Knees Up Mother Earth

29

H.G. Wells said, “Oh, calamity.”

Winston said, “Sorry, gov’nor, but I couldn’t let you top him.”

The window of Norman’s kitchenette was now open. The computer’s fire had been extinguished and the smoke had cleared.

“But my Time Machine.” Mr Wells wrung his fingers. “The bullet ricocheted through the mechanism. It has been destroyed … entirely.”

“We can fix it, gov’nor. But I couldn’t let you top him, truly I couldn’t. It would’ve bin murder most foul.”

“But he was running the computer program, the signal emitted by which enabled us to locate him through time. He must be the one.”

“Be honest, gov’nor. Does he look like the King of Darkness to you?”

“The Devil takes many forms, Winston.”

“Yeah, but they’re mostly rulers of nations – dictators, according to you. This bloke’s a nobody.”

“I resent that,” mumbled Norman. “I mean, sorry, don’t kill me. I’m innocent.”

“He’s a non-such, gov’nor.”

“Then he’s an agent of the King of Darkness.”

“I’m a shopkeeper,” moaned Norman. “My shop is next door. See for yourself.”

“You were running the computer program,” said Mr Wells, “activating the terrible spell that would wreak havoc upon mankind.”

“I didn’t know what it was. I left the computer on. It was running itself.”

“A likely story.” The gun was once more pointing in Norman’s direction.

“I’m just a shopkeeper. A nobody, like that dirty little urchin there says.”

“Urchin?” said Winston.

“The computer was in an old store,” Norman explained, “in crates. I reassembled it. I didn’t know what it would do. Although …”

“Although what?”

“Nothing,” said Norman. “Although I wasn’t expecting this, perhaps.” He raised himself to a kneeling position, sought out his errant wig and repositioned it upon his shaken head. “Is that really a Time Machine?” he asked. “How exactly does it work?”

“It no longer works,” said Mr Wells, lowering his pistol.

“Perhaps I could mend it for you,” Norman suggested.

“You?” The gun was once more pointing in Norman’s direction.

“I have a Meccano set. You’d be surprised what I can do with it.”

“Meccano set?” said Mr Wells. “I invented the Meccano set.”

“And Velcro, too,” said Winston. “Mr Wells invented that. And Blu-Tack. And the jumbo jet.”

Norman was now almost on his feet. “It really is a Time Machine,” he was saying. “That’s exactly the way a Time Machine should look. And you really are H.G. Wells?”

“And I’m Winston,” said Winston. “Mr Wells’ personal assistant.”

“He’s nothing of the kind,” said Mr Wells. “He’s a common little thief who entered my house when I was putting my machine into operation, climbed aboard without me seeing him as I travelled into the future, and has been plaguing my existence ever since.”

“You like me really, gov’nor. I’m a lovable rogue. And I’ve helped you out of more than a scrape or two, Gawd nip at me ’nads if I ain’t.”

“Well, I never did,” said Norman. “A stitch in time saves two, as it were.”

“Enough of this idle discourse.” Mr Wells puffed out his cheeks, which were of the ruddy persuasion. “I am here upon a sacred mission. I have no time for trifles.”

“I quite like trifle,” said Norman.

“Me, too,” said Winston. “And humbugs.”

“I’ve got jars of humbugs in my shop,” said Norman. “And blackjacks and gobstoppers and—”

“Cease this idle prittle prattle. My machine must be repaired. Even now, in some future time, the computer program might be running again.”

“I don’t think you have that quite right,” said Norman, helpfully. “If it’s in some future time, then it can’t be running ‘even now’, can it?”

“It can if you possess a Time Machine. Now cease your stuff and nonsense, or I will shoot you through petulance alone.”

“Sorry,” said Norman, now fully in the vertical plane, “but if the computer program has been destroyed, and it does look very destroyed to me—” Norman viewed his burned out computer “– then your work here is done and you can return in glory to the past – as soon as the Time Machine is fixed, and I’m certain that I can help you to mend it. Do you have a set of plans with you?”

H.G. Wells shook his head. Sadly.

“Well, never mind,” said Norman. “A trouble shared is a trouble halved. And half a sixpence is a threepenny bit.”

“There’s truth to them words, gov’nor,” said Winston. “Now, about them gobstoppers.”

Norman looked over at Mr Wells, who was ruefully considering his ruined Time Machine. “Is it all right if I give Winston some gobstoppers?” he asked.

“Do whatever you will,” said Mr Wells, prodding at the bullet hole.

“This way, Winston,” said Norman.

“The way I see it,” said Jim Pooley, propping up the counter of The Stripes Bar, “as long as I keep following the professor’s instructions for the team’s tactics, we’ll win the FA Cup and the black magician and his henchmen won’t get their evil hands on the football ground and set free the biblical serpent.”

“Will you please keep your voice down, Jim,” John told him. “You have imbibed too freely, in my considered opinion.”

“This is only my seventh pint,” said Jim. “I’m fine.”

“Well, keep your voice down anyway. There’s no telling who might be listening.”

“They’re all watching the stripper, John. No one’s paying us any attention.”

“Well, keep it shushed. I’ve just seen Archroy. I’m going over to say my hellos. Will you be all right here on your own?”

“I’ll chat to Mr Rumpelstiltskin.”

“But not about private matters, eh?” John tapped at his nose.

“Absolutely not.” Jim tapped at his. And John made off through the crowd.

“Enjoying yourself, Mr Pooley?” asked Mr Rumpelstiltskin, sidling over. “Everything meeting your approval?”

“Everything’s fine,” said Jim. “Another pint, if you will.”

“Certainly, sir.” Mr Rumpelstiltskin drew Jim off another pint of Large. Jim accepted it with gratitude, but it really didn’t taste as good as those drawn in The Swan. Exactly why, Jim had no idea, but it just didn’t.

“But everything is okay, isn’t it, sir?” Mr Rumpelstiltskin asked.

“Everything’s fine,” said Jim. “And less of the ‘sir’. I can’t be having with the ‘sir’. Call me Jim.”

“Just as long as you’re happy, Jim.”

“And why shouldn’t I be happy?”

“Oh, no reason. Just talk. Things blokes say in pubs. You know the sort of thing.”

“I don’t,” said Jim, settling into his pint.

“Rumours, then,” said Mr Rumpelstiltskin. “And what with all that weird stuff happening on the Benefit Night. And the team actually winning for a change. And what I just overheard you saying to Mr Omally.”

“Take no notice,” said Jim. “Of anything. Just do your job and I’ll do mine and everything will be fine.”

“Oh yes, Jim. Certainly. But you know how people are. And about your job – there’s rumours about that. Well, let’s face it, I’ve known you and Mr Omally for years, coming in here to drink after hours. Have you ever actually had another job before this one?”

“Many,” said Jim. “Many, many, but none like this. What about you? Have you always been a barman?”

Mr Rumpelstiltskin shook his head. “I was a professional dog-walker once.”

“And what does that entail?”

“Walking dogs for people who can’t be bothered.”

“Really?” said Jim. “And was there money in that?”

“There was for a while, before the authorities found out.”

“Is professional dog-walking illegal, then?”

“Not as such, but what I did was.”

“I’m intrigued,” said Jim. “What happened?”

Mr Rumpelstiltskin did lookings to either side to assure himself that he wasn’t being overheard. “It was all Norman’s fault,” he whispered.

“Norman Hartnel? Not to be confused with the other Norman Hartnel?”

“Same fellow. I had this van, see. Picked up the dogs each day, put them into the van, drove them to the park and walked them. Then one day Norman happens by the park and asks me what I’m doing with all these dogs. So I tell him. And Norman says, ‘That’s a waste of energy.’ Which it was, because they used to drag me all over the place. Norman says, ‘Those dogs should be working for you,’ which had me a bit baffled. He came down to the park the next day and told me that he’d worked out a plan for me that would not only save me energy, but get the dogs to generate energy for me.”

“Whatever did he mean?” Pooley asked.

“I had no idea, but he explained it to me. Put the dogs inside big wheels, he said, like hamster wheels, and connect these wheels up to generate electricity.”

“That sounds like Norman,” said Jim. “And it sounds like a good idea, actually.”

“That’s what I thought. And Norman built the wheels for me, out of Meccano. There was a lot of Meccano involved. We put a can of dog food in front of each wheel and the dogs ran and ran, for most of the day. The power they generated provided the electricity for my home.”

Jim Pooley laughed. “It’s pretty brilliant,” said he.

“That’s what I thought. Then Norman had this other idea, that he said would save me money on buying the dog food and generate enough electricity to power the entire street. He said he’d go into business with me and build all the extra wheels.”

“You were going to take on more dogs?” said Jim.

“No,” said Mr Rumpelstiltskin. “Not dogs, other animals. Norman had this idea about perpetual motion. He said he had a ‘spin’ on it. It would be called Petual Motion.”

“Go on,” said Jim, already halfway through his pint.

“It wouldn’t just be dogs, you see, there’d be a whole series of wheels, starting out big, then getting smaller, then big again, positioned in a circle. We built them in a rented warehouse down by the docks. It worked like this: there were six wheels; in the first there was a dog, and in the one in front of the dog there was a cat – so the dog chased after the cat, see. And the cat ran away from the dog, so both wheels turned.”

“Go on,” said Jim once again.

“In the wheel in front of the cat there was a wheel with a mouse in it. And in the wheel in front of that, an elephant.”

“An elephant?” said Jim. “Where did you get an elephant from?”

“We, er, borrowed one from the zoo – we couldn’t think of anything else that would run away from a mouse.”

“I understand,” said Jim. “Go on some more.”

“We got a lion in front of the elephant, to run away from that, and a buffalo in front of the lion, to run away from that, and then we were back to the dog in the circle, you see, in front of the stampeding buffalo in the wheel behind it. All in a circle, they all ran and ran. Petual motion. Powered the entire street.”

“And then the police arrived,” said Jim.

“Exactly,” said Mr Rumpelstiltskin. “There was a right fuss. Norman and I were lucky to stay out of prison.”

“This is the first time I’ve ever heard this story,” said Jim, “and I certainly never read about the case in the newspapers.”

“It was a very long time ago. We were teenagers then. And I bet you never read the papers when you were a teenager.”

“Only Sporting Life,” said Jim. “But you do have to hand it to that Norman. He certainly does come up with some inventive ideas.”

“Do you really think he’s going to make millions out of those patents he claims to have?”

Pooley shrugged. “It all seems a bit doubtful, doesn’t it? I mean, can you really imagine Norman doing something that would gain him a place in history?” And Pooley laughed.

And Mr Rumpelstiltskin laughed.

And Winston the ill-washed youth laughed also, although in Norman’s shop.

“These are brilliant gobstoppers,” he said.

“Have more,” said Norman. “Put some in your pocket for later.”

“Thanks,” said Winston, digging into the jar and filling his pockets.

“Tell me about you and Mr Wells,” said Norman. “I mean, this is incredible, you both appearing here, now, in my kitchenette. And thank you for nudging his elbow and saving my life.”

“I could see you ain’t the King of Darkness, gov’nor. Not with them patched elbows.”

“But what is all this business about the King of Darkness?”

“Mr Wells’ sacred mission. It happened by accident. He just wanted to try out his machine, see if it really worked. He was to present it before Queen Victoria the next day. Perhaps he will go back to the same time that we left, after he’s finished his mission.”

“But this King of Darkness?” Norman persisted.

“Well, it happened like this. Like you heard, I snuck aboard his Time Machine when it was taking off. Yeah, I was in his house on the nick, I admit it. We landed the first time about five years in the future from now.” Winston took his shabby self over to Norman’s front window and peered out through the grimy pane. “It’s all very different then than it is now, Gawd flatten me ol’ fella if it ain’t. There’s technology, see, like you ain’t got now, at this time, but like we had back in the Victorian days. Wireless transmission of energy, it was, electricity without wires.”

“Ah,” said Norman. “That.”

“Flying hansom cabs,” Winston continued, “and a space programme. But none of that survived – it’s as if it all vanished. But it will come back. It will be everywhere in a few years from now. And the one who brings it back, that’s the King of Darkness – the Devil in the shape of a man. He wants to rule the world, you see, and hasten the Apocalypse. And Mr Wells has this bee in his bonnet that somehow it’s all his fault and he has to stop it.”

“I really don’t think I understand any of this,” said Norman. “Why exactly did you and Mr Wells appear in my kitchenette, right now?”

“Because you were running the computer program, the King of Darkness’s computer program, with all the magic in it and all the nicked plans. Mr Wells did all these mathematical calculations – he worked it out.”

“Nicked plans?” said Norman in as normal a tone as he could muster up. “What is this about nicked plans?”

“All the technical gubbins – the wireless transmission of energy, all that stuff. The stuff that was somehow vanished out of history so that the King of Darkness couldn’t get his evil hands on the plans and do all the awful stuff that he would do with them if he got hold of them, if you know what I mean.”

“He sounds a very bad sort, this King of Darkness fellow,” said Norman.

“He is.” Winston stuffed another gobstopper into his mouth. “Mr Wells is determined to stop him, so he zeroed in on the computer program. The computer is destroyed now, so that should be that for now, in this time.”

“Right,” said Norman. “That’s that, then.”

“So if we can fix up the Time Machine, we’ll go home in it.”

“I’ll help you,” said Norman. “I’m sure together we can fix it.”

“You’re a good bloke, Norman, I can see that.”

“Thanks,” said Norman.

“I mean, you’re not an agent of the Devil made flesh, is ya?”

“Of course I’m not,” said Norman.

“Of course you’re not,” said Winston, thrusting yet another gobstopper into his mouth, but still managing to speak somehow. “You wouldn’t do anyfink that would help the King of Darkness gain control of the world, would ya? Like bunging him the plans for the supertechnology?”

“I certainly would not.” Norman crossed his heart. “Just one thing,” said he.

“Yeah,” said Winston, with difficulty.

“Do you know the identity of this Devil-made-flesh chap?”

“Of course,” said Winston. “We’ve already been to his time, five years in the future. We had to scarper back here quick – he nearly did for Mr Wells.”

“So,” said Norman, “what is his name?”

“William Starling,” said Winston.