Robert Rankin - The Brightonomicon

'I will refill your cup, then.' And I did so. 'Am I to understand,' I asked, 'that you have lost a dog? Is that what this case is all about? The one that has the police baffled and Inspector Hector recommending the services of Mister Hugo Rune?'

'Not lost,' said Mrs Orion, supping further champagne and hiccoughing prettily, 'but stolen. Our prize-winning Spanikov.'

'Spanikov?' I said, feigning the pouring of champagne into my own cup and giving Mrs Orion's a further topping-up.

'It's a rare Russian breed of spaniel, probably the only one of its kind in the country – maybe even in the world.'

'Very valuable, then?' I brought out the jar of pickled quails' eggs and unscrewed its lid. 'Those are funny-looking onions,' said Mrs Orion.

'The dog,' said I, 'this Spanikov – is it a very valuable dog?'

'Very valuable and very big, too.' Mrs Orion dug her fingers into the jar and speared a quail's egg with her lengthy thumbnail. 'Almost the size of a horse.' 'A horse!' I said. 'A spaniel the size of a horse?'

'Well, a Shetland pony, perhaps, but there's no telling, is there? It's like a pig.' 'It looks like a pig?'

'No, that's not what I mean. I mean there's no telling how big a pig can grow. They're always slaughtered when they reach a certain age, so there's no telling how big a pig might grow if it escaped into the wild and lived out its natural lifespan. Which might be anything up to three hundred years, like a tortoise.' 'A tortoise?' I said.

'I heard,' said Mrs Orion, drawing me closer to her and whispering in a conspiratorial tone, 'of a pigman who lived in Henfield, just north of Brighton, back in the Victorian days. He kept a pig in his barn, didn't kill it. When he died, his son took on the responsibility – it was in the old man's will, you see. And then the son of the pigman's son took it on, and so on. They say that the pig still lives, and that it is the size of an elephant now.' I shook my head. 'I think you are piddled,' I said. 'I think so, too. Is there any more champagne?' 'There certainly is.'

I refilled Mrs Orion's cup and her free hand leaned upon my shoulder as I did so. She smelled very nice, did Mrs Orion, and her freedom-loving bosoms pressed against my chest. 'Come,' called the voice of Mr Rune. 'Rizla, come.'

Mrs Orion fluttered her eyelids at me. 'I think you might have been about to,' she whispered.

I reluctantly gathered up the Fortnum's hamper and grudgingly withdrew from the kitchenette.

'I think I should further question that woman,' I told Mr Rune as we stood together in the hall.

'Have you forgotten so soon the matter of her husband's fowling piece?'

'Perhaps we should go, then. Have you learned all that you wish to learn? As it were.'

'It is a case that falls into the inexplicable-conundrum category.'

'It is a lost – or stolen – dog. Hardly anything to get excited about, surely?'

Mr Rune brought his stout stick down hard on to the hall floor. 'Farewell to you, Mrs Orion,' he called. A hiccough was returned to him from the kitchenette. I sighed and said farewell to Mrs Orion also. And Mr Rune and I took our leave. The sun shone as cheerfully as ever. Birdies twittered in treetops, a ginger torn sleeping upon a windowsill dreamed of Theda Bara, and as the cabbie had yet to awaken from the blow Mr Rune had dealt him earlier, the Mumbo Gumshoe suggested that I shift his unconscious body into the passenger seat and place myself at the steering wheel of the taxicab.

'Drive us home, Rizla,' said Mr Rune, settling himself in the back. 'I shall take a nap. Awaken me when we're there.'

'I do not know how to drive,' I said. 'At least, I do not think that I do.' 'Then now would be a good time to learn.' 'In a stolen car?'

'You are a teenager, aren't you? That's the way most teenagers learn to drive.' 'I am quite sure it is not.' 'Details, details. Apply yourself, lad.'

I shook my head, turned the key in the ignition and pressed my foot to various pedals until I received a noisy response. The taxicab, however, did not move.

'I think you'll find there's a handbrake involved, and also a gear lever,' said Mr Rune, drowsily. 'Do you know how to drive, then?'

'Certainly not. There are two kinds of person in this world: those who drive and those who are driven by them. I am, needless to say, one of the latter.'

I released the handbrake, stamped my feet on to various pedals and pushed the gear lever forward. And then we were off.

I really cannot see what all the fuss is about driving – why you need to take a test and get a licence and suchlike. I soon mastered the basics of the procedure. I scraped along a few parked cars and I did run over something that I suspect was a cat – it was certainly not a Spanikov, given its diminutive proportions. I suppose it might have been a hedgehog. And I eventually discovered the brake. In the nick of time, some might say, in particular the woman in the Morris Minor who screamed at me that I was on her side of the road when I discovered it. Then I ran the taxicab into the dustbins at the rear of forty-nine Grand Parade, which I will swear to this very day jumped out in my path. This collision awakened the cabbie.

I awakened Mr Rune and we quickly took our leave of the taxicab. 'You were evidently born to drive,' remarked Mr Rune when we were once more safely ensconced within his rooms. 'I will hire a car for you to chauffeur. It will expedite matters regarding our travel. And spare my shoe leather.'

'Make it a Rolls-Royce, then,' I said, as I had indeed quite taken to the driving.

'Flashy,' said Mr Rune. 'A Bentley, perhaps. I shall look into the matter. But first this case.' 'Lost dog,' I said. 'Hardly worth the bother, surely.'

'The dog is merely the tip of the iceberg.' Mr Rune sought Scotch. 'Are we out of whisky?' he asked. 'Pop over to the offy and fetch more.' 'I have no money. You have yet to pay me.'

'You have yet to earn your keep. I provide you with free room and board. What ingratitude.'

'Regardless, they will no longer serve me at the local offy,' I said, 'because I do not wear black.'

'Black?' Mr Rune tried in vain to wring Scotch from the empty bottle.

'New management. It is the "Goth Licence" now. You have to wear black to get served.'

'Outrageous,' said Mr Rune. 'And you wasted the last of the Mulholland champagne upon Mrs Orion.' 'I think she fancied me.' 'Let us apply ourselves to the task in hand, to whit-' 'The lost dog.'

'The dog is the tip of the iceberg. The iceberg itself is the Chronovision.'

'This is altogether new,' said I. 'What in the names of the Holies is a Chronovision?'

'It is what I seek, and what I will inevitably find once I have solved the twelve tasks that lie before me.' 'The finding of a lost dog being one of these tasks?'

'I sincerely believe so, yes.' Mr Rune had located a bottle of port and this he uncorked, sniffed at and then decanted with care into a brace of glasses. 'Let me tell you about the Chronovision,' he said as he passed a glass of port to me. 'It is better that you understand the situation now. There will only be confusion later if you do not.'

'I may not be around later,' I said. 'I agreed to stay with you for one month only.'

'You never did read the small print on that contract you signed, did you?' 'Ah,' said I.

'The Chronovision,' said Mr Rune, settling into his great big chair and tasting the port. 'A fascinating contrivance -and one, should it fall into the wrong hands, that would seal the fate of Mankind.'

'Ah,' said I once more. 'We are back on that subject again, are we?' 'It is the subject that consumes me. It is what I am.' 'Go on about this Chronovision, then. What does it do?'

'Quite simply,' said Mr Rune, 'although there is nothing simple about it, it is, in effect, a television set upon which one can view events that happened in the past.' I laughed heartily at this.