Pooley entered the saloon bar. Neville greeted him with a hearty “Morning Jim, pint of the usual?” and Omally merely nodded a greeting and indicated his parcel. “The Professor,” he said, “very valuable, very old.”
Pooley accepted his pint and pushed the exact change across the counter in payment. Neville rang it up in the till. “No Sale,” it said. “The brewery have been offering me one of these new computerized micro-chip cash register arrangements,” the part-time barman told Pooley. “They do seem to have some obsession about cash registers actually registering the money that is put into them. I can’t see it myself.”
“Possibly they would take it kindly if you were to keep accounts,” Pooley suggested, “it’s a common practice among publicans.”
“We always run at a profit,” Neville said in a wounded voice, “no-one could accuse me of dishonesty.”
“Of course not, but breweries are notorious for that sort of thing. Why don’t you just accept the new cash register and let Omally give it the same treatment he gave to the juke box?”
The Irishman grinned wolfishly. A brewer’s dray drew up before the Swan and Neville disappeared down the cellar steps to open the pavement doors. Pooley took Omally aside.
“You had better get around to the Professor’s right away,” he said urgently. “There is a bit of trouble coming your way from the direction of the Mission, our man Pope Alex is out for your blood.”
“Always the bearer of glad tidings eh, Jim,” said Omally. “I have to go down there anyway, the Professor’s last book has arrived.” Omally gestured to the parcel upon the bar.
“More magic of the ancients?” said Pooley. “I wonder what this one is all about.”
“More unreadable Latin texts I should expect. That old fellow absorbs knowledge like a sponge, I do not understand where he puts it all, for certain his head is no larger than my own.”
Pooley lifted the package from the counter and shook it gently. “It is extremely heavy for its size. You are sure that it is a book?”
“I have no reason to doubt it, all the others have been.”
Pooley ran a finger over the glossy surface. “It’s almost like metal, but look here, how is it sealed? There are no flaps and no joint, the book appears to be encased in it rather than packed in it.”
“Indeed, now try and get it open.”
“Better not to, the Professor would not appreciate it.”
“Try anyway, I already have.”
Jim dug his thumb nail into a likely corner of the package and applied a little pressure. The package remained intact. Pooley pressed harder, working his thumbnail to and fro across the edge. “Nothing,” he said in dismay, “not even a scratch.”
“Use your pocket knife then, don’t let it defeat you.”
Pooley took out his fifteen-function scout knife and selected the most murderous blade. Holding the parcel firmly upon the bar counter he took a vicious stab at it. The blade bent slightly, skidded cleanly off the package and embedded itself in the counter top.
“You bloody vandal,” screamed Neville, who was entering the saloon bar door. “I saw that!”
“I am trying to open this parcel,” Pooley explained, withdrawing his knife and rubbing a bespittaled fingertip over the counter’s wound.
“Give it to me,” said the part-time barman gruffly, “I’ll open it for you.” He took up the can opener which hung on a chain from his belt. “Nothing to parcels if you have the know.”
He scratched the opener roughly down the length of the package. There was not a mark. “What’s this then?” said the part-time barman. “Trick is it, or some new kind of paper?” He began scratching and scraping with renewed vigour. He laboured at the parcel as one possessed, but succeeded in doing nothing whatever, save taking the nail from his left thumb and totally destroying his opener. “Bugger,” yelled the part-time barman, “that was my favourite. Wait here!” He strode from the bar leaving a fine trail of blood behind him.
“Did he mean that the opener was his favourite or the thumbnail?” wondered Omally.
Neville reappeared behind the bar with a fourteen-inch meat cleaver clutched in a bandaged hand. “Put it here,” he demanded.
“Now steady on,” said Pooley, “after all it isn’t even our package. You will clearly destroy it with that thing.”
“One good swing,” said Neville, “just one. I’ll merely snip the end, I won’t damage the contents, I swear!”
“He’s a good man with a cleaver,” said someone. “He’ll open the bugger, never fear.”
Pooley looked to Omally. “What do you think?”
“Can’t hurt. If he damages it we can always say that the Post Office did it in transit.”
“OK,” said Pooley, “one swing then, but for God’s sake, be careful.”
The parcel was placed upon the bar counter and the spectators withdrew to what they considered to be a safe distance. Neville squared up to the parcel, placed his feet firmly apart and wiggled his behind in a manner much practised by top pro golfers before applying their wedges to a bunker-bound ball. Spitting on to his palms he raised the cleaver high above his head and brought it down with a reckless force which would truly have done credit to the Wolf of Kabul wielding the legendary Clicki-Ba.
The patrons let out a collective gasp as the cleaver struck the parcel amidships and rebounded from the part-time barman’s grip to go hurtling over their ducking heads like a crossbow bolt and lodge itself up to the hilt in the dart board.
“Double top,” said Old Pete, “give that man a pint.”
Neville stood pale-faced and trembling, regarding the package with horrified eyes. “Not even bloody dented,” he said in a quivering voice, “not even bloody scratched.”
Leo Felix, who was making one of his rare appearances at the Swan, thrust his way through the crowd. “I an’ I got me an oxyacetylene cutter back at me work,” said the newly converted Rastafarian.
“Come on now,” said Pooley, “this has all got out of hand. Omally, take that package around to the Professor at once!”
The crowd would have none of it. “Fetch your blowtorch, Leo,” said somebody. Leo left the bar.
Omally picked up the package from the bar counter and made to move in the direction of the door. The mob surrounded him. “Put that down, mister,” said someone. “Leave it be till Leo gets back.”
“Come now lads,” said Omally, “this is madness, mob law in Brentford? Come now.”
“This is going too far,” said Jim, stepping into the fray.
“You do what you want mate,” said a burly navvy, “but the parcel stays here.”
“This man knows Dimac,” said Pooley, indicating his Irish companion, “deadliest form of martial art known to mankind, and can…”
“Instantly disable, mutilate and kill, his hands and feet being deadly weapons,” chimed the crowd in unison. “We’ve heard it.”
“Strike them down, John,” said Pooley, “give them iron hand.”
“My iron hands are a little rusty at present,” said Omally. “Archroy is your man for that sort of thing.”
“Did somebody call me?” The voice came from the saloon bar door, and the crowd, turning as one man, were stunned into absolute silence by what they saw. Framed dramatically by the Swan’s doorway, which had always been so excellent for that sort of thing, stood an imposing figure which the startled throng recognized with some difficulty as none other than Archroy.
He had discarded his usual ill-fitting wig for an ornate dark coiffure of oriental inspiration which was secured by elaborately carved ivory pins tipped with jet. He wore a full-length black kimono emblazoned with Chinese characters embroidered richly in gold thread, and walked upon the high wooden shoes much favoured by Samurai warlords of the fourteenth Dynasty.