A Cure for Cancer

I. Dope-pushing preacher was Peeping Tom

Bishop Beesley popped a bar of Turkish Delight into his large, wet mouth, smiled as he chewed the soft chocolate and jelly, and unwrapped another bar. He swallowed, licked his lips with his grey tongue, and picked up his pen.

In the lounge of the Golden Orrery, one of the best hotels in Brussels, he was polishing up the newspaper article he was writing. It was called Heroin: A Cure for Cancer? and would appear the following Sunday. He had written for the Sunday Messenger for some years. Before the dissolution of the clergy, he had done the regular From My Pulpit feature, and afterwards, when the Messenger had to change its policy to fit in with modern trends, had changed the name of his column to From My Viewpoint. Journalism, however, did not pay him sufficiently and was really just a useful sideline.

From where he sat, Bishop Beesley could see the main entrance of the hotel and he looked up as the glass doors swung open. Through them came a man carrying a light grip and dressed in a black and white fur coat. The man appeared to be an Indian, for his skin was black and he wore an elaborate turban and what the bishop considered a rather vulgar silk suit. The man walked to the reception desk and spoke to the clerk who handed him a key.

The bishop popped the unwrapped bar of Turkish Delight into his mouth and resumed work.

It did not take him long to complete the article, put it into an envelope, address and stamp the envelope and walk to the hotel's mail-box where he posted it.

He looked at the clock over the reception desk and saw that dessert would be being served about now. He walked across the foyer to the dining-room and entered it. The dining-room was half-full. Two or three family groups sat at tables along the walls, a few businessmen with their wives or secretaries ate at other tables, and at the far end sat the Indian who seemed to have chosen pheasant, the hotel's speciality.

Bishop Beesley hated the whole idea of meat. He hated the whole idea of vegetables, for that matter, but the orange bombes were unmatched anywhere and it was for them that he came to The Golden Orrery.

With a great deal of dignity he sat his full buttocks down on the well-stuffed chair and put his pale hands on the cloth.

There was no need to order.

Very shortly a waiter appeared with the first of the six orange bombes that the bishop would eat tonight, as he ate every night when in Brussels.

The bishop picked up fork and spoon and bent his nose over the dessert, his eyes watering with delight.

Although absorbed in pleasure, the bishop could not help noticing the Indian when the man got up and walked past his table. He walked so lithely, there was such a sense of physical power about him, that the bishop wondered for an instant if he were all he seemed to be.

Though he had paused only a split second in his eating, it was enough to bring the bishop back to his fourth orange bombe with added relish.

Rising, at length, from the table, he decided to get an early night. He had a busy morning to look forward to.

Jerry Cornelius took off his turban and flipped it onto the chair beside the bed. The girl looked a little surprised by the colour of his hair; her full lips parted and she moved her body on the bed.

Like a big, black boa constrictor he slid from his silks and came slowly towards her, taking her shoulders in his strong hands, pulling her so that her pink breasts pressed against his ebony chest and she drew a deep breath before his lips touched her rose-soft mouth, his tongue stroked hers and love boiled in their bodies, rising, rising, rising in volume with the glory of the very finest Gregorian chant; tempo increasing, flesh flush against flesh, mouth against mouth, hands moving, bodies fusing, teeth biting, voices shouting fit to wake the dead.

He lay beside her with the smell of her body in his nostrils, trying not to breathe too heavily so that the smell would stay there as long as possible. He put an arm around her shoulders and she settled against him, her long, fine dark brown hair brushing his skin. For a while they lay still and then he took his cigarettes from beside the bed and lit one each for them.

He had not expected to meet another organization operative in The Golden Orrery: Koutrouboussis had said nothing about it. But Polly Fass had recognized him in the corridor outside his room, though he did not know her.

'What are you doing here?' he'd asked.

'Looking for you.' She took her opportunities while she could.

Now he said it again.

'I've just delivered a consignment,' she told him. 'On my way back to England now. It was a touch job — all kinds of trouble. Are you looking for potentials here?'

'No.'

'Oho,' she said knowingly.

He slid the flat of his hand over her thighs and hips, up her torso and over her right breast, stroking the nipple until it was hard; he put his cigarette out in the ashtray by the bed, took hers from her fingers and put that out too. Her excellent teeth delicately nipped his tongue as they kissed.

It was a shame they hadn't put the light out. Bishop Beesley, peering through his spy-hole in the room above, frowned. He had recognized Cornelius.

2 Danger! Hitch-hikers who pose as journalists!

Leaving the hotel the next morning, Cornelius was stopped by a shout from the corner of the street. Turning, he saw a fat figure in the gaiters and frock-coat of a clergyman. The man was waving a small attache case and waddling just as fast as he could.

'A moment, sir! A moment of your time!' The words were panted in a tone reminiscent of sewage warbling underground.

Cornelius paused by the Phantom VI. 'Ha,' he said. 'A moment, eh?' He wondered if this were an organization contact nobody had warned him about.

The clergyman reached him, breathing heavily, leant against the car and hastily pulled a paper bag from his pocket, taking something that looked like a chocolate cream from it and cramming it into his mouth. It seemed to help him recover.

'Birmingham,' he said.

'Indeed,' Cornelius replied.

'Beesley — from Birmingham. We met there the Easter before last.'

'I never go to Birmingham if I can help it,' said Jerry fastidiously. 'I haven't been there in four years.'

'Mr Aserinsky.' Bishop Beesley spoke with prim accusation. 'Mr Aserinsky! Come now. Birmingham. The Easter before last.'

'Before last, before last.' Jerry pursed his lips. 'Before last...'

'Aha!' Beesley grinned and patted his forehead with one finger. 'Aha! Memory playing tricks.'

'Certainly not!'

'Can't remember where one was at any particular moment -can one? Eh? Or, might I say, who one was, hm? Ha, ha!'

Cornelius put himself on his guard, ready to drag his vibra- gun from its holster in a split second. But Beesley was leaning forward with a knowing smile. 'Trust me, Mr Aserinsky. We have much in common, you and I.'

'Are you from the organization...' Cornelius said, 'at all?'

'No. Unfortunate. But I understand the aims. And I endorse them, Mr Aserinsky.'

'I'm leaving now.' Jerry put hand to handle.

'I was going to ask you a favour.'

A yellow, single-decker tram went past on the other side of the street. Cornelius watched it from the corner of his eye.

'What was that?'

'I believe you are on your way to Germany. You'll be passing through Aachen?'

'That's for me to say.' Jerry relaxed a little as the tram turned a corner.

'Could you, perhaps, give me a lift? I am only a poor journalist and the rail fares are so dear, as you appreciate, I'm sure.'

'Journalist?'

'Churchman! Unfortunately that profession is a dead one these days. Progress, Mr Aserinsky, has scant sympathy for the redundant... I mean,' the bishop reached into his coat pocket and took out a bar of chocolate which he put into his mouth, 'I mean — one must survive. There was little else I was trained for. Consolation was my trade. I still pursue it as best I can.'

Jerry watched a thin trickle of chocolate leave Bishop Beesley's mouth. It looked rather like blood.

'I don't trust you,' he said.

'Forgive a trace of self-pity.' The bishop spread his hands and shrugged in despair. 'But my appearance is doubtless disturbing to you. Can I help that? My clothes — they are all I have. My poor, coarse body: glands. My method of approach: urgent necessity, if I am to earn the pittance that will support me for another week or two. And there is the plague to consider. Rats have been seen. You, Mr Aserinsky, are well dressed, handsome, rich too...'

'Too rich.' Jerry opened the door and threw his grip into the back of the car and started the engine.

Soon he was driving from Brussels, on the Aachen road.

Not too far behind him, his face set in an expression of moral outrage, came Bishop Beesley, stiff-backed at the wheel of a silver Cadillac, his jaw moving rhythmically and, from time to time, his hand moving to meet it. Beside him on the seat was a large paper bag containing almost a pound of walnut fudge.

Bishop Beesley turned to walnut fudge in moments of crisis.