'I do,' said Derek. 'I do.'
'I an' I tell you what,' said Leo. 'You an' I an' I have a deal. We smack hands together. So I an' I be fair with you. I an' I get you everyting you want by tomorrow, how's dat?'
'Dat's, I mean that's perfect,' said Derek. 'I couldn't ask for anything more than that.'
'Good,' said Leo. 'Dat's my half of the deal. Now all you have to do is two little tings.'
'Go on,' said Derek.
'Give me all the money in your pockets,' said Leo.
'Oh,' said Derek.
'Dat's one,' said Leo, stroking the neck of Marcus.
'Now, come on,' said Derek.
'Dat's one,' said Leo. 'You show no respect. Hand it over, Babylon.' Marcus growled and so did Marley and Yellowman.
Derek dug deep into his pocket and brought out all the money.
'I tink dat's mine, ain't it?' said Leo.
Derek hung his head once more. 'It is,' said he.
Leo took the money and pressed it into the colourful trouser pocket of his colourful trousers. 'Yo get all de stuff you order,' he said. 'I an' I keep my side of the deal. I an' I show respect.'
'Thank you,' said Derek. 'And I'm sorry. All that cash. The temptation was too much.'
'I an' I understand,' said Leo. 'Business is done.'
'Thanks again,' said Derek, turning to leave.
'I an' I said dere's two tings,' said Leo.
'Oh yes,' said Derek. 'What was the second thing?'
'Yo got ten seconds' start, Babylon,' said Leo. 'Den I release me dogs.'
It's remarkable just how fast you can run at times. Even with a hangover. Derek ran like the rabbit of proverb. And if there wasn't a rabbit of proverb, Derek ran like the hare. He ran and he ran. Away from Leo's showrooms. Out of Leo's forecourt and up Brentford High Street. Derek ran all the way back to the offices of the Brentford Mercury.
And it's a fair old run, especially with a hangover.
Once inside, Derek slammed shut the outer door and leant upon it, breathing horribly.
But no bowlings or hayings of dreadful hounds •were to be heard from without.
But had Derek had the hearing of Superman, he might have been able to hear the laughter.
The laughter of Leo, back in his showrooms.
Where he still patted his dogs.
Derek took his liquid breakfast, which was now a liquid lunch, in the Shrunken Head. He didn't play the Space Invaders machine though, he just swigged at Scotch.
He was doomed, he just knew it. He was done for. The best thing he could do was shape up and ship out. Quit the borough, do a runner, before the excrement hit the rotating blades of the air-cooling apparatus. They'd kill him. The locals would string him up. Mute Corp had no idea what they were dealing with here. This wasn't like other places. This was Brentford.
Derek swigged further Scotch.
'I'm unhappy,' he said to no-one but himself. 'I'm a loser. A total prat. That's what Kelly thinks I am. And I am. I really am. I've fouled up every which way. Oh God, I don't know what to do.'
Derek did even further swiggings and returned once more to the bar counter. 'Same again,' he said.
The barman was reading the Brentford Mercury. The celebrations going on at the Swan did not seem to have extended themselves to the Shrunken Head. Different kind of clientele, perhaps. Or some other reason. Derek didn't really care.
'This is all a hoot, isn't it?' said the barman, pointing at the paper. 'This should bring a bit of trade to this establishment.'
'You think it's a good thing then?' asked Derek hopefully.
'God, yes,' said the barman. 'I'm hoping to persuade the residents' committee to give it a week before they start the tarring and feathering. But I'll probably be on my own for that one. I've heard that the lads at the Flying Swan are planning a charabanc trip to the West End.'
'Really?' said Derek. 'Why?'
'I think they're planning to blow up the Mute Corp headquarters. A people's protest, that kind of thing. From what I heard, it seems that the locals are getting well fed up with always having to fight on home territory. So this time they've decided to carry the war directly to the camp of the aggressor. It's a bit revolutionary, but after all, these are the twenty-twenties.'
'The Mute Corp headquarters?' Derek's face fell terribly. 'They can't do that, can they?'
'I'll bet you they can,' said the barman. 'Old Vic's leading the war party. He used to be a POW, you know. He knows all about blowing things up. He told me that he once blew up a Nazi watchtower at his camp, using an explosive formulated exclusively from his own bodily fluids. You wouldn't think that was possible, would you? Although I would, I've heard the old blighter fart.'
'Oh no,' said Derek. 'Oh no, oh no, oh no.'
'I don't know what you're "oh no-ing" about,' said the barman. 'You don't have any friends working at Mute Corp, do you?'
Derek's pale face nodded up and down in time to his nodding head. In perfect synchronization, in fact, because it was all joined on. 'Kelly,' he said. 'The woman I love.'
'The beautiful bird you were in here with yesterday?' asked the barman. 'The bird with the outstanding charlies?'
'Shut up!' said Derek.
'Sorry mate. But she's a babe. You lucky sod. I'll bet she's something between the covers, eh? You wouldn't care to tell me all about it, would you? I'm a married man myself and other than forging my signature and painting our house purple because it's the colour of universal peace, my missus doesn't go in for anything much any more. She seems to be obsessed with charity work. I went home the other evening and found her giving that Mad John a bath.'
'Shut up!' said Derek again. 'I have to warn her.'
'Well, you have plenty of time,' said the barman. 'They're not going to do the dirty deed until Monday. They want to cash in their shares first.'
Derek breathed a big sigh of relief. 'Phew,' he said.
'So there you go,' said the barman, handing Derek his Scotch. 'That's one pound one and sixpence, please.'
'Yes,' said Derek. 'All right.' And he rooted about in his pockets in the hope that he still had some change. He didn't have much, but he did have enough and he also had something else. A screwed-up note that he'd picked up from his doormat, but hadn't yet read.
Derek paid the barman and then he read the note.
And then the bleary bloodshot eyes in his pale and designer-stubbly face grew wide and Derek screamed very loudly.
Horrible, it was.
20
There was no-one home at Mrs Gormenghast's.
Derek banged and hammered at the door, but no-one answered. He thought he saw the net curtains move in the upstairs front window and he thought that he saw the face of Mad John peeping out. But Derek dismissed this as only his fevered imagination.
Derek was all in a lather. Kelly's note was a warning. It warned him not to use his mobile phone. Indeed, not to use any telephone. And not to touch his computer, nor indeed anything that might have computerized innards. And it said, 'Come at once, as soon as you read this note,' and it said, 'You are in terrible danger.'
Derek fretted. He didn't know what to do. Go to the Mute Corp headquarters? Surely that was where Kelly was. But would she be there? If she was warning him not to touch any computers and that there was terrible danger, surely she wouldn't be there, amongst all those computers. Derek thought not.
So at least she would be safe if Old Vic and his cronies actually blew up the building.
She would be safe.
Wouldn't she?
But where was she?
Where?
Derek fretted further. If she wasn't at Mute Corp and she wasn't at Mrs Gormenghast's, then where was she? Oh no! Not that? Derek fretted furiously. Not vanished"? Not her too. He'd turned his thoughts away from all that mad stuff. Kelly had to be somewhere, and somewhere safe. She had to be. Surely. He loved the woman, for God's sake. Nothing bad could have happened to her. It couldn't have. No. No. No.