I am sure that it must have been May when it happened. The Brighton Festival was on the go and many strange fellows were doing strange things in the town. There was a lot of 'street theatre', which seemed generally to consist of foolish people with whitely daubed faces climbing into cardboard boxes and fiddling about with fish. Things that I am told they did for Art. Now, I confess that I have never been altogether comfortable with Art. It comes in so many shapes and sizes and is more difficult to pin down than Iron Man Steve Logan, my favourite wrestler of the day. You knew where you were with the wrestling, of course. You were sitting in your armchair at four o'clock of a Saturday afternoon watching television with Kent Walton doing the commentary. But Art, well, I was never comfortable with it.
I felt this irrational desire to smite the whitely daubed types, tear up their cardboard boxes and murder their mackerel, which brings me, albeit circuitously, to the next case that Mr Rune had set himself to solve: the Monstrous Mystery of the Moulsecoomb Crab.
Now, I had never set foot in Moulsecoomb. I had mooched all around and about the rest of Brighton in the hope of stirring something that would lead to the rediscovery of my identity, but the Moulsecoomb area remained a mystery.
I do not know what it is like these days. Perhaps it has 'come up' like so many other areas have. Perhaps the houses there now sell for millions. But back then in the swinging sixties, Moulsecoomb was a NO-GO AREA. And that was in capital letters.
It all went back to Victorian times, apparently, and the transportation of criminals to Australia. With the opium and slave trades having fallen off, worthy captains had put their vessels to use in the lucrative transportation of criminals to the lands of Down Under. The scheme – organised, I understand, by an early precursor of the NHS – was that the captains were paid for the one-way journey there only. They dropped off the criminals in Australia, then took on whatever cargoes they thought would prove profitable at home, and then returned.
The cargoes they acquired in Australia – platypus pelts, which were used extensively in the manufacture of theatrical costumery of the amphibious persuasion, and koala ears, which adorned many a fashionable Kensington dowager's snuff-trumble – were profitable in their way, but it was the trip out that paid the bills. And Australia was a long way away. It took nearly a year to get there in those days, two if you took an accidental turn into the Gulf Stream and had to go via Canada. So the worthy sea captains shortened their journey times by dropping off the criminals in Brighton and returning to the port of London the pretty way, via Dublin's fair city where the girls are so pretty, with talk of favourable headwinds and excuses for their empty holds – that platypi and koalas had become extinct.
The criminals themselves, of course, knew better than to return to London and so set up a colony in the Moulsecoomb area, which was at that time all but impenetrable swamp, the haunt of the Sussex crocodile, the Hove hippopotamus, the Brighton bagpuss and any number of sundry other unlikeable beasties. And from there they engaged in piratical activities and freebooting.
The name 'Moulsecoomb' derives, of course, from the founder of the colony: the infamous pirate, brigand, plunderer and pigeon-fancier Blackjack Moulsecoomb. Of evil memory.
Black Jack's escapades remain to this very day the talk of the quayside taverns of Brighton. Wherever two grizzly salts meet together, the name of Black Jack is never far from their tattooed lips.
I must have always harboured a liking for pirates. Whether it was the cutlasses, or the flintlocks, or the Jolly Roger, or the drinking of rum, wenching of wenches, chewing of limes or the wearing of ostentatious earrings, I am unable (or perhaps unwilling) to say. But I like 'em. Do not like Art, do like pirates. It is simply a preference thing. And I am sure I would have really liked that Blackjack.
It is said that when the weather held to fair and the barometer was rising, he and his scurvy crew would set sail from their secret inlet within the swamps of Moulsecoomb, cruise around the Brighton Marina and at precisely four o'clock on a Sunday afternoon (during the mixed-bathing season) pillage the Palace Pier.
Apparently, members of the aristocracy, lords and ladies and the like, who came to promenade upon the sundecks during that period did so in the hope of being pillaged by Black Jack and his pirate crew. Especially the ladies, for Blackjack was something of a Johnny Depp.
The upshot of all this, lest the reader think that I am losing the plot, is that Black Jack put it about all over the place, but nowhere more so than in the pirate enclave that he founded, with the result that it grew and expanded into the community that it became: the den of iniquity known as Moulsecoomb, where policemen and rigfrt-thinking individuals feared to tread.
Back then, in the nineteen sixties, the barbed-wire entanglements were still up and Moulsecoomb had its own parliament and private army, the Moulsecoomb Militia, better armed and more greatly feared than any official British regiment. There were fewer pirates, of course. In fact, there was hardly one to be found, the last pillaging of the Palace Pier on record being in 1953, when Blackjack's great grandson Grey Jim (for he was getting on in years) launched one final pillage as a tribute to James Dean who had died the previous week.*
So I had never taken to walking alone around Moulsecoomb, and would certainly never have entered it at all if it had not been for Hugo Rune and his desire to visit the circus that was presently encamped upon the Palace lawns before our rooms at forty-nine Grand Parade: Count Otto Black's Circus Fantastique.
'We cannot go to that' I told Mr Rune as he and I sipped champagne in The Mound and Merkin (for such was Fangio's bar named upon this particular day). 'Count Otto is your mortal enemy, or so you told me. And you never told me that he ran a circus.' 'It comes to Brighton every year at this time,' said Rune, *James Dean, it is to be noted, did not die aged 27 and had no connection with Robert Johnson whatsoever. Although he was recently canonised and is now the patron saint of pirates. quaffing champagne and chasing a tiny spaniel around an ashtray with a cocktail stick. 'It's part of the Festival.'
'But he is the Moriarty to your Holmes – or so you told me.'
'It is unnecessary for you to add the words "or so you told me" to each sentence. You may assume, and you would be correct, that I am aware of what I have told you.'
'I suppose then that you will want me to acquire the tickets.'
'No need,' said Mr Rune. 'Fangio here has two free tickets.'
'Got them for putting up a poster,' said Fangio, indicating the gaudy item that hung amongst the auto parts behind his bar. And drawing the bowl of complimentary peanuts beyond the reach of Mr Rune. 'And I'm keeping them, too,' he continued. I recollect now that Fangio put up a respectable struggle to retain his circus tickets. I recall the silken words of Mr Hugo Rune that oozed persuasion to part with them. And the harsher words that followed when Fangio failed to comply. And I recollect also that I took to the gents' when I saw the stout stick rising.
And it was in there, in the gents' of The Mound and Merkin, that I first met the bog troll.*
It was the first time I had ever entered the gents' in Fangio's bar (for I was young and my bladder elastic) and I had never before encountered a bog troll. 'This way to the urinal,' said he. 'Excuse me?' I replied. *Bog troll is the generic term applied to cloakroom attendants at nightclubs. It is to be noted that they do not actually attend to cloakrooms. Rather, they set up their stalls in the gentlemen's toilets, where they proffer their wares, soaps and towels and a squirt of aftershave 'for the ladies'. And all for a small fee. And just as there were once 'the Cries of Old London', so is there a cry of the bog troll. And this cry is, 'Freshen up?'
'That's right,' said the fellow, laughing with vigour. 'This is the gents' excuse-me.'
'I am well aware of that,' I told him. 'I have come here to take a pee.'
'Come on, then,' he said, bowing graciously, 'I'll escort you to a urinal. This one is unoccupied, but it is over the drain hole, from which noxious fumes sometimes issue. This one, although on the face of it no different from the rest, has an evil reputation and it is rumoured that those who pee in it end up in court upon trumped-up charges of necromancy.'
'Are you insane?' I asked, which seemed a reasonable question. 'On the contrary, your lordship.' 'My lordship?'
'On the contrary. Now, this urinal might also appear to be the same as any other, but don't be fooled – the floor tiles are unevenly laid before it and an unwary man, or one somewhat taken by the drink, might easily make a forward tumble. My name is Bartholomew, by the way.' 'Is that hyphenated?' 'No, it's Jamaican.' 'Hence the dreadlocks, I suppose.' 'But I'm bald,' said the man, as indeed he was.
I covered my embarrassment by explaining that I was dyslexic.
'Does that mean that you bounce when you fall?' he asked. 'Dyslexic,' I said. 'Not elastic.'
'Pardon me, your lordship. I lost my hearing aid. I've been trying to grow a new one, but with no success so far.'
' Grow a new one?' I asked, in a manner that implied that I actually cared.
'A mate of mine grew a new pair of spectacles. But he's a Tibetan lama and they can do all manner of things like that.'
'Listen,' I said, 'I have just come in here to take a pee, and although I find your conversation fascinating, I would appreciate it if you would just leave me alone to do my business and then I will be off on my way. No offence meant.'
'And none taken, I assure you. Now this urinal, again whilst appearing identical to its fellows, is definitely not the one for you-' 'Stop,' I told him. 'Stop now.'
'But your lordship, it's more than my job's worth to have you pee in an unsuitable urinal and then report me to Health and Safety for failing to advise you correctly.' 'Your job?' I asked. 'What exactly is your job?' 'I'm the cloakroom attendant.' 'But this is not a cloakroom.' 'It would be if you were wearing a cloak.'
'But I am not.' And I unzipped and took aim at the nearest urinal. Not that I could actually go, because I never can when someone is watching.
'As luck would have it, you've chosen correctly,' said the cloakroom attendant. 'I'll deduct the finder's fee from your bill upon this occasion, but if you could conveniently forget that you chose this particular urinal the next time you come in here, then I'd really appreciate it because I need every penny I can get – I'm saving up for a galleon.'
I zipped my trousers. I did not really want to pee anyway. 'A galleon?' I said.
'A three-masted man o' war. Forty cannon, three spinnakers, a yardarm and a plank for walking mutineers off. Not that I'm expecting any mutineers. I won't be press-ganging the crew.' And the cloakroom attendant laughed at this, although I have no idea why.
'Why do you want to buy a galleon?' I asked, because I was genuinely interested, what with my love of pirates and everything. 'To follow in the bootsteps of my great-great-greatgrandfather, Blackjack Moulsecoomb.' 'Get out of here,' I said. 'Certainly not, your lordship. This is my place of work.' 'No,' I said. 'I meant "get out of here" as in "you have to be kidding", or "no f*cking way".'
'You speak the pirate patois,' said the great-great-great-grandson of Black Jack Moulsecoomb.
'But surely you cannot be a pirate nowadays – not in the Brighton area, anyway.'
'There's plenty of booty to be had in the English Channel – pleasure boats, sailing yachts, the floating gin palaces of the gentry.'
'I suppose there is,' I said, 'but would a speedboat not be better than a galleon for such work?'
'A speedboat!?.? And Bartholomew Moulsecoomb spat into the chosen urinal. 'Pardon my phlegm, your lordship, but I don't hold with speeding boats. Back in the days of the early steam railways, it was believed that a man's brains would come loose if he was to travel at more than the speed of a galloping horse. And I hold this belief to be true.' 'But-' I said.
'Those who travel at greater speeds do so at the risk of their sanity. The faster a man moves, the more stupid he becomes.'
'I think there is probably some truth to that,' I said. 'But a life of piracy does have some risks of its own, such as ending up in prison, for instance, or at the end of a rope.'
'Prison?' The cloakroom attendant laughed once again. 'So what would you call this? 'A cloakroom?' I suggested. 'A prison that smells of wee.'
'I think most of them do. And feet, of course. Prisons stink of smelly feet. And unwashed armpits. Or so I have been reliably informed.'
'You evidently number dubious characters amongst your acquaintances. Do you think that any of them might wish to enlist in a life of piracy?' 'I should not be at all surprised. I am quite keen myself' 'Then let's call it a fiver.' 'Let us call what a fiver?' 'For services rendered. Freshen up?' 'Freshen what!' 'Freshen up.' The cloakroom attendant guided me towards his table. It was one of those wallpaper-pasting tables, of the type that I have spent most of my life avoiding, along with fitted-kitchen catalogues and visits to IKEA. The life of domesticity has never held much appeal.
The cloakroom attendant's table was covered by a white tablecloth and this by regimented rows of popular male perfumes of the day in their colourfully hued spraying bottles. There was Brut and Hai Karate and Old Spice (which was new at the time and had a sailing ship upon its bottle that might well have been a pirate vessel). And there was Muskrat For Men and Big Helmet and Silver Spaniel and Bird Puller, although few folk remember these top-selling brands today.
'Freshen up,' said the cloakroom attendant, 'for the ladies.' 'Are you selling these bottles?' I asked. 'A shilling a spray.' 'But some of them only cost two bob a bottle.'
'Galleons don't come cheap. And I will be avenged for the death of my brother.'
'Avenged?' I asked, for it is not a word that comes up in conversation too often. 'Avenged upon whom?'
'Upon all of creation. The pirates of old waged war upon humanity and so shall I.' 'Oh,' I said. 'So what happened to your brother?'
'Murdered,' said the cloakroom attendant, 'although the police refuse to investigate the case. They say that it was death by misadventure – that he built the costume for himself and so it was his own fault that it happened. If you ask me, I'd say they were simply baffled.'
'I am baffled, too,' I said. 'Of what costume do you speak?'
'That of a crab,' said the cloakroom attendant sadly. 'The costume of a crab.' 'The costume of a crab,' I told Mr Rune, upon my return to the bar. The Guru's Guru nodded his big baldy head. 'A crab?' said he. 'Go on.' 'It seems that the cloakroom attendant-' 'Bog troll,' said Mr Rune. 'Bog troll?' said I. 'Bartholomew the bog troll?'
'Bog troll,' said Mr Rune. 'Trust me on this. I am, after all, a magician.'
'The bog troll, then. His brother was found dead upon the Sussex Downs inside a platypus-pelt crab costume. The police are baffled; they say it was death by misadventure. And not only that, the police refused to release the body to Bartholomew for burial. They said it was too badly decomposed, a health hazard, and they had it cremated. But Bartholomew says that his brother had only been missing for a day. It all sounds very strange and I thought it might interest you.'
'It does indeed,' said Mr Rune. 'Pop behind the bar and set us up with drinks, would you?' 'Where is Fangio?' I asked. 'Upstairs, nursing his bruises and sulking.' 'Oh, right then.' And I shinnied over the bar.
'Naturally I read of the case,' said Mr Rune, when I had presented him with a bottle of Scotch and returned to the punters' side of the bar. 'Most curious business. Body of a man found all alone upon the Downs encased within a platypus-pelt crab costume. Naturally, I could conceive of at least a dozen reasons for him being there in such a guise, but as to his demise, I do not consider that death by misadventure quite filled the platypus bill, as it were.' 'The bog troll thinks he was murdered.'
'I shall have a word with this fellow.' And Mr Rune rose from his barstool and set off for the gents' excuse-me, taking the bottle of Scotch with him.
I sat and twiddled my thumbs, as one is apt to do when lost for some other way to pass the time. I have never fully acquired the knack and sometimes it has taken me almost an hour to untwiddle my thumbs again.
Happily, they were not too inextricably twiddled by the time Mr Rune returned. 'The case is ours,' he said, 'and the game is afoot.'
'I have never been sure exactly what that means,' I said, as I deftly (and, I think, through luck rather than design) untwiddled my thumbs. 'What does it mean?'
'It means, my dear Rizla, that I have saved the patrons of the Palace Pier from an unexpected pillaging – or at least will do once the case is solved and the murderer brought to justice. And there will be a profit in it for the both of us.' 'The bog troll is going to pay you?'
'For bringing his brother's murderer to book, the galleon that the ship-builders at the marina are presently constructing for him will become mine. I had him sign a contract to this effect.' 'In blood?'
Mr Rune cast me a certain glance. 'How else?' he asked. 'How else?' We did not visit the circus that day, but as Fangio's tickets were for the following week, this mattered not. We travelled instead to Moulsecoomb.
And we travelled in a taxicab that I hailed for our conveyance.
The taxi driver's name was Ralph, and he was an avid supporter of Chelsea Football Club. To which, he promised us, 'I offer my allegiance and will continue so to do until the Rapture comes and the good are carried bodily to Heaven.'
He then went on to expound his views upon the gift of prophecy. 'What folk don't understand,' he told us, 'is that prophets aren't blessed by God. It's just that they are able to see the peaks. Time doesn't travel in a straight line, you see. Time is like light, it comes in waves. You can chart it, like a hospital chart of a patient's heartbeat.'
I cared not for talk of hospitals, what with my recent experience in one and everything, but the taxi driver continued, 'So time comes in waves, peaks and troughs, like on a chart, and your prophet, he can see from one peak to the next – like a mountaineer, if you will. He can see what's on the next peak. And on the last one, but prophets never predict the past, you notice. They always look forward. And do you know why they do that?'
Well, J never learned why. Because by that time we had reached our destination, which was within the gates of Moulsecoomb, for cabbies were allowed entry. And there was some unpleasantness regarding the matter of the fare. And I turned away once more. 'Widdicombe Way,' said Mr Rune. 'A rather insalubrious neck of the woods.'
'This is a most unsavoury neighbourhood,' I said. 'We will be murdered here for certain. And most likely eaten also.'
'Plah!' cried Mr Rune, 'no man dines upon Hugo Rune.' The Lad Himself brandished his stout stick. 'I am a master of Dimac,' he continued, 'personally tutored by Count Dante himself.' 'A chum of Count Otto?'
'Another count entirely. But have no fear for your safety, young Rizla. Hugo Rune will protect you.'
'Then I will have no fear,' I assured him. 'But what are we doing here?'
'I wish to gain an overview of the situation. We are going to visit the house of the deceased.'
'I see,' I said and I followed Mr Rune as he paced on ahead. And I have to confess that I marvelled at the man when I did so. Not because he was pacing on ahead – anyone could do a simple thing like that. No, it was something much more than that. Mr Hugo Rune had a way about him, something that signalled him as being above the everyday and the everyman. He was an enigma, a riddle wrapped around an enigma and tied with a string of surprising circumstances. He appeared to inhabit his own separate universe, where normal laws – and I do not mean those of the legal persuasion – did not apply. Who he was and what he was, I know not to this day. But he was certainly someone. 'Pacey-pacey, Rizla,' Mr Rune called back to me. "The worm of time turns not for the cuckoo of circumstance.' And how true those words are, even today. I did not like the look of the house we stopped at. I did not like the look of the gun emplacements in the front garden, nor the rocket launchers on the roof. And I did not take kindly to the garden gnomes. 'What are those three gnomes doing?' I asked Mr Rune. And he told me. 'The house seems quiet,' said the Cosmic Dick. 'Too quiet, in fact. Follow me.' And I followed him. The front door was made of steel and fortified with many rivets, but it was not locked. 'Suggestive,' said Mr Rune. 'Of what?'
'Of many things, but none of them auspicious.' And he pushed upon the door, which swung open soundlessly. 'Also suggestive,' he said. 'I suspect foul play.'
The hallway smelled of something. I think it was Bird Puller. Mr Rune sniffed at the air and said, 'Suggestive,' once again. 'Search for clues,' said he. 'See what you can come up with.' I shrugged and went off searching.
I did not take much to the hallway. The floor was of mottled linoleum and the walls were papered with a drab floral print. Photographs hung upon these walls – military group photographs. I gave them a bit of perusal. There was the face of Bartholomew – or more probably, on reflection, his brother – grinning along with a bunch of hard-looking soldier boys. I read what was printed beneath this photograph: The Queen's Own Electric Fusiliers. I had never heard of that regiment before and I headed into the lounge.
I did not much take to the front lounge. It was furnished with a sofa and chairs of the style known as hideous. Their horizontal surfaces resembled the flight decks of aircraft carriers and the vertical ones the north face of the Eiger. There was a preponderance of tweed, and a severe lack of cotton. I am no connoisseur of fabrics, although I do know when to call a spade a spade and when to avoid doing so, lest I cause offence. But there was nothing even vaguely spade-like here and I was lost for an answer to that eternal question: Why?
There were medals in a glass case on the wall, big important-looking medals with strange sigils and planetary signs upon them. I shrugged my shoulders at these medals and moved on. There were maps on the walls also, maps of the surrounding area with crosses marked variously upon them. A wall calendar, also with markings – rings about certain days. One, I noticed, about today's date. I moved on.
A desk stood by the window, a desk cluttered with papers through which I nosed. I examined one of several letters: 'Dear Prime Minister' it began, and beneath that there were lots of crossings out. The other letters all looked the same. There were many books to be seen on shelves, books of philosophy and religious matters.
Mr Rune peered over my shoulder and said, 'Suggestive,' to me. 'Digestive?' I said. 'I would love a chocolate digestive.' 'You're piddled,' said Mr Rune. 'I am not,' I said, 'but I do feel rather odd.'
And I did. I suddenly felt giddy and sick and the room began shifting unsteadily.
'Out!' cried Mr Rune. 'It is all around us and it is affecting you.'
'Or a ginger snap,' I said. 'Or a caramel spaniel. One with a waggily tail.'
'Out, quickly.' And Mr Rune grasped me under the armpits and hauled me bodily from the house.
Outside and in the sunlight, I came to myself once again. 'What happened?' I asked. 'I feel altogether strange. What happened to me in there?'
'We are on to something here,' said Mr Rune. 'Something untoward. Something unique and unsurpassingly queer. We have stepped into a sticky situation.' 'I think I am going to be sick,' said I. 'Better that than to end up dead in a crab suit upon the Sussex Downs.' 'You mean…?' said I.
'I mean,' said Mr Rune, 'that the brother of Bartholomew Moulsecoomb was undoubtedly murdered. This is a very bad thing. A truly bad thing. If I am not very much mistaken, this is a plot not only to bring down the House of Windsor, but also the British government itself.' 'And that is a bad thing?' I asked.