’
‘Lepus, stop sitting on Mr Landen,’ she sighed.
‘Not unless he lets me out.’
‘He can’t let you out unless you get off him.’
‘I don’t care. I’m not getting off him till he lets me out.’
But how’d she done it? How’d she got away? Madam Tallulah hadn’t been able to escape masking tape, and Sally hadn’t bound her with half the vigour she’d used on Teena. And yet, when Sally’d found the tape, its sticky side had collected so much fluff it must have been unpeeled from her flesh for hours. She must have got free as soon as Sally’d climbed into the bottom bunk.
And why’d she escaped? Didn’t she realize Sally was trying to help her? And if there’d been a certain pleasure in seeing Teena in discomfort, a sense of revenge for her rabbit antics, that was just a bonus and shouldn’t in any way be viewed as a major part of her reason for doing it.
She tried to put Teena to the back of her mind and concentrate on her work, sticking another square of foam rubber in place.
‘What’s the hell’s this?’ asked Cthulha, to her left, watching Daisy.
Sally took the final square from the box to her right, unrolled it then pressed it in place. She ran her palms along its edges to make it stick, pressed its centre then stepped back to admire her handiwork.
It stood before her, magnificent, Wyndham’s first ever caravan to be completely covered in foam rubber. You could throw yourself at it all day and never get hurt. Not that the two hippy geeks staring out of its window looked like they wanted to throw themselves at it. They looked like they wanted to throw her at something. But to do that they’d have to leave the caravan and, when she’d called round the other day, they’d refused to do so, pushing the rent out through a slot in the door. The sign on the doorknob might have said WYNDHAM FINISHING SCHOOL FOR DAINTY YOUNG LADIES but, to Sally, they were just two geeks.
She said, ‘Cthulha meet Daisy. She’s helping me make the camp safe.’
Hands in tuxedo pockets, cigarette in mouth, Cthulha eyed Daisy from a distance of nine inches. ‘It’s flying.’
‘Floating,’ Sally beamed.
‘Jesus.’
Daisy floated tethered to the caravan door, chewing a foam rubber square Sally’d given her to keep her entertained. The cow gazed at a pink sports car parked ten feet away. Open-topped it stood so low you’d have to lie down to sit in it.
Hands in pockets, Cthulha leaned forward. Her face now one inch from Daisy’s she too watched the car. ‘Know what that is?’
‘Moo?’
‘That’s my Spooder Yo-Yo.’
‘A Spooder Yo-Yo?’ Sally laughed. ‘What the hell’s a Spooder Yo-Yo? It sounds like someone who got shoved out of an airlock in Star Wars.’
Cthulha attempted a withering stare. ‘For your information, no one got shoved out of an airlock in Star Wars. And the Spooder Yo-Yo was the grooviest car of 1968.’
‘Sure it was.’
‘It was Greek,’ Cthulha protested. ‘The title lost a little in translation. But secret agent Carnaby Soho drove one in all her films.’
Sally frowned. ‘Carnaby Soho?’
‘You remember Carnaby Soho.’
‘I’ve never heard of her.’
‘Everyone’s heard of Carnaby Soho; pink-clad super-spy, righter of wrongs and, in later years, serial thwarter of the evil Mullineks.’
‘Mullineks?’
‘Queen of the mad moon lesbians.’
‘Cthulha, where exactly do you get your videos?’
‘You must have heard of Mullineks. Everyone has.’
‘Like they’ve all heard of Carnaby Soho?’
‘But Mullineks was even hornier than Hudson Leick.’
‘Hudson what?’
Then Cthulha started singing.
‘Carnaby Soho
making all the guys go whoa whoa.
Cruising in your Yo-Yo.
Letting through your hair the wind blow.
Carnaby Soho, do you know what you’ve done?
Having make the room go spun and spun and spun and spun and spun and spun and spun and spun … ’
‘Cthulha, I’ve no idea what you’re on about.’
‘It was Italian.’ She shrugged. ‘It lost something in translation.’
‘Yeah – the audience.’
Her face again inches from Daisy’s, Cthulha told the cow, ‘That car came with my big flash job. Want to know why you’ve not got one?’
‘Moo?’
‘Because only special people get a Spooder Yo-Yo. That’s what humans get to do. We get to sprawl naked across our car at sunrise and kiss it till it hurts. Cows just get to stand around chewing grass. It must look pretty flash to you.’
Sally assumed she meant the chrome-tube tangle that jutted from it at seemingly random angles.
Cthulha told Daisy, ‘My boyfriend’s souped it up with some weird technology of his. Now it does six hundred miles an hour and a thousand miles to the pint. How fast can you go?’
‘Cthulha,’ Sally said. ‘Not many people bother asserting their superiority over cattle.’
‘Says a woman who works for squirrels.’
‘I don’t work for squirrels.’ Suddenly she was looking everywhere but at Cthulha.
Cthulha looked upwards.
Sally looked upwards.
Mr Bushy was on the edge of the caravan roof. He looked down at them, wearing a little red crash helmet, with knicker elastic tied to his tail.
He bungee jumped off the caravan, boinged just above the ground, recoiled several feet into the air, plummeted again then hung there by the tail.
Sally turned red.
Cthulha said, ‘Even I can figure out what you’re doing.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘Training it to do death defying stunts because you’re so desperate to be an entertainer’s assistant you’d even accept being assistant to a squirrel.’
‘And why shouldn’t I?’ she protested. ‘No one else’ll work with me, and I happen to be the best damn assistant this town’s got.’
‘Apart from that bit where you kill the turn.’
‘This is a showbiz town. I have to be in showbiz.’
Cthulha lowered her little round shades to the tip of her nose. She looked over their rims at her. ‘Sally, the fact that Charlie Williams once played a venue within ten miles of the place doesn’t make it a showbiz town.’ She prodded her sunglasses back into place. Hands in pockets, she watched the squirrel dangle. ‘Are you leaving this here?’
Sally said, ‘He likes hanging there.’
‘Says who?’
‘I can tell he does.’
‘Does it pay rent? I can’t see Uncle Al letting it stay for free.’
‘Mr Bushy pays three pence a week with dropped coins he finds under caravans.’
‘And Dobbin?’
‘Daisy.’
‘Does it pay rent?’
Before Sally could answer, Teena appeared from round the far side of her mobile home. Gaze fixed on the offices, jaw clenched, she strode towards them. If she’d been a bull (and not just engaged to one) she’d have been snorting.
Sally took it that things hadn’t gone well at the mobile home.
Hands in pockets, Cthulha watched Teena all the way; ‘Jesus. Imagine that spread naked across your car.’
‘I take it you mean Dr Rama.’
‘That’s a doctor?’
‘And she’s not a “that”. She’s a woman.’
‘Oh yeah. You’re still into that hardline feminist “women aren’t objects” crap aren’t you? No wonder you never have any fun.’
Sally rolled her eyes.
Teena reached the offices, pulled open the door and entered. Its lax spring pulled the door to behind her.
Cthulha watched the door, imagining getting up to God knew what. ‘So, what’s the story?’
‘That big mobile home.’
Cthulha glanced across at it.
Sally said, ‘Her assistant’s locked her out of it. So she spent the night with me.’
Suddenly impressed, Cthulha twisted her head round to stare at her, ‘You gave her one?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘I’m heterosexual.’
‘Jesus.’ Cthulha shook her head in disbelief and again watched the offices.
Sally said ‘I thought you were into men now. Only two days ago you were boasting about this great new boyfriend you’d found in a ditch.’
‘I have, and he’s okay. But you know there are times when you need a woman. No matter how hard they try men don’t understand our needs. No man’ll ever know what it’s like to have your head swell up eight times a month.’
‘Cthulha?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What’re you on about?’
‘Women’s things.’
‘Cthulha?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What’re you on about?’
‘Your head. You know?’
‘Cthulha.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Women’s heads don’t swell up eight times a month.’
‘Course they do. It’s a woman thing.’
‘No it isn’t.’
‘Doesn’t yours?’
‘No.’
‘Then why does mine?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘What about the Beloved Catherine?’
‘What about her?’
‘Her head must swell up fifty times a day at least.’