Читать книгу Mr Landen Has No Brain - Stephen Walker - Страница 11

Incapable of doing this job? Useless? I’ll show you, Mr Aloysius Bracewell, with your man-eating cooks, low-life whores and stitched up awards.

And you TV types with your smug grins, cameras and free cups of tea; When Jobs Go Good, let’s see you do that one.

Sally slapped her paste-smothered brush up and down her living room wall with enough force to strip paint, all the while imagining it was her uncle’s stupid face she was slapping. She dunked her brush in the bucket between her feet, stirred it round to collect a great thick dollop and slapped more paste on the wall.

The front door creaked open behind her. She ignored it. Unseen feet scuffed, not bothering to wipe on the Welcome mat. The door creaked shut and tea-leaf cigarette smoke announced Cthulha Gochllagochgoch’s arrival before her footsteps had even entered the living room. The footsteps half crossed the room then stopped as though their owner was stood looking around. The settee went flumpf and Cthulha said, ‘So, what you up to?’

Sally pasted on, no intention of looking at her. ‘We’re redecorating.’

‘We?’

‘Me and Mr Bushy.’ Mr Bushy was Sally’s pet squirrel. She’d left him on her TV set with a paint brush for company.

Cthulha said, ‘Sal.’

‘What?’

‘He’s eating his paint brush. Interior designers don’t eat their brushes – not even the ones in Changing Rooms.’

‘So long as he’s happy.’ She grabbed a foam rubber square by her feet and stuck it to the wall, alongside the foam she’d already hung. She pressed it in place then prepared for more pasting.

Cthulha said, ‘I take it this foaming’s for the safety award?’

‘It’s called the Dullness Award. The council felt the word “Safety” might remind people of danger.’

‘Whatever it’s called you’ve no chance.’

Sally pasted on. ‘Within days this’ll be the safest caravan park on Earth.’

‘Sal? How long have you been working here?’

‘A week.’

‘And in a whole week you’ve not noticed anything suicidal about the people who stay here?’

‘Of course I have. I’m not blind.’

‘I am,’ Chulha said.

‘What’re you on about?’ said Sally.

‘I’m of the sightless.’

‘Cthulha.’ Sally pasted on, still not looking at her. ‘You’re not blind.’

‘Shows how much you know.’

‘I know you’re not blind.’

‘Twenty minutes ago, where was I?’

‘No idea.’

‘Outside Davey Farrel’s.’

‘You’re always outside Davey Farrel’s.’

‘So?’

‘Do you fancy him?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

Sally asked, ‘Why’s it ridiculous?’

‘He’s my brother. Dr Steinbeck says all the other stuff’s okay but close relatives are out of bounds.’

‘Cthulha, Davey Farrel’s not your brother.’

‘Course he is. I used to shove him off his bike, as a kid, and ride off with it.’

‘Maybe you did but he’s not your brother. He’s my cousin. He’s no relation to you.’

‘Then why was I shoving him off his bike?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘God, this town. You can’t keep track of who’s related to who in it.’

‘I’d have thought you’d be able to keep track of who’s related to you.’

‘Sally, you must bear in mind that, due to a former hobby of mine, certain aspects of my past are a little vague to me.’

‘Not to mention the flashbacks.’

‘I don’t get flashbacks.’

‘What? Apart from you dropping everything to shout, “Aargh! Lobsters! Lobsters!”’

‘I don’t do that,’ she chuckled. Then, after a lengthy pause; ‘Do I?’

‘Only three times a day.’

‘Jesus.’ Cthulha thought about this. ‘Lobsters lobsters; I wonder what that means.’

‘You don’t know?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

Sally said, ‘Tell me about Davey Farrel’s.’

‘I was outside his shop. And what was the wind doing?’

Like Sally cared.

‘It was slapping me from all sides,’ Cthulha said, ‘like I’d done something wrong.’

‘You probably had.’

‘So then what happens?’ Cthulha asked.

‘I don’t know. I wasn’t there.’

‘My hat blows off.’

‘You think it was a punishment from God?’

‘Listen,’ Cthulha said.

‘What?’

‘This is where it gets good.’

‘Cthulha, your anecdotes never get good. They just stagger round till they fall into a ditch.’

Cthulha said, ‘This bloke takes one look at my dark glasses, and my hat on the pavement, thinks I’m a blind beggar and chucks fifty pence in the hat. Can you believe that? From now on, when we’re out in public together, I’m blind.’

‘How dignified.’

‘Every penny helps.’

Sally dipped her brush. ‘Anyway, suicides don’t count.’

‘Who says?’

‘Uncle Al faxed me the rules. They say. Caravan park managers will not be held responsible for suicides. Suicides are committed at guests’ own peril, unless death was initiated at the manager’s request. – like if I say, “Go kill yourself.”’

‘But you’re always saying that to me.’

‘Not for the next few days. Anyway you’re not a guest, you’re an intruder. You probably count as a burglar. Burglars are fair game.’

‘Not that I’d kill myself. I wouldn’t want to upset those who love me.’

‘And who’s that?’ said Sally.

‘My boyfriend, you, my mother–’

‘Cthulha, your mother hits you with a stick.’

‘But she must love me. She’s a mother. Mothers love their daughters.’

Sally said, ‘You don’t love me.’

‘Don’t start that again.’

‘You have to accept that when an eight year old loses her real mother, she’ll look for a surrogate one. And you happened to be the one permanent female presence in my young life. When I had my first period, you told me I was dying. When I needed my first bra, you helped me buy it – not that you knew how to fasten it.’

‘Those things are death traps. You can tell a man invented them.’

‘Bras were invented by a woman.’

‘Who says?’

‘She knotted two hankies together then showed it to all her mates who were most impressed.’

‘Were they used hankies?’

‘Why would anyone want to wear used hankies?’ Sally said.

‘Why would they want to wear any sort of hankies? If you’re sat in a restaurant on a date and, halfway through the evening, he declares that he makes his trolleys from knotted hankies, you’re not going to be accepting any invitations into his home.’

‘The point is that with you around ALL THE TIME you were bound to imprint on me. It’s like ducklings that think a pair of wellies is their mother because it was the first thing they ever saw.’

‘I don’t believe this.’

‘Believe what?’

‘I bought you a bra, now you want me to buy you wellies.’

‘I don’t want you to buy me wellies. I want you to love me.’

‘If you ever again sit in the pub on a Friday night, telling the men I’m trying to pull that I’m your mother …’

‘But that’s how I see you.’

‘I’m only four years older than you.’

‘Twelve.’

‘Eleven and three quarters.’

‘Twelve.’ Holding the bucket steady between her feet, Sally dipped her brush in it, stirred it, then spread more paste on the wall. ‘Is your mother still sending you death threats?’

‘Yeah,’

‘I’d go to the police if I were you; remember I’ve met your mother.’

‘Yeah that’s right,’ Cthulha complained.

‘What is?’

‘If you worship a giant space octopus, people always want to think the worst of you.’

‘Well it’s hardly normal is it?’

‘Loads of people must do it. They just don’t admit it. Anyway, I’m sure she doesn’t mean it. It’s probably her idea of a joke.’

‘Yeah. Right.’ Sally hung the last foam rubber square and pressed it in place. She turned to face Cthulha.

Cthulha Gochllagochgoch, thirty one, gangled on Sally’s settee, in an undertakers hat, little round sunglasses, black tuxedo, black jeans and black trainers. Beneath the open tuxedo, she wore a purple bikini top, with a rub-on transfer, IF I’M JUICY SQUEEZE ME, on her left breast. One lace-gloved palm held Mr Bushy while the other stroked him. Sat there she reminded Sally of the reptile aliens in V, the ones who could almost pass for human, till you caught them eating your pets.

Mr Bushy squeaked. Now sat up, Cthulha held him before her and chuckled. ‘Look at this.’

‘Look at what?’

‘If you squeeze this it squeaks like one of those dogs’ toys.’ And she squeezed away, producing a string of random squeaks.

‘Cthulha!’

‘What?’

Sally snatched him from her and stroked him to calm his nerves. ‘Dynamite Pete asked me – if anything ever happened to him – to look after his squirrel. It shouldn’t take a genius to know that treating it as a rubber toy wasn’t what he had in mind.’

‘And as Dynamite Pete’s intended profession involved swallowing a pint of nitro-glycerine then running round a stage till he exploded, it shouldn’t have taken a genius to figure something was bound to happen to him.’

‘I tried to warn him,’ she insisted.

‘Don’t you always?’ Cthulha settled back into the settee and took a drag on her cigarette.

Sally placed Mr Bushy back on the TV, with his paint brush, and continued stroking him. Dynamite Pete’s demise; some experiences were best not remembered – especially when they were your fault.

Mr Bushy started nibbling his paint brush, which she took as a good sign, so she turned to face Cthulha. ‘Do you actually have a reason to be here?’

‘Uncle Al wants money.’ Uncle Al was not Cthulha’s uncle. Uncle Al was not the uncle of most people who called him Uncle.

‘He always wants money.’

‘Now he wants more money.’

‘What’s he want it for this time?’

‘Fifty-six rolls of foil. Personally I think it’s an excuse to get me out of the way. Though why anyone’d want a girl like me out of the way, I don’t know.’

‘Cthulha?’

‘Yeah?’

‘What kind of cooking needs fifty-six rolls of foil?’

She lowered her dark glasses to the tip of her nose and peered over them at Sally, eyebrows hoisted knowingly. ‘Aloysius Bracewell doesn’t do his own cooking – any more than he does his own eating. You know he has servants for that.’

‘So what’s he want tin foil for?’

She prodded her glasses back into place. ‘To add to the roll he’s just wrapped round his head.’

Sally squinted at her, baffled.

Cthulha said, ‘Half an hour ago, some Texan turned up on satellite news. Seems he’s broken the world record for wrapping his head in foil – except they called it “aloominum”. The previous record holder was British. The moment Uncle Al hears that, he grabs a roll and starts wrapping it round his head, declaring his determination to reclaim the record for some place called “Blighty”. He says someone has to restore the dignity it lost when it gave away some empire or other.’

‘By wrapping his head in foil?’

‘And Uncle Al won’t be using “aloominum”.’

‘Then what’ll he be using?’

‘Lead.’

‘Lead?’

‘He says you can get lead foil from nuclear power plants, if you bribe the right women and sleep with the right men. That’ll be my job. He will of course make sure the national media knows all about his sterling act of patriotism and that he owns a chain of caravan parks – prices reasonable. I told him, “Uncle Al, you’re a pillock. Lead foil must weigh a ton. You’ll squash your head.” He said that’d make his achievement all the greater – though guess who’ll get to do all the wrapping? Still you’ve got to hand it to him; fifty-six rolls – no man’s ever wrapped his head in so much lead.’