 
### BREAD

By Stephen Brown

Copyright 2012 Stephen Brown

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Also available in Paperback. See author website for details

http://www.thestephenbrown.co.uk/

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For

Douglas Adams

A genius 1952 – 2001

Table of Contents

Title Page

Contents

The Beginning

About the Author

Other Works

Chosen Charity

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

It is early spring, and my first impressions of Scotland have been beautiful. Despite the torrential rain and howling, relentless winds - or perhaps partly because of them - the whole place exudes a certain freshness that sings to the soul made stale by city life. There is an ever-present, timeless quality that is difficult to describe; like a watch that has had the hour and minute hands removed - only the second hand tick-tick-ticking resolutely away. An imprecise, immeasurable time, unrelated to any fixed points of reference that simply passes inevitably and relentlessly towards who knows what.

Lately I have found my attention being drawn towards Scotland in a variety of faint but insistent ways. My dreams have been haunted by hazy images of thick-bearded highlanders, the blue and white flag of St Andrew waving continually in my peripheral vision; in my thoughts, wind battered mountains and long, low lochs have been vying for my attention in ways which would have a group of surrealist painters fighting hand over fist to get down on canvas.

What's more, these influences have not been limited to my sleeping, but have carried over with alarming prevalence into my everyday, waking world: on the television I have noticed an inundation of Scotsmen and women - news reporters, spokespeople being interviewed, politicians (they're all bloody Scottish, every one of them), doctors, game show hosts - an unstoppable tide it would seem.

In fact, the only thing that could possibly bring more attention to our northern neighbours would be if their national football team was to actually win a match, but that is so unlikely it has shot through the realms of impossibility and burst out the other side.

It's not just a recent thing - for several months now I have had these nagging feelings, tugging me inexorably in the direction of the Borders and beyond. It is similar in many respects to the tweaking of a long forgotten memory, yet I am sure that it can't be, as I have never been further north than Chester.

I had come to thinking, what can be so special about all those thistles and glens that is strong enough to distract me from my day to day life? What is it about all that rugged coastline and the splattering of tiny, fragmented islands that have been sneezed from the nose of Caledonia that allures me so much? How can I have become so addicted to Scotland?

Anyway, there it is and here I am. Finally, after a long, drawn out winter of speculation I have made the decision to come up here and find out once and for all. It is my intention to learn where all things Scottish come from. How all the kilts and bagpipes and all that sort of stuff actually came into being. The origins of Scottishness and how the nation then evolved from there.

Is that my mission in life, my raison d'être? Is that why I am now here in Scotland, to carry out my life's true purpose? Perhaps it is too ambitious; a too all-embracing task for one man (especially me) to complete; maybe I'll be forced to leave an unfinished legacy for others to continue after my death.

Who knows, but I'm here now, so I can make a start at least.

My first port of call is here in Skye, or 'Skye' as the locals call it, just off the rugged north-western coast. In the mouth of the beautiful Loch Alsh there is an island, over which a bridge has been built connecting Skye up with the rest of the mainland. Legend has it that the very first haggis was conceived, prepared and eaten there, on the 'wee small' island of Eilean Ban.

On the site of this supposed historical event there now stands a hotel, huge and impressive. It is a five star affair, catering for conferences, functions and Americans more than anything. I am staying just down the road in the Loch and Quay, a small family run place - it was apparently the present man of the house who thought up the inspirational title. I see him at the beginning and end of every day collapsed in a small rowing boat with a few empty bottles of Glen Fiddich as sleeping partners. Such a shame, a wasted talent like that.

The story goes that there were two villages - fishing villages, both relying heavily on the multitude of squid that used to visit the loch all year round. The happy coexistence of these villages was unfortunately brought to an end when they became embroiled in a dispute: long, long ago a Mr Gavin Glenragh accused his neighbour Colin McArum of cutting his nets. This bitter feud lasted seven whole generations.

Many hideous acts of vandalism were carried out by both sides over the years, until a deal was finally struck by William Donley Glenragh and Colin McArum - a descendant, not the same man. He would have had to have been an immortal, if it was the same Colin, and there are apparently very few immortals now living on the west coast of Scotland (rumour has it they have all moved to Zimbabwe for reasons known only to themselves).

The deal came with the proclamation that both villages would stop fishing entirely and they would all eat badgers. How the present day Haggis has evolved from this is quite beyond me, but I intend to find out.

There were several conferences going on at the Eilean Ban Hotel where my search started yesterday. A large contingent from Interpol were discussing whether there was any point in them existing as an organisation anymore; there was a sizable group of Swiss pocket-watch manufacturers wondering whether or not to call it a day and go digital, and there was also a lone hitch hiker from Swansea who thought he had heard that Status Quo were playing a concert here (I've checked and they're actually playing in Redcliff, deep in the heartland of Zimbabwe at the moment, to a group of fans who have been with them 'from the start...')

There was one which particularly caught my eye however, going on in the MacPlimsol Hall. It seemed on a smaller scale, with only a handful of people inside gathered around the stage, where a man in his mid fifties was speaking. His light rimmed spectacles and grey hair would have made him look distinguished, had it not been for his grin, which was in between that of the Cheshire Cat and a used car salesman.

Looking at the set up through the glass panel in the door, I noticed that upon the raised platform he was speaking from there stood a large blackboard with ominously familiar sigils scrawled across it. Directly across from this on the opposite side of the stage was one of the more modern white boards decorated with yet more hieroglyphics.

Dominating his background however, was the inevitable OHP, or overhead projector, that we all learned to hate whilst going through school and college \- I dare say they used the accursed things at University too, but who would notice? The only reason any student attends any lectures at Uni is because they tend to be secure and relatively quiet places to sober up or come around from whatever they were on the night before. I was intrigued. What was going on in there?

Outside the conference halls in the plush, carpeted corridor, sandwich boards had been positioned outside the doors, advertising the theme of the lectures going on inside. A cursory glance was enough to make me choke in amazement. I could not believe my eyes! Surely not?

A second look was required.

But it was true! The bare faced cheek of the man! No wonder the contents of the black and white boards had seemed so familiar. Professor Alan Humphries, the speaker inside, was claiming – quite unashamedly - that "Maths Can Be Fun!"

I was in half a mind to nip back into the Interpol Conference and insist they come and arrest this man immediately. Something held me back however. I never minded maths at school to be honest, more for the fact that it teaches your brain how to think than for all the swirly squiggles and formulae you have to go through.

No, if this man was actually here in this highly respected hotel, talking to actual people and was actually being paid for it, there must be something worth listening to, surely.

I entered the hall as quietly as possible - which was not very, as I fell down the two short steps immediately inside the door. Professor Humphries glared at the cause of this interruption over his podium like a judge, before taking a casual sip from his glass of Sparkling Skye Spring water (manufactured and bottled in Bristol) and motioned for me to please take a seat.

For several minutes he droned on in what has be to said was an incredibly boring voice, and I could see heads dropping in front of me, as the gathered ensemble tried to stay awake. It was almost hypnotic; his voice became a monotonous dull throbbing sound at the back of my consciousness, and the algebraic symbols began to swim and dance on the boards in front of me. The room was incredibly hot and stuffy, and it finally became like a despised relative's slide show as the lights in the hall dimmed to nothing. A single spotlight focused on the boards at the back of the stage was all that was left. The voice mumbled on...

I was vaguely aware shortly before it happened that the Professor placed a pair of mirrored sunglasses on. The thought crossed my mind that this was an odd thing to do in a darkened room. Suddenly though, the spotlight was cut dead and several strobe lights flickering and flashing about is all I remember, until I came around with the rest of the audience several hours later.

The hotel has of course tried to hush the incident up, but apart from the embarrassment and anger caused by the ordeal, the only things any of us seems to have lost is any food we were carrying (I had a pack of Rolos taken from me) and also neck ties from the gentlemen and shoes from the women. Strange. Luckily I had no tie on, so it was only my sweet tooth which suffered.

I have decided to put my Scottish research on hold, in order to try and find out what had happened here, and why? The whole thing is quite mystifying and besides - it seems far more interesting than what I was doing originally.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

I had been summoned to see His Grace the Abbott in his study straight after Evensong, so I did not really notice the murals lining the otherwise bare corridors in this part of the Monastery, the flapping of my sandals echoing noisily as I dashed, almost running, to keep my engagement. Needless to say a whole myriad of thoughts were spinning in my head as I stood outside the door. I took a deep breath and knocked, waiting for the reply before entering.

To be requested for an audience with such immediacy straight after prayers meant it must be something quite serious, but as usual His Grace showed a composed and most holy frame of mind, not letting anything on. At the moment of my ingress he was holding out a handful of corn to his 'pet' Rocking Horse.

"He doesn't seem to be very hungry today Brother Sadfael. He hasn't touched his meal from this morning. I am beginning to worry about him."

I looked away, unable to meet his eye and in the embarrassed silence that followed he patted the toy horse affectionately on the neck. It was always like this when somebody forgot to remove the food His Grace put down for the thing twice a day. I have since looked on the rota and seen that it was Brother Goot's turn today and have already admonished him for his forgetfulness. Lord knows - I hope and pray \- that we mean no harm by this deception, for surely it is kinder to His Grace this way, to humour him in this, his one and only weakness rather than telling him that for the past fifteen years he has been trying to feed a wooden toy. It could well break him, and he is such a great man.

Sighing and replacing the corn in the bowl at the horse's feet, he stepped away and moved to the other side of his dark, wooden desk. His countenance was grave indeed and he proceeded to tell me of a Just and Righteous Mission for which he has singled me out.

"Sadfael, there is a Just and Righteous Mission at hand, for which I have singled you out." He was always straight to the point, His Grace. "Reports have been coming in from the countryside," he began, his face darkening further still. "Most disturbing reports. The peasants from as far a field as Ashworthy and Hood have sent messengers here to St. Malcolm's, all claiming that the very Devil is abroad, waging havoc and laying waste to all in his path."

I crossed myself as a chill passed down my spine, respectfully following His Grace over to the lead-lined window. We stood in silence for a few moments, watching as the crows fought the magpies and the pigeons fought each other for the scraps put out for them – not as much as was customary, due to Brother Goot's lapse.

"Your Grace, if this is true, if the Great Goat himself now walks among us, the Lord of Lies, could it mean that the Second Coming is at hand? Could this be the beginnings of the end? Could it be that Old Jake Peabody was right after all?" The Abbott raised an eyebrow at the name.

"Old Jake Peabody?" he enquired.

"From the village, your Grace. The one who walks around with a bough of apple-wood tied around his neck, believing it somehow to be his Bible. He rants and raves continuously about the final war between Heaven and Hell being upon us." A glimmer shone briefly in the Abbott's eye and he nodded with recognition.

"Ahh yes, Mad Jake Peabody - Peabrain the villagers call him." Uncharitable souls. "No, no brother. He has been going on about Judgment Day being at hand for as long as anybody can remember; a half dozen years at least. I fear that poor Jake's ramblings owe more to his fondness of the Brewer's tap than to any inclinations towards God.

"I do not believe that these latest incidents – heinous though they undoubtedly are – foretell the opening of the Seven Seals, but certainly the Dark Angel has sent one of his Hellish minions to work his deprivations among us and he must, therefore, be stopped.

"In consultation with my colleagues at the High Table, it has been decided that you are the one to be sent out after him."

"Me, your Grace?" I almost choked, so taken aback at this new confidence.

"You, Brother Sadfael. It is our considered belief that in the whole of St. Malcolm's there is none other with your... unique skills." He did not give me time to brook any further arguments as to my suitability, simply turned back to the window and continued on. "You are familiar with the Rites of Exorcism?"

"Err, to a degree your Grace." I stammered.

"Good. It is well for you that you will have ample time to refresh your memory of them as you walk. By the pleas for help coming in to us it can be deduced that the fiend's path is carrying him East, ever away from the Monastery."

"No doubt he fears the certain retribution that would be visited upon him were he to stray too close to this Holy seat," I proclaimed with fervour.

"Err... yes..." the Abbott replied, although with a somewhat furrowed brow. "No doubt. The clouds in the evening sky show good portent of the weather for you on the morrow. I pray the Lord in his Mercy will bestow such favour upon you for the duration of your journey." His Grace moved toward the door. I followed meekly, still shocked.

"I... I must leave so soon?"

"Oh yes. It is of the utmost importance that you do not dally Brother Sadfael. This spawn of Satan must be tracked, caught and banished as soon as possible. I recommend that you gather together a small pack of what you will need and then sleep. As it is I fear it may well take you several weeks to find this monster, so one more night will not overly hinder you, for the sake of freshness." He opened the door to usher me out into the cold corridor beyond. "But no more than that. Do not expect anybody to see you off on the morrow brother – it is my intention to spare as many as possible, even from the knowledge of these troubled happenings, lest a great panic set in, allowing Lucifer a further foot in the door. You must be up and away before the others rise."

As I stumbled into the long and lonely corridor which now seemed to stretch far longer than ever it did, the Abbott folded his arms within the sleeves of his habit and stared at me with a look of absolute finality.

"You are doing a great service to all of us Brother and I know I can rely on you to never quit, to never stop, to never come back until this thing is done." Numbly I nodded, dumbstruck by the gravity of it all. Maintaining his forceful stare, His Grace nodded one last time.

"Goodbye Brother Sadfael," he said and then he closed the door.

Much as it troubles me to think of the tribulations that lie ahead, as I sit here in the tiny, unadorned cell which has been my humble home for many years now, I cannot help but count my blessings. For no matter how daunting, 'tis an honour indeed to be given a quest in these times of darkness and devilment. True, it does mean that I must leave here on the Eve of the Great Centenary Cheese-fest, and will therefore miss the week-long celebrations, but God's work is always more important than our own mortal frivolities; one must never lose sight of that.

Ahh, to think of it, an infidel on the loose, some Stygian Abomination, and it has been given up to me, Sadfael, to stop him!

This can only be a sign from the Lord! I must confess that there had been some unholy - or rather I should say 'less than holy' - thoughts racing around in my head these last few months. Why does He allow cabbages to rot after only three days, for example? Why am I not permitted a draft excluder in my cell? And why must I wear these unstylish sandals all the time?

It must be a sign, an opportunity from God for me to expunge these and other blasphemous thoughts from my mind and thus to reaffirm my faith. He has bestowed a great honour upon me, and I must ensure that His trust is well founded. I now close this entry in order to pray for success and then go and pack.

But first I will quickly nip back to the Abbott's rooms and remove the horse's food which is still sitting uneaten. I am surprised he has not noticed how fat the birds are around here, but then His Grace does not get out as much as he used to.

A truly great man though.

In his youth.

Or so I am told.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

It is amazing how people will insist on nothing but the police until the word compensation is mentioned. It was handed out in huge dollops by the hotel in order to keep the incident quiet. For the sake of a wasted afternoon and a packet of Rolos, I received three night's free accommodation plus the princely sum of two hundred Scottish pounds.

All I have been able to ascertain is that, by switching on the strobe lights after we had been lulled into such a near hypnotic state, the whole audience had effectively been put into a kind of trance from which we only awoke almost as one, long after Humphries had gone. I have been unable to squeeze any information from the staff or management as to the credentials of the now infamous professor, or his whereabouts - or anything else about him in fact, so that is why I decided to invest my almost useless Scottish money in hiring a Private Detective.

He is an odd fellow, an Englishman currently 'visiting his Scottish offices'. It transpires that at this time of year he normally works in and around Salisbury, but for four days during the waxing phase of the moon which he spends up here in Scotland. He also spends one night every three months, preferably during a new moon for some reason, squatting in a tent in Romney Marsh. Quite why he does this he seemed reluctant to tell me.

When he handed over his card I noticed several strange things immediately - well who wouldn't, when presented with a business card with no name or address on it? All that appeared on the little white square were the words 'Shamanic Detective' in bold letters and then underneath that 'Spiritual Arbitrator' in slightly smaller script. What any of it is supposed to mean I have no idea.

"Call me Eric," he said.

"Eric," I repeated, "Ok." He then hesitated a moment.

"No, hang on. Not Eric, Vincent. Yes, that's it. Vincent. Vince."

"Fine," I said, although somewhat puzzled. "Vince is fine. And your last name?"

There was another moment's pause. "Dragon. Vince Dragon." I had to laugh. In a thick Scottish accent he told me it was highly rude up here to mock someone's name.

"I didn't know you were Scottish," I said.

"Aa'm no, but it's still bad manners," he replied.

"I'm sorry," I said finally, "I don't mean to mock your name, I just thought it a little unfortunate that you are what you are with a name like that: a Private Dick, with the initials V.D."

***

### CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

A strange job, I'll say that much. Some mad professor nicking peoples' food, ties and shoes. No obvious connection, but a hunch told me he would have headed down South and as the Moon was nearly in Her full face I followed him.

It wasn't long before I realised my hunch was spot on. The guy I'd hitched with had stopped at a transport café for a break. I bought myself a cup of tea and had a herbal Pipe to try and get a trace on things - to see if I was heading in the right direction. And lo and behold, when I stepped back outside of the dingy place, wiping the grease my hands had picked up from the door handle onto my trousers, I spied a piece of stolen merchandise on the opposite side of the car park.

There was a young and unnecessarily rotund woman was sitting in her frozen foods delivery van with the door open, about to eat a piece of flapjack. I might have missed it, but at that moment the Pipe kicked in and I noticed traces of a strobe light still dancing between the oats that made up the base. I strode across the broken, pot-holed tarmac and confiscated the aforementioned confectionery item, telling her it must be taken to be used as evidence.

She looked at me with cold blue eyes and said nothing. She didn't look convinced though, so I began to explain a bit more about the circumstances involved as I felt I owed it to her. She listened to my speech impassively and then, slowly extracting herself from her tatty vehicle, she stood and faced me.

She blinked once and when her eyes opened again I was staring straight into a pair of swirling, baleful pits filled with all the fury of the Seven Hells. She held me like that, rooted to the spot for several moments before speaking and when she finally did her voice cut through me like a chainsaw. I was forced to shut my eyes and clasp my hands to my head in order to stop it being sliced apart by the words which tore through my mind like a dentist's drill.

Eyes still shut and ears suddenly inoperative, I read what she was saying as angry lines on the blackboard of my mind. The exact words are insignificant, but were to the effect that should I fail to hand back her flapjack - which she had apparently been given by a well to do businessman she had met yesterday. He'd bought too much and otherwise it would only be thrown away - she would ram the king size Twix lying on her dashboard up my anal tract and also punch my face to the back of my head.

I considered it was more important finding that I was on the right trail than in collecting every scrap of evidence which came my way, so I handed the item back without pursuing the point any further and made myself scarce until Joe – my ride - was ready to go again.

Once Joe had finished his English brekkie we continued Southwards, only this time, thanks to my Pipe, I was aware that we were being watched by the beady little gaze of the thousands of Gnomes that dwell within the cats' eyes, lining the roads. They weren't for letting on what they were looking for – kept disappearing whenever I tried to catch their eyes' – but for them to take an interest there must be more to this than meets the eye.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

I have been brought up to date with my detective's progress, whose name is apparently Geeza Vermies. He is always cautious of giving out his real name to anybody he meets.

"There are some dodgy characters out there you know," he explained to me.

Pots and blackened kettles rose unbidden into my mind as he said it, I must just say. I had decided to let him follow the professor alone for a while however, because in the meantime I have received an important tip off with regards to my Scottish investigations.

It is a little known fact, I am told by the natives around these parts, that the radio transmitter was invented in Scotland years before it caught on in the rest of the civilised world. Many years before. The world at large might have been wowed by Marconi and his machine in 1896, but up here they had known about transmitting messages over the airwaves for ages.

And I mean ages.

If all I have been told is true, then simply by tapping the horns of cows - or some other horned ungulate - and then listening up close with the aid of a large sea shell, one could listen to a myriad of frequencies.

Similarly, by repeating the first part of the process and then speaking through the shell, you could send messages. It was as easy as that. Due to the Aberdeen Angus and other long horned varieties indigenous to the area, it is said by the locals that there was a complex intercommunications network established by the Celtic peoples thousands of years before the birth of Christ!

It is further claimed that the ancients were in communication, not only with the Native American Indians, who used buffalo as their medium, but also the Chinese and the multitudinous population of the sub-continent. I also heard a local legend that the Scandinavians spoke to the Celts - and others - using a technique called Norse Code, but I feel this goes beyond the boundaries of my investigation.

And so it was that I was staying in a guest house just on the outskirts of Edinburgh when my mobile phone announced that somebody wanted to talk to me. It was Mr. Vermies, and he had discovered something new.

"Reading," was all he said after I had greeted him.

"I beg your pardon?" I said. "Is that Mr. Vermies?"

"Yeah, yeah," he came back impatiently. He was obviously excited and wanted to skip the niceties. "Look, I'm in Reading; or nearby anyway. He's been here! I'm right onto him!" Good news indeed! "Well, almost."

Ahh.

He claims that our wily Professor is no more that two days ahead. How he knows this, or quite what he means by it he wouldn't say. Two days to get to Reading? What's he doing, walking? However, I am paying the man so all I can do is trust his information to be correct, and begin to think about making my way down there.

***

### CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

I picked up more signs of my quarry along the banks of the upper reaches of the Thames, on the outskirts of Pangbourne, a village on the borders of Oxfordshire and Berkshire as exclusive as it is picturesque. It's about four or five miles North-west of Reading. The vibratory patterns this Humphries has left in the vegetation are as easy to follow as an eight lane motorway. At one particular point he had stopped and by leaving hard, tangible evidence, the Professor has made a big mistake.

Alerted by swirling bands and spirals floating as rainbows on the surface of the river, I came across his scent. Carelessly left in a small patch of rushes by a still sleeping chestnut tree between the water and the railings of a pub garden was a small bag of rubbish screwed up with some highly significant bread and pastry crusts. These were definitely alien to the area - ducks, otters and various rodents make up the majority of the fauna to be found around here and I doubt very much that any of them nipped off to the pie shop for lunch.

And if any of them did, at least they'd have put their garbage in the bloody bin! I know pubs take a dim view of people using their facilities these days if they're not customers, but I don't think they'd mind about the rubbish! The fact that this guy dumps litter all around the countryside makes me even more determined to grab him. That really sticks in my craw.

Anyway, the trail is no more than two days old. Hopefully I can nab him for the weekend.

Later...

Damn! He's smarter than I thought. I tracked him all the way through Reading only to find he has got himself onto the M4 and gone off towards London! It's like a bloody Wasp's nest that place, but I have no choice; I have got to follow him. I had already parted company with Joe – Reading was as far as he was going – so I've now got to find myself another lift.

Even if I had my car with me there is no way I'd be driving into the City, not a chance mate! Congestion, congestion charges, road rage, astronomical parking fees – I vowed long ago never to take my car into London again. So here I am, stood at Junction 10 where the Professor's trail heads East, trying to thumb a lift to the Big Smoke.

Ah, here we go \- a lorry has just pulled up. Right then, to London.

Later, again...

Damn it, he's slipped the net! I kind of knew that once he made it to London his trail was as good as lost, but hope drove me on. Bernard Hope, of Hopes' Haulage to be precise. He was delivering a truckload of new, blue plastic seats to one of the football stadiums dotted around the capital. A likeable guy and very well spoken for a lorry driver. He told me he started out as a mechanic before switching to work for one of the main banks in a small Lincolnshire town. Through the years he worked his way up to become manager of the branch, but he said his heart had always been in engines, so he quit and started his own haulage company.

I asked him how he coped with all the aggression you find on the roads these days. He said it was nothing compared to all the hassles and shenanigans he had to deal with in the bank.

"Besides," he continued motioning to his thirty-something ton lorry, "people don't tend to get angry with this. They store it up and let it all out on some unsuspecting granny further on down the road."

Eventually he dropped me off pretty centrally – Zone Two, tube users would have called it. With so many people bustling about I would have had enough trouble latching onto him if I was only half an hour behind, but nearly two days? This was going to be difficult. Very difficult.

However, a quick toke on Old Smokey showed me quite an aura of blackness which he'd left in his wake, so although it was pretty laborious I finally managed to track him South of the River to a phone box in Kennington where he had made a few calls. No one else had used the box, amazingly, but it was damned hard getting a trace. I could only pick up hints of the first call. I knew he had made a couple of others, but how many and to whom there was no way of knowing.

The phone itself was like putrid treacle and I had to make sure I didn't put the receiver too near my head or else I would have got a load of sticky, tar-like strands – the decomposing left-overs from his voice - all over me. It was bad enough getting them on my hands, but if they had gone down my ears, or in my mouth - urrrgh! Foul, man.

Anyway his call had been to a British Airways booking agents and as I tried to pour my mind into the memory of the phone line I had to fight through clouds of distortion so thick that it was not so much cutting through them with a knife as having to hack through them like a Victorian explorer, carving his way through the jungles of the Congo. Too much damned time has elapsed! Africa is all I got. He is going to Africa, and he is going tonight. First class.

So now I have got to contact Cripplesby to see what he wants to do. If we are still going ahead with the case then I had better find out exactly where he has gone to. There is something about this guy. I don't know what it is yet, but I'm picking up some very dodgy vibes about him. He's as slippery as an eel in butter and is hiding his tracks pretty well.

The fact that he is trying to hide them at all reaffirms that he's up to something - whatever this is about, I've only glimpsed the tip of the iceberg. There is more to this than meets the eye. Much more.

Something ugly. Something tricky.

Tricky, perhaps, but not impossible.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Having had an early start, I am currently on the six forty-seven stopping train from Edinburgh to London, where I am meeting Mr. Vermies to discuss the case further.

Now trains are all well and good; I could have taken a plane, but this way I have limited my so-called carbon footprint and they do help to keep cars off the roads, so I am all for them in principle. The thing is though, the rail system we have here in England is like an old farmer who has laboured for many, many years in the sleeting rain, howling wind, and driving snow.

It has been baked by long, hot summers and subjected to wild, wet winters. Now is the time when it should be metaphorically tucked up by a crackling fire, the work having been taken over by a horde of doting grandchildren. Instead though, it is still out there toiling away as if it were still young and sprightly. Which it most definitely, definitely is not.

In a word, it is knackered. If it is possible for an entire transport system to have developed arthritis, then this one has. Privatisation has done nothing to improve things and the whole system creaks and groans in constant complaint. It is slow, dirty, and its movements are laboured. I suspect that even Stephenson's Rocket could easily over-take the train I am in right now, such is its inability to pick up speed.

And the people who use these fatigue-ridden carriages - do they bring rubbish specifically in with them in order to spread it around in as wide an area as possible? Perhaps the station is closer than the dump for some people, I don't know. I boarded this train at the point of departure. That is to say the journey began there. It had not been to or come from anywhere else, yet it was already dirty. Do they never clean them? Or is there some sort of pixie that comes out at night, casting litter hither and thither with a filthy wave of her magic wand?

Still, I made my choice so here I am; it cannot be helped. The reason for my unhappy travelling is that it would appear the elusive Mr. Humphries has left these fair isles we love to call home, and bade a hasty retreat, to Africa of all places.

Mr Vermies has put it to me that I have some decisions to make. Should I drop the whole thing and try to stay focused on Scotland? Or do I carry on paying the mysterious 'Shamanic Detective'? I am unsure of his methods, but he certainly seems to have tracked him down somehow or other. Is it worth the expense in packing him off to big game country? He insists that it is.

But then he would do, wouldn't he?

I for one was looking forward to spending a glorious summer 'over the border', perhaps finding out how the sporran got its name and many other interesting historical truths, which would help me to understand my Celtic cousins and therefore – hopefully - lessen the need for me to spend almost every waking hour thinking about the place.

Surely if I was that committed in catching up with the mad professor I would have to go myself to the sunny continent with G Vermies Esq., denying myself the summer just described and replacing it with one of dust, disease and insects.

Having said that though, if I did go to Africa I would be guaranteed the sun, roving purposefully across the plains of the Masai Mara, spotting elephants and dodging poachers' bullets. If I wanted a good tan in Aberdeen this summer, I would be better advised to go to Malcolm MacGin's Sun Parlour as opposed to relying on dear old Mother Nature. Unfortunately it is an indisputable fact that, laying wistful romanticism aside for a while, the influence of nature's sun between the months of June and September up here is not so much that of a Mother as an obscure Great Aunt living alone and undisturbed in St. Ives.

It is something I shall have to think long and hard about on my way down to London. Thankfully, due to the nature of my chosen method of transport, 'long' will not be a problem. You see? There is always a silver lining if you look for it.

***

### CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

OK. I know he has gone to Africa, but that is a fairly large net to cast, let's face it. I've got to narrow it down somehow, to a single country or at least East, North, South, or West. Something. Anything. Otherwise I might as well just give up the chase completely – and I have a funny feeling in my bones that I need to stay with this one.

Last night I spent a night as close to the River as I could get, in a grubby little backpackers' hostel on the South Bank. The Sun has dipped down again now though, another day gone, and I have retreated to a small pub back across the River called the Apple Tree. It is a cosy little place, filled to brim almost entirely with postmen for some reason. Weird. I've got myself settled into a nice secluded alcove with a table and a window and have decided to call upon the aid of a couple of Mick Jaggers which I managed to procure yesterday evening.

I figured that under these circumstances I needed a bit more of a kick. The Smoke's great, but I wasn't handling London very well and it just wasn't cutting through – so many people, so much going on, so many disturbances and so little time.

It's me that's at fault, not the Smoke, but there you go. I needed something stronger; I knew that without a doubt.

As I was looking for the Backpacker's earlier on I had seen a hooded man lurking around underneath that enormous railway bridge near Waterloo Station. As soon as I'd clapped eyes on him I knew what he was up to. Fortunately when I went back he was still there.

"Evening," I said to him as I approached, quite obviously fiddling with a tobacco pouch, as if to display I was running low. He eyed me warily from beneath the hood, but stood his ground.

"I, err, I was wondering if you could help me out," I said, again shaking the pouch about a bit. His bloodshot eyes narrowed to slits momentarily. I guess I must have passed his test.

"What d'you want then?"

His body language gave him away to be all street tough and bluster. The same sort you'll find in any part of any city, anywhere in the World. It is never pleasant having to do business with these types, but there you go. Neither of us wanting to take too long about it I decided to get straight to the point.

"I want to get off my chops mate." Talk to them in language they understand.

He dropped his guard enough to allow a half-smile break out, and then he put his hand out to shake. It was cold, pale and unpleasant.

"My name's Simon, but friends call me Charlie," he said. Bingo. He'd be able to sort me out. "What you after mate?" he asked. "Smoke or powder or pills?"

"Actually I was looking for a bit of acid."

"Yep, yep; I can do that. How much we talking?"

"Ahh, couple of tabs is all." He looked disappointed, but I shrugged an apology. "Hey, sorry Charlie, but there's only me here."

He tried flogging them for a fiver each if you can believe it, and then kept on reaching into various pockets and pouches, trying desperately to get me to buy some of his other wares.

"Got some wicked strong skunk mate. Dead trippy – could be up your street?"

Eventually I gave him four pounds and came away. The two tiny, cardboard tabs I'd bought were each decorated with a big set of thick, rubbery lips, a tongue and teeth, hence the name – Mick Jaggers.

"Go steady with 'em," Charlie had told me as he handed them over in the smallest size of seal-top bag. "They're good and strong these mate. Can get away from you if you let 'em." Sounds like just what I needed.

I thanked him and left and now I've banged them both down they do feel quite strong. There's a good buzz about them, a good kick, and very informative they are becoming, even as we speak - well, even as I write.

I am beginning to detect aromas of a deep, deep earthy smell and looking down into my cup of coffee I can now see a rainbow of browns and tans that wasn't there before, spinning and circling round and around. The rich scent of coffee fills my nose, taking over my head and quickly consuming my whole body.

As I shut my eyes there are swarms of space invaders buzzing about, dancing hypnotically left and then down, right and then down, left, right, down, left, right, down! Down, down, down! Each time they drop down a row the whole world shakes as if a mountain just fell over. On the walls and table tops of the pub there are pictures, pint pots and ashtrays jumping all over the place, but no one else seems to have noticed.

Gradually these pixelated aliens drop below my line of sight, grinning at me as they go, with only my teeth rattling in their settings and a wispy vapour trail left lingering in the air to mark their passing.

In their wake they leave sets of life sized antlers and horns, tossing to and fro amongst the thickets of coffee which have suddenly sprung up. Next, these antlers start to grow people underneath them - like a horses' hoof, growing downwards. These then begin strutting down a long, low cat walk in a variety of clothes: blacks, reds and greens, melding and merging and blurring together eventually to take on a wholly safari look.

Once the khaki safari gear dominates the apparel of the antlered models, a host of babbling, overweight figures appears like a mote of dust on my eyeball, swimming and dancing in my vision, yet they disappear as soon as I try to look at them directly. They are ghostly white in colour, that pale, sickly shade that makes people look as if they need to get out in the Sun a bit more – a bit like Simon really, or Charlie, or whatever his name was. Only much, much fatter. Binoculars hang around their necks' without exception.

Aha! It is becoming clearer now... Black, red and green, somewhere in Africa, where they grow coffee, and obviously have a large amount of safari to tempt the tourists.

It has got to be Kenya doesn't it? Doesn't it? South Africa? No, there's some blue on their flag somewhere. I think. So, Kenya...

And now I'm seeing a kaleidoscope through eyes a good eight to ten inches in front of me. I have a strong feeling that I am going to get well and truly Jaggered tonight.

Sit back and enjoy...

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

My satchel is considerably lighter than when I left the Monastery and many miles have been covered in these two weeks hence, during which time it is my sorry duty to note down that never have I seen such chaos and sufferance! Woeful though I am to report it, it has not just been in one, but in _all_ of the villages and hamlets through which this emissary of Beelzebub has smeared his evil taint - on each occasion it has been my deep misfortune to have to follow and witness the misery left in his wake.

A well spoken prayer and a choice concoction of the various medicinal herbs I carry for such purposes is all I can offer the simple folk whose minds have been so abused by my quarry. Alas, but I cannot afford to spend the time I would like in helping these people as I cannot waver in my pursuit of such a rogue, the likes of which I feel the world has never seen since before the days of Judas himself.

In the worst cases of his demonic manipulations his victims are wont to show severe outbreaks of delusion and delirium, incessant mutterings and wild gesticulations. All gibber distressingly about this odd looking character and the magic he makes, and also about the singing demons he carries with him.

Strange. And most disquieting.

One man I felt especially sorry for was a certain master 'Dundee' Jock McBride, a traveller in these parts from across the Borders no less, hailing from the eastern coast of Scotia. I feel great shame that this man, a visitor to our fair Kingdom, could have been so rudely and fatefully accosted, robbed of all the monies that he had brought with him from his homelands and then bewitched to the point of idiocy.

So whilst a goodly part of me wishes to tarry longer in order to administer to these poor unfortunates, a far greater urge presses me on forthwith, with narry a thought for my own safety. Oftentimes have I had to remind myself that this task to which I have been appointed is such a one as has been bestowed upon me by the very highest of authorities. The Lord _Himself_ has commanded me to rid the world of this cursed Hell Spawn and so that it what I must surely do!

Wheresoever this fiend despoileth the earth with his foul footfall I am duty bound to follow and whensoever I finally happen upon him, this malevolent blackguard, this terror incarnate... well, there can be no argument with the Heavenly Father. I will smite him down!

I feel no fear peculiarly enough, but it could be that I am so consumed with pity for all the casualties I have seen along my way that as yet I have not found time to allow the seeds of fear and doubt to take root in my head. Not to be discounted though, in this warding off of my fear, are the blessings from my very own Monastery which bring me more succour than anybody might know. Indeed, it is quite by accident that I happened to overhear a conversation on the night before I left St. Malcolm's which, although it causes my chest to sinfully swell with pride whenever I think of it, it nevertheless has provided me with an immeasurable comfort thus far.

Having stolen back to His Grace's quarters to empty the excess horse feed out into his private rose garden, I was creeping back through his rooms when I heard the unmistakable sound of the Abbott's voice issuing from behind the door to his inner vestibule.

I would hope that any reader will not think that I stopped in order to eavesdrop. The truth of the matter is that I was forced to freeze for fear of my unwieldy sandals flapping awkwardly and giving me away. As I stood like a guilty child caught scrumping apples in the western orchard, it became apparent that the Abbott had somebody in there with him. They seemed in the midst of discussing something.

"So he's _definitely_ going?" It sounded like Prior Job Pedloe, second in the hierarchy at St. Malcolm's, answering only to the Abbott himself.

"Yes. Tomorrow before dawn."

"Well thank _God_ for that!" Prior Pedloe exclaimed.

"Indeed," came the more measured tones of the Abbott.

"Finally he is on his way! Glory be!"

Could I believe what I was hearing? Unless my ears were deceiving me I could have sworn I heard then the sounds of a set of goblets being clunked together, as if in a toast. _Could this be true_? I thought to myself as I stood there, cold and breathless in the middle of His Grace's woollen rug. Not only were these two most important men of my order actually discussing me, but they were also _raising a toast_ to my endeavours! I was touched beyond words.

"So who do you think this maniac is then?" the Abbott was asked.

"I don't know, just some lunatic probably; some peasant finally driven mad by a life of serfdom and repression."

"You don't think there's any chance that... that Sadfael might not...?"

"Now Prior," His Grace's voice floated through the door. "We can but put our trust in God and hope that in His ineffable wisdom Sadfael is... taken care of. Whatever the eventual outcome of it all, I shouldn't wonder that Brother Sadfael will be gone for a long, long time."

Well, I can tell you that hearing all of this brought a huge lump to my throat. It had not go unnoticed by me that here was the Abbott talking with Prior Pedloe, his right hand man – the very man to whom St. Malcolm's was entrusted in His Grace's absence – and yet he was playing down the nature of my mission, even to him!

Claiming in his unruffled manner that this Demon is simply a poor lunatic, the Abbott is attempting to shield even the prestigious members of the High Table from the full burden of this painful happenstance.

That His Grace should see fit to do this, that he should keep the truth even from his most trusted Brethren causes me to fairly brim over with a sense of duty. I must confess that his supposition that I will be away for a lengthy period of time did sink my heart like a rock in a bog, but remembering his faith in me is a veritable Tower of Strength.

And of course, I also have God on my side, which is deeply comforting...

***

### CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Arrgh! I've got to get this down while I still can! I am sitting, cross-legged on my chair, when suddenly I'm staring down my own throat as if I were using one of those doctor's fibre optic cameras. A gaping hole opens up, revealing a toothless jaw into which I am swallowed whole. This new tunnel is held open by C-shaped rings of thick cartilage, running parallel to my trachea. After only a short distance, which takes an immeasurably long period of time to travel, it branches off and I go with it.

Plummeting down in this new direction, gyrating and rotating as I go, I find myself surrounded by a thousand shades of black, more dazzling than any colours I have ever seen. Agghh! I'm still spinning and tumbling, careering out of control down the tunnel which has suddenly widened into a limitless, swirling void – what's that? A sound! Faint yet insistent. What is it?

I am floating now. As soon as I heard that noise I stopped falling. But what _is_ it? It is somehow familiar... A buzzing? Purring? I can't make it out, it is too... distant. I must try to get closer.

I can actually swim through this inky blackness, but it is thick like molasses and I am sweating already. Whenever I stop moving, to listen and try to get my bearings in relation to the sounds, I find I am bobbing and floating about like an Otter, without any effort at all. As soon as I head off again towards the noise though, I am back to swimming in a sea of glue. Jesus, I'm knackered! It is like being caught in a rip tide, but I am... almost... there –

Arrrgh! A roaring, angry sound slashes through my eardrums, reverberating maniacally as the taste of oil and smoke fouls my mouth! The roaring changes to a throaty revving sound, and a few faces whirl fleetingly past my vision. Sinister faces.

Something is about to go wrong.

Laughing faces in dark glasses! Cruel faces, circling, taunting, laughing...

Stop. Stop! Oh! Christ, make them stop!

Quick! They've turned their backs' on me, turned to look inwards. Oh Gods, their malice - I can feel it from here! And the noise - it's unbearable! They're focussing on someone, inside the ring they have formed. Such malevolence! Such wanton menace!

But why? And who? Who is the unfortunate soul in the middle being choked in the poison given off by that noise?

Cripplesby!

It's Elliot Cripplesby. I've got to get to him! Got to warn him. His face! Distorting in a scream of pain! I must get to him! They're laughing! Oh Gods, stop laughing! Look out!

He turns to look at me and a black hole bursts forth from his straining lips. Once more I am dazzled by the blackness. I know now with a terrifying certainty that I must get to him, I _must_ reach him, before they do. Whoever _they_ are.

All I can do is to swim blindly in the darkness, groping for the light that will lead me out of here. And fast. Cripplesby is in serious trouble.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

I now find myself more alone and confused than I have ever been in all my life. I shall endeavour, by these writings, to glean perhaps a small part of the explanation as to how I am... wherever it is I am. Much have I prayed to the Holy Father, but so far He has chosen not to answer, so all I can do is record the facts leading up to my present predicament in the hope that by doing so some answers and perchance some much prayed for guidance will be sent my way.

I had through Divine Guidance and, methinks, not a small amount of luck, caught up with my quarry sooner than I had thought possible. He was not difficult to follow mind you - it was like following Johnston le Hat's heifers after they had escaped and fled through the wheat field last year – only a thousand times more harrowing. I simply went from ruined village, to battered hamlet, through each of which a wide swathe of chaos and confusion had been cut.

Oh! Was it only yesterday that I came to stand atop that craggy hill, overlooking the site where this demonic fiend had apparently been trapped? It seems like an impossible eternity to me now.

Even without him in sight, the crowd's reactions were too obvious to be coincidence. There was a small, single roomed hut surrounded by at least two score enraged God-fearing peoples of all denominations: peasant farmers, through soldiers and militiamen right up to the mounted nobles of a nearby keep. Fiery brands were being wielded, Holy Bibles were being quoted from, spears were brandished and accusations were flying about like nesting birds, flitting from one end of the mob to the other in a matter of moments.

I muttered a silent prayer to give me strength for the confrontation to come, and headed down the grassy knoll into the morass, where I made the Lord's presence known. After a moment or two, all but a few recalcitrant herdsmen were quiet, and I asked for a spokesman to tell me what the disturbance was concerned with.

Unsurprisingly, it was one of the mounted peers that spoke. He declared himself to be Duke Duster of Nine Feathers Castle, a stout upholder of the law and a devout Christian. I could not help raising my eyebrows slightly at this, as I noticed the lack of a crucifix around the Nobleman's throat.

He explained that a moustachioed madman had attempted to subvert his entire population of serfs with evil demons and witchery. Thankfully he said they had not been duped, despite many of them being afflicted by his hideous spells. They had chased him as far as this hovel, kept him here whilst a sizable force was mustered, and they were now set to burn him for the abomination he undoubtedly was.

I held my hand aloft at this juncture however and told them of my Holy Mission, from God Himself, to rid the land of this accursed fellow, whom I had been pursuing now for several weeks. They immediately conceded that if that were indeed the case then it was now well and truly in God's hands. For the time being at least they agreed to hold back their torches and bade me luck, one and all, as I approached the door to the peasant's house.

Immediately as I reached the door though I heard a tortured sobbing from within and turned sharply to the crowd who were by now eager with anticipation of seeing the Lord's work done and justice served. With a calmness that belied the tumultuous feelings that were running amuck inside my puny body I caught the Duke's eye and asked who else was in there.

In their satanically inspired bloodlust, perhaps pardonable under such trying circumstances, the gathered menfolk had neglected to mention that two individuals - the local hounds' man, and a visiting London dog breeder to the high society - were trapped inside, along with the demonic cause of all this mayhem.

Fearing the worst, but resolute, I squared my shoulders, breathed deeply and entered.

What I saw inside sent my mind reeling in an instant! I had told the ugly mob outside to take no action unless I did not re-emerge in half an hour, but I could not help wishing that I had not intervened at all and instead had allowed the crowd to burn the hut and its occupants \- all of them - to the ground.

I know these are sinful thoughts indeed, but at least in taking that particular course of action I would have been saved from the terrifying moments that followed!

Indeed, I would also have been spared the torment I am going through now... To continue though:

There were flashing lights, as if a hundred multi-coloured will-o-wisps had been encased inside a number of boxes that lined one wall. The boxes were of metal I believe, but of a craftsmanship so fine that it would have been any Smith's proudest day to show them off at his Village Fete. Also, there was a myriad of... I know not what - similar to ropes, yet much thinner and smoother - and these were criss-crossing all over two thirds of the room, like a tangled fishing net.

Cowering to my right as I entered were the two innocents whom I had been told about: the Londoner, Paul Coddingtail and lying wounded in his lap was Albert Brass, the hounds' man. The gentleman, Mr Coddingtail seemed remarkably on top of the situation and was keeping his head admirably. Mr Brass, however, would not last long I feared, as he was gibbering like a madman, thrashing and flailing about uncontrollably.

Unfortunately I never had the chance to go to his aid directly however, as it was at this point that my eyes fell upon the very Antichrist himself! Surely this was the Devil in a human incarnation and although finding strength in my faith, I now feared for much more than my life.

He – It - was connected to the boxes on the wall by a cluster of metallic tubes that appeared to suck on his head like a horde of leeches. I noticed that two of these led to a small, sealed casket upon which I was able to read the inscription 'Caravan, 12 Volts', although what this could have meant I did not have the time to speculate. After the event I can suppose this chest once belonged to a trader's caravan, perhaps of twelve wagons in length and that it once was the property of a Mr Volt – however, this is nought but idle speculation and quite irrelevant as to what happened next.

I crave the forgiveness of whomever is reading this account, but please try to understand that at the time of writing I am searching for anything – even a minor detail such as this – which may help me regain control of my most pitiable situation. I freely admit that I am desperate! Anyway, back to the events as they transpired inside the hovel.

This devil, his eyes were quite clearly mad and the poor soul who had originally inhabited this body I can only hope had been mercifully pushed aside long ago, at the moment his body had been completely possessed. It was an hideous sight, and I at once crossed myself and began the exorcism rite I had been revising daily since my hurried departure from St. Malcolm's. The Demon stared straight at me, feigning surprise.

"What's this?" he snorted. I immediately retorted with the next lines of the Latin incantation. He collapsed and I wondered hopefully if this would be easier than I had imagined. It quickly transpired though that he was laughing.

"Oh no!" he mocked. "It's the Exorcist, come to get me!" He screamed with more insane laughter which fair chilled my blood.

Somehow I maintained enough presence of mind to motion for the two unfortunates to try and get out whilst I kept the Luciferian menace at bay. The next three lines of the Rite issued forth from my mouth to which the Lord of Illusion doubled up again in fits of wicked cackling.

"Hokus pokus, gobble-di-gookus," his gutter-tongue spewed back at me, each word poisoning the air with its foul blasphemy. "Espiritu Santi, my fat Auntie," his abominations continued. "By the love of Christ and all that!" He waved a dangerous finger at me. "Don't forget 'Get thee behind me Satan!'"

How I longed to close off my ears, to shut my eyes, to flee from the hovel and this devil incarnate, but the strength of God suffused my body allowing me somehow stand up to his despicable tauntings.

"Look," he said in yet another tone of voice, "I hope you're not expecting my head to turn green and spin round full circle, projectile vomiting and all that."

I neither knew nor cared what he was talking about. I simply continued unbroken in my chant, speaking louder and louder as I went on in order to drown out his foul insanities. Eventually I was forced to shout as I neared the end because the lightning infested boxes had begun emitting loud and unearthly sounds.

I stepped closer to the fiend, to drive the incantation home and also to prevent him from doing any more harm to the two men who, mercifully, I could see from the corner of my eye, were making good their escape through the door. The brave Mr. Coddingtail was having to drag poor Mr. Brass to the safety which lay outside, but he managed and by the Grace of God I knew that they were now safe.

As I screamed the last words at the top of my voice, directly into the Demon's face, the power of the exorcism rite began to take hold and smoke began to race from inside the tubes affixed to his head! Again he laughed insanely and his arms shot out to grasp my own - then, a blinding, searing white light, a deafening explosion and now he is nowhere to be seen, and I know not where I am...

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

I never really enjoyed visiting London as the whole size of the sprawling conurbation just seems wholly unnatural to me. I had found a place to stop for the night a few minutes walk from Kings Cross station, where my train had finished up - eventually.

This morning I decided to go for something to eat - a late breakfast, early lunch \- before taking a taxi to my arranged rendezvous with Mr Vermies. Having feasted on a delicious toasted sandwich, one of those slightly greasy ciabattas dripping with mature Scottish cheddar at the splendidly basic Giuseppe's El Snacko, I hailed a cab and set off towards the spot we had arranged to meet.

After roughly three minutes and twenty seconds I had stopped trying to engage in conversation with the driver, and instead I interspersed his nasal monologue with "Yes. Really? Ugh, hmm," and ironic laughter at what I assumed to be appropriate moments. Before the half way stage of my journey, I began to notice a gradual increase in the presence of policemen and to my surprise and alarm, members of Her Majesty's Armed Forces.

Quite abruptly, the cabby stopped at a particularly seedy-looking street corner and refused to take me any further. When I asked him why, he simply told me that the presence of so many officers of the law was making him nervous and that I could walk the rest of the way in "less than two minutes," if I took a short cut across a nearby estate. He was deaf to my repeated protestations, so eventually I paid him his fare and left the vehicle, stalking off towards the supposed short cut.

Forty-five minutes later and I came to the conclusion that the driver had been lying. I was by now, of course, hopelessly lost, so I decided to ask one of the natives for directions.

About a block away I spotted a scrawny tree which was apparently being guarded by a corporal of the aforementioned body of fighting men. I thought that I would be safer in these strange parts to ask a man in uniform than to trust my luck with an everyday Joe citizen, so I approached him smiling. My amiability was not returned however, and my questions were answered with a short and curt response.

"You want to get locked up?" he snarled. "Go on, bugger off!"

Apparently there had been a number of bomb scares in and around this part of the capital in the last few days and I was informed quite gruffly that any time wasted on me could better be spent in looking out for 'terrorist scum'.

"What d'you think I am – bloody Tourist Information? Go on, get!" When I simply stared open-mouthed at the chap's undisguised hostility he looked me up and down and added "Unless of course you're one of _them_ , deliberately trying to distract me..."

Honestly, this whole 'War on Terror' business has brought the very worst out in people. The reasoning behind first of all making a man live in fear and then giving him a gun and a uniform is one that has escaped me from the start.

Be that as it may, the thought of being detained by this obviously power-hungry, unpleasant young man made his advice seem sound, however rudely it had been delivered, so I moved on fairly quickly without making further issue, although I did take his number so I could report his inexcusable behaviour to the proper authorities at a more appropriate time - as if they'd listen. The days of reasonable tones and subjective argument have all-but died out, from what I see in life going on around me. Only those who shout the loudest get heard in modern times, or so it seems.

Anyway, a few moments later I spied a shaven headed youth of around nine or ten years, so I made my way over and addressed the question of my whereabouts to him, offering him a crisp Scottish pound note in return for information. He eyed the money up with an ever-narrowing stare, before suddenly snatching it from my hands without a word and legging it through a hole in the adjacent fence.

I found myself once more stunned by the downright anti-social behaviour of the folk around these parts before walking off, disgruntled, down an alleyway in search of a more cooperative person who could help me extricate myself from this dirty backwater and send me on my way towards Geeza and our meeting, which was drawing ever nearer.

After a further half an hour or so of hearty walking - striding purposefully, arms swinging and chest puffed out with as much enthusiasm as you would find in any high street fitness video - I noticed that I had finally left the run-down residential area behind me. The squat terraced houses and pathetically sparse and sickly looking trees had been replaced by huge, domineering skyscrapers, sneering down at me from their smooth and impersonal mirror-glass walls.

In a street that I was highly surprised to find deserted, I found myself at the foot of the London Stock Exchange, examining the emblem and motto of that venerable institution set above the door at the top of a short flight of steps. Somehow I had found my way into the financial district. That was _miles_ out of the way!

Suddenly, amidst a roaring of powerful engines and a constricting cloud of black smoke I found myself face to face with several bikers, dressed in sharp, fashionable suits and sat astride a variety of motor cycles of all shapes and sizes. I appeared to be the focus of their attention for reasons which were about to me made painfully clear to me.

It all seems a bit of a blur now, sitting here writing this and it is highly possible, even probable, that I have missed out large chunks of activity, but here is how I remember it - and you have to remember that it all happened so fast...

I was being harassed by seven, maybe eight executive, stock market bikers dressed in expensive suits and sunglasses, wearing menacing faces. There they were, circling me, revving up their engines and laughing in a way which would have made the most malcontented, murderous gang from any one of a hundred Hollywood films stop what they were doing, put down their cheap cans of American lager or bourbon or whatever it is they drink, and nod approvingly.

After they had decided I had coughed and choked upon their ghastly fumes for long enough, they responded to a signal from their apparent leader and formed a crude circle around me, trapping me in a menacing henge of bikes. Despite an occasional 'rev' now and again, however, these henchmen melted into the background as the leader, a tall fellow, well over six feet tall with curly hair, waddled forwards. The movement made by his legs on either side of his motorbike reminded me for some reason of a duck emerging clumsily from his pond, not entirely comfortable out of the relative safety of the water. The air was still for a minute, and the sun glinted off a highly polished brass buckle on his left shoe. He smiled. And then spoke in a cultured voice.

"Good morning," despite it being well into the afternoon by now. "You may or may not realize it, but you have something - certain items in your possession - which we are very, _very_ interested in."

I told him that I was only a visitor to London and he must have mistaken me for somebody else.

"Oh, I don't think so," he replied and, with another smile, leant forwards. And there riding pillion, unseen up until now, was the youth who had absconded with my Scottish money! The nerve of it, I thought, and must have taken a step towards him, though as I said before, I cannot remember the exact run of play. However, I must have done something as the man in the driving seat raised his hand.

"Now, now, that is quite close enough thank you." He turned momentarily to the boy. "Is this him?" My identity was confirmed with a monosyllabic grunt and a nod of the head.

"You see good sir," I believe the villain saw himself as some sort of modern day 'charming highwayman', although if this was indeed the case then it's desired effect had not even the merest hold upon me, because, scared as I don't mind admitting I was - to the core - I saw none of the lovable rogue in him at all. "This lad here saw upon your person a large wodge of Scottish pounds. No, no, don't try to deny it. It would not be in the boy's interest to lie to me." This last statement was a cutting response to my attempted protestations. He continued.

"No doubt you know as much as the next man about the highly turbulent fiscal climate we are living in. The Euro teeters almost daily on the very brink of collapse, China owns more Greenbacks than the US Treasury and the markets bounce around like a jack-in-the-box on a bumpy road. You may or may not be aware that the Scottish pound shows every sign of replacing the dollar as the world's leading currency.

"Rumours have been floating about for weeks, but believe me this is not mere idle conjecture – all the predictions can be substantiated easily enough given ten minutes or so on a computer linked to the financial data of the last dozen years. If you know what to look for," he added, "a man can also see a correlation in the commodities market – which is always to be expected, of course."

Of course. What? Did I look like some kind of out of uniform investment official? Did he assume that I, like all of his cronies, had even the _slightest_ inkling of what he was talking about? _Please don't start talking about_ _Sub-Prime interest payments_ _and negative equity_ I pleaded in my head.

"Now I know there are always those who would advise caution with these kinds of speculations and admittedly it is a high risk venture, but just think of the rewards." His eyes glazed over for a moment as he stared out at something only he could see. Then with a brief flick of his curly mop he was back. "Trust me; there is a lot of money to be made in buying Scottish. You are probably well informed of the sudden increase in the prices of such products as porridge, tartan materials, dried thistles and the like." Then with a nod and a wink, "and between you and me, cabers are due to make a meteoric rise.

"However, I digress. I see that you are standing there a little bemused, wondering to yourself what exactly is the nub of my gist. And in a nutshell sir, it is this: I would like you to hand over your Scottish currency to me. All of it.

"Now perhaps 'insist' is too strong a word, but if you fail to do so willingly the consequences _will_ be dire."

What choice did I have? I reached for my wallet.

***

### CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Having seen what I had seen in my trip last night I knew I had to act fast! Immediately when I came to back in my bed at the dingy hostel I filled my Pipe with a mixture of herbs and 'shrooms, lit him up and offered him to the four directions. East first, then South, West and North, asking for their advice. I then offered the smoke to the Sky Father above, the Earth Mother beneath my bare feet, the Sun, and Grandmother Moon.

Once I had called upon all of the Spirits of Nature, I smoked the Pipe empty, wet my finger and cleaned him out. And then I waited, breathing rhythmically, first from just my throat, then from my chest cavity, and finally bringing my diaphragm into action. Four breaths of each individually before closing my eyes and breathing from all three areas of my respiratory tract at once, clearly and deeply.

Time distorts during altered states of consciousness so I cannot say how long it was before my vision was upon me. When it came though, it was direct and to the point – if you know how to read these things. It showed me quite clearly the action I had to take.

Tall buildings, some very old and others of much more recent construction were suddenly enveloped by a huge swirling cloud of colours - grey, black and white with here and there flecks of purple and also a metallic green. It was twisting and contorting all the while, never staying still for a minute. After only a short while though the whole cloud lifted high up into the Sky, at which point I saw all of the buildings were gone, eaten away by a trillion acidic white blobs. Where their remains still hissed and smoked there now rose a plaza, large and ornate, a couple of acres across, in the centre of which stood a tall, proud pillar.

The brooding cloud swooped low again and formed the shape of a Bird, her beak pointing towards the financial district of the City. Then a hole opened up in the main portion of her body where her stomach would normally be positioned. This hole then filled, bit by bit, and the cloud descended still further, coming to rest on a solitary figure in the square. As it did so, it exploded into thousands of Pigeons and the figure was lost in a storm of feathers - grey, black, white, purple and the same metallic green that I'd seen in the cloud from which they'd been born.

Knowing now what was to be done I tore several pieces of my hair out and burnt them as a thank you to the Spirits. I then wrapped up Old Smokey in his velvet cloth and sprang into action.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Evidently in no hurry, the curly haired leader of the biker gang held my wallet in his left hand and then, one by one, began counting out my Scottish pound notes. Holding the bunch aloft in his raised right hand with each new addition, he received a chorus of cheers, whoops and cries of victory from his thugs around him. I remember one of these cries as being heavily laden with an American accent, as his blood curdling exclamation rang out above the rest: "You're the Man!"

Suddenly, just as I thought my situation was hopeless, bursting from around the corner at the end of the street came my saviour, Mr Vermies! He was running at full pelt straight towards us carrying a large crusty loaf of bread under each arm. Quite how he found me I do not know and _exactly_ how he effected my bizarre yet miraculous escape I am - and will forever more I suspect - remain completely clueless.

The drama unfolded thus: the leader of the bikers must have seen my startled look, as he turned his head to see what was happening behind him. Those of his gang who had their backs to the fast approaching Mr Vermies also followed suit. Yelling a cry of "Cripplesby, run!" Mr Vermies vaulted the circle of bikes, tearing the loaves into rough, large pieces as he did so and flung them up in the air, causing everybody - myself included - to raise their heads skywards.

It was only then that the sun was blotted out by hundreds and hundreds of pigeons which were descending rapidly from the sky! Still running at top speed, Mr Vermies grabbed my wallet from the open-mouthed brigand leader with one hand, my wrist with the other and then dragged me clear, just about, to avoid the screaming - well 'cooing' - mass of hungry birds that had descended upon the scene.

While we fled, I chanced a look over my shoulder and the last I saw of those modern day highwaymen was each and every man-jack of them leaping and running about in panic and confusion, their bikes forgotten in their frantic attempts to flee from the chaotic swarm of feathers, beaks and claws which had by now completely engulfed them.

Having bade a hasty retreat, shocked and somewhat shaken for my part, we took refuge in a cafe where, over a cup of tea and a sticky bun, he told me that the robbery in Eilean Ban and these bikers were undoubtedly linked, although he could not quite see how; not yet.

So as I sat wiping crumbs from around my mouth and slurping the dregs of my drink – don't you just hate it when people leave that last mouthful? You go to pick up the cup and end up spreading half a gallon of cold tea or whatever all over your carpet - I was persuaded by Mr. Vermies to continue with the investigation. Disappearing below street level, we made our way onto the London Underground and headed towards the first of our connections that would take us to Heathrow and thence to Africa.

At one of these stops, above ground once again, we had about a quarter of an hour's wait and while we were stood on the platform I took a little time to examine Mr Geeza Vermies the man. He had long, flowing hair, covered up at the moment by a conspicuous red woolly hat. He stood at around five feet ten inches tall, but it was difficult to judge his build accurately as he was wearing fairly loose fitting black jeans and an Arran sweater which hid his precise contours well. He also wore a comfortable looking pair of well worn brogues and sported a set of small, round, sixties style sunglasses.

A camera hung around his neck and from time to time he placed a set of smart binoculars to his eyes, watching for the train I assumed. Having finished his observations, he would thrust the field glasses back into one of the voluminous, bulging pockets of his blue windcheater. In this guise - for he had differed in appearance on each of the few instances I had met him so far - he seemed completely and utterly forgettable: an anonymous face in the crowd.

When I asked again how he had found me and what exactly had he done with the pigeons, he simply shook his head and told me that I didn't really want - or need - to know. A real enigma for sure. Perhaps the 'Dark Continent' will bring a little more of the man out. We shall see.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

If I am to believe what I have so far discovered, then our Lord - in his infinite wisdom - would appear to be testing me far more than I could ever have imagined. In fact, what I have racing through my mind right now could be construed as heretical, even blasphemous!

Simply to _think_ of myself being in the situation I am in, having undergone all that I have, would cause even a flagellant trouble! He would run out of birch and have cramp in both arms before he had managed to thrash even _half_ the sin out. And yet think it I must and my journey has only just begun.

I sit here writing this in surroundings which are as outlandish, foreign and downright other-worldly as anything I have ever known or heard of in all my life. Now I am aware that, with much of my time on God's green earth having been spent within the walls of the St. Malcolm's, there will be my critics who would perhaps suggest that another, more well-travelled man might not be suffering the same culture shock as I.

Well, I concede that that is possible, but I must let it be known that at no point in my narrative have I exaggerated in any way and I must also point out my very firm belief that no matter how well travelled a man may be, were he to find himself in my position and had he not the same depth of faith as I, he would find himself, methinks, faced with such a level of insurmountable confusion and doubt that he may never recover! Whether I do or not is in the hands of the Lord.

I have been put up in mystifyingly sumptuous accommodation by the vicar of the local parish, the wooden cot I am used to having been replaced by the bed and furnishings of a King!

This is my second night here since I awoke - for I do not mind admitting that I fainted during my tussle with the devil, though not at first, I might add. I was fully awake and aware during my confrontation with the Satanic foe back in the hut. It was only afterwards that my wits failed me, after an enormous bang and once all the smoke had cleared, when my surroundings presented themselves to me. When I found myself I knew not where, I knew not how.

If truth be told, I thought myself to have been transported to the Outer Circle of Hell, but this first supposition has since been proved erroneous.

I shall list the facts plainly as they would appear to stand, however far fetched, and then explain how I have come to accept my situation - as accept it I must, lest I go mad!

It would appear that I have been catapulted several hundred years into the future - and a very strange future it is, in this, anno domini _two thousand and nine_!

I know, I know, but as preposterous a claim as it seems, it is the only explanation to be found, and here is how I came across it.

As the smoke cleared and I took in - well, everything - I could not make out what on earth had happened and then upon looking around, as I said, I fainted dead away from shock. When I came to again, I found a small cluster of people gathered around me, all dressed very differently than we do. I was lying at the foot of a nice and comfortable looking wooden bench. The floor was hard and not dissimilar to flagstones once they have been warmed by the sun, although there was only one unbroken piece stretching as far as I could see.

I was carried into a neat little church which, I noticed as I was lifted through the doors, bore the inscription 'Bramfield Chapel' and as I learned later that day it lay nestled in a small village similarly named Bramfield.

Most of the parishioners were ushered out, leaving only a dear old lady and the vicar of the parish. I was brought around by a milky, sweet, hot herbal drink of tea and was delicately probed with numerous concerned questions. By my clothing, so unlike theirs, they thought that I had been to a celebration of some sort that required the participants to dress up in costume, as the nobility are wont to do. Having ascertained that this was not the case and that I was not under the influence of the Devil's own brew, they asked me to explain what I was doing and, indeed, who I was.

Having been told, the look on their faces gave away the fact that they were both of the mind that I was a hopeless lunatic; a poor, ranting simpleton, scratching a living in-between the worlds of the capable and the dependant.

A discreet look from the vicar encouraged the old lady to make her excuses and leave. Then the vicar, the Reverend Gawdley Pinball, asked me once again to explain myself. So one more time did I recount to him my story so far – both the Heavenly quest and my terrible dislocation. Throughout my narrative he interspersed in timely places, asking astute questions and clarifying things within his own mind.

I like the Reverend Pinball, I must say here. He is kind, wise, intelligent and most humble – the very soul of compassion. Or so he appears and whilst I admittedly know very little of him beyond first impressions, the respect he generates in his community adds a not inconsiderable weight to my own humble suppositions.

Having finished this retelling of my tale of woe, he invited me to pray with him in the chapel, and then to look at the Holy Book of the Parish of Bramfield. And it was here, in the Parish Book that I learned what I now know and which troubles me so deeply.

Flicking through the early pages of this aged book the Reverend somewhat excitedly traced the lines of script with his finger and read out certain excerpts from several passages.

"Here, look," he said. " _'Thee next week after that most dreadful of combats with thee foul Devil, only after seven days of glad rejoicing had taken place, but days that were also used for remembering such a sad loss and noble sacrifice, thee Church commissioned a chapel to be built in honour of that brave and most humblest of Brothers...'_ " He fell silent here, murmuring to himself as his finger travelled over a few more lines of text. "Here we go: _'...that bravest soul who most willingely gave himself up unto the bosom of thee Lord, that heroic monk sent out from St. Malcolm's wythe his singular purpose to banish that foul figure of evil, Beelzebub Himself._

' _Therefore do we pay honour and tribute in this, thee very Heart of thee Parish, to that Knight Protector, that Paladin of the Lord, Brother Bramfiel.'_ "

"Bramfiel?" I almost shouted. " _Bramfiel?_ " The good Reverend put a hand to my shoulder to settle my shock.

"Brother Sadfael, calm yourself, please! It could easily be a mistake in the translation. You see the inscription stone, which supposedly marks the exact spot of the exorcism, was so faded with age and the effects of the elements that it was removed some years ago and a commemorative bench was erected in its place."

"But, but, the book," I stammered. "The book must be accurate, surely?" He shook his head in a way which suggested this may not be the case.

"Well, we _think_ it is, or did anyway, but the original parish book was damaged by floodwaters some four hundred years ago." So approximately _five hundred years after_ my own time! "It was copied immediately afterwards, so in the early to mid Seventeenth century, but parts of it, certain words, had to be guessed at in places.

"The name 'Bramfiel' was chosen as the most appropriate from examining the faded inscription left chiselled into what has since been made the foundation stone of our lovely new pulpit." He signalled to the admittedly magnificent structure to the right of the altar.

Unlikely as it may seem then, it would appear that upon touching me, the Devil managed to transport me several hundred years into the future without actually moving my feet! So ironically, although I had moved scarcely a yard, I am now further away from home than I could ever possibly conceive.

Despite my troubles though it is of huge consolation to me that I had seemingly managed to complete the exorcism successfully, thus freeing all those tortured peons of Duke Duster from that hideous creature's depredations. It is also humbling in the extreme to find that a church and indeed an entire _village_ has been named in my honour! Incorrectly named, maybe, but the thought was there and one must not succumb to the sin of pride, must one?

My relief was short lived however, for something was announced this very morning which leaves me to believe that my work is not yet done, and that the Devil abounds still in this very parish!

This latest aberration occurred some time in the early hours of this morning. Unfortunately it would seem that several Holy Artefacts have been taken from the very chapel in which I am staying! A range of ceremonial robes, aspersoria and other silverware, crooks, crucifixes, plates and a wide variety of other religious icons have been removed by a man who was only glimpsed by chance by an individual who delivers milk to several of the houses in the village. From the little he saw, it is beyond doubt I fear that my nemesis is biting his thumb at us once more.

At around five of the morning clock, Bedward D'Elevere, the 'milkman,' observed a man in his fifth decade - or sixth; in the light it was difficult to tell - whilst out on his daily rounds. Quite brazenly this man entered the chapel by the front doors and although his hair was wild and unruly, in all other aspects he looked from a distance not unlike the Reverend Pinball: staunchly built at around five feet and seven inches tall.

It was only natural for this D'Elevere to assume the vicar had got up early on Parish business, perhaps in a rush, had been unable to brush his hair in time, so he thought no more about it at the time.

Now though, in the clear light of day, it is heart-rending to see that the sanctity of the Church itself has been violated. The Artefacts and the Relics of the Chapel have been feloniously removed in their entirety. Gone! Stolen!

Worrying. Very worrying indeed.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Having arrived at Heathrow without further incident and not much conversation, both wrapped up as we were in our own private thoughts - in my case regarding what had happened to me back in London - we booked two seats on British Caledonia flight CA0768 to Nairobi International airport. This was conveniently leaving in three hours time, and so having checked in at the desk (Geeza was quite distraught when he discovered that it was a no smoking flight – they all are these days - partial, as he is to the odd roll up or his pipe, which he never seems to be without), we made our way around the shops contained in the Terminal building, purchasing such items as sun cream, hats and cool summer clothes, as I was sure our current apparel would have been most unsuitable.

The flight was long but uneventful, and although I dozed through the feature film the name of which escapes me now, I did enjoy a small half an hour interview, an old re-run, between Michael Parkinson and that finest of Scottish comedians much beloved by said eminent chat show host, Mr Billy Connolly – on his day, a raconteur without equal. We touched down at around eleven forty-five local time and left the aircraft directly onto the tarmac - my first ever contact with Africa.

Africa! What can you say about the place that could possibly do it justice to somebody who has never trod upon her soils (concrete or tarmac)? Other than repeating old clichés, involving words such as 'majesty', 'mystique' and such like and so forth, you just... cannot – it's as simple as that.

The sheer immensity of the place is stupendously overlooked until you are actually here, at which point you realise that without travelling by air it takes _days_ to get around, rather than the hours we associate with a long journey back in Blighty. It is truly, truly massive, and you feel this simply by standing silently and looking around. It is difficult to retain the feeling which everybody carries around with them that they are somehow important, even irreplaceable, in a place as vast as this.

It has since struck me that it does not matter whether you are stood in quiet solitude on the parched savannah, sheltering amongst the Acacia trees dotted about here and there, or whether you find yourself similarly 'alone' despite being surrounded by a multitude of people in a sprawling metropolis such as downtown Nairobi. You are simply another Human being, as frail and temporary as one of the billion snowflakes alighting gently on the upper slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro, visible in the distance by the light of the moon.

Before any of this sinks in, however, you first and foremost notice the heat. Wow! It hits you like a thousand tons of velvet, smothering you, suffocating you, every delicious breath as thick as treacle. It seems so much heavier, yet much more comfortable, like the difference between sitting on a hard-backed, wooden chair and lounging in a sea of silken cushions. And this was still the middle of the night!

I freely admit that upon first impressions I loved the place.

We negotiated passport control relatively easily, although Geeza was asked a few half-hearted questions due to the words 'Private Detective' being written in the Occupation box on his immigration card. Next we queued for some Kenyan Shillings and US Dollars at the Bureau de Change in the massive corridor that is Nairobi Airport.

I haggled only briefly with a taxi driver, who delivered us to our three star accommodation, a lovely little hotel by the name of, funnily enough, _The Scotsman Abroad_. By this time, the hour had changed from late night to early morning, and so after signing several forms in the hotel lobby, we both headed straight for our rooms, which were opposite one another on the third floor.

Despite my fatigue, I could not help but notice the decor of my room. Functionally, it was pleasant enough, with two low to the ground single beds with wicker work headboards, a small ensuite bathroom with shower and white walls and floor tiles throughout that were cool to the touch. A sliding glass door led, presumably, to a small balcony or veranda. There was a ceiling fan, currently switched off, positioned over the gap between the beds, and there was also a small desk attached to the wall, with a couple of shallow drawers. On it was a large ashtray and a polished mirror lit by a single, low wattage clay lamp. A dark coloured telephone upon the bedside table blended in nicely with the browns and tans of the bed linen.

There was the low humming of an air conditioner - which was a blessed relief - and this gently drowned out the few sounds that filtered up from the streets below. All of this went a long way to make me feel very comfortable and as 'at home' as could be. However, like a crack in a window pane, or a yellowy curry stain on your otherwise clean shirt, there was something which stood out a mile and slightly offset the otherwise restful ambiance of the room.

Dotted around the walls were several big game 'trophies', wholly inappropriate I thought, in today's day and age and I felt these glaring, gnarling, growling, snarling faces were in rather bad taste, making - as they did - for most unwelcome bedfellows.

After waking to the ghastly visages of those poor unfortunate creatures mounted on their polished wooden shields, I shaved off two days of growth, had a refreshing shower, and met Geeza downstairs for a breakfast.

"Good morning," I greeted hum, plonking myself down at his table with a big plate of fresh, local fruits and a glass of pineapple juice. "I've ordered tea and toast. Do you want some?"

"Thanks, no," he said with a smile and I noticed then the crumbs littering the white, linen table cloth and the soiled knife lying on his side plate. I decided to have some fun and play the detective – beat him at his own game. Coughing outrageously to attract his attention I reclined in my chair and pretended to smoke a pipe of the Sherlock Holmes variety.

"I deduce from your sunny disposition and early appearance that you enjoyed a good night's sleep before rising bright and fresh to dine upon a breakfast of toast and," I checked the spent packet sitting beside his knife, "mango jam. You completed your repast with two bananas and a cup of coffee." I grinned a grin and a glimmer of humour caused his mouth to form a reluctant smile.

"Are you taking the piss?" he said. I laughed out loud.

"Elementary, my dear Vermies!" and I waved a nonchalant hand over his place setting. "The evidence is all there for the discerning eye. Even now it is barely eight o'clock and yet you have already showered – the ends of your hair are still wet – and have finished eating. By the banana skins on your-"

"Yeah, yeah, thanks Sherlock, you don't have to spell it out." He pointed to my hand where I had forgotten my imaginary pipe. "You're spreading ash all over the place by the way."

I laughed once more and as my tea things arrived we discussed our next course of action.

"So," I said with a mouthful of toast, "I hope you've got some ideas of what we're going to do next, because I haven't got a clue."

"Yeah don't worry," he replied in his laid back way, "I've got a few leads to check up on."

"What, already? God, you _were_ up early!" He smiled a peculiar smile.

"Let's just say I had an eventful night and leave it at that." And he did; he refused to be drawn any further, but he suggested that to get a good feel for our surroundings we should take a stroll around Nairobi, just a random wander about letting our feet dictate where we go.

It wasn't long, however, once we had descended into the heaving streets – already boiling hot – that we changed our plan. After fifteen minutes or so of constantly fending off a plague of begging kids and peddlers of every kind of trinket imaginable, my detective friend spotted that I may have had enough.

"You ok Elliot?"

"No I'm bloody well not!" I snapped back. "It's too bloody hot, there's too many people," and here I swatted aside another set of begging hands that had been thrust into my face, "I don't know where I'm going and I don't know why I'm here and I could be in Scotland and... and... it's just so damned hot! God, it's not even ten in the morning!"

"Hey, it's _Africa_ , what did you think?" Seeing how thoroughly fed up I was though, he suggested a change of tack to which I instantly agreed.

Geeza would push on - he didn't seem to mind the horde of straggling urchins who were clamouring all around us. In fact, it seemed to me as I walked away that he was positively encouraging them and as he headed off in opposite direction they strung out behind him making the scene look like some sort of tropical Pied Piper.

He would continue trying to find the trail of the devious Mr Humphries in his own peculiar way whereas I would head back to the hotel to follow up a few leads of my own, like scouring through the selection of newspapers provided by the hotel – which all happened to be found in the comfort of the cane furniture of the lobby. I also hoped to speak with the proprietor of the _Scotsman_ himself, a Mr Allistair MacIntosh, a bachelor who has lived out here for the last thirty seven years, and who hails, coincidentally or not, from the island of Skye.

And so it was that I found myself out of the heat of the midmorning sun, sat in the lobby area of the hotel. Five cane tables topped with glass were arranged about the place, each one the focus of four deep, basketwork bucket chairs sporting decorative blue and white flowery cushions. Three ceiling fans whirred away overhead, creating a lovely downdraft of air which added itself to the cooling breeze coming in from the landscaped area beyond the confines of the main building. Out there was the swimming pool which nestled on the fringes of the ornamental gardens, a beautiful array of delightfully bright colours - oranges, reds, pinks and greens - which could be seen quite easily from where I sat with my iced fruit drink, as could the numerous rainbows dancing upon the droplets of water given off by the sprinkler system without which, presumably, nothing would grow.

As far as the papers were concerned, the English ones - the Telegraph, Express and the Sun - yielded nothing. Then I leafed through the Kenyan English-language ones, the only item of any interest being the mention of the sudden influx of tourists which apparently happens around the same time every year, when people flock in to watch the annual Nairobi to Mombassa Rally. Over a thousand miles of raw African countryside, including about one hundred straight through the Tsavo National Park in a race with a top prize of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It is apparently a most prestigious event, fought fiercely each year by hundreds of competitors from all around the world, with prize money totalling nearly half a million, being awarded down to sixth place.

My reading was interrupted at this point, however, by a most succulent smell drifting over from the poolside area where a barbeque was declaring to all who cared to notice that lunch was ready to be served.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

So, we're here in Africa at last! The flight took an age, and the infernal airline company wouldn't let me smoke for the duration. Elliot booked us into a hotel, and as soon as I got into my room I realised that the blasted manager had switched the air conditioner on! Christ, how am I supposed to assimilate myself to the place with so much artificiality?

Needless to say, I strode straight across the room and switched the damn thing off, throwing open the balcony doors to try and let some of the night in - it's bad enough that we're three floors up. I suspect that the Allies I shall find here will be immensely strong - and tricky - so I really have to localise myself, because apart from the obvious 'not-wanting-to-get-torn-to-bits', I must make contact very quickly, otherwise I'll lose the scent for sure. The Prof could be thousands of miles away by now. I must act fast.

Right, smoke a pipe man and calm down.

Later...

Ok, so I sat at the foot of my bed - it is nice and low, but I still prefer just a mattress on the ground, if not the ground itself. We're so _removed_ from everything these days! I filled up Old Smokey, having shut off the lights. There was a big, fat, contented Moon lazing by and Her silvery glow illuminated several grotesque animal heads hanging up on the wall. I felt for the things, I really did and as I sat puffing away the sorrow seeped in with the smoke - I swallowed lungfuls of the stuff.

It brought tears to my eyes, the wanton destruction... the sheer lack of respect. I looked into the Lion's face, and saw the last moments of his life, sprawled out on the Savannah after a big meal in which the whole pack had been able to gorge itself. He spent a leisurely afternoon playing with the cubs, and then he spots a strange contraption moving closer to his family group, kicking up huge clouds of dust. He rose to confront the invaders of his territory, and moved a good dozen lengths away from the pack. That was when, isolated, he had been hit square in the chest by a Winchester. It took seven shots to put him down.

Bastards! A hole seemed to open up inside my stomach, a bottomless pit of pain and loss and it was at _that_ moment that they came to me, just as I was about to lapse into a pit of sorrow and grief. Suddenly there was this towering dark figure standing where an Antelope's head had once been, only about two yards away from me!

I'm going to have to tread _very_ carefully with these guys - they're so sharp! You get nothing like this raw energy, this freshness back in England.

She stood a good eight feet tall, the antlers on her shoulders rising another six or seven inches past that. The silken qualities of her smooth, chocolate coloured skin seemed enhanced by the Moonlight, and she gave off an aura that was exotic, alluring and powerful.

I took a strong but very respectful stance, and offered her the Pipe. She smiled, with narrowed eyes, but made no further move. I was still unsure of what was going to happen here and was all too aware that one false move on my part could well prove fatal. I guessed that something further was expected of me, so I decided on an impromptu speech, keeping it formal.

"I give my thanks for your coming and wish for you to know that I have called you freely and welcome your presence here. I am grateful for any assistance you may be able to offer." Still nothing. She just stood there, radiating power and looking down at me with a quizzical, slightly amused expression. I continued.

"Should you desire to lend your help to me then I would be glad to perform a service in return," and here I chose my words carefully. "Anything that it would be within my limited power as a stranger in your land to perform without malice or unnecessary detriment."

At hearing this she smiled beautifully and stepped forward towards me. Although still potentially on dangerous ground I remained where I was, unflinching. Stretching out her long arms she held my face in her large, elfin hands. Still my resolve held and I made no reaction, though inside my heart was pounding like a jack hammer! I was really on my toes, ready for something to happen, whatever it may be.

In what can only be described as one of the most amazing feelings I have ever experienced, she leaned down and kissed the top of my head. I was flooded instantly with both ecstasy and relief. Her touch and kiss surged through me in rush after rush, after golden rush.

"Always so formal little one?" she purred, her hands lifting my head up to stare into her eyes. "Come now, I do not feel this is your way." She gave me the look of a fiery temptress then and stroked one long finger down my chest. "Surely you do not wish for anything to be between us," she teased like a sultry predator closing in for the kill.

As I was struggling for words – struggling to do anything in fact – she burst out laughing and released me from her delicate grasp, stepping away and staring at me as if she could see straight into my soul. She smiled again and then sprawled herself across my bed, lying on her back and stretching out luxuriously.

"You are the first in forty years to speak with us in this place," she said. "Do you know who we are?" I had a few guesses which turned out to be pretty near the mark, but seeing as I still couldn't speak she went ahead and told me. "I am Malika, of the Denubari, only one of the many Animal Spirits who frequents this place, seeking recompense for the wrongs committed by those who came before you. Seeking a way to put things right." She propped herself up on one elbow and stared at me again. "We know why you are here Little Thief."

I knew by the way she said it that this was a name she had chosen for me. It puzzled me. Little Thief? Why would she call me that?

"Yes, we know what you are after and will gladly assist you – and perhaps you _could_ do just one small thing for us in return, seeing as you offered _so_ kindly with _so_ eloquent a speech just now." Her movements and tone had turned temptress again. "And if not for the others," she said, looking down and toying with the bed sheets, "then maybe just as a _personal_ favour for me... Would you do a favour just for me...?"

Not for the first time my mouth became as dry as the desert. She continued.

"This hotel contains many of these _despicable_ remnants, heads and other dismembered body parts, taken merely to be _trophies_ by those of your kind – needless cruelty and death just to ornament their dwellings."

At last I found my voice. "I look at them with probably almost as much hatred and contempt as you, but surely you can't expect me to exact revenge for you – the scum who did this will all be long dead themselves by now I should think-" she silenced me simply by tilting her head to one side and smiling.

"But my Little Thief, you misunderstand. We look for no revenge. Any retribution we could have carried out years ago. The recompense we are looking for is simply to remove these hideous insults to all that lives and return them to the Wilds in which they belong. To give them the respect denied to them for so long.

"Would it please you to do this small service for us Little Thief? It would please _me_... Do you wish to please _me_...?" She rolled coquettishly on the bed and left the question hanging in the hot, night air. Gods! She is _achingly_ beautiful!

Of course I agreed to do this for them – that it would be an honour. I even told her it would be _my_ pleasure, flirting back a little bit. She loved it.

So I don't know how I'm going to do it yet, but I _will_ get them out of here and bury them with an appropriate ceremony in a wild and untamed place - just as soon as I come across one.

Having agreed to help them I decided to stick my head out a bit and tried to press upon her the need for urgency in catching up with the Professor. Again the beautiful Denubari stopped me with a glance.

"But I have already told you Little Thief, do not worry. Your quest is known to us. Look into my eyes and also the eyes of others. It is there that you will find what you are looking for."

It was then as I looked closely that I noticed the area immediately surrounding each of her almond eyes was shaded a much darker, ebony colour which followed the contours of her strongly defined bone structure like some kind of ceremonial face paint.

"Should you complete our little task as you have promised you will find the Denubari very useful Allies." She gave me another smouldering look. "And very willing..." Then she sat up and said one last thing. "Know me as a friend Little Thief, for I am Malika. Be kind to the Children."

And then she was gone.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Fantastic news! Which is leading me to say that I am fast becoming a firm believer in what I call 'Geeza's Law,' due to the fact that I have often heard him repeat this one statement, sometimes under his breath, as if continually reminding himself of it at specific times: "There is no such thing as Coincidence."

As I piled high my plate with juicy salads and a veritable mound of barbecued meat, I got to chatting with Mr MacIntosh - Allistair as he insists I call him - who is in the amiable habit of circulating amongst the guests at meal times, cocktail in hand, in order to make small talk and see that everybody's needs are met, thus ensuring a pleasurable stay for one and all. He is the real colonial type, impeccably dressed in a lightweight beige cotton suit, and wearing a large, whiskery moustache. When seated in conversation he toys playfully with this prodigious facial decoration and his eyes glaze over as he wistfully recalls anecdotes with a fondness born of time and distance, whether the activities of a guest last week, or the far from forgotten memories of his childhood in Scotland.

And this is the amazing thing! Are you ready for this? Allistair MacIntosh was born some fifty nine years ago to a humble background on the northern coast of the Isle of Skye. That is amazing enough in itself, but further than that, his parents were part of the coastal community upon the shores of Loch Alsh, hardly a stones throw from Eilean Ban where my journey originated! Unbelievable! What a small world!

Here I am, thousands of miles away from home, my Scottish research all but forgotten, when I suddenly find myself talking to a man whom I suspected would be able to single handedly solve many of my Caledonian conundrums in one afternoon!

When I realised what a gold mine I had stumbled on to, I decided to let Mr Vermies tackle the trail of the Professor by himself for the time being, while I took the opportunity to indulge in my hobby a little and concentrate my efforts on wringing out as much information as possible from Allistair. So this afternoon, as Geeza walked the bustling streets of Nairobi, I bombarded MacIntosh with questions and Haggis was where we started.

When I last left Eilean Ban, I had learned of the feud amongst the fishing communities of the area, which somehow led to the discovery, or perhaps invention would be a better word, of Haggis. I asked Mr MacIntosh what he knew and this is what he told me.

There was, at around the same time as the fishing dispute, an abundance of badgers inhabiting the areas along the Northwest coast of Scotland. Now these badgers, nocturnal and shy creatures that they are, were mistakenly blamed so the story goes for the night time activities of one Eoan McPresley - later discovered to be a notorious chicken thief, the scourge of poultry farmers from Kyleakin to Badicaul.

What with the dietary shortfall that both sets of villagers now suffered as a result of the self-imposed lack of squid and also the fact that chicken was mysteriously disappearing from their menus, the village Elders decreed that in order to kill two badgers with one stone (more of that coming up) they would create a brand new dish, the main ingredient of which would have to be the only remaining source of meat to be found in any abundance in the area – the badger.

Having decimated the population over a period of time, using only the best cuts of the once numerous local badgers, the recipe underwent the first of the many changes it was to see before it finished up as the world famous culinary delight that we all know today. Rather than badger, which was by now very difficult to find, the natives of the area started to use otter instead, whose numbers had boomed with the abundance of squid now available to them.

Over the years, of course, the same thing happened and gradually, as the population declined, the less desirable parts of the unfortunate otters were incorporated into the meals so as to get as much out of the animal as possible. It was all too little too late however and after not too many months more the inevitable happened and the otters vanished completely.

The hungry inhabitants of the countryside surrounding Loch Alsh then proceeded through necessity to begin a period of experimentation, trying all manner of local fauna for their staple dish. Squirrels, voles, sparrows, earthworms, even squid was tried again, but nothing seemed to work. None of these substitutes did the trick. Too salty, too earthy, too fishy, too difficult to catch - whatever they tried, there was always something not quite right. Eventually it was decided that they would revert back to the badgers, whose numbers had rejuvenated somewhat by then. This time however, they did not throw away the offal, but instead began to use all of the edible parts as they had done with the late and lamented otters.

So determined were they not to waste a single morsel, a brand new method of killing was devised which in turn gave rise to another Scottish phenomenon, that of the Blarney Stone.

Yes, it is true that this famous stone can nowadays be found built into the very definitely _Irish_ Blarney Castle of County Cork, but it has not always resided there. Originally the Blarney Stone was a large, smooth rock, with two holes of about an inch each in circumference, holes that had been worn away over time by the ceaseless motion of the seas around Skye.

Through these holes two badgers would be secured by strong cords, and then the whole lot was thrown into the Loch, thus drowning the badgers and therefore ensuring that their carcasses' would not be spoilt in any way. Hence the phrase, 'to kill two badgers with one stone,' which has been denigrated through the years to the proverb we know today. Remarkable.

Back to the Haggis though, and after years of eating countless 'blarnies' of badgers, domesticated livestock became more and more prevalent, and so in the matter of two or three generations, the Haggis changed yet again, with the principle ingredients becoming predominantly lamb and occasionally beef. Things were added, things were left out, but essentially this is the moment in time when Haggis became the dish we know and love in the present day.

Fascinating, and also astounding that I should have discovered the full story so soon after hearing the first tantalizing tales back in Eilean Ban.

And this was not all. In an interconnected story, did you know that America was actually discovered by a Scotsman? I had of course suspected as much, but here was the proof, straight from the living memory of Mr A MacIntosh who had heard the tale from his great-grandfather, to whom it had been told by an equally aged relative.

"Aye, it's true. It was just after the first lot of badgers had dried up and the otters were started upon, it soon became apparent that a mistake had been made. Chickens were still going missing, you see, but there weren't any badgers left any more, or very few I should say, so it couldn't possibly be them. And so it followed that it probably hadn't been them in the first place, you ken?"

"I do, I do," I said scribbling notes down frantically, fascinated.

"Well, there then followed some very dark days indeed for the peoples of Loch Alsh. Out of the ever-present threat of hunger people grew highly suspicious and mean-spirited. Neighbour watched neighbour and an air of mistrust and unhappiness spread out across the land. In this sort of climate it wasn't long before the activities of that notorious Eoan McPresley were noticed. Gradually word got round, until only a few weeks later – that's Scottish weeks of course, as they counted the days back then-"

" _Scottish_ weeks?" I interrupted; well, I felt I had to.

"Oh aye – did you not know about them?" I replied that I didn't. "Well, the ancient Scots used to divvy up the year into four seasons same as we do, but their weeks only had five days each, each day honouring one of the five stages of making a kilt."

"I see," I said. I didn't.

"The Scots didn't count time the same way we do Mr. Cripplesby. You have to remember how hard it would have been to eke out a living back then; just to survive. They had no concept, or desire in fact for a 'weekend.' Every day was toil and if you didn't toil you didn't eat. Simple as that.

"Now, everybody knows the Scotsman's propensity to drink."

"Indeed, it is perhaps the thing they are most famous for around the world," I agreed.

"Aye well, folk back then couldn't afford to have someone bladdered and off their heads, lazing around all day sleeping off the effects from the night before, so a 'weekend' - a _free day_ , time off - was not exactly what you'd call a progressive socio-economic step for them, you see what I mean?"

"I do," and this time I did.

"Right then. Five day weeks. The year would start on..." he blew out heavily, frowning as he made the calculations in his head. "Let's say on about our March the tenth. Course they didn't know it as March the tenth, but it'd be around two 'weeks' before the Spring Equinox, see? There were then fifty weeks of five days each with the year coming to an end on or around our fifth of November. And that was that – the Scottish Year."

"Err," I began, having seen the obvious flaw, "but what about the rest of the year? What about the winter?"

"Och come on! Have you ever _been_ to Scotland during the winter? It's not something you want to remind yourself of, believe me. No, they ignored it."

" _Ignored_ it?"

"Aye. They just 'got through.' They didn't count it out, just tried to get by – and why not? There's a whole lot of trees and animals do the same; they can't _all_ be wrong."

"Well... I _suppose_ not," I conceded, although I was not yet fully convinced.

He went on though to explain that the word 'hibernation' can actually be traced back to the Emperor Hadrian, who managed to take a legion as far north as the present location of Leith, just beyond Edinburgh.

During this exploratory march, which Hadrian noted on his slate diaries as being distinctly uncomfortable, the roman legionaries had time to observe these 'long-sleep' practices amongst the locals before they collectively decided enough was enough and fled the weather to head back down south. Driven temporarily mad through exposure, Hadrian had his wall put up to try and keep the wind out. Bizarre, but true!

Hiburnus, in Latin, means wintry – I checked it up - and Hibs, or Hibernian FC, the Scottish football club based in Leith was supposedly born out of the first ever game, played between the natives of the area and a team of Hadrian's soldiers!

"What about Leap Years?" I asked.

"The ancient Scots didn't bother with Leap Years Elliot – before March the tenth see?"

"Hmm..."

"Anyway, where were we?" he asked after a moment's silence. I checked my notes.

"Err... ok, people were beginning to suspect Eoan McPresley."

"Aye, that's right. Well, young McPresley was made public enemy number one soon enough and on the very night a mob had been formed to apprehend him he took to his heels and fled. That was enough to damn him in the eyes of the locals, of course. Definitely guilty. Only thing was, no one knew where he'd gone. Vanished he had, into the night and he was never heard from again.

"There were some terrible repercussions for the rest of his family though and every single one of the remaining McPresleys, in deepest shame, took the drastic action of tearing up their tartan and changing their Clan name so that never again would a McPresley walk upon the western shores of Scotland."

The hotelier was evidently enjoying our conversation as much as I was. He ordered another cocktail for us both and then delegated his usual duties for the afternoon to the rest of the staff.

"It doesn't end there though Mr. Cripplesby. The legend continues that a local woman by the name of Mrs Gloriana Lummley saw McPresley put to sea in a small, one man coracle and most hurriedly paddle away.

"Now the rest is just conjecture, with no direct evidence to support it, but it _is_ a tale well known throughout the Highlands so it must have origins as old as the roots of the mountains. If the story is to be believed, Eoan McPresley single-handedly navigated his way across the Atlantic and landed upon the shores of the New World years before even the Vikings went there.

"He is said to have beached his coracle near the mouth of what is today known as the St Lawrence River, where he fell in with the local Indians. After some years his tough, Highland ways saw him rise through the ranks to eventually become chief of the indigenous tribe. He re-named the tribe by swapping syllables around from MicMac to MacMic, but though they tolerated this whilst he lived, as soon as he passed away the elders reverted back to the original."

Amazing! I was struck with a light-headed giddiness which was not only down to the numerous cocktails I had downed over the course of the afternoon. What a day! I _know_ that I have only scratched at the surface of MacIntosh's knowledge and there is more – so much more to come.

And then there is all the news that Geeza brought back with him! Frankly though I am much too tired to go into it now. It is late and I want my bed.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Ha! I'm back onto him! The Denubari have helped me find this Professor Humphries already, and I've not been here a day yet!

I am still reeling from the fact that she gave me her name so quickly, so openly! Malika... She is the most beautiful thing I've ever experienced. So raw, so completely... free. I don't know; I'm at a loss to describe it really, but her energy can be felt from fifty yards. Yet it is not intimidating. It lulls you, hugs you, caresses you...

Her power embraced me in a way that I found very difficult to resist, allowing myself to become totally absorbed by it. Not that I had a lot of choice. So strong. If she is typical of these Denubari Spirits - and I find that very difficult to believe - then these guys are something else.

To find the name of one of the Spirits back home could take weeks, months, or years of flattery and treading on eggshells – I have even tried trickery and barefaced lies at times - and they may still never tell you. But she just stared straight down into my eyes and offered it to me on a plate - "For I am Malika."

Either I am doing something absolutely, one hundred per cent right and they have taken me immediately to heart, or else they are so Goddamn powerful they don't care who knows them.

Personally, I have a sneaking suspicion which of the two it is.

Anyway, back to the case. After a spot of breakfast we decided to both head out and get our bearings. Pretty soon we got mobbed by beggars, mainly kids. Cripplesby couldn't hack it, so he went back. However Malika's words were still resounding in my mind - "be kind to the children" - so I dished out handfuls of coins and asked them to show me around.

After a fairly comprehensive tour, they walked me with great excitement to the compound containing the entrance to the World famous Nairobi-Mombasa Rally to look at all the cars, the crowds and the colours and there he was, plain as day - the Professor, standing out like a sore thumb amongst the other drivers! They were all togged up in their racing gear, presumably for some publicity shoot and they all looked absolutely boiling in the afternoon sun.

Ha ha! They had led me straight to him! I managed to blag our way past the guards at the fenced perimeter, telling them I was from 'the orphanage' bringing the kiddies out for a special trip. So we all walked in, about thirty kids aged from four to fourteen and me. Not the most inconspicuous approach you might think, but sometimes the best way to become invisible is to stand out as much as you can.

Not a single person gave us more than a cursory glance. The sight, sound and smells of thirty bedraggled, down trodden and noisily excited local kids made everybody give us the widest berth possible. It's disgusting really, but that is the state of mind humanity is in at the moment.

I managed to steer us to within earshot of the drivers, where they were stood around chatting. I told the children to listen to the drivers and try to hear what adventures they'd be going on. This was mutually beneficial as it not only added to their enjoyment of the day, but also kept them reasonably quiet so I was able to eavesdrop effectively.

What I heard was that one of the favourites for the race, a top South African driver by the name of Ollie Donald, had signed up a Mr A Humphries as his co-driver, only a day or so ago. This was creating a lot of excitement amongst the rallying fraternity - could Donald, the previous winner, pull it off a second time in succession with a brand new partner?

What on Earth is Humphries up to? First he's stealing fiddly bits and bobs off an audience at some obscure Scottish hotel. Then the next thing you know he's jetted out to Africa and signed up for the Trans-Kenyan Rally! Weird. And try as I might, I just cannot see a connection.

I discovered that entries for the race were now closed, so there was no way of pursuing him that way, but we knew the route, so I led my youthful entourage off and asked them to get me back to my hotel.

After thanking them all and emptying my pockets for them, I found Elliot and told him what I'd learned. He agreed to go and make arrangements to hire a Land Rover or something to get us to Mombassa.

And now all that remains is for me to carry out my side of the bargain with the Denubari. This is going to be tricky. I haven't done any house-breaking for some time. I feel here that timing is going to be everything.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

Well, wherever, or rather, 'whenever' I am, things seem to happen exceedingly quickly here. It is now the evening of the fourth day since my arrival and what a day it has been!

I must point out at this point that although the Sun dipped well below the horizon some three or four hours since, it is still as light as day in my palatial room. They have automatic candles here - that is to say you need not light them, nor do they ever seem to burn away! You simply push a contraption on the wall and 'click' on they come. And then 'click', off they go again. No matches, no wax, no flames. Just light, and a hundred times brighter than a candle too! It is that type of light one finds given off by fireflies as they dance their merry dance down by the river in the Eastern Gardens, over towards the Cloister of St. Cribbins. If you can imagine capturing a hundred, nay, a thousand of these flies, and containing them inside a bowl of blown glass, stoppered and hung from the ceiling, that is the nearest I can come to describing it!

But once again, I am rambling. It would be all too easy for me to fill these pages with all the ceaseless wonders I find around me, but I must come to the point. Much has happened today and here is a brief summary. Incidentally, my quill has been replaced by a strange, smooth object. It is long, thin and cylindrical in shape, like the shaft of a normal quill, but has none of the feathers you would usually expect to find. The ink is actually housed inside the shaft itself! Laughably simple really. But aaargh! No! Yet _still_ I find myself wittering on! Focus, Brother. Concentrate! Here is the story.

Early in the morning I was aroused from my slumber by the sound of wheels upon gravel. It was another of these horseless carts that I see whizzing past me day and night. It shocked me at first to see them and I crossed myself without fail each time I saw their eerily smooth shapes hurtling past, yet I have become as blasé about them as the next man in this short time. They are so numerous as to become commonplace. The Lord alone knows what drives them. The Reverend Pinball did try to explain it to me when I first enquired, but I could understand not one word, so we agreed it must indeed be the work of the angels and left it at that.

I headed downstairs for hot, sliced bread and the juice of oranges, (despite the fact they are not yet in season!), and was joined by Reverend Pinball and the stranger who had just arrived.

He had the appearance of a very respectable gentleman in his middle years and it looked as though life had been kind to him, as he seemed in excellent physical health. We were introduced and, to my utter amazement, he shared a name with our own Abbot, both being called Slush. Astoundingly though, this was not at all coincidence, as Mr Geoffrey Slush explained to me that he could trace his ancestry back hundreds of years and he was in fact a direct descendant of His Grace back at St. Malcolm's!

How extraordinary! It appears that this Mr Slush is one of the highest ranking members of our Church, yet he has no parish of his own. Instead, he is sent many miles in every direction by the hierarchy at Canterbury to investigate divine or satanic phenomena whenever it may happen that they should occur.

We spent several hours together as he questioned me in order to verify the facts as I had told them. For his part, he had a great depth of knowledge about life in our times and of the Monastery itself. His clever questions were formulated so that they could not have been answered correctly by a madman or confidence trickster.

After satisfying himself with my story he thanked me and then set about searching the church grounds and surrounding areas with several weird and wonderful pieces of equipment, looking for clues which will hopefully help in finding and retrieving the stolen artefacts. As he examined the area around the bench where I had first appeared, his long-handled 'beeping' device cried out in triumph – the device of which I speak is a type of broom or brush which is wont to make strange, high pitched sounds whenever it passes above or close by any objects made of metal. Laying this investigative aid down gently beside him, he took up his spade and started to dig.

After only a moment or two's labouring, he held in his hand several small objects, rusted with age, but which I recognised from over his shoulder as being parts of the satanic headgear worn by the fiend during our confrontation!

Mr. Slush put these carefully into small pouches which you could see through just like a window. He then placed them in his bag and continued digging. More and more objects were unearthed, the most foreboding being a completely intact though somewhat dilapidated cone, rusted with age. It was one of the attachments that had been stuck, leech-like, to the demon's head! I lunged forward and grasped his arm before he had a chance to handle it.

"Your Grace, look out!" I had to warn him exactly what he was dealing with. Although I was holding him as tightly as I could, he reclaimed his arm as easily as if I were a malnourished child. Kindly he looked at me and yet I believe I saw a certain amount of exasperation writ into the lines of is face.

"Sadfael, I have asked you not to call me that, please. I hold no such office. Geoffrey or even Slush are both fine; so please, once again, I am _not_ 'Your Grace.'"

"Yes of course," I mumbled. "Sorry Brother Slush."

He had also requested I did not call him 'brother' either, but for now all my attentions were firmly transfixed on that cursed artefact he had uncovered. It was all I could to keep from running until my legs would go no more. My whole body tensed as he reached once again for the heinous object and a tortured cry escaped my lips when his fingers curled around it and he heaved it out of the dirt.

"Aieeeee!" I fear I screamed, falling backwards and flinging my arms across my face to ward off the evil I was sure was to come! After what seemed like an interminable length of time though (which the clock on the church tower claimed to have been even less than a single minute)... well, nothing happened.

Peeping out from behind my arms - and feeling a little foolish – I sat up. Geoffrey was kneeling on his blanket quite calmly, examining the Hellish machine minutely through a disc of glass.

"Brother, please take care," I hissed

"It's really all right Sadfael," he said. "Fascinating actually. I can't be sure but it looks like a stainless steel shell, housing..." he squinted inside the thing, having to carefully scoop out several wads of mud before he did so. "It looks to be... a copper sheet of some sort, lying atop a layer of quartz crystals..." He brought his disc of glass to bear again, "... and inset at various points with... well, we'll know more once it's back in the lab."

He happened to glance across at me then and by the look on his face you might have thought I was drooling like an idiot. He turned his eyes to the Heavens and sighed.

"Ok," he said and then with an added depth to his voice "Fear not for me Brother Sadfael, for I am watched over by the Lord God Almighty and a Host of Glorious Angels." His voice changed timbre once more. "Is that better for you?"

I admire his strength, his courage, his resolve; I really do. I only wish I shared but a fragment of his iron nerve, not to mention his depth of faith. I _must_ remember though – and I do keep forgetting \- the Lord _Himself_ picked me for this quest, so I must have _some_ worthy qualities.

Perhaps Geoffrey's detector of 'mettle' could find them for me – but pardon me; this is hardly the time for a pun. For shame Sadfael, for shame.

Brother Slush placed this crusted cone into a similarly see-through bag, and remained with us throughout the rest of the day, leaving no stone unturned in his observations. It was not until late in the evening, after he had had several private conversations with Reverend Pinball that he stood at the door as we said our goodbyes. And though this formality was not in itself another of these private affairs it might as well have been, for all I understood of it.

"And you're _definitely_ sure you can't take him with you?" the Rev. Pinball asked.

"Sorry Gawdley, no. For the time being he's much better off here. Have patience Reverend; patience and fortitude." The quiet authority with which Brother Geoffrey spoke left no room for argument. "First of all I'll get the lab to have a look at this lot. Once I've seen the report we should know more or less what we're dealing with. Then we'll figure out what _else_ to do; not before."

"But, wouldn't it save everybody's time if he just came back with you now? _Surely_ they'll want to speak to him."

"Gawdley, come on now. We're all in this together. You would do well to remember your responsibilities; remember your vows."

"But he's such a-"

"Patience and fortitude Reverend," he cut off Pinball's final protestation. "As I said before, your request will be duly passed on, as will your comments." He flicked his sleeve away from his wrist as I had seen him do on several occasions during the day and glanced at a band he wore around it. "Now I really must be off if I'm to be in Canterbury at any decent hour. Goodbye Brother Sadfael, Reverend. Just sit tight and wait to hear from us. We will be in touch within the next few days."

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

My mood is a mixed one. Jubilation on the one hand, in that we have somehow managed to catch right up with the dastardly Mr. Humphries, but this has been marred slightly - more than slightly in fact. _Considerably_ more - by the manner in which we left the hotel. Our lovely hotel...

Yes, the mine of information that was Allistair MacIntosh has dried up on me forever now I'm afraid. Whatever snippets - or hefty wedges - of invaluable information I could have obtained from him I will never know now, as I'm _pretty_ certain I'll not be setting foot anywhere near _The Scotsman_ again; not after this.

I have been 'put in a position', so to speak, by Geeza Vermies and whilst one cannot argue the fact that he is amazingly successful at what I've hired him to do, it nevertheless has to be said that his methods – well, no, I don't know his methods – let me say the side affects of his actions have... soured things to say the least.

Let me explain. I was euphoric after my chat with Allistair over lunch and all I had learned from it. It was only as I was finishing up the notes I had made over a cocktail in the lobby that Geeza appeared, somewhat grubby, yet animated. I ordered him a beverage of his choosing - a tall glass of thick mango juice as I remember, once he'd downed a half-litre jug of mineral water - and bade him seat himself and report upon what progress he had made.

"I've found him Elliot," he said.

"What already?" I think I'd said that to him once before today.

"Yup, and it was so easy. The kids led me straight to him!"

"Err, the kids?"

"Yeah, you know. All that lot from this morning."

"All the beggars you mean?"

"Come on Elliot, they're street kids, what do you want them to do? They haven't got anything - _anything_ \- and they're never going to have anything either."

"Yes I know, I'm sorry," I replied somewhat ashamed of myself. "It's just that it was so... in your face, you know?" I do not consider myself to be a judgemental person and yet I had condemned the lot of them this morning in an instant. Not my finest hour.

"Hey, don't beat yourself up about it. It's a whole lot different to seeing it on the six o'clock news isn't it?"

"It certainly is," I agreed. "Ok, so these kids... they'd seen him or what?"

"No, no, we just wandered round for a bit, same plan as before. They showed me the sights, I got them some food, we walked some more. They thought I'd be interested in this big rally that's going on-"

"Yes, I read about that."

"Yeah well, guess what? He's in it."

I could scarcely believe it. How on earth could this fifty-something year old lecturer suddenly be a rally driver? What's going on?

Geeza continued. "There's no way we can collar hold of him before the off, but at least we know where he's going so maybe we can get him in Mombassa."

My already euphoric mood was increased a hundred fold. I was soaring and couldn't believe the astounding luck we were having.

And I still can't really. It is just that I feel our fortune has become a little... jaded by what must have happened later on last night and then presumably early this morning, the consequences of which I was more than shocked to learn only a few short hours ago.

To continue, Geeza had told me that he had several things to do and headed off to his room. I contacted a car hire firm and ordered us a Land Rover to be delivered to the hotel for this morning. After a sumptuous meal I finished off a bottle of wine with Mr MacIntosh before retiring to pack, and to sleep. I saw nothing more of Mr. Vermies all night.

This morning, after breakfasting heavily in order to sustain us for the better part of the day, I settled the bill with the hotel receptionist and also paid for a packed lunch and basic provisions which Allistair had recommended I do - a few sandwiches, a couple of hard boiled eggs and the like, plus numerous bottles, cans and cartons of soft drinks and water - which we have been most grateful for, let me tell you.

MacIntosh had laid a bus on, free gratis, to take people to the starting line, as almost everybody in the hotel was going, guests and staff alike. This was a big event in Nairobi and was not to be missed.

"You should go," Geeza suggested. "Go and see the start of the race, make sure the Prof's still in it." I nodded in thoughtful agreement.

"Hmm, yes. That might not be a bad idea. It'd be a bit of a shocker if we got all the way down to Mombassa to find out he'd caught wind of us and jumped ship. What time does the bus leave? Are you ready?"

"The bus goes in about five minutes, but I'm going to hang back here. I've got a few things to do still and then I'll get the Land Rover packed. I take it that's ours?" he said, pointing to the car park outside the lobby.

"Yes, they delivered it this morning. It's all signed and paid for and I've squared everything up with Allistair too, so... Yes, alright then. I'll leave the packing to you." And I did.

It was hot, dusty and unpleasant at the site chosen for the start of the race. The crowd was loud and jostling, the mood tense with excitement. As the race was started Le Mans style, with the drivers starting outside their vehicles, I took no time at all in recognising the felonious Mr. Humphries.

Flags waved and people cheered as each driver and co-pilot was introduced to the crowd, with a wave and a smile. It was then announced that the sponsors were bla-bla-bla, most entries since 1987, etc. etc., and all those other formalities that no one ever listens to. The circuitous route was roughly pointed out for the audience on a large poster board and it was explained to us that the first team to reach Mombassa would be declared champion and receive the winner's cheque for a quarter of a million US dollars (more cheers).

The starting procedure was then clarified so there could be no confusion amongst either the crowd or the participants. A whistle would be blown. This signified 'on your marks!' A hooter would inform the drivers to get ready and then a loud klaxon would be sounded to declare the race begun. The drivers would then run to their cars, start them up, and may the best team win.

A whistle whistled and the drivers took a hunched stance, not unlike long distance runners at the start of their races. The hooter hooted, and the crowd held its breath in the kind of silence that can only be generated by a couple of thousand people all being quiet - it screamed at you. Finally the klaxon... klaxed, breaking the tension as the drivers sprinted to their cars to a thunderous roar from the expectant crowd. And in a few moments after that all was lost to a monstrous cloud of dust.

The noise had been deafening and the atmosphere _was_ admittedly electrifying. But then it was over. The rally was underway and I had personally watched as our quarry raced away somewhere near the front of the pack.

We were taken back to the hotel by the bus that had brought us and I met Geeza immediately in the shaded hotel entrance next to the Land Rover with ants well and truly in his pants. He was incredibly keen to get going which I could readily understand. Although the race route was much longer than the direct one we would be following, the winners at least would probably still beat us, so I allowed myself to be jostled into our four by four and Geeza drove us away, rather quickly I remember thinking.

I can also recall my thoughts when I noticed that the back of our vehicle was absolutely _packed_ with stuff - I couldn't see what it was, because it was covered up by blankets, tarpaulins and the like, but there seemed far too much there for our journey. It would only take about two days at the very most to reach Mombassa, and then only if we went at a very leisurely pace. OK, we did not know the state of the roads, but even so, it would be two days absolute tops. By the look of it though Geeza had piled in enough gear for a month-long assault on Mount Kilimanjaro.

Another interesting issue was not only the amount he had been packed, but where had it all come from? As far as I was aware Geeza was carrying no money on his person, not since he'd given everything away to those kids. Yet here was a large four-wheel drive vehicle absolutely stuffed to bursting point.

Still, at the time I chose not to comment. We were on our way again and in no time at all I forgot whatever concerns I was keeping, becoming completely mesmerised by the scenery which was - is - simply out of this world.

It quickly became apparent that no matter how many of those documentaries you watch they simply do not prepare you for experiencing the place first hand. The thing with nature programs is you only see what the camera wants you to see. You get no insights as to how the place smells, how the air tastes or how it feels, the cool breeze streaming through the window as you drive along - refreshing, yet fighting a losing battle against the intense heat all around you.

And that's another thing: 'all around you.' There is just so much space! It is immense! Vast, stretching out further than the eye can see in every direction. The sky here is simply enormous! You are dwarfed, beset by insignificance as the colossal, unbroken blue swallows you up like... like... well, like nothing I can imagine.

Is it possible for a sky or a landscape to be humbling? I suppose it can. Perhaps an art lover would feel the same when they finally came face to face with their favourite masterpiece. Actually though, that might not be the best comparison. I don't really know that much about what makes the Art World tick. The only time I have seen an original, bona fide 'treasure' of the art world was at the Louvre in Paris many years ago.

After walking for some time in amongst the most life-like and intricate sculptures I have ever seen and then strolling along in the company of hundreds of beautiful paintings, some of which stretched magnificently from floor to ceiling, I came across the first of many signs pointing the way towards the Mona Lisa, that fabulously famous portrait by the undisputed genius, Senor De Vinci.

A good ten minutes and several signs later I entered a long, high-ceilinged corridor and there, twenty yards away was a crowd of people stood before a painting mounted on the right hand wall, roped off to a distance of five or six feet. I have never considered myself as a great art aficionado or even a big fan, but I have to say that my pulse did quicken slightly as I stepped forwards to mingle with the group paying silent homage to Leonardo's supposed Magnum Opus.

And I remember to this day not being able to get past my initial thought - _it's a bit small isn't it?_

I could not for the life of me see what all the fuss was about, but am fairly sure that somebody with a deeper appreciation of the old oil and canvas could easily be overwhelmed. And yes, _that_ is exactly the feeling I had under the mighty gaze of the Kenyan sun - of being overwhelmed.

We made excellent progress all morning and by the time the sun had gone beyond its zenith we had entered the Tsavo National Park. Geeza was still driving and seemed rather pre-occupied. He was constantly scanning our surroundings, as if looking for something specific. He had not spoken much along the way and as yet I had seen no reason to disturb him. He had still not told me what was in the back, but I was soon to find out.

Our speed had decreased somewhat after passing through the boundaries of the Park \- partly because one instinctively slows in order to look out for animals, but also because the road had become a pitted, pot-holed, shambles of a dirt track which had to be negotiated in first gear in many places.

We had not long driven through a patchy area of Acacia woodland when, upon the plains in front of us, we saw several giraffes stood near the roadside. As we edged slowly closer, they decided to cross and when one in particular walked past, Geeza brought us to an abrupt halt. I asked if there was a problem, but with a raised hand he motioned me to silence and, pointing, singled out this one giraffe from the rest of the herd.

It seemed to me that he was chewing cud or some such thing, but it turns out that Geeza claims _she_ was speaking to him. Whatever the truth of the situation, he stopped the Land Rover claiming enigmatically: "This is it." He turned off the engine and got out, something I am fairly sure that would be frowned upon by the Rangers.

"Geeza, what the hell are you doing?"

For some reason I found myself whispering. He either chose not to answer or more likely just didn't hear me. Taking the spade from its fastenings on the bull-bars at the front he made his way round to the back door and opened it up. I tried again, a little louder this time.

"What are you doing man?"

"Carrying out a promise I made," he replied enigmatically.

Without another word he tugged back the coverings and blankets and revealed to me the contents of our vehicle. There staring grimly up at me - and every other which way as well to be frank - were all the heads of the animals from the walls of _The Scotsman Abroad_. He must have been in every room and ransacked the place! There were dozens of them!

"What the hell have you done?" I cried, as this was theft on a reasonably large scale. He simply repeated that he was keeping a promise. I was astounded, to say the least.

He refused to elaborate despite my questioning and had the gall to ask if I was going to help or not? Stunned and now - in my mind at least - a criminal on the run, I got out and helped to dig as he carefully unloaded our cargo, muttering softly all the time and sprinkling what looked like herbs of some kind over each and every head and body part as he handled them.

A little over an hour and a half later we set off again, with me driving this time. After several long miles of tense silence he finally tried to explain.

"Look Elliot, I'm sorry to have sprung that on you-"

"Really," I said. Truth be told I was furious.

"I didn't have time to explain. You wouldn't have understood-"

"Try me!" I snapped. "Now that we're wanted felons it's all a bit late, but why don't you go ahead and try me?"

He sighed and stared off into the middle distance as we continued to bump along.

"All those things – those heads and things – they belong out here in the Wild, not on the walls of some crumby little hotel-"

"That happened to be a 3 Star hotel for your information, with air conditioned rooms, swimming pool and-"

"Yeah all right! Of _any_ bloody hotel then!" Ok, I _was_ being a tad pedantic. "They're a disgrace Elliot, the sorry legacy of a disgusting bunch of brain-dead cowards – men and women both – who should have been strung up long ago, shot and then left to die."

I think I shared his general views on the subject of Big Game Hunting although he did seem a little more vociferous than I.

"Yes, but that was all years ago Geeza."

"Don't kid yourself matey; it still goes on. There's bloody canned hunts go on right next to the Kruger for God's sake." That's the big National Park in South Africa of course. "They coax the animals out under the fence, drug them up and get some big, fat German or American or someone to come and shoot them. No, it still goes on and it's as sorry and pathetic as it ever was – even more so now, because we should know better."

I have since learned that there are actually organised tours which cater exclusively for hunters to come and bag the animals they most want to have mounted on their walls. Inevitably perhaps, these people are mainly Americans. I wonder why that is...

"Do you know the San Bushmen of the Kalahari have a tradition," he went on, "a Rite of Passage that all their hunters have to go through in which they have to find and follow a Rhino for a given distance and then sneak right up to her and place a stone on her back without her noticing. Now _that's_ a challenge. _That's_ a test of your manhood. That shows you off as a skilled hunter, not standing in the middle of the plains pointing a bloody great cannon at anything that crosses your path and blowing it all to buggery!"

We rode on in silence for a few more minutes. Yes I was angry, but this had obviously affected him more than I'd thought.

"Not that it matters," I said to myself; or thought I had.

"What?"

Realising I must have spoken aloud, I stared at the road ahead and took a deep breath. "Ok. Be all that as it may, that attitude of unfettered testosterone that should have died out with the cavemen - none of it really matters does it? You've done it. You've ransacked an entire hotel and made off with all its... _furnishings_! Why was it so important to have taken them all? You can't undo what was done."

"The Spirits of the Animals weren't happy. They wanted to be brought back out here; they wanted some dignity back, some respect. They wanted release."

"Huh?"

"I said you wouldn't understand," he shrugged.

"You are telling me that..." it was no good. I was stumped. " _What?"_

Geeza sighed. "Ok, I'll try and explain. On our first night here I made contact with a local... Spirit, one of the Denubari."

"The Denubari?"

"They're... kind of the Essences of the Animals. Each one represents a certain type of Animal, the embodiment of everything they represent, everything they feel, their attitudes and impulses. To cut a long story short they agreed to help me if I helped them. All they wanted was this lot put back where they belong. When those Giraffes went by, they told me that was the spot."

I didn't say anything - what _can_ you say to that? He has his methods. They may well be way, _way_ out of leftfield, but they do appear to be very effective. You only have to cast your mind back to the pigeons and the motorbike-straddling stockbrokers who had accosted me back in London. I still don't really know exactly what had happened back then, let alone how it was done.

I must have another word with him about it pretty soon, but not today. I will let myself calm down first; give myself some time to reflect on the situation. I only hope that MacIntosh has not put two and two together and phoned the authorities in Mombassa. Mind you, how could they possibly prove we have done anything now, unless they dig up half of Kenya?

As I said, I'll leave it for the time being, but I'm keeping my fingers and toes crossed for the next few days at least.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

I completed my side of the bargain and performed ceremonies of passing away on each head and mutilated body part as we buried them.

Needless to say there was an uneasy atmosphere in the car after that. Understandable. I told Cripplesby the motives behind my actions, which to his credit he took quite well. Some people would have flipped. I don't think he was too happy about it, but that's mainly because he won't be able to do any more of his research with that MacIntosh guy. Never mind. Like I said to him, he'll find whatever he needs to know from someone else.

For my part I felt great. I was filled to the brim with a feeling of deep satisfaction and could feel the Spirits' joy as they danced about in their new found freedom. It felt good. Really good.

This morning, when everyone had cleared out of the hotel to go to the race, I had whacked a handful of mushrooms down my throat; my last ones. But I had to – I had to be sure I found every one of the God-awful Animal heads and other trophies - there was a stool in one room made from an Elephant's foot for Christ's sake! In another an ashtray made out of a Gorilla's ear... To make good my promise I couldn't afford to take the chance of leaving anything behind.

So, yes it feels good - it feels _fantastic_ \- to have got them all out, but it does mean I've got nothing left 'herbal-wise.'

Later on, while Elliot was driving after the digging had been done, Malika's voice rose up out of the dregs of my trip like a Siren out at Sea. She told me to search for an old lady known by the name of Ramona, a healer who lives on the outskirts of a town called Voi. It is on the way to Mombassa so we don't have to go too far out of our way to stop by; a slight detour is all. This Ramona would be able to help me out I was told, but when I asked how Malika flickered playfully into sight like an old film strip which jumped and crackled as she hovered in the air in front of us. She was smiling and teasingly wagged a long, thin finger at me.

"You will find out when you get there," she said. "Do you not trust your poor little Malika...?"

The question was left hanging in the air as she faded away to be replaced by a faceless man holding three massive forks, each one at least ten or twelve feet tall. He was dwarfed into insignificance by them. It wasn't just the difference in height though; he was made even more unnoticeable by the fact that he had no discernible facial features and also that his clothing was drab and indistinct. Even more telling was that the longer I looked at him the smaller he grew.

As for the forks themselves, they seemed to be glowing from within, or was it that the Sun was going down directly behind them? Either way shafts of light were beaming out from them like you see depicted in all those religious paintings from the Renaissance, or whenever. Haloes, Auras, call them what you want – these forks had them for some reason.

The man was stood on their right hand side and despite being only about nine inches tall by now, was still able to hold them upright in his _massive_ hands, all out of proportion. He looked like Kenny Everett's _Brother Lee Love_.

The wind picked up suddenly and blew about a hundred tumbleweeds past the giant forks, from left to right as I looked at them. Given that I don't know if you even _get_ tumbleweeds in Africa I took this as being significant somehow; but how...?

Elliot had to change down a couple of gears at around this point, negotiating a gully or something and the noise the engine made sounded to me like the chain being pulled on a toilet. The forks, and with them the huge-handed midget, the tumbleweeds and everything else swirled and gurgled away as if down a plug hole, disappearing out of sight with a loud sucking noise.

As normal consciousness hit me, so did fatigue - I _had_ been up all night and through the morning, nipping in and out of peoples' bedrooms and all the other rooms of the _Scotsman_ \- so I put my seat back, closed my eyes and drifted into a well deserved sleep.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Having stopped the night in one of the small groups of rondavel huts that are dotted about Tsavo we started afresh, bright and early. So early in fact, that it had not yet had a chance to become bright. Well, the best times to see the animals are supposedly dawn and dusk, so I thought we might as well make the most of it whilst we were there.

After all, now that the names of Cripplesby and Vermies can be added to those of Bonnie and Clyde and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, who knows how much longer I will have to enjoy the sun on my back? This time next week I may be locked up in some dark, dank Kenyan prison, beginning the period of incarceration that will see me through to the end of my days. Not a pretty thought...

A few hours after sun up we each breakfasted on a rather curly sandwich - no, that is not really fair. It was not curling, or stale, but you know what it is like when you bite into a warm cheese and tomato sandwich. It was that sort of taste - well, actually, it was exactly that taste because that is precisely what it was. Any warmer in fact and they would have been toasted.

So after we had both eaten a couple of sarnies I began to broach again the subject of Geeza's illicit activities in the hotel. I told him that whatever his methods were, they seemed to be working, but then I mentioned my concerns with regards to crime, the police and things of that nature. Rather than apologise however he held his hands up \- which I rather wished he hadn't, as he was driving at the time - and assured me that he was willing to swear to any oath I chose that there would be no repercussions.

I was taken aback by his confidence, I don't mind admitting. I asked him how he could be so sure. Smiling wistfully, he turned to face me (again, err, driving? Eyes on the road and all that?), and said, somewhat mysteriously: "Don't worry Elliot. We've got powerful friends."

God alone knows what he means. Does he know the mayor of Mombassa do you think? Or has he been here before? He's never mentioned it, but I can only assume he has because not long after that we came to a split in the road - one way was signposted to a town named Voi. The other disappeared back, presumably, into the depths of the Park.

I wondered aloud where the other road went and Geeza replied "I don't know." Turning purposefully down the road that led to Voi however, he continued, "but this is the way we've got to go."

So he _must_ have been here before. However, as we drew up to the outskirts of Voi, which seemed a little larger than I had been anticipating, he pulled over to the side of the road and switched off the engine. The whirring and pinging sounds made by the motor as it cooled could equally have come from my friend's head - by the furrowed expression on his face I could see his mind was working on over drive.

He seemed in a bit of a quandary. Ahead of us the road split once more, this time into three. Two of them headed vaguely left and presumably separated further apart from each other down the road a ways, whereas the third branch took the traveller right. Mr. Vermies was chewing his lip I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, to all intents and purposes stumped.

After a minute or two's deliberation I spoke up. "Well?" I asked him simply. His response was to let out a frustrated 'tut' and heave a dirty great sigh. "Come on now – you were so sure of yourself not long ago."

"Yeah, that was different though."

"Oh?"

"Well, I knew we had to come to Voi – there's someone I've got to look for."

"Not another poacher's house," I said, only half joking.

"No, no, no," he explained, all seriousness. "There's an old woman I need to see. An old... herbalist called Ramona."

"Ramona...?" I wondered about a surname.

"That's all I know. She's called Ramona, she's a traditional doctor and she lives somewhere in or around Voi. But where exactly..." he trailed off and lapsed into further silence.

I saw our predicament of course. If we really did have to stop and see her, which we _did_ apparently, then how on earth were we going to find her? I confess that I grew a little down hearted.

"Well sitting here isn't going to do us any good is it?" I said, not allowing the gloom to settle. "We might as well just toss a coin for which fork to take and then start asking when we meet someone." Not a great plan I know, especially as there were three forks so unless I could find a three-sided coin... Well, we could draw straws or something. Anyway, it was all I could think of at the time.

Geeza pulled a face at my suggestion initially, scowling, but then he suddenly looked thoughtful as if something had finally clicked. A grin slowly began to take shape and I could tell right there and then that he had cracked it! He keyed the ignition.

"Elliot, you're a genius!" Rather unwarranted flattery I thought and said as much to him. His reply was even more cryptic than usual. "This is the one we want," he said, as we headed off down the right hand lane. "A fork in the road! The dwarf with the hands was on the right, and the bushes were blowing this way." He was smiling all over his face. "It's flaming obvious!"

Obvious?

Is it?

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Idiot! Fork in the road - I should have seen that one coming, I really should. I am obviously taking myself far too seriously. She must have been laughing her head off at me!

From there it was easy. The road wound around the outskirts of the town and there was only one scattered cluster of buildings to be found before the road rejoined the main highway to Mombassa. We pulled over and got out. It felt good to stretch the old legs - something I don't tend to notice as a rule, the stiffness. The Durban Poison usually keeps it well under control, but I ran out of that before I came away.

I took a deep gulp of air, breathed the place in and raised my eyebrows in greeting to an old, grizzled man sitting on an upturned crate of Fanta under a tree. He made the slightest of movements with his head in response. It was hot here. You saved your energy wherever you could. Cripplesby got a drink out of the back, and offered me one, but I wasn't thirsty. The old boy was though, so I handed him a green bottle of Sprite and said "Ramona?"

He took a long drink from the bottle then looked hard at me. He seemed to deliberate for a moment or two before pointing with his chin to a whitewashed breeze block building with a new corrugated iron roof shining brightly on top of it. I thanked him and went in. Elliot followed behind.

Inside was dark, cool and fragrant. It was empty of people, apart from Ramona herself, a sturdy woman of indeterminate age; not young, but by no means old. She wore the long, flowing dress particular to the area, a hand-dyed mixture of natural browns and reds, with a just smattering of purple here and there. A tightly wrapped headscarf kept her hair out of the way as she worked.

She was currently in the process of grinding up some bark and peelings on a roughly hewn wooden table. She looked up as we walked in, but stayed seated and silent. When my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw that she was smiling quizzically as she looked at me. Shaking her head, but still grinning from ear to ear she made a clucking noise and laughed, motioning for us to sit down.

Once we were seated upon the hard, wobbly bench, she asked us with one word if we wanted a drink. There is a universally accepted etiquette to follow in these situations, so we accepted. I was glad of the delay, as she rose to pour some thick, black coffee into three small cups, and I began to think about how _on Earth_ I was going to try to explain my situation to her. Frankly I had no idea how I was going to even start. However, returning to the table and setting the coffees down before us she made it easy for me.

"Denubari?" she asked, with highly arched eyebrows. Elliot looked perplexed, but I nodded my head and said yes. She burst out into a spluttering laugh, shaking her head all the while. Then she caught me square in the eyes, her gaze holding me still for a moment. "Tulu?" she asked, but reading confusion on my face she continued. "Omfali? Malika?"

The penny dropped and I replied quickly before she carried on. "Malika, yes."

She shook her head again, sighing through her broad smile. She muttered something to herself which I did not understand, but ended "Oh, Malika!" Catching my eye again, she said, "Wait, eh?"

She then rose once more and started bustling about the place, picking out handfuls or pinches of herbs, leaves and powders from various jars and pots. Poor old Elliot was right out of his depth here and just sat there taking polite sips from his strong, bitter coffee – and that looked like it was a bit of an effort. His face screwed up like he'd bitten into a lemon every time he put the tiny clay cup to his lips. It _was_ bitter though; strong.

I guess I'll have to explain all _this_ to him as well, later on, though I'm not sure how he's going to take it. Ramona returned to her seat before too long, humming a tune to herself. She cleared a space on the table before plonking down all she had collected and then got to work.

Having chopped and pounded away for about ten minutes she placed various concoctions in a number of hand stitched bags. She held up one particular package, making sure I could pick it out from the rest. There was only a pinch or two of herbs in there. She looked at me and said "First, eh?" I nodded my head.

She then stood up and shoved all the pouches she had made across the table. "Thirty dollars, American," she stated, wiping her hands on a cloth hanging on a hook in the wall behind her, smiling all the while. I looked at Elliot and she followed my gaze. To his credit, although he must have had no idea what was going on, he took out the money and handed it over. I thanked them both and we left.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

The man has more facets than the Crown Jewels. I am talking of course about Mr. Vermies. In the drive from Voi to Mombassa he told me more about himself than I feel he has ever told anybody else before.

He explained to me that Ramona was a doctor. He then told me that he had to see her because he had run out of shamanic plants! Can you believe it?

"Ok Elliot, I think I owe you another explanation," he began, having thanked me again for paying the woman. "Ramona is a doctor; a local doctor. She dishes out traditional cures, natural remedies and potions, that sort of thing. But she's also much more than that. She knows of certain special Roots and Plants – Shamanic Plants – that I need to contact my Allies."

"Your Allies?"

"Yeah, my... helpers."

"You can't just get them on the phone then?" He gave me a look and then continued patiently.

"I mean helpers like the Denubari. Spiritual helpers. The entities that exist in the Spiritual World, or if you prefer, on other, more subtle levels of existence. An infinite number of Worlds and Universes exist alongside our own, but on a different vibrational rate – a different frequency if you like, like all the stations on a radio.

"These Worlds, these Beings, they're all out there now," he waved his arms about vaguely. "Always have been, always will be, it's just that we normally can't get to them. It's all to do with vibrational energy, but we'll not get into that right now, but by using certain psychotropic Plants and substances along with the appropriate rituals, it is possible to access these places and communicate directly with the inhabitants – what people sometimes lump together as Ghosts or Spirits. The Denubari had told me that Ramona made them. I'd run out."

"Hang on a minute. Psychotropic substances? Do you mean drugs?" A hint of alarm crept into my voice.

"Come on Elliot, we're all grown ups here. 'Drugs' is a word that has been deliberately used to instil fear and mistrust by the authorities. The negative associations have become so strong over the last couple of generations that you only have to hear the word 'drugs' now and you immediately think about dirty, filth-ridden smack houses and sallow-faced addicts breaking into houses, beating up grannies for their pensions and that sort of thing. The truth is very different.

"Our culture is perhaps the only one in the history of humanity that has not openly embraced mind altering drugs, be it for pleasure or the expansion of the mind. And it isn't just the 'primitive' tribes, the aboriginal cultures around the World who've been happy to dabble. Oh no - it's quite ironic that the very civilizations who helped to shape our own, the Greeks, Romans and Egyptians – they were _all_ on some sort of substance or another. And there are hundreds out there: Amphetamines, Blue Lotus, Cannabis Sativa, Datura and then from E, literally, right through to Z."

He gave me plenty of examples, some of which I knew and many that I did not and I found it an interesting perspective, I must admit. As were his further claims that it was not the drugs themselves that were dangerous, but the users.

"Yes ok," I came in, "but that same argument has been used by the various firearms associations in America for years: that it is not the guns, but the men holding them."

"No, no," he responded, "guns are made specifically for one reason and one reason only - to kill. To destroy. Plants not only grow naturally, but – and especially in the case of psychotropics - each has a whole plethora of uses depending on what you want them for and how you go about preparing them.

"And anyway, what about the use of amphetamines in the Second World War? The government issued pills in order to keep the soldiers going for longer - in order to _help them kill_. But now all of a sudden they're bad, wicked, evil. So it's ok to use them to kill more people, but not for anything else? They were fine before, but now they're dangerous? Come on, don't you find that massively hypocritical?"

"Well, I suppose they would say that people _have_ died using them recreationally."

"Yes, but Elliot, out of a drug-taking population of several million in England let's say... fifty deaths a year isn't bad. Any death is a tragedy, of course, but fifty people die falling off ladders every year. What do you want to do – ban ladders?

"Look, it's not the substances, but how they're taken. We are living in an age of excess and it is this _attitude_ that is to blame for any drug problems - the need to go too far, the lack of respect for the substances themselves - and for life in general."

Hmmm, all deep, meaningful stuff... I hope I am not turning into a hippie, but a lot of what he said made sense. I could see his point of view quite easily and have to take my hat off to him anyway because it couldn't have been easy to blurt it all out like that, stuck in here with me in a land rover in the middle of nowhere, not knowing how I was going to react. On the other hand, maybe being thrown together like that actually made it easier. In normal, everyday life there are always plenty of distractions to stop this kind of intense conversation from taking place. Switch on the TV, listen to the radio, watch a billboard sailing past – out here though there was nothing but me, him and the situation. It's probably much healthier this way.

From his standpoint these 'substances' are essential, very valuable tools to be used with the very greatest care and respect. And whatever my personal opinions may happen to be, he does get astounding results. That much is undeniable.

Of course, none of this alters the fact that having ransacked a hotel and then ditched the stolen booty, we are now heading into a major city with a car full of drugs – that's how the authorities would see it, no matter what we might think.

Burglary first, then drug running - I am turning into a bigger criminal that the man we're chasing for God's sake! Where will it end? Hopefully not in an East African jail cell, that's all I can say!

Anyway, back to the events of the day. We drove into Mombassa with our newly acquired contraband (not exactly "Fear and Loathing..." but it did prey on my mind) to find that a good number of the rally drivers had long since finished the race and it was only the stragglers still to come in.

And you could have knocked me down with a feather, but the Professor's car had only gone and won! Fans of the principle driver, Mr. Donald, were waving hundreds of South African flags and it seemed as if every inhabitant of the place had come out, thronging onto the streets. It was bedlam.

We slowly inched our way along the teeming byways and turned into the first hotel we came to, having made the decision to park the Land Rover while we still had chance. We chose not to check in immediately, thinking we would come back later and do it. I was sure they wouldn't mind and besides, there was only a skeleton staff on duty, so I don't know that they even noticed.

Making much better progress on foot, we headed for the area set up for the public to view the winning drivers and as we got there it was just being announced over the tannoys that the few competitors who were still out had officially retired, so the prize giving would now take place. The third and second place teams were brought out and handed their prizes before finally, alongside Mr. Donald, our very own Professor Alan Humphries appeared on the podium.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Whether or not I should have done, I told all to Cripplesby after our meeting with Ramona. I owed it to him really. After all, he is paying out hand over foot for this investigation. And I tell you what - he is a man of hidden depths. Yeah, Elliot's cool.

Abandoning the Landy in some hotel car park, we barged our way through to the podiums just in time to hear the winners being announced over the P.A. Humphries and the South African had won and collected their bottles of bubbly and the enormous trophy with smiles to match. Then came the cheque, one of those over-sized ones made up and brought out for the cameras. Once it was deemed the crowd had been sprayed with enough champagne, all the drivers headed off for the publicity photographs round the back of the rostrum.

We decided to split up so that one of us at least could hopefully get into the winners' compound itself. We arranged to meet back out in front of the podiums in an hour. Cripplesby made a great play of synchronising watches without realizing that I don't wear one! Oh well, at least he's trying to get into the spirit of things.

Elliot walked away, looking for some sort of side gate or else just the entrance, to try and pay his way in. I ambled around for a bit, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible and then when I could be sure no one was watching I shinnied up and over the fence. It was pretty simple. Everyone was caught up in the celebrations, including security, so no one was really paying any attention to anybody.

Once on the right side of the perimeter fence I strolled casually about - nobody stops you if you look as though you're meant to be there. After no too long I found my way round to the press tent easily enough.

The photos with the presentation cheques were unfortunately already finished and the Professor was nowhere to be seen. Ollie Donald was still there though. He was doing some sort of advert about designer sunglasses for South African T.V, where apparently he is a bit of a celebrity. Good looking, successful, pearly white teeth – you know the sort.

Suddenly I felt a chill, uneasy air gathering around me and I knew I had to find the Professor - quickly. I brought out the sachet that Ramona had told me in her no nonsense way to take first, went to some quiet corner, and smoked the lot.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Separating once again, Geeza went off to try and find a back way in. I myself joined the throng and queued at the main gates, paying the sum of fifteen US dollars to gain entrance to the grand enclosure. I am not so sure everybody paid that much, but I couldn't really grumble. It's not really all that much and besides – and you can be as PC as you like here, but the facts remain the same – fifteen bucks to me is an awful lot less than it is to one of the locals.

On top of all that though, it was not just the post race celebrations I was buying my way into. You see, the rally coincided with another annual event, namely the Celebration of African Brotherhood, an attempt, using the words of the late, great Bob Marley, "to see the unification of all Africans." A most noble and worthwhile cause.

Now, anyone who has ever attended an outdoor occasion such as this - a large craft fair, county show, or open-air festival - would be well aware of the sort of things that could be seen. Multicoloured stalls sold every sort of product imaginable and were set out in a crude, rectangular arrangement around the main display area, where currently performing was a group of tribal Zulu Dancers from the winner, Mr. Donald's, country of origin.

I stopped suddenly, forgetting the Professor and the reason I was here because the dancers had caught my eye, hurling themselves with abandon about the close-cropped and obviously well watered lawn. Their movements bore a striking resemblance - in an abstract way - to the little known kilted Scottish dancers who, sadly, perform only occasionally now, giving a similar demonstration at the Scottish Highland Games.

I am not referring to what most people know as Scottish Dancing, the sort of urban equivalent to Morris Dancing, but the genuine thing: raw, unrestrained and energetic and unfortunately nowadays, rarely seen. It is a dance of great antiquity, marvellous beauty and forms the basis from where all folk dancing and even the modern day - dare I say popular - Scottish dancing originated.

This was something that just had to be followed up. I noticed a chap leaning against the inside of the railings who seemed to be associated with the dancing troupe. The man was possessed by that easy African rhythm it was plain to see, by the way his legs swayed and stomped in perfect synchronicity with the drumming and chanting going on behind him. He was flamboyantly dressed in a batik shirt of many greens and blues and purple hues, with shoes to match his tailored trews. His flat-topped hat wore the same spiralling swirls and patterns as his shirt. Brighter than his clothes though was his huge, toothy smile, which he beamed at every person passing by, handing out pamphlets as he greeted them all.

I walked over and hallooed him, taking the flyer he offered me with pleasure. They hailed from the Valley of A Thousand Hills near Durban, South Africa and travelled about putting on their displays all over the place - mostly in Africa, but their troupe had been to every populated continent on at least one occasion.

I had scarcely managed to open my mouth though, to ask about the history of this type of dancing, when bursting through the crowds of people like a whirling dervish came Geeza, shouting out my name repeatedly, unconcerned - or unaware - of the attention he was drawing to himself.

I thought it best to excuse myself and intercept Mr. Vermies before he got us thrown out - or worse. Pocketing the dancers' leaflet for further investigation at a later date, I went to meet Geeza's rush head on and tried to shush him a little as I asked him what on earth was the matter?

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

It is all a bit hazy now, but here's how it happened. I found a spot underneath the bank of seats facing the showground and sparked up Ramona's 'first' mixture in Old Smokey. It was quite smooth and mellow until, pretty much as soon as I'd finished the Pipe and was cleaning the bowl with a wet finger - _Bam!_ It hit me man! It hit me hard.

I was sat on my backside by the force of it and it was only by a supreme force of will that I manage to keep hold of Smokey and put him away. Then I was gone mate.

Malika towered above me, as graceful and elfin as before. If anything she seemed to emanate even more energy this time! Man, I was wiped out. I couldn't have moved if I tried. What the Hell was in that mix? Christ, it was strong!

She squatted down and then knelt, cradling my head in her lap. I was utterly powerless and had she been inclined to, she could have stretched me until I snapped, right there and then.

But instead she sang to me and stroked my hair as her lullaby massaged my wildly spinning head. A few moments of this and she looked down upon me, holding my head in her hands. The World stopped, had ceased to be. There was nothing that existed beyond the beautiful Denubari whose face completely filled my vision.

Again she smiled and it was like a thousand brilliant Suns appearing from behind a Cloud. Instantly I relaxed and felt control returning to my body. I didn't move though. Why should I? This was everywhere anyone could possibly want to be. When she spoke, her words flooded my body with shivers of ecstasy, every cell vibrating with pleasure.

"Ramona looked after you, yes?" came the words, dripping with honey. I smiled in response. There was no need for me to speak.

She then went through with me all the packages that Ramona had prepared; the effects that each one would have, the time it would take to kick in and also how long each one would last. She refrained from telling me what the ingredients were exactly, not that I'd have been able to do anything if she had. I wouldn't try to fiddle about with this stuff unless I was more than doubly certain I'd get it right. I kind of get the impression that if you got it wrong with these mixtures, you wouldn't want to survive long enough to know about it.

These herbs were strong and long lasting and without taking a hell of a lot of care - more so than usual - I could find myself sailing the waves of eternity with a broken mast.

Having been through the mixtures thoroughly, she dropped my head once more into her lap and toyed at my hair with her long, luxuriant fingers. She bent down low and kissed my forehead - ahhhh, the feeling is indescribable!

She looked at me seductively with her irresistible brown eyes, and parted her lips. "Oh, my little one," she whispered softly, "you are my first White Man; did you know that?" My eyes closed as orgasmic convulsions shook my body in wave after wave; all I could do was to groan with pleasure.

Malika laughed, and brushed her lips lightly against my own. Oh, it was a sensation, a taste I shall never forget. "Thank you for helping us my Little Thief," she said. "You will be leaving us soon and I see you travelling a great distance within the next moon. But you will come back to see us won't you?"

It was a purely rhetorical question. Wild horses couldn't keep me away from her now! After I've finished this job, that's it - I am coming over here to stay. How can I do anything else, if it doesn't involve her?

Malika stood up and helped me rise weakly to my feet, keeping my hands clutched securely within hers.

"Go now my Little Thief, with both speed and care. Your adversary is cunning and capable, but far from invincible. And then return here to me, after the next moon has ripened in the sky."

She knew as well as I did that I had no choice.

And then she was gone. I found myself standing underneath the seating rig, alone amongst the metal scaffolding, staring out upon an unmarked, two-storey building about thirty feet away. I was in full control now. My senses were razor sharp and would remain so, my beautiful Denubari had informed me, for a good eight to ten hours. Once again, I felt that uneasy atmosphere closing in around me. I closed my eyes, taking a good deep breath or two, just to reassure myself that I was all still there and fully grounded.

It was only after a few minutes that a sense of security returned, but when I opened my eyes again my vision had changed completely and I saw in the same way a Snake senses her prey with the heat pits in her nose. It was not heat that I was picking up however - there was one bright white light on the ground by a door leading into the small building opposite and the colours cooled through all the shades of the rainbow as my eyes moved away from the object.

I blinked, and my vision returned to normal. Puzzled, I walked across to the spot near the door and noticed a pair of expensive looking ray bans discarded on the small step that led up to the entrance.

Odd, I thought. Why were these significant? People lose sunnies all the time. I bent down to pick them up and reeled at the sensation that attacked me the instant my hand closed around the discarded glasses - my eyes were instantly swamped with movie pictures of fists raining down! Down, down, down, in three parallel columns, my eyes swimming with the attempt to try and keep up with the images. Still the fists rained down with ever increasing force until finally - _Shing! Shing! Shing!_ \- they stopped.

There, lined up before me like the winning row on a slot machine, I saw faces. Three faces, all the same man, once good looking but now battered and bleeding. One eye was puffed up like a haemorrhaging soufflé and the whole face was hideously disfigured, stained with crusted blood. Yet I felt sure I knew him. I just needed a minute to see through the injuries. Suddenly the veil was lifted and I realised who it was! Ollie Donald, the Rally Champion!

Jesus! What had happened? Again my vision changed and I saw red hot foot steps leading inside. Flinging the door open, I was confronted by a long, blank corridor, with at least a dozen doors on either side. However, there were vapour trails as clear as day heading right down to the end of the passageway and turning the corner. The trails had been left by Humphries, dragging the inert figure of Ollie Donald who was slumped unconscious - at least, I hoped he was unconscious.

I had to find Elliot. I needed his help here, but I knew I had to be quick.

Perhaps if I had gone after them straight away, there and then, I could have caught them up. Who knows? As it was I went for safety in numbers. Slamming the door behind me I headed back out into the glare of the afternoon Sun.

How in the hell was I going to find Cripplesby? There must be thousands of people out here and I had absolutely no idea how long ago it was since we had separated. Had it been a half hour, or an hour? Or two? God knows. I headed back around the seating block towards the main arena - I had to start somewhere - and what a choice. There he was, only about fifty yards away!

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

I write this on the way to the International Airport back in Nairobi, my fears of retribution from our former hotelier having had to be have been pushed to one side through necessity. I don't suppose it will hurt to cross my fingers though. What a time of it we are having! I am not certain I can come to terms with this at all!

Let me explain. When Geeza found me near the dancers on the showground he was in a frightfully excited state - in fact, he was all over the place, shaking, stammering, pulling on my arm and mumbling incoherently. He dragged me around the back of the grandstand and over to a building which housed, I found out later, a few small rooms that served as offices, some toilets, a couple of store rooms – that kind of thing. It was used in a seemingly random way, for all manner of functions.

However, Mr. Vermies appeared to know where he was going as we burst our way through the door and hurtled down a corridor, turning left at the end. We continued along for a further few feet when Geeza pulled me up short at a door which looked to me, for all intents and purposes, just like any other.

"What's going on? Where are we? Are we even supposed to be in here?" The questions were coming out as fast as they formed in my mind. He grabbed my shoulders and stared into my eyes, panting for breath.

"Elliot - we're probably too late - just be careful, ok?"

As you can imagine, this put me immediately on edge, but he placed a finger up to his lips, silencing the string of yet more questions that were battling with each other to get out.

"Here we go," he said, "get ready."

Placing a careful hand on the doorknob, he listened for a moment and then flung it open and charged in.

The room within was a tiny affair, a storage cupboard really, filled with tins of paint, brushes, brooms, a couple of rolls of wire and things of a similar nature; all for the maintenance of the showground. The faint noises made by the crowds filtered in from outside through a tiny, three-louvered window set high up in the wall. And there, lying bound and crumpled underneath it in a bruised and bleeding heap was the inert figure of the Champion Rally Driver, Ollie Donald!

I rushed straight out after one look at him to find Mombassa's equivalent of the St John's Ambulance, returning shortly after with two large men carrying first aid kits. We found Ollie sitting up - Geeza having untied him - and looking a little better for having some water splashed on his face, administered by my friend from a single tap at the end of the corridor.

A credit to their profession, the paramedics set to checking for broken bones or any other injuries he may have sustained and within the space of a few short minutes they had Mr Donald bandaged up and looking remarkably better. Apparently, these things often look worse than they actually are, head wounds, something to do with the amount of blood vessels in the face or something like that. Having finished their work, they explained that they would have to inform the show organizers (and they'd no doubt inform the police) and that they would then like to take Ollie into hospital for some tests.

Instructing us to stay here in the cool and quiet, they disappeared to find the appropriate authorities. I used the time to ask the racing driver if he could remember what had happened to him.

"We had done the presentation and the photo shoots," Ollie said, "and I was on my way to the drivers' rooms for a shower and to get changed." He paused for a minute, his breathing obviously painful as he had sustained two cracked ribs. "I remember opening the door and there was my navigator, waiting for me with a bloody great pick-axe handle!"

Mr. Donald's story revealed a most unpleasant side to this mad Professor's character - for indeed I can only assume that he is, in fact, truly insane. He had set about Ollie with his stout cudgel like a man possessed, bludgeoning him to near unconsciousness before dragging him into the tiny store room and trussing him up in a corner.

"I must have passed in and out of unconsciousness a few times," he admitted. "I saw him leave with the key to my locker and then when he came back he had all my stuff in a big bundle."

"Did he talk to you at all?" I asked. "Give you some idea of what he wanted?"

"No, he just went through my wallet and all my pockets and things – he didn't even look at me, not once. Man, that guy is a lunatic!" I could only agree.

"But all your money's still there; all your cards..."

"Yeah, he seemed to be looking for something specific, you know?"

And evidently he found it because the last thing the battered driver could remember before sinking mercifully beneath the dark waves of oblivion was the Professor's face, gleaming with a manic smile and holding aloft the key to Ollie Donald's villa in Cap Ferret, in the South of France. When I asked him how Humphries had known about his home on the Med, I learned a most intriguing fact.

"It was two days before the race," he began, "when disaster struck. HD suddenly went down with an acute case of food poisoning." That would be HD Le Roux, his co-pilot or navigator, or whatever they call themselves. "This Humphries, he'd been loitering for a day or two around the drivers' compound - just chatting, you know, talking with the guys. Anyway it turned out he had navigated once or twice when he was younger for a friend of his back in Scotland. I took him out for a couple of test runs and he seemed competent enough – and there was no one else anyway, so I took him on."

"Scotland?" I couldn't help myself from latching onto the word. It was quite unconscious.

"Yeah?" he said slowly, although with his accent it was more like 'yarrrrrrr?' "Is that important?"

Well, where to start? I explained very briefly about my interest in all things Scottish.

"Ah, what, you're a research student, or you're writing a book or something like that?"

"Something like that," I said sheepishly.

"Well, my family's from Scotland."

"What?" This was getting weirder by the minute.

"Yeah, originally I mean. Funny, Humphries was interested in that too-"

" _What?_ "

"Yeah, he asked me quite a lot about my family in fact."

He then proceeded to tell me what he had told the Professor, shortly after they had teamed up. I could say he told _us_ , but Geeza seemed to be in a bit of a world of his own. He just squatted silently and looked around as if he was the only one there – which he may well have been, wherever he actually was, because he certainly wasn't with us.

Mr. Donald is indeed of Scottish descent – I should have guessed from the name really. The story goes that his great, great grandfather had shipped the family out in the latter portion of the 1890's. They had set up home along the eastern coast of South Africa, a few hours drive from the Drakensberg Mountains which apparently reminded Robert Donald of the Grampians.

With his main home currently situated near Durban in the town of Amanzimtoti, Ollie Donald now owned several houses and villas around the world, wherever the rallying circuit took him on a regular basis.

He had explained to Humphries, he said, that some of the family heirlooms were housed in his French home and that among these treasures were several coins which his great, great grandfather had taken with them when they emigrated. These coins were the sum total of all the family had owned when they emigrated, having sold up lock, stock and barrel, but upon arriving on the shores of their new homeland they soon discovered that the money was useless. It was Scottish money and therefore not recognised as legal tender!

What a tragedy! His savings had totalled nearly seven Scottish pounds, a princely sum in those days, especially after paying passage for his family. They effectively had to start again from nothing, but the great, great grandfather kept the coins as a reminder, so they would always have a target to aim for. Once the sum they represented had been surpassed, then the family would know that they had 'made it', been successful. Ollie regarded the coins as primary factors contributing to the competitive streak in his family and therefore one of the reasons for his success. These coins were kept in a display case on the wall of his French living room.

And so the penny had dropped. Or was about to - right into the Professor's pockets! Geeza sprang back to life when this Scottish money was mentioned.

" _That's_ why he attacked you!" he exclaimed. "He wanted the key to get the coins! It's the money he's after – the Scottish money! Damn it, we've got get to it before he does! We've got to get to the South of France!"

Of course we do Geeza.

He insists, although he will not explain why or how, that we must assume this is why the Professor latched onto poor old Ollie in the first place.

"It's probably the only reason he came out here - it's the money, I'm telling you! Remember the bikers and the hotel," he said. He would not be drawn into saying anything more however, so I left him to it.

It seems a bit far-fetched to me, but what am I talking about? This whole saga up until now has been exactly that! Why on earth should this professor \- although granted he's quite obviously stone bonkers - why would he be so interested in Scottish money? It just doesn't make any sense. Then again, like I said, what does around here these days?

After explaining briefly our own motivations for wishing to catch up with Humphries, Mr. Donald gave us carte blanche to do as we saw fit in apprehending the lunatic. He told us the address of his home in Cap Ferrat and how to get there from the nearest airport in nearby Nice.

"You can have the run of my house boys," he said as he was being quietly stretchered into an ambulance out of view of the public eye. "There's a spare key in a little box buried just to the left of the third rose bush by the door. Do whatever you need to do ok - just get this guy."

And so that is where you now find me, driving back to Nairobi at a rate of knots. We are not in the Land Rover this time you see. The race organisers, keen to hush the whole thing up, have given us the use of one of the Rally cars (having assured me they would handle all the paperwork regarding the Land Rover) and have agreed to give us two days before informing the authorities of anything. That way if we catch the Professor, all well and good and the correct channels can be gone through from there.

And if not, it ensures that we will be well out of Nairobi by the time the police come swarming around the airport, so there will be as little chance as possible that the incident with the animals from the hotel will rear its ugly head – poor choice of expression there, under the circumstances - and give us any nasty, unwelcome surprises.

I am not sure that I fully approve of this kind of shameless corruption, simply because we are helping Mr. Donald out, but funnily enough I think I'll be able to sleep at night, just so long as we get of Kenya intact.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Having ditched the car with someone affiliated with the race who met us at the airport, we high-tailed it into the terminal building as fast as we could inconspicuously go.

We knew we couldn't afford to draw attention to ourselves for a number of reasons. First and foremost were the _Medicines_ I was carrying about my person, which would not have stood me in good stead with any local constabulary. Plus we had no way of knowing what action MacIntosh, the guy from the hotel might have taken. It was possible that we were already on the wanted list. I completely trusted Malika to have taken care of things one way or another, but it didn't stop the fear from taking hold.

And then there was the Professor. We didn't think he was on to us, but if he was and then saw us charging headlong after him, he would panic and bolt and there was no way of knowing what might happen in that sort of situation.

In any case, the race officials and Ollie had made us agree not to cause a scandal. It would create such bad publicity, not just for the event itself, but for the whole world of rallying that we had promised not to get the police and not to raise a scene. Basically, not to do anything if we couldn't do it unnoticed. If we couldn't bundle Humphries away with us nice and surreptitiously we were to follow him to France - for which they had paid the tickets. Once there we were to wait for him to break into the villa and only then call for the police, posing as friends of Donald, having apprehended a burglar.

That is, if we weren't too late and we might well be now, because although we could see the man himself, calm and unruffled, already through passport control and making his way to the departure lounge, we found that the check-in for that flight had now closed and we were going to have to wait for the next one. This meant hanging around _sixteen hours_ for the next flight to _L'aeroport de Nice-Cote d'Azur_ , or else a four hour delay and then flying to Genoa, about a hundred miles east of Nice across the Alps and driving the rest of the way. That seemed the best option so, having swapped our tickets over, all we can do now is wait...

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

I have had word this morning from Mr. Slush in Canterbury. I can commend his scribe for the neatness of his calligraphy, although it is not as flowery or as illustrated a text as that to which I am used to seeing. Of course it may not be a scribe at all because I am certain that Mr. Slush must be more than adequately practiced in the art of writing to have done it himself.

He apologised to me for not having more to tell, but informed me that certain tests were still being carried out on the objects he had taken away with him in his little windows and that they were proving to be very interesting – I can only hope that he is being as careful as and is taking all the precautions he can. I shall be sure to mention him in my prayers this evening.

He also mentioned that it may be necessary at some point for me to go to Canterbury! He said that it would be foolish to assume that more questions will not have arisen by the time the tests are finished and that the Church leaders will need to talk to me.

Can this be true? Should I dare to go along with this, to think that the very highest echelons of the Church - the very Hierarchy itself – gives its valuable time over to thinking of me? But more than that, Slush claims that I should fortify myself, as the Church may well be asking for my continued assistance! Me, _Sadfael_!

Personally I cannot see what it is that a lowly monk such as myself can possibly do that cannot better be done by somebody else, somebody more capable, for Heaven knows there are many! Especially when you consider that they have the enormity of the entire Church, with all of its vast riches and resources to call upon. Of course it goes without saying that I will give myself completely to whatever it is that is asked of me.

And in the meantime I pray for guidance as I feel, sitting here in this little village, that there is surely more I could be doing - should be doing - in my Holy mission to apprehend this Spawn of Satan and send him back to the pits of Hell where he belongs.

I still find myself wondering why the Good Lord has seen fit to bestow upon me this most difficult of tasks. Whilst I in no way wish to cast aspersions upon His ineffable wisdom, unquestionable as it is, I cannot stop myself from thinking there must be somebody better, a more able man than I, with a faith more deep and shoulders more broad who would be far better suited to the completion of this most Holy yet onerous of tasks.

I do not mean to tread in the footsteps of Saint Thomas, but I cannot help but feel a plethora of doubts creeping into my mind and assailing my beliefs in my every waking moment. Am I to believe that there is not one single person in all of God's Kingdom who would not be more capable than I in ridding the world of this Evil foe? Geoffrey Slush is top of the page in my book.

Perhaps it is just fear and the after effects of being in the insidious presence of the Fallen Angel, but how can I possibly hope to stop my head from spinning when I spend my days and nights passively sitting here, doing nothing? All the while I rest here I find myself drawn still further away from my monastic lifestyle. I know we all have been given our own burdens to bear and yet...

Jesus Himself _was_ made to carry His cross after all, but rather being comforted by this fact I am instead given over to the blasphemous thoughts that it was _only a cross_! It was two bits of wood lashed together with a length of rope! Did He undergo the sufferance that I am being put through? Yes he was nailed up and subjected to the unbearable agonies that must follow, but was He displaced without warning into a world that He could not have dreamt up even in the storms of His very wildest imaginations?

Terrible I know, but try as I might I cannot keep these thoughts from assailing my head! I know too, as do all good, God fearing Christians, that Lucifer also appeared before Christ and offered Him temptations, but do you suppose that he had amongst his Hellish weaponry at the time such things as coffee, chocolate, denim jeans, or pre-dyed, multi-hued, felt-tipped pens?

Did the Unholy One demonstrate to the Son of God how, merely by placing a silvery disc into a slightly duller coloured box, His favourite musician could be brought forth to play actually in _the same room_ that he was standing? Was Jesus ever tempted by 'compact disc recordings'?

I know that the longer I remain here inactive the further I will sink into this pit of depravity. My descent might be slow, but it is inevitable, no matter the strength of my resistance. It is all too much and if I do not do something soon I dread to ponder what the eventual consequences might be!

And to exacerbate my situation yet more, I also feel myself succumbing to the sin of sloth. The bed in which I sleep is so comfortable that I find myself lying-in until half past five every morning! I can only hope that no one notices!!

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Waiting in that airport must have been the longest few hours of my life. It was tortuous and every time I heard the bing-bong of an announcement being made I listened with dread, certain that this one would be the security alert sounding our death knoll and sealing our fate. It never came though and so after an interminably long time we continued on to the next stage in proceedings: Customs.

Now I am no stranger to airports, having been lucky enough to have travelled to many far flung destinations in my time and I have found that wherever I have been, at whatever time in my life – even as a small child – there must be something about me that the customs officials from around the world just don't like.

I can remember lugging my favourite stuffed toy around with me everywhere I went as an ankle-biter – we were inseparable, Palladium and I. It's funny; I have no memory at all of why or how he ever got the name Palladium. What I do remember is that, having been opened up so many times by the uncaring knives of the Excise men, he eventually looked like some kind of Frankenstein's Teddy. Of course the more he got stitched back up the more convinced the _next_ set of customs officers were that he was stuffed full of rubies, or drugs or some other type of contraband - but there was only ever sawdust and not much of that thanks to them!

As the years passed by my Mum wanted me to get rid of him because he was scaring all the other kids - friends that used to come round to play - but I would have none of it. The neighbour's dog got him in the end and while I accepted the loss quite well, finding enough forgiveness to continue sharing my jam sandwiches with him as I had always done, I was never entirely satisfied with the story of how Palladium had got into their garden in the first place...

As I was saying though, Customs. You cannot help but feel guilty, even though you have done nothing wrong which of course _I_ hadn't, but the fact that twenty yards behind me Geeza was carrying about half a kilo of highly dubious herbal products didn't help me in the slightest. I was on tenterhooks.

By the time we stepped off the plane in Genoa I had completely forgotten about being frustrated at the time we had lost and was, instead, a hopeless bag of nerves. Somebody somewhere must surely be watching over us however because we succeeded somehow in getting through the customs completely unscathed at both ends of the flight.

I checked to see if there were any connecting flights from Genoa to Nice, but there were none within the timescale we were looking at, so within an hour of touching down on Italian soil I had managed to hire a car – pretty quick, but the plane was not full and we hardly had any luggage between us. There was a disturbingly large surcharge to pay on the car because we were making a one way journey, to use their terminology, and would probably be leaving the car in France, but that couldn't be helped so I signed the papers and we were back on the case! Before I knew it we were making our way along the _autostrade_ towards the mountainous roads that would lead us to France and then onwards to the tiny headland of Cap Ferrat where Ollie's villa was located.

Here's a thing that struck me as peculiar – everybody I spoke to from the stewardess on the plane to the woman at the car hire desk was convinced I was an American. Even the man at Passport Control! He sat there with his dark glasses and strong smelling gum, chewing with his mouth open as obnoxiously as possible and looked at my EU passport with 'British citizen' clearly printed on it – and yet he continually asking me about life in America!

"So which State are you from? Is this your first time in Europe?"

"No, actually I'm English," I kept my replies simple.

Further examination of my documents ensued and then "Si, si, but you were originally from America, no?"

"No." My nerves being strung out as they were, I was fast losing patience with the man and was about to suggest he remove his sunglasses as perhaps they were unsuitable for the lighting in this part of the building. However, just as I was about to – and thank god I didn't, because there can be nobody more petty and vindictive than a customs officer scorned – he caught sight of a pair of pretty, young twenty-somethings with backpacks and blond plaits, so he hurried me through with a final "Have a nice day," in his finest Californian and tried to attract them over to his short queue.

None of that is at all relevant, but what an introduction to Italy!

With all that behind us though we began the road up into the mountains where there was not a lot of traffic so we were able to make good time. Although resigned in our hearts to the fact that we were already going to be too late, what else could we do? We still had no idea what the Professor's next move would be, but if the trail had not grown too cold - Geeza had already demonstrated his ability to pick up a scent better than a bloodhound with a grudge - then there was still a possibility, no matter how small, that we might catch up with him yet.

The journey took us along treacherous, but beautiful winding roads, before we made the descent into coastal France, passing to the North of Monte Carlo and the Principality of Monaco. Tired as we both were, having taken it in turns to drive across the Alps where one mistake would have proved very costly indeed, it was inevitable that we made a few wrong turnings in and around the Cape itself. Driving hurriedly whilst beset by fatigue, your nerves in tatters, in a place where you do not understand the street signs is a far from pleasant experience and is not something I wish to repeat in a hurry.

As Geeza eventually swung the car into the driveway of Ollie Donald's house the signs were not good. Lit up by our headlights was a police car already standing in the driveway, with evidence of others having been there until only recently - tyre marks in the bushes, polystyrene cups littered about the place, numerous lights on up and down the boulevard and several of the neighbourhood dogs barking into the night.

It was as we had suspected - we were too late.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Although I kind of knew it would be a waste of time I went and talked to the policeman posted on the door, telling him we were friends of Ollie's who had just arrived and were due to stop in the villa for a couple of nights. Even though I offered him Ollie's number out in Mombassa the gendarme was having none of it. More frustrating was the fact that I couldn't get any vibes out of the place either. There had been too many policemen, forensic chappies and all that lot - it was just a blur.

They were pulling out all the stops, the cops. Apparently they like their celebs down here and Ollie was a big favourite - even more so now, having just won another big race. They loved winners, this little circle of society and made sure they were well looked after, so they had been all over the place like a swarm of Locusts, leaving absolutely nothing undisturbed.

That they loved the high society was brought home to me even more as I walked dejectedly back towards Elliot in the car. Passing the policeman's vehicle, I glanced inside and on the driver's seat was a copy of the local rag _Le Côte_. There on the front page was some story about a boat (or bateau) that was leaving tomorrow (demain), chocka-bloc full of celebrities of one description or another. It was some sort of highly publicised, exclusive yacht trip, with a proportion of the costs of passage going to charity - I only found that out later. My French isn't _that_ good.

Two of the third-rate celebrities that were due to be on board had been photographed to help publicise the event and their faces were displayed full length up the left hand side of the page. As I glanced down I noticed something which brought my Denubari's words back into my mind with a jolt.

Dominating their faces were dark, conspicuous shapes, black facial decorations which throbbed in perfect synchronicity with my now racing pulse. The glowing swirls that surrounded their eyes matched exactly the ones which had adorned my beautiful Malika.

"Look into my eyes, and the eyes of others. It is there that you will find what you are looking for."

That was it! I knew where he was headed! He was getting on this boat! Ha ha! I told Elliot what I'd learned as I buckled up and we drove away.

The next day...

He's a cunning cat, this Professor. I'd like to know what exactly it is that he's up to, but as yet I haven't got the foggiest. Apart from the fact that it has definitely got something to do with Scottish money I just don't know. He travelled all the way out to Kenya, manipulated his way into the rally by poisoning someone and then committed GBH, just for a key to a house containing about a fiver's worth of useless coins.

I'm sure that stunt with the bikers back in London was all down to him somehow too. I'm positive, but I cannot think _why_. What is so damned important about Scottish money?

We managed to grab a bed each at one of those large roadside motels, but neither of us got much sleep. We were both pretty het up and excitable, trying to come up with some sort of plan to grab the guy in the morning. Besides, we were checking out at four a.m. anyway, to be sure to be at the docks on time. We both agreed that we were only going to get one chance to collar Humphries, if we were lucky, so we couldn't afford to miss that boat.

We reached the seafront early to check out the lay of the land, but we needn't have bothered. The docks, or whatever they're called round here were already buzzing - the media circus had come to town! It was only just before five in the morning and the ship wasn't due to sail until around half ten, but the amount of famous faces and big names involved meant that we couldn't get anywhere near the yacht itself, as the cameramen and reporters had already formed a lined corridor all along the quayside, shutting it off completely from the outside world.

The celebrities started turning up in trickles at about half nine - as fashionably late as possible. As they paraded between the flashing bulbs and microphones, their attention-seeking was painfully clear for all to see. I could not help but notice their vanity spreading out around them like demarcation zones, keeping all others out of their own bit of highly-craved limelight.

And then there was Humphries, strolling up the aisle like the father of the bride, pleased as punch with himself and waving and smiling at the cameras like all the other passengers! The man must have more nerve than a hydrophobe in a diving bell. Unbelievable.

But there was nothing we could do about it. I'd had a bit of a pick me up out of Ramona's bag in case I needed a helping hand and although this meant I was forced to witness the horrible shocking pinks given off in the celebrities' self important auras, it did mean that I got to see the stolen coins - in x-ray - making their way through Humphries' gut where he had swallowed them for safekeeping. But he just walked straight past me, and there was nothing I could do about it.

So, the upshot of it all is that we're taking a couple of days break here courtesy of Ollie – we've already changed hotels - and then we're off to the States. That's where the ship is bound and this turn of events means we've got plenty of time to get there first and spring a trap.

Talking of Ollie, another thing that has made Elliot happy other than the prospect of a decent night's sleep or two, is that we are now being backed by Ollie Donald, so the poor old boy doesn't have to keep shelling out all the time. Despite the fact he never mentions it, this little expedition must be costing him a fortune, so I'm sure Ollie's offer has come as a bit of a relief.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

The ship sailed at eleven in the morning and our dastardly Professor went with it. He has "more caber tae toss than a McGovern highlander," as was said to me one summer by a Scotsman called Wally. He was a Highlander I shared a table with once at a transport café on the A1 just North of Peterborough. He was going off on one about a 'Sassenach' he constantly referred to as 'Beaky.'

I think they had been working together on the roads and this Beaky fellow had done him over in some way. It was difficult to tell because I was only picking up every third or fourth word the man said, his thick, accented drawl being worsened by a face full of egg and chips. This thing about the cabers was one of the few phrases I actually picked up in its entirety. Quite what it means though I still have no idea.

No doubt _les gendarmes_ have Humphries' fingerprints, but who would expect the man to choose the most publicised event of the month as his getaway? The French constabulary must have men posted at the airports, both in Nice and at the couple of local aerodromes dotted about the countryside and there were more than likely all manner of squad cars buzzing up and down the main roads leading out of the area, keeping their beady little eyes open for a man answering to the Professor's description (which they now had from Ollie in Kenya), but none of this running the gauntlet for Alan Humphries. He just hitches himself a lift on the _Snowy-downed Swan_ with the eyes of the world watching and has the audacity to wave at the cameras as he does so!

I contacted Donald in his sick bed back in Mombassa, for he seems as keen as us now to catch this brazen, brass-necked psychopath - so much so that he is throwing the weight of his not inconsiderable fortune behind us. I think the coins, the battering, and the whole principle of the thing have really got under our South African friend's skin.

Of course, we couldn't get anywhere even remotely close to the ship as the massed members of the press and media had closed ranks and flexed their collective muscles - it was alright for the public to read about the event in their papers or see it on TV, but not to actually be there and see it for themselves. Good God no!

So we were forced to watch as the _Swan_ sailed away, standing amongst the cheering throng of adoring fans who were _je t'adore_ -ing and waving their little Tricolours with mad abandon.

That always puzzles me: just why do people get so excited about watching someone arrive somewhere, or leave again, just because they are rich and – well, I was going to say 'talented' there, but you can never be sure can you? It's the same with royals. Just where _do_ all these people come from with their ridiculous bows and curtsies and _gawd bless you ma'am_ s? It's beyond me, it really is.

The ship is stopping off in the Azores to allow a few more high profile guests to board and is then sailing for Matagorda Bay, in Texas. We'll take a couple of days off here to recover and then fly over there to await his arrival. I think perhaps that Mr. Humphries may have been too clever for his own good this time.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

We caught a shuttle to Paris before checking onto a flight bound for Houston - another bloody non-smoker, so I struck up my Pipe in the smoking room of the departure lounge for my last good toke for the next ten hours or more.

Elliot had gone into a place that sold _petit pains_ , thinking it was some sort of shortbread biscuit. I had left him to it to go and smoke, but having finished and come back into the lounge proper I found myself within earshot of _le magazin_ and I could hear all the people coming and going, in and out of the shop.

As time went on I became aware that the noise from the cash-till was getting louder and louder, becoming the predominant sound throughout the departure hall. The noise became more and more repetitive, growing louder and louder and louder again until it reached a tortuous crescendo that made my ears bleed.

Then the large clock on the wall across from where I sat suddenly went all Dali on me and I was confronted with a giant, twelve foot sand timer, the top of which contained the old clock face flowing down and ebbing away. As it fell through into the bottom, the clock transformed itself into money as it passed through the tiny neck between bulbs \- strange, archaic coins and notes that looked familiar, yet still just alien enough for me not to recognise them.

I'm not sure how long I stared at the sand timer before it began to draw me in – I may have stood involuntarily, I don't know. Everything in my peripheral vision darkened slowly as the timer grew and grew, filling the lounge first before expanding still further, on and on until it broke the confines of the building.

My vision blurred momentarily and the next thing I knew I was standing in the middle of a barren Moonscape, nothing but a level plain of powdery grey sand for miles in every direction. There was a black sky above me. All was still and silent, drab and lifeless until I blinked, at which point I suddenly found myself at the intersection of two white roads – _blindingly_ white roads. I'm talking about the kind of white you get in washing powder ads here, that completely unrealistic white so bright it stings your eyes.

The intensity of the glare was unbearable, forcing me to look away and when I did so, I noticed the flat, featureless land these paths cut through had become an otherwise unbroken blue. A blue that _throbbed_ with colour, varying from a shade almost reaching black to a colour that would be called Navy Blue on a wallpaper chart – although saying that it would probably be _Arctic Shadow_ or _Pacific Depths_ , or something equally as stupid.

Anyway, next I turned my gaze upwards and that's when my jaw hit the floor! There was the sand timer, still hanging in the air, but by now so huge that I hadn't even seen it!

As I craned my neck to take it all in, the top half finished draining away and it began to slowly turn itself over. There was an eerie silence for a second or two and then - _Wham!!_ I was buffeted about by the air the movement had generated, the shockwaves slamming into me like a Warrington Wolves front row forward with a head of steam.

The ground rocked and heaved as if hit by an Earthquake notching a number nine on the Richter scale. I felt like a drunk on a bouncy castle, trying desperately to keep my feet, but it was no use. I was swept up flailing into the air, but soon realized as I calmed down that I was safe enough. In fact I seemed to be being carried quite deliberately towards a specific point in space which as yet I couldn't recognise.

I looked down as I drifted and saw from my new vantage point that where I had previously been stood looked like an enormous Scottish flag, the cross of St Andrew stretching out for over a thousand acres.

Then I was brought to a gentle halt with a grandstand view of the Celestial sand timer, the edges of the glass glinting like Starlight. I stopped just in time to see it turn on its end again and begin pouring away, watching as the countless coins cascaded from top to bottom. When this process had finished, the whole thing swivelled around and started again. And again and again.

Every time it turned over I was taken closer to it until eventually my breath was clouding the glass. I could have reached out and touched it, but I didn't. I was being shown something here, but it was just beyond my grasp. Turn and drain, turn and drain; turn and drain, turn and drain. Then my mind finally caught up - it was Scottish money!

And then I knew, in a moment of multi-coloured clarity - just before the kaleidoscope came crashing in and took over: not only was time running out for us, as the longer we left it the more Scottish money our adversary was accumulating - but time was also running out for _money itself_!

I suddenly got the impression that this case was a whole lot bigger than I had thought. Elliot came back at that point muttering something about bread rolls and false advertising, but by then I had already set off on a flight of my own.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

Oh I am so muddle-headed! I do not suppose this will come as much of a surprise to anyone who has been reading this notebook of mine, in which I have been trying to faithfully record and fathom out the events surrounding my ongoing dislocation. Such is my constant bewilderment that I cannot be certain of anything at all anymore.

This myriad of sensations and experiences with which I am continually beset and expected to accept has escalated, to have reached a level of perplexity so tangled now that I wonder just how much I can give credence to anything I see in this world of mystery and wonder! The only thing I know with any certainty is that if it were not for the love I am receiving from the Lord then surely I would have faltered long, long ago.

I have felt like a fish out of water ever since arriving in this strange and... I know not what to properly call it - this new 'Time' I am living in. On the one hand it is full of such splendour and luxury that I, but a humble monk, cannot help but stand in awe. Some of the things I have witnessed you would never even dream! On the other hand though, it is a world overflowing with dark mysteries and temptations in which it is all too easy for a man to stray, to cast his each and every principle to the winds - and a man without morals is one eating from the hand of the very Devil himself.

No longer able to sit and wait idly by, even though instructed so to do by my betters in Canterbury, I decided to search the parish for signs of the monster I am supposed to be pursuing. I reasoned that my superiors could have no objections to a little investigative work on my part. I am in situ after all and although distances hardly seem to matter in this extraordinary age, surely that must count for something.

The village of Bramfield is a small one, but the houses are all of an affluence superseding anything I have seen; and large too, most of them being the size at least of a coaching house. Those few which are not quite as magnificent could easily still accommodate several families if only their owners were so disposed.

Which most of them are not, I feel saddened to say. This very morning I mentioned to a group of people who had come to help tidy the church grounds that they might consider taking in the poor, what with all the space they have in their mansion houses.

I could not help but see the looks on their faces in the silence that followed. It was only for a brief moment and then the Reverend Pinball rather smoothly suggested I went with him so he could show me how he wanted the yew hedge to be trimmed at the far end of the grounds beside the stream, but I saw them none the less.

And that is it you see? Here was the main cause of my confusion - upon my first meeting the good Reverend Gawdley Pinball I would have been ready to sing his praises to the most vociferous of his critics. Indeed, I would have found it very difficult to believe he could have any, for he seemed to me to be the epitome of goodness, the very embodiment of virtue: kind, humble and gentle in his dealings with man and beast alike.

Do you know I even found him putting corn out for the rats that inhabit the vestry? It is of a variety I have never seen, being bright blue in colour, but alas despite his charitable ministrations to the creatures – whom many, including myself up to that point, would look upon simply as vermin – they were still found dead in the mornings over the next few days. Perhaps his kindness came a few days too late or else it were a disease of some kind that afflicted the rodents. The Lord works in ways not always obvious to us mortal souls and it must be that He wanted the rats to join Him in His Kingdom on High. Mayhap He has a surplus of heavenly cheese and who better to help dispose of it than a family of _Rattus rattus_?

The plain fact of the matter though is that the Reverend had changed. That this is beyond doubt I must painfully accept and although I do not especially want to, I must recount what came to a head only today.

His generosity knew no bounds, or so I thought at first. After all, he was putting me up in such regal splendour in his own home and the foods he lavished upon me must have been costing him the absolute earth! I did wonder, I am disgusted to say, if the proceeds from the collection box were perhaps being pilfered by him towards my upkeep, as I could think of no other way for him to maintain me in this manner. It was not long, thankfully, before I learned that there was, of course, another explanation.

I came to realise that Gawdley must be descended from a high born family, if not actual nobility then at least from one of the powerful merchant classes. Perhaps a wool baron from the low-countries around Boston. _That_ is how he has the monies to afford such sumptuous living! Why, when I saw into a wardrobe in his bedroom not long since I thought myself to be looking upon one of the stock cupboards of the famous tailors of Nottingham! And this was just _one_ of his wardrobes! To my knowledge he has _three_ , including the one downstairs used exclusively for thick, weatherproof coats!

No, of course I could not accuse the man of siphoning off the donations given by the God-fearing parishioners of Bramfield. The very thought seems ridiculous to me now - he is a Reverend after all. That thought was far beneath me and I craved both Gawdley's and the Lord's forgiveness in my prayers for several nights afterwards.

And after the happenings of today I shall begin again to crave forgiveness in my conversations with the Heavenly Father. In truth, he must be a forgiving God indeed to pardon me for all my despicable thoughts!

As I said, it was undisputable that my friend had changed and this I noticed in several ways, the two most obvious being that he insisted on following me everywhere whenever I ventured out into the village – he was like a shadow, as if not wanting to let me out of his sight \- and also that he had become quite obviously more short tempered towards me as time has moved on. Yes, his altered temper was the most apparent change, but knowing what I now know, this is entirely understandable.

I go back again to the incident of this morning, when we were shaping the gardens for the year to come. Spring is turning to summer here and the growth in the church grounds is as prolific as you might expect. As I made my observation about taking in the poor to those who had come to the church to help, that look which was all too obvious upon the faces of the peasantry was present too in the expression of Pinball - one of utter disbelief and incredulity. Yet it seemed to me to be not as absurd a suggestion as all that. Surely a family of two adults can have no need for a house with _seven rooms_ \- can it?

I was under no illusions either, as to why Gawdley hurriedly took me off to the hedge by the stream away from everybody else. He was obviously embarrassed, I thought at the time, either that _he_ had not thought of this or that he had he stopped pressing for it himself in the face of the opposition he must have met amongst the local populace.

_Perhaps his conscience is pricking him_ , I said to myself and then I am ashamed to say that – albeit in my own head – I then gave way to gossip, that most harmful type of speculation which I find all too easy in this time of endless temptations. I believe I have documented already how quickly I have succumbed to the many enticements dangled in front of me like a juicy carrot before a fat and idle donkey.

But I will pass on all the terrible things that danced distractingly like the whore of Babylon through my mind. What happened next made fear grip my heart with ice!

Leaning against the well established yew hedge was an evil looking instrument, a many-toothed blade extending from out of an orange box of smooth material, as hard as oak wood. Coming out of this box at the other end from the blade was a long, black cord and I gasped – I may have even staggered – when I realised it was indistinguishable to one of the criss-crossing ropes that had been connected to my original quarry's head-piece!

I grasped Pinball, pulling him over in fact, such was the strength of my abhorrence in seeing another of these tendrils from Hell! That one of these Serpents of Satan could be right here in the very grounds of the Parish Church!

He twisted his knee as I wrenched him to the ground and the discomfort must have been great for it was with more than a hint of pain that he next spoke.

"For God's sake Sadfael! What is the _matter_ with you?"

Hobbling to his feet with a blasphemous explicative in which I cannot be sure, but thought I heard the Lord's name taken in vain, it was only then that I realised the plight of my friend and the terrible danger he was in! I have been remiss indeed to have not thought about the possibility before, but I can chastise myself as much as I see fit now, and for days to come if needs be.

Right there and then however, finally seeing the situation for what it was, I lost no time in acting.

Gawdley staggered over to the infernal device which, upon first seeing it, I had assumed was an hideous machine of war, some bloodletting implement more suited to the fields of battle than the gardens of a Church in the heart of rural England. My suppositions were proved correct when he picked the thing up in two hands and it began to flail about, whizzing and buzzing like a demon's gurgle, all the time with a look of grim determination fixed upon his face!

Remembering the tragic look behind the eyes of the man possessed back in that hut in my own time – Brass was he called? Albert Brass? - I knew then that the Devil was without doubt abounding still in this very parish! And the Fallen One had set his sights high, for he was trying to gain control of none other than the Reverend himself!

Oh, poor Gawdley! How long has this battle been going on, right here underneath my nose? What strength the Reverend Pinball must have, to have wrestled with him unaided for so long! And how blind have I been for my part, when it has been my very mission to be watching out for the Infidel!

It is with great shame that I think back to all the things I thought about my friend, the good Reverend, who was all the while fighting for his very soul while I did nothing but criticise him and find fault. _This_ was why he had changed! He was expending all his energy in fighting off Beelzebub! Of course his temper had become frayed!

And here was my chance to make amends.

I yelled out the first scriptures that came to mind and leapt upon the tentacle. It was a little unfortunate, admittedly, that the words which issued from my mouth happened to be from the Song of Solomon, as screaming "Her breasts were like pomegranates and her teeth like a herd of goats, none of whom were barren!" hardly seemed appropriate under the circumstances, but they did the trick. After all, against the words of the Good Book the puny works of the devil are but chaff in the wind!

I saw a pair of hinged blades normally for use in the garden lying on the grass only a few feet away and seizing these I set about the tentacle with vigour, cutting the thing into several pieces with a series of deadly chops!

And as quickly as that it was over.

Panting and trembling, unaccustomed as I am to throwing myself into open combat, I got unsteadily to my feet and looked across at my friend.

The demonic entity had evidently lost its grip on him, though it must have been a considerable shock to his system because all he seemed able to do was to stare at me, opening and shutting his mouth in an attempt to speak. Still, it was a delight to see him free again.

"Do not thank me Reverend," I said, patting his arm with camaraderie. "It is over now. We must remain on our guard of course and be sure to maintain our vigil," I knelt and bowed my head to give thanks, "but for now it is over."

He walked away without uttering a word, completely overcome with emotion.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

We landed in Houston, Texas, the U.S. of A at around nine in the evening local time. It is such a lovely feeling to get out of a plane where the air is still and cold, to be engulfed by warm, humid air, blowing in on a light breeze. Especially at night time. There's something magical about that. I could definitely get used to it.

Both of us being quite tired from the flight, we checked into the nearest place we could find - the imaginatively named North Houston Hotel - and went straight to bed. Well, to our rooms at least. I ordered a toasted sandwich which was very nice although they sent up far too much for one person. Four sandwiches - that is eight rounds of bread - sliced in half in the traditional Breville manner, with so much salad and garnish that I wondered whether they thought I'd brought a horse with me. Is this the normal amount Americans eat? Surely not!

At around eight the next morning I went for breakfast and caused a bit of a _to do_ when I asked for tea. You see, the waitress patrolled the breakfast area like a shark, with a huge pot of coffee that smelt as strong as hot tar in one hand and a jug of cream in the other, permanently on the look out for refills. So I threw her out of her stride a bit really, asking for tea. And then when it came it had a slice of lemon in it. I apologised to her, but asked if she could take it back and bring me a pot of tea, a cup, some milk and some sugar.

"I'm English," I explained when I saw a peevish look creeping across her face. That seemed to explain everything. Geeza joined me not long after my tea arrived and he got another cup for himself. We were marked men by then, so this time it came without any fuss.

"English Breakfast tea for you sir," the waitress popped the cup down in front of my friend and then whipped out a pad and a pen as fast as Quick Draw McGraw – we _are_ in cowboy country I suppose. She must practice in her time off. "Would you _English_ gentlemen like to order anything else?" she asked with only a hint of venom.

"Err, toast I think," I ventured and looking at Geeza he nodded in agreement. "Yes, toast for two – just two people, no horses." The joke had come out before I could stop it, but she didn't get it. Instead she simply stared at me as if I'd just stepped down from the Freak Show, but then her basic training kicked in and a Pavlovian gushing of exhaustive choices came out – the same as I'd had the previous night.

"Ok sir, will that be white, brown, thick, thin, granary, wholemeal, linseed, sesame seed, poppy seed, pumpkin seed, soda bread, potato bread, fruit loaf, nut loaf, salted, unsalted, low fat, or gluten free?"

I was stunned into choosing white, for simplicity's sake, but Geeza went for wholemeal.

"Ok, and what would you like with it?"

"I'll take jam," Geeza butted in as her mouth opened to bombard us with a billion different options. It was a shrewd move on his part; I think I'll be sticking to jam from now on. I made the mistake of asking for a couple of fried eggs and the barrage that hit me next stunned me.

"How would you like your eggs sir?" I was asked.

As I had already told her 'fried' my confused reply was a rather hesitant: "Err, cooked please." I don't know whether it was scorn or pity in her eyes.

"No sir," she said with hands well and truly on hips by now, "you can have crisp or soft-edged, runny on top, sunny side-up, soft yolked, medium yolked, hard yolked, over easy, double easy, under easy, easy under, rolled, disturbed, flattened, and with or without bacon crispies." There may have been more, but I stopped listening after I heard sunny side-up, the only option I was familiar with – I didn't like the sound of _disturbed_ at all! I decided not to ask whether they were free-range or not. I am not sure what you had to do to get run out of town around here, but the look on the waitress' face gave me the impression that I was not far off.

We got hold of a rental car and drove down to Palacios, a little over a hundred miles taking the route we did. This town, on the coast of Matagorda Bay, was to be the first port of call in the States for the _Snowy-downed Swan_. Our plan was to find out when it was due in and then simply lie in wait.

Down at the seafront we learned from the harbour master, a Mr Silas Perriwinkle (pronounced Per-eye-winkle) that the ship was owned by Tex Bullmer, an oil billionaire who was usually found in Bingo's Bar and Bait Shop at this time of day. It was only just down the road and he gave us directions.

Mr. T. W ('double-ya') Bullmer was a larger than life, stereotypical Texan (where men are men, and all that). Despite the heat, he was togged up in a business suit, shirt, one of those little string ties they wear down here and of course his hat. _Everybody_ had a hat on round here. His huge, bushy moustache accentuated the large, loud mouth it nestled above and his ten decibel laugh drowned out the strains of some Kenny Roger's song about a highwayman that was coming from a large fifties style juke-box on the far wall.

We approached him as he stood leaning up against the bar, where his bottle of Budweiser made wet rings on the worm-eaten, wooden surface. Seeing us approach, his companion stood from the stool on which he had been lazily slouched, adjusted his faded red baseball cap and bade Bullmer farewell, stuffing his half-emptied packet of Marlboroughs into the top pocket of his chequered shirt.

"Yeah, so long Orville!" boomed Bullmer and then "Morning folks, what can we do for you?" He walked around to the business side of the bar. "Jerry's gone. He'll not be long. What can I getcha?"

Without waiting for a reply he pulled two fresh bottles of Bud out of an old chest freezer full of ice and opened them up, plonking one each down on the bar in front of us. I was not so keen to start drinking this early in the day, but if this was the way the man worked, you had to play along - Geeza explained this to me later on; that men like him lived life the way they did and expected everybody else to follow suit. If you wanted to get in with them, you just had to wade right in.

"We're actually looking for a Tex Bullmer," I started.

"We need to ask him about his boat" Geeza finished.

Tex pursed his lips and nodded his head – he didn't seem in the least put off by my friend's direct approach. Again, Geeza told me later that with men like this you are better off being straight to the point. How he can weigh someone up so quickly is a little spooky to be honest; uncanny. The Texan shrugged and held his hands up as if in surrender.

"Well here I am. You got me at least. I'm Tex Bullmer," he said to me and then switched his gaze to Geeza. "Which boat though mister? I have to tell you I've got a few."

"Oh right," Geeza replied. "It's the _Snowy-downed Swan_ we're interested in. It's a bit cheeky I know, but could you tell us when and where exactly she'll be coming into dock? We're hoping to interview one of the passengers for our magazine. I know she's not due in for a few days yet, but we thought we'd better get here early to make sure we had rooms – before all the big boys from the media get into town and pack the place out."

Not bad. I was impressed, I have to say. To come up with a credible story like that on the spur of the moment... I hadn't actually given a thought to what we would say to the man once we'd found him. However, my admiration for Geeza's sleight-of-tongue was shredded in an instant by the bombshell Tex dropped on us.

"Guys, I don't know what magazine you work for, but your editor's sent you on a buck run for nothing."

"I'm sorry?" I said.

"There ain't hardly anyone left on the _Swan_ by now. Most of them got off in the Azores. All those celebrity-types were then jetting off to go skiing."

" _Skiing?_ " I almost dropped my beer.

"Yep. That's how it was all set up. I didn't have anything to do with it; it was all their people and my people if you know what I mean, but I think that's how it was arranged."

"But, but..." I couldn't believe it. "Wha- what? Where?"

"Do you know where they all went skiing?" Geeza helped me out.

"Ohh, all over. Some in the Alps; over in Colorado, a couple of spots in California and up in Canada as well I think." He looked long and hard at me then. Then to Geeza and back to me again. He knew something was not quite right. "Which magazine are you guys with?"

Now I was all set to panic at that point. First of all because where the hell had he gone, but also because if this Tex knew we were lying to him then how were we ever going to find out? That was it for me. We had lost him. We had failed. Geeza though just took a long swig of his bud.

"It's called the Microcosm," he said, totally unfazed. "I doubt you'll have heard of it. It's a glossy full-colour, a bit like the National Geographic only much, much smaller. We've really only got a circulation in England, but there's a couple of dozen foreign clients on mail order." He grimaced. "And it's not the editor who screwed up unfortunately. It was my call to come here.

"We were in France when the _Swan_ set off, but my friend's _francais_ is limited and I don't speak a word." He slapped me on the back. "Never mind Elliot. We can blame the French press eh?"

Mr. Vermies had stunned me with his composure and his ability to carry on despite everything. For my part I was able to back up his ever more elaborate story by looking totally crestfallen. It was not an act.

Thanks to our misunderstanding the French papers we had come out here on a wild goose chase - that 'buck run' Bullmer had mentioned. We had totally wasted out time. Worse than that though, we now had absolutely no idea where Humphries was. He could be anywhere by now. Anywhere in the world.

I took a long drink myself and Tex pulled another couple out of the freezer and one for himself. He seemed to be weighing us up.

"Tell you what," he said. "You tell me who it is you're after; I'll give the captain a call, see if he's still on board."

"But I thought you'd said-"

"Most I said, not all of them. There's one or two of them going all the way with us – I'm joining them myself when she gets here, then we're going on to the Keys and then the Bahamas. That's journey's end. So come on," he flicked open his phone, "what's the guy's name?" I was totally speechless, but Geeza pounced.

"Alan Humphries he's called. A mathematics professor and rally driver – I know, I know, but he's one of these... geniuses; eccentric. Brilliant, but eccentric."

Bullmer strode away from the bar and propped himself against the jukebox as he spoke to the _Swan's_ captain. I turned to Geeza, a million and one questions on my lips, but he _shhhhh'd_ me into silence, motioning for me to stay calm.

"Thanks Mike," we heard the Texan's big voice fill the silence as the jukebox changed songs. "Ok," he said to us back at the bar, "it's not good, but it's not all bad. Your professor got off with the rest of them – sorry. I can tell where he's headed though; the ship's staff arranged the flight. He's gone to Canada. To Banff. You know where that is?"

"Not really," I almost laughed, "but we'll find it." Unbelievable! The gods must really be shining down on us! "Thank you Mr. Bullmer, thank you so much!"

"Yeah sure," he replied gruffly, a little embarrassed. "Look I don't normally give out information like this, but there's something about the two of you I like. I don't know what it is - Hell, I know you haven't been real straight with me, but I've a hunch that you're being that way for a good reason." My heart froze as he started to say this, but unnecessarily as it turned out. "Whatever you two boys are up to, that's your business, not mine, but it feels right from where I'm standing and folks round here'll tell you Tex Bullmer is a man who trusts his instincts. You got to ride your luck in this life and maybe this is one of your lucky breaks.

"Ok, I gotta go now, so you can leave the money on the bar for Jerry. I'm thinking you'll be wanting to get away yourselves."

We threw a few dollars beside our empty bottles and got to our feet. He turned the sign hanging in the door to 'Closed' as we all left the bar.

"Bye now and good luck to you!" he barked, turning his back and leaving us there on the doorstep. He climbed into a monstrously large, silver pick-up parked across the street and drove off with an easy wave.

I guess Geeza was right – perhaps taking those beers had worked after all.

So then it was off to Canada. Touching down at Calgary International Airport just under two days after our meeting with Tex we took the main road, or I suppose I should say highway – or is it a Freeway up here? I shall have to ask. Even though for the most part it is only an imaginary line that separates the U.S from their Canadian cousins, I have discovered that they feel the distinction as keenly as a Scotsman falsely accused of being English. Anyway, whatever they call the road, this one passes through the Stoney Indian Reservation, on past the town of Canmore and finally takes the weary traveller into the township of Banff, high in the Rocky Mountains. The journey took us a couple of hours after appropriating yet another hire car.

The Rockies form a pretty obvious natural border between Alberta, where we were, and British Columbia or BC as the locals say, but it was long before we reached them that I had some 'subtleties' pointed out by several people.

"No, no, no!" I was told when I asked in all innocence what State I was in. "This is Canada; we don't have 'States' here! We have Provinces." And then, as I forgot and dropped it into conversation again getting the car:

"Hey!" a warning finger was wagged my way. "You're not in America now. We have Provinces here!"

I get the impression that it is important to them, so I've not made the mistake more than a couple of times.

We were around three thousand metres above sea level here and whilst the cold was noticeable it was the thinness of the air that I found more immediately apparent. Geeza ended up having to drive nearly the whole way, as it was all I could do to restore my laboured breathing as I grew gradually more accustomed to the altitude. Finding rooms at the Kicking Horse Lodge Resort - named after an incident which gave it's name to a mountain pass some twenty five miles north of us - we dumped our bags and freshened up before going down to the bar and restaurant.

We decided to have a pre-prandial slurp of something, so we each ordered a cocktail at the bar as our food was being cooked. Mine was a Rocky Mountain Gringewhistler, with Geeza choosing to knock back an Albertan Certain Headwrangler. Interesting drinks to say the least and both had the essential warming properties we were looking for.

Seating ourselves at a table by a stove chimney where some fairly huge logs were crackling away, we settled down to eat. Half way through the main course though, Geeza suddenly dropped his fork on his plate and stared wide-eyed at a couple of jet-setters, obviously very well to do, togged out in fake fur, jewellery and hair by _Marcel_ , who were guzzling champagne at the bar.

He seemed in one way to be excited and in another quite desperate, muttering away to himself in a disturbing way something about "the eyes, the eyes," and "the trail is getting cold." When I finally managed to shake him out of his own little world and ask him what the problem was, he stared hard at me and took a deep breath before speaking. "Elliot," he said, "he's been and gone."

This time it was my cutlery that felt gravity's embrace. _Gone?_ Already? Where the hell's he gone _now_? Buggeration!

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

As I saw the face of that young girl in the bar I knew instinctively that it would be the last time I'd be able to get easy answers just by looking into peoples' eyes, as Malika had suggested. Two times now she had helped me out like this, but by the look of the fast fading colours, which were now more like faint, smeared make-up or mere outlines than anything else, I knew that I had very little time left. I was going to have to squeeze what little I could from this final chance.

Soon after I'd told Elliot that the Professor had already gone he retired to his room visibly shaken. His body has not quite got used to us being up here in the mountains, and learning that Humphries had out-manoeuvred us again sent his system into a mild kind of shock. All this driving and flying isn't doing either of us a lot of good, especially when we find we're still chasing our tails whenever we think we are getting somewhere close.

I think he was telephoning Ollie Donald to tell him we were now in Canada and to give him a brief update - not that we know much more than the fact that he's here, somewhere. Lucky for us that Canada's not a big country, eh?

Having skipped dessert I wandered over to the bar for a few more drinks - I didn't particularly want them, but I had to find out what I could about this girl with the marks of the Denubari about her eyes - the traces were dwindling and I guessed that if I didn't get something out of her tonight, we'd be finished; any hopes we may have had of finding Humphries would be dead and buried.

They'd been slapping back the bubbly since we came in and their party must have started much earlier on because they were wasted and loud. Annoying in the way only really rich kids can be.

It wasn't hard to listen in on them. In fact you had no choice. Unless you left the room or were clinically deaf, you just couldn't help but hear what they were blathering drunkenly about.

Apparently Banff National Park - which we had entered on our drive up here - was a great place for a sightseeing trip and they were all off down there to Lake Louise, which they described as "really, really, just, kind of like, totally awesome." Good to see the money spent on their education hadn't been wasted.

I had seen loads of leaflets in the foyer earlier on about several key spots in the Lake lands and remember seeing quite a few for a particular site called Lake Louise. The girl's eyes were by now completely normal, if a little glazed over, so I went to my bed, taking some of the tourist brochures with me. I was sure at that point that Lake Louise was the place to start looking, although why and for what - well, I found that out when we got down there.

I knocked on Cripplesby's door at 8.00a.m., and he was already up, dressed and packed. Whether he was getting information from somewhere else or whether he just trusted that I'd have got the answers over night I don't know, but we went down for a quick blueberry muffin and a large mug of hot chocolate, laced with cinnamon - a favourite of the holidaymakers apparently - before hopping in the car and heading North-west.

The road took us along pretty much the same route as the Bow River. As it wound its way down the mountains we went up, copying each kink and twist like a big cat at top speed as she closes in on her prey, shadowing its every curve. About twenty five miles later we reached Lake Louise Village just near Kicking Horse Pass, the place from where our hotel in Banff had taken its name.

An old guy, he was either a prospector or a trapper I think, was crossing the River at a shallow ford so the story goes, back in the days when the White Man was still in the process of stealing the land from the _First_ _Nations_ – that's what the Canadians call the native tribesmen and women who South of the border would be better known as Native Americans, Amerindians or just Indians.

Anyway, he had a team of Mules and a couple of Horses as he was making his way North when one of the Horses decided she'd had enough and wanted a drink and a rest. So here we had a situation where the man wanted to go on, but the Horse wanted to stop there. In the ensuing 'discussion,' with both sides putting their arguments across in their own particular ways, the man got kicked in the head and was killed instantly, falling stone dead in the middle of the River.

Not the prettiest or the most romantic of legends, I'll give you that, but it is fitting for these parts because it helps to remind you that us all-conquering humans will not necessarily win in a battle of Man against Nature, not up here. In fact we will probably lose. Canada is still a very wild and untamed place in many areas and it would be a good idea not to forget that.

Which of course I promptly did. But hey, I'm lucky. I survived.

Once we'd parked and found out where we were going, picking up a rough map from a little kiosk in the village, we headed straight off on foot for the Lakes, keen to pick up the scent again. What a spot! Absolutely stunning scenery, large purple Mountains topped with snowy peaks, Forests, Meadows, and Lakes of emerald green - something to do with glacial silt we were told. Fantastic.

Elliot mentioned that it looked a little like the Northwest Highlands of Scotland, around Invergary. I've never been there myself so I couldn't say, but I am not convinced. Just call it a hunch. There are not many places could look like this.

So anyway, we're walking where our feet take us, watching the Eagles circling and soaring overhead, looking for any sort of clue we could find - I was quite hopeful of getting a quick result because this place is absolutely alive with Spirits! They are mainly Nature Spirits, Animals and Plants, but I can also feel what the First Nations would call _Ancestors_ all over the place here. It is so in your face, so noticeable, so... undeniably 'there'! No wonder the original inhabitants of Turtle Island - as many tribal people still call their continent - are such a holy people. You can't help it. You draw it in with every breath.

Out of the corner of my eye in the edges of the thick Pine forest that grew on our side of the Lake I noticed something, the way you do. Not knowing what it was, I started over towards it. Cripplesby reminded me what we had been warned about - the Bears around here are growing bolder with every year - and I held my hand up to stop him from following, just in case there _was_ any danger.

Creeping stealthily forwards along the rocky shore I made my way towards the tree line, where I came across a small circle of mushrooms, poking their caps up from the dark forest floor. I laughed out loud. Panther Fungus! This was it! I was obviously still too immersed in Africa to fully tune in to my surroundings, so I'd been guided towards these Amanita Pantherina, a hallucinogen native to this part of the world, obviously to help me blend in.

Christ, I've never had this much assistance before! I don't know if it's a good thing or not, but there you go. We must be onto something big. Really big.

After picking a handful and eating them fresh, I walked back to Elliot, saying it had been a false alarm. To eat them straight out of the ground like that was dangerous – really dangerous - but a calculated risk under the circumstances. My reasoning being that if the Spirits were so keen to contact me that they had shown me the door, they were unlikely to bite my head off when I opened it up and went through. Saying that though I did take a much smaller dose than if they'd been dried properly, just to be on the safe side.

It was now just before ten o'clock in the morning. I suggested that we split up and if either of us found anything out we should head for Louise's Larder, a bar and cafe back in the village and wait for the other to return. He agreed and took himself off back towards the village to show a picture of Humphries around - he had got it from the sports pages of a Kenyan paper he'd picked up at the airport in Nairobi, at a time when the results of the race were the only news to have come out of Mombassa. His plan as far as I know was basically just to ask around to see if anyone had seen him lately – funny, I hadn't even thought of that!

So now I was on my own and I knew that I had two or three hours to kill before the Spirits would come a-calling. I sat for a bit on the stony beach and offered a couple of pinches of tobacco in my Pipe to all the Spirits of the place before having a smoke, taking in the scenery while I waited.

It was probably only about an hour later that I became drawn towards the woods. I stepped inside the living Forest, every sense on full alert. My nose was taunted and teased by the scents of Plants and Animals mixed in with the deep, damp litter of pine needles which cushioned every footstep.

Once I'd wandered for a while thousands of tiny Insects began to cluster together and fly in formation before me – the Pantherina had kicked in! They formed directional arrows in mid-air and started pointing me down particular paths, or more often away from the paths altogether. After who knows how long of being guided in this way, a tiny clearing opened up around me and the Insects suddenly disappeared into the air.

Less than ten yards away, standing propped up against a tree, was a man dressed in the fashion of a hundred years or so ago. His other hand rested upon the shaft of an axe and his huge top hat had been discarded along with his overcoat a few feet away. His head was enormous, much larger proportionally than it should have been, so that his whiskery sideburns were in fact as long and wide as his thighs.

He looked indifferently towards me, almost as if I were just one more face in a crowd walking past. He seemed passive, neither aggressive nor openly friendly. I must confess that I was taken aback somewhat as I had been expecting any apparition – if it were human - to be an indigenous man or woman, someone from the First Nations. Not a dour and grizzly _pale-face_.

After I had greeted him I waited for his response. Then it suddenly dawned on me just how much danger I had put myself in, in my over confidence. Stupid, Geeza, stupid!

This could be it, I thought. Game over and no one would ever find my body. But despite the dangers and being lost in the middle of the forest I stood calmly and tried not to show any concern. I was completely in the hands of the Spirits now.

For a while he said nothing, simply stared at me with eyes as big as fists. Then he pushed himself up from the tree and standing upright, he spoke.

"I can see the fear in your eyes boy. And you're right to feel it too. Don't go gettin' all cocky now, just because you've found favour elsewhere." At that point, with the Panther Fungus working away inside me, Malika suddenly felt a long, long way away. "My name is Elias Abrahams, but people more often call me Klondyke Sal."

"I hope I'm pleased to meet you Sal." I know he'd just told me not to be cocky, but I hoped that by joking I might bolster my own courage a bit. I was getting scared and if I didn't do something _the fear_ would take hold and that'd be it – I'd be as good as dead. Anyway, other than glaring at me even more sternly than before he ignored my comment.

When I asked him how he came to be out here he told me "Why shouldn't I be out here? It's where I live isn't it?" He said he'd made his fortune selling firewood to the hordes that had joined the gold rush out West. He had been given his name by the prospectors themselves, as he came to be their salvation in the hard, cold Winters.

"If I hadn't chopped all them trees down and carted all that wood out to them, why, every man jack of them would've perished. Died a frozen death. You ever seen a man frozed to death boy?"

"No."

"Well it ain't pretty! Why, I'd rather be stomped on by a Grizzly than suffer all that cold working its way through your body, blackenin' things and making bits drop off; sapping the life out of you, slow and painful."

"Is that how you died?" I asked. Most ghosts love to talk about their own deaths.

"Nope."

"How did you die then?"

"I _was_ stomped on by a Grizzly; stomped on and mauled up real good! In these very woods. That was years after the Klondyke days though. Years after. I'd made me enough of a fortune and seen all I wanted to see of what gold can do to a man, so I moved back East. Over twenty years of good living I had before that Grizzly got me. Hard, but good. I had a cabin out that aways," he waved vaguely, "just near the lake.

"Now, you want to know where he's headed don't you?" His abruptness surprised me. Up until then I'd got him down as a rambling old fool.

"Err...yes please," I stammered.

"Well you're way too far South! You're going to have to get off of the roads and trails and head up towards Mount Amery. It's about fifty miles yonder." He pointed with his axe and said "Nor-nor-west. Look for three small aspens and you'll find a couple who I'll warrant your friend'll find most interesting. From there, well, you'll just have to start looking afresh I guess. Do what you do best - but damn it, be more careful!" He shouted this last bit and then paused, allowing his chastisement to sink in.

"Ask for up help here son," he spread his arms wide and turned slowly around, indicating the forest and the country around him, "and all you have to do is listen - so long as your heart is good. This one that you're after, mind," he glared terrifyingly, his eyes becoming two black, bottomless chasms with eerie green lightning flashing below the surfaces, "his heart is blacker than pitch!"

Thankfully his eyes returned to normal, as I could feel myself being dragged inexorably towards them.

"You watch your step while you're here laddie. This is wild country and your lady friend ain't here, least not so much as she'll be able to help, if 'n someone takes a dislikin' to you." He wagged a finger at me. "You'll not be so lucky next time if you keep on a-blunderin' about like you just did." Then he reached down and donned his topper, neatly folding his coat over an arm. He hefted his axe up onto his shoulder. "Be seein' you boy," and then he was off.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

The pace is quickening. I feel the same sense of anticipation that a high stakes poker player must feel with four aces in his hand and a massive pot in the middle of the table. We've not caught him yet, not even caught sight of him, but we are hot on the heels of Professor Humphries and out here in the wilderness, away from the television cameras and huge crowds of people he has surrounded himself with up until now, he will not get away so easily. If he can't feel us breathing down his neck then the man must be wearing a spacesuit, vacuum sealed. I am confident that surely, _surely_ he cannot evade us for much longer.

And in the meantime... Well, where to begin?

Geeza had stumbled across something down at the lake, but he obviously needed to be by himself, so I agreed to his suggestion that we separate without objection. Not only did I agree to split up, but I took myself away from that flawless, breathtaking scenery and headed back to the village, fool that I am! It is simply amazing here, jaw-droppingly beautiful; more spectacular even than the Brayford Pool on the outskirts of Lincoln!

The network of lakes nestled in amongst the mountains takes on a glorious palette of iridescent colours, all due to the weight of the colossal glaciers rising steeply all around them, which grind down the boulders and stone into what is known as rock flour. This fine, powdery substance becomes suspended in the water and refracts the sunlight to give off a veritable feast for the eyes.

Isn't it amazing what you can learn from tourist information brochures?

There are hundreds of bird species here too, all happily flitting about to and fro. I even saw a hummingbird! I never would have believed they came this far north. Amazing! I'm told that in autumn, or 'Fall' as they say over here, the colours are simply stupendous as the deciduous trees shed their leaves and retreat for the winter which gets very cold – and I mean _proper_ cold.

We are all familiar with seeing our breath when the temperature drops, but here they say that in certain parts you can see steam coming off your eyeballs! Any return trip I decide to make after all this is over will have to be planned extremely carefully! The colour and the beauty of a Canadian Fall certainly sounds like something worth coming back for, but steam coming from my eyeballs? I think not.

The village of Lake Louise itself is wonderfully picturesque. At this time of year it is surrounded by meadows given over to thick carpets of bluebells which really have to be seen to be believed, although it is still pretty nippy, even now. As I went from shop to shop with my photo of the Professor I had numerous opportunities to buy all manner of goods, all of which without exception had Maple leaves plastered all over them. Whether it was a key ring with my name and date of birth on it, a deck of cards, a postcard or the kind of big, fat pencil you only find in tourist shops – even a can of larger – _everything_ was smothered with Canadian flags, Maple leaves and quite often the words: "I am a Canadian," too.

The stores in the village ranged from tourist tat to essentials such as food and clothing, and then onto some pretty serious military equipment: shotguns, assault rifles and all manner of hand guns were there on display should I be interested. I would have had to show a permit and one other piece of identification with my name and address on it in order to buy one though. Comforting to know such stringent measures are taken to limit the sale of these things.

It was also pointed out that while they were for sale, you could not actually let them off in the national park, as this was strictly illegal and doing so would land you in all sorts of trouble.

I reneged on my chance to own my own gun and also passed up the offer to get a good quality chainsaw, Canadian made (Maple leaf! Maple leaf!). In one way I was quietly pleased that none of these hardware shops had recognised Humphries - I do not wish to speculate how I would have felt if I'd found out that he'd bought himself a gun. Thankfully though, that is not an eventuality I will have to face. Unless he is _already_ armed of course - no, come on, stop it! I'm just scaring myself now.

Eventually growing slightly despondent - I would have had to have been a Jehovah's Witness to be able to bear so many negative answers and closing doors - I went into Louise's Larder last of all with my photograph, with the view to ask them, be told 'No we haven't seen him,' and then perhaps walk a couple of the shorter trails to take in the scenery. That way at least I wouldn't have wasted the entire day. However, much to my surprise the lady behind the counter, a woman in her late thirties with long black hair clamped onto the top of her head with what looked for all the world like a medieval torture device, remembered him passing through here not long ago!

"Sure he was here. A couple of days at the most," she had told me.

Her name was Abigail DeMontres and Humphries had stuck out in her mind because he had wanted to know which the best trails were to get to Mount Amery, right up in the north of the park. It is, by all accounts, difficult enough to get there at the best of times, but even more so at the moment because not all of the vestiges of winter have left us. He had also bought an entire chocolate-chip flapjack, made to resemble the Canadian flag of course, measuring twelve by eighteen inches. I am not sure which made him stick in her memory more, but I have my suspicions.

Ever since my arrival in Canada - which is a fantastic country by the way - I have noticed all sorts of little quirks and idiosyncrasies which I had until now been putting down to patriotism. Talk to anybody from this vast nation and you come away thinking to yourself: _those Canadians – they're a patriotic bunch aren't they?_

Now though, I am beginning to wonder whether they are not so much parading the fact that "I am a Canadian," as "I am _not_ an American."

The jury's still out for me, but I would say it is about a fifty-fifty split at the moment. I don't know. Maybe both philosophies go hand in hand, but whatever the motivation behind it all is – and remember, this is a feeling strong enough to persuade let's say at least one in every three Canadians to have a Maple leaf, if not the entire flag, _tattooed_ somewhere on their bodies' – it is a force to be reckoned with.

Then again, maybe it has nothing whatsoever to do with patriotism or anti-American sentiments. Instead it could just be all the Poutine they eat – the Canadian national dish: chips, gravy and cheese curd? That's enough to send anyone funny in the head isn't it?

When I asked Abigail which route the Professor had taken she wanted to know why I was so keen to find him and it was here that my association with Geeza shone through because I came out with a magnificent, but entirely fabricated tale on the spur of the moment which did enough to convince her.

"My two colleagues and I are researchers for the BBC - that's a television station in England, I don't know if you've heard of it. We're here to see whether or not this will make a suitable location to do some filming in the late summer and 'fall'.

"My co-worker Humphries," I told her, "has gone up north to see what that area of the park has to offer, but we've just heard the happy news from London that we have already been given the go ahead, based on the info we sent back before we separated."

I was quite pleased with myself, especially my talking quite glibly on the subject of e-mail and satellite communications, given that I know nothing about either, being a total, self-confessed technophobe. I even had the audacity to tell her of his love of cakes, in particular home made flapjacks which was the only thing his mother had cooked well when he was a child! Terrible really, deceiving her like that, but this Professor has got to be stopped – besides, I don't suppose any harm has been done by my spinning this tangled web of lies.

"Strangely enough," she said "he didn't say he was with the TV. He did look the type though." What on earth does _that_ mean? "What was it has said now? Oh that's right, he said he'd heard there was a couple who lived up there and he wanted to ask them a few questions."

"A couple?" I asked. This was odd...

"Mmm, sure. I told him I didn't think so, that somebody must've been playing a joke on him. No one lives up there; how could they?"

She had told him that it was wild and inhospitable, with more bears than you could shake a stick at. Ok, she didn't say that exactly, but the implication was the same. However, he had simply winked at her and tapped his nose slyly, saying "You'd be surprised my dear, you'd be surprised."

She asked if I had a map and having brought it out she highlighted the roads and routes to take, just as she had done for the Professor. She also marked the point where the car would have to be left behind and drew a big circle around Mount Amery. It was about fifty miles further north, at the very headwaters of one of the Bow River tributaries. Had there been a big picture of a dragon and archaic lettering informing the reader 'Here Be Monsters,' I would not have been at all surprised.

"I guess you already have your tents and camping gear," she said, to which I suavely replied "Err, well actually...," so she informed me who I could purchase the best equipment from and offered to provide us with a hamper that would last up to one week.

"Just as long as the bears don't get a sniff of it."

This statement, although it may have been an example of the world famous Canadian Wit, unnerved me somewhat and I asked her if perhaps we should have a mobile phone or a walkie-talkie or something, so we could get in touch with a park ranger or a Mountie or whatever, should there be an emergency. She looked at me with suspicion and arched an eyebrow in my direction.

"But what _aboot_ all that multi-media communications equipment, the BBC laptop and satellite phone you've got in your car? Couldn't you just use that?"

Oops. I laughed my 'forgetfulness' away as nerves. "We have no grizzly bears back in England," I told her. "Only squirrels."

Having found all that out I was feeling pretty pleased with myself, so I bought a cup of chamomile tea and some blueberry pancakes and went and sat outside at a wooden picnic table to await Geeza's return. Whilst the Canadians are not far behind the Americans with regards to their food portions, they are noticeably more normal. I don't suppose I will ever forget what I ate in Texas – not until I can get back into my trousers without loosening the belt a few holes, at least. Besides, you could forgive them eating a lot up here, given that it gets so stupidly cold.

The muffins were good and the tea was better. I was just about to order myself a second cup in fact, when he finally rocked up at around six in the evening looking somewhat wild-eyed and unkempt. He swayed his way over to the table and collapsed down onto the bench.

He then proceeded to inform me that he had found a lead and that we must get to the area around Mount Amery as soon as possible. While I was pleased that he must have found something out, I must confess to feeling a bit disappointed at having the wind taken right out of my sails.

It didn't stop me grinning from ear to ear though as I saw his jaw drop when I told him "I know," and brought forth the map with our pre-planned route already highlighted in luminous pink.

We had both stolen each other's thunder completely! I wouldn't mind knowing how he had come by his information, but I guess he must have spoken to someone else who had seen our flapjack loving foe.

He wanted to leave right away, but though this idea was tempting I had been advised by both Abigail from the Larder and all the people in the camping stores (which are ominously called 'survival' stores up here) that it would be best to set off at first light, or just before. That way we could take maximum advantage of the precious daylight hours to negotiate the roads which tend to become less user friendly the further off the main tourist routes you go.

So rather than do anything hasty which we might come to regret, we nipped back into the Larder where the night-time menu had just been posted and enjoyed dining there before lodging in a hotel across the road.

Geeza laughed out loud when I informed him of my elaborate cover story, but went a bit far I thought, forming his hands into the shape of a camera lens and moving about the dining area supposedly 'getting angles'. Poor Abigail. It was unnecessary, but I did laugh.

We rose before dawn, packed our car with our newly purchased _survival_ goods as well as the large, wicker hamper from Miss DeMontres and off we went, with the promise of our deposit back - a couple of Loonies - if we returned the basket.

A Loonie, in case you were wondering, is how they commonly refer to a one dollar coin over here. It has a picture of a Canadian goose on it, which can also be known as a Loone. The birth of this coin in the late eighties immortalized Brian Malronny, the Prime Minister at the time, as "Loony Malroony." This was a direct response to him going ahead and replacing all the old one dollar notes which everybody had preferred. Yet another shining example of a politician carrying on and doing something which absolutely nobody wanted.

Politicians the world over seem to have forgotten over the years – or perhaps we have, the general public at large – that they are supposed to be _serving_ us, working _for_ the people; not elevating themselves to a separate ruling class, a law unto themselves, riding rough-shod over the very people they have been chosen to represent. Why not do away with the lot of them? It's the beaurocrats who run everything anyway, so who would miss them? Look at Belgium – how many hundred days without a government and yet still things rumble on. Not very well, admittedly, but life continues.

Perhaps when the _Arab Spring_ begins to encroach into Europe they'll suddenly begin to take notice of the people they supposedly represent. Democracy? Gravy train more like!

So anyway, up before dawn and when the sun broke over the eastern horizon and illuminated the landscape around us we drove in silence as the sights, sounds and smells defied description and made speech impossible. I am beginning to wonder if Scotland has moved to its present location through place tectonics and was originally a part of Canada, many eons ago. They do seem to be cast from the same mould - although having said that Canada gives you a feeling of youth, growth and the immensity of life, whereas Scotland has that air of untold age and the wisdom it brings is infused into every rock, loch and field lying fallow.

It is as if Scotland is the parent or grandparent and Canada the younger relative - large, strong and in the prime of life. So perhaps it is Canada that has drifted _westwards_ upon the Earth's crusts... Hmmm, maybe... I'll have to find a geologist and ask him.

***

### AN EXTRACT FROM THE DIARY OF THE REV. GAWDLEY PINBALL

I don't know how much more of this I can take, I really don't. He has been troublesome from the first day he arrived and it is reaching the point now where... Well, I am at the end of my tether.

The man behaves like a gibbering idiot sometimes – most of the time in fact – but if his story is at all true... All this fire and brimstone stuff is right out of the middle ages, from whence he supposedly comes, but come on! I wrote to Slush at the Canterbury Investigations Agency, or the CIA as they like to call themselves, from the address on the card he gave me and asked them – _begged_ them – to take him off my hands. With him here it is impossible for me to carry out my normal duties administering to the needs of my parishioners. He has to be watched at all times. He's worse than a child!

I didn't notice how annoying he was at first. His mysterious appearance and the theft of the church relics distracted everybody and added a bit of intrigue and excitement for a while, but since the dust has died down his presence has become, how can I put it? Oh yes: INTOLERABLE!!

Take the spring clean-up of the grounds for example – oh my God! I threw myself into the work with an almost Olympic zeal. I found that tiring myself out physically is the only way of lessening the impact of his constant twittering and bleating on, which otherwise keeps me awake at nights. It's not that he talks all night mind you – in fact, since the third day I think it was, he has actually started going to his bed earlier and mercifully is waking up later and later each day. If I see him much before eleven o'clock now I consider myself unlucky.

No, it is the way his words, his bearing – his very being here – disturbs me within my own mind that stops me from sleeping.

It's all _brother this_ and _brother that_ , _sister so-and-so_ , or _father bla-di-bla_! The guy still maintains that he is from the twelfth century for crying out loud, under the reign of King Stephen! To be honest if it wasn't for the sheer impossibility of his tale I would be quite prepared to believe it! He seems so, so, hopelessly naive - vacant almost. Every little thing has to be explained to him time and time again.

"Yes Sadfael, the drawer pulls out easily because it is on a roller. No Sadfael, there are no hot springs around here. The water heats up due to the emersion heater. Yes it is gas powered. Yes that's right; it is piped in from the North Sea just like I told you A HUNDRED TIMES, ONLY YESTERDAY!"

Street lights, lino floor tiles in the kitchen, shampoo, pizza, shaving cream, the kettle, tins of beans, the garden hose, the foam inside my sofa (which he cut open fiddling around with a Swiss Army knife!), running shoes, burglar alarms, credit card statements, radiators, plastic, toothpaste, sushi – you name it, he asks about it repeatedly and with such amazement that you begin to wonder if he _is_ from the Dark Ages after all. His total failure to grasp any explanation you care to give him backs it up still further, but surely it cannot actually be true? If it is I only wish he'd go back there!

I have followed Church protocol _to the letter_ : I contacted the authorities immediately who sent up their man Slush from the CIA. He explained on the day that all the evidence pointed towards his fanciful tale being one hundred per cent accurate and that I have just got to sit tight while they run a few more checks to verify every aspect of his story from a few more angles!

The Church, in all its Holy wisdom, thinks he is genuine time travelling monk? Call me Mr Sceptic, but come on...

You see? He's got me contradicting myself now! Is he or isn't he? Oh GOD!

So my parishioners and I have all been put on ice for the time being – yeah, I guess we are not that important, just a small country parish. I have been told instead that my priority is to sit and wait with him and at all costs to keep him here. I have to make sure he does not go wandering off, blundering about somewhere.

It's all very well for them, of course! Easy when you are closeted away all snug and cosy down in Canterbury. "Just be patient," they kept saying over the phone – right until that idiot cut me off the other day!

Ever since he saw the wire coming out of the back of the hedge trimmer he has become convinced that " _Thee many tentacl'd grasp of Lucifer_ ," has reached Bramfield and has somehow infiltrated my house. Whenever he sees a wire now he follows the thing to the wall and pulls at it with all his might, yelling inanities at the top of his voice! I have lost two phones, my electric razor, the hi-fi, computer, two bedside lamps and an alarm clock in just three days!

The church has said they will reimburse me in full, but do they expect me to just sit here and watch him pull my house to pieces? I've an engineer coming to reconnect my phones on Tuesday – thank God for my mobile – but I've had to take steps to hide all the other wires I can think of: the fridge, microwave, TV, etc. Look at what happened with the hedge trimmer for God's sake!

He wouldn't go anywhere near the thing when he saw it leaning against the hedge and nearly broke my bloody knee trying to stop me with his amateur dramatics. I had to shake him off to hobble over to it, turning it on to show the idiot that it was only a garden tool. Suddenly though he leapt on to the extension cord and set about it with a pair of secateurs! Christ knows what would have happened if there hadn't been a circuit breaker.

We couldn't use any of the power tools without my extension lead so he had to do the entire hedge by hand - and that suited me just fine. I got him to mow the lawn as well, using the old hand mower. It has kept him out of harm's way ever since and more importantly out from under my feet.

What happens if he were to find the fuse box? Jesus! It doesn't bear thinking about! I am sorely tempted to show him the thing and lock him under the stairs with it, if it wasn't for the fact that he would undoubtedly manage to burn the rectory down with him as he _fried_!

Oh my Lord! I shouldn't think such unchristian thoughts I know, but... _Please_ , God, give me strength and get this imbecile out of my parish!

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

We left the car in a gravelled car park ringed with boulders. A solid, wooden sign was painted with the warning that the reader was now well and truly in bear country, so be careful not to leave any food either in the car or out in the open.

Hidden or exposed, it doesn't matter to the bears, who will happily smash through car windows without a second thought to get at something the owners might have thought was tucked away out of sight. This wilderness certainly gives you a fresh spring in your step, as your senses become more alive than they could ever be in the hum-drum domesticated landscapes we have built up around ourselves in our over-planned and uniform urban culture. Out here it really is dog eat dog - but not, if we could possibly avoid it, bear (or wolf) eat humans. An occurrence that, whilst rare, is by no means unheard of.

Mount Amery itself is a towering flat topped peak, clad in thick, evergreen forest up to a distinct line, at which point the trees instantly give way to bare rock, snow and ice, giving it the rather odd appearance of the tonsured head of a monk. The river at the base is wide and quite deep at this time of year with all the melt-water still spilling down off the slopes and beginning its long, winding journey southwards.

I had not given much thought as to what we would do once we got here, it must be said. Just look for obvious signs of the Professor I guess, in whatever shape or form they might come in.

There were three other cars in the car park, but we didn't know which one was his – we really should have thought to ask Abigail if she knew what vehicle he was driving, if not me then certainly Geeza; he is the detective after all. I suppose we were both feeling so pleased with ourselves at having picked up the trail so easily that it just slipped our minds that there might be more we could learn. Mind you, she might not have remembered.

Besides, even if we had known, would it have helped? I suppose we could have deflated all of his tyres, or immobilised him some other way - I don't know, pulled a few wires or take his battery out or something, but as we didn't know which of the three was his, we could not take any action, simple as that.

I began to look far off into the horizon, ever hopeful in much the same way that men gather beneath the bonnets of cars, supposedly knowing what they are looking for (I myself am guilty at having done this, despite the fact that I wouldn't be able to distinguish a carburettor from a head gasket). Instead I had to be contented in simply gazing away, looking for a sign. Looking for something, anything, without quite knowing what it was.

Alan Humphries jumping up and down, screaming "Over here!" and waving a big flag would have been nice, or else a friendly set of footprints leading us straight to him, curled up asleep on the sunny side of a large rock, fat and contented with an empty flap-jack tray lying by his side. Unfortunately he must have been well fed and rested already and had left his flag behind on this occasion.

Ok, so I was dithering; I admit it. Geeza on the other hand seemed to be on the lookout for something specific and when he saw what it was he whooped with delight. Three young aspen trees, red in colour - which was peculiar for this time of year - danced ever so slightly in the icy breeze, away in the distance.

"That's it!" he exclaimed triumphantly.

"What's what?" I replied. Without bothering to enlighten me any further though, he rushed over towards them. I sighed and then followed.

We were well off the beaten track by now, but he would not answer any of my questions as to what exactly we were heading towards. However, when we reached the aspens it was fairly obvious and I think what we found surprised us both, him as much as me.

"Mr. Vermies, you have excelled yourself once again," I congratulated him as he squatted down beside a well worn path which led to a small pool set into the river bank.

It was not quite the footprints I had been hoping for, but it was just as good! It would be impossible to see from any of the tourist trails, and the very way the path wound this way and that into the nearby woods gave the impression that its meandering route had been trodden quite deliberately, over a not inconsiderable period of time. It didn't even cross our minds that it could have been an animal track: bear, wolf, coyote, even a mountain lion. God knows what lives out there! I don't know what we would have done if it had led us to a dark cave mouth, strewn with bones...

Thankfully it didn't and following the track silently for nearly twenty minutes we came across a small, but neatly maintained log cabin nestled in a clearing in the middle of a tall pine forest. It was right out of a picture book, fully equipped with a little rock lined path leading right up to the raised wooden porch. There was a rough stone chimney and log piles neatly stacked up, water barrels - the lot. Very old fashioned and antiquated and, by the thin stream of smoke rising faintly from the chimney, very obviously lived in.

I felt like Goldilocks as we approached the small door, sawn in half, but with both parts fully closed at the moment. We knocked gently and stepped backwards, not knowing who, or what, to expect on the other side.

There was silence for a moment - well, not silence exactly. The creaking of the trees and the numerous bird calls that drifted down from the forest in which we were now completely enveloped floated down to us from all angles. But the house itself was quiet for a moment or two before we heard slow, heavy footsteps and then the top half of the door opened outwards - we were wise to have taken those steps back.

An old man with a neatly trimmed beard and thin framed, tinted spectacles appeared. "What do you want?" he said - not exactly abruptly, but it was clear that we could have picked a better time, whoever we were. Or better still, not bothered to come at all.

"Err, we were kind of looking for someone. We think he was up here in the last few days."

"You're not journalists are you?"

"No."

"Police?"

"No."

"MTV?"

"What?" I said, surprised. "Err, no." Bizarre.

"You'd better come in then," he said and showed us through.

Looking back now I suppose I should have noticed before I did, but this being America and all – sorry, sorry! Canada! You know what I mean though \- you hear so many stories don't you? Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself. To continue.

The insides of the cabin were surprisingly luxurious - well, more comfortable than I was expecting anyway, with a flowery three piece suite, dark wood coffee tables, frilly lampshades and what I thought at first to be wallpaper although as it transpired, it was in fact a variety of thick drapes and wall hangings that stretched fully from the ceiling to the floor. Equally as decorative as wallpaper, but with the added luxury, or perhaps that should be 'necessity', of providing vital insulation in the winter.

There was a seventies style Panasonic stereo system and a number of 12" LPs in a bookcase by its side. Displayed proudly on the wall above the door to the bedroom was a Gibson Les Paul six string guitar, with black neck and a unique tartan body, the pattern of which I was unfamiliar with.

The man himself spoke in a naggingly familiar way, and immediately gave the impression of being a wily old customer. His snowy haired wife seemed a lovely, if a little diminutive lady, who looked to be enjoying her middle years, despite the somewhat crazed look in her eyes. Cabin fever, we learned in a later conversation, was only the tip of the iceberg.

"You'll have to excuse us," he drawled in a thick southern accent, positively dripping with the moisture from the swamps of Tennessee, "but we don't get many guests up here, so if our hospitality is a little lacking, it ain't nothing personal."

I knew I had heard his voice before, but where?

"No, no, that's quite alright. I can imagine you wouldn't exactly have folk popping in every day. It's quite a place you've got here." I sipped politely from the cup the lady had poured me. It was some kind of home-made, fruit tea, blackberry or black currant I think.

"Thank you very much," he said. I knew him, I _knew_ him! But from where? "So tell me, what brings you all the way out here? There's nothing for miles round here this time of year, 'cept for snow, fish and bears."

I fought down the butterflies in my stomach that thrashed about like kids in a club whenever the word 'bears' was mentioned – why do they all keep going on about them like that? Is it true or just a joke they all play, scaring the tourists? They way they talk you keep expecting to find one behind every tree. I wish they'd pack it in.

"As I said, we're actually looking for someone."

"Uh-huh," he replied with a hauntingly familiar grunt.

It screamed at me again that I should know this man. Not personally – I had realised by now that perhaps he was somebody famous. Oh, who was it? It was on the tip of my tongue, the forefront of my mind, but I _still_ couldn't make the connection!

I reached a hand into my coat pocket and pulled out the newspaper cutting of Humphries. "It's unlikely I know, but I don't suppose you've seen this man have you? Has he been by at all? It's really quite important."

His face visibly darkened. "Uh-huh," he grunted again. "Yeah we saw him alright! Hey, when I said we didn't get many visitors round here what I meant was we ain't had _any_ visitors, not since the guy came to install the solar panels out back." That was for the electric and to heat the water tank. "Back in early 1979 that was. We ain't seen no one since we came here and that's just how we want it! Not another human soul in thirty years. Right up until yesterday evening."

The day before we got there.

"This guy," he flicked the photo with utter disgust, "swanks up here right out of the blue. Knocks on my door claiming to be an historian tracing the roots of several old Scottish families."

Obviously a good deal more learned than I in the rich heritage of Caledonia, the Professor apparently took one look at the guitar and immediately recognised it as being the long lost McPresley tartan!

I'm sorry if this becomes just a load of incoherent babble now, with more tangents than a cubist's painting, but I cannot keep my mind on the same train of thought long enough to write this in any kind of orderly fashion. I simply have to get this down before I continue any further. I took some convincing at the time before I fully believed it, but it is true. All of it is true. Beyond the shadow of a doubt.

This man, this elderly gentleman cooped up here in a remote, rustic log cabin out in the wilds of central Canada is none other than - are you ready for this? Elvis.

Elvis Presley. _The_ Elvis Presley!

Amazed? Well hold your breath, because there is more. Much more.

The lady was Elvis' wife Gretta and we were stood in the house they had lived in as recluses since he faked his own death, back in 1977! And that _still_ isn't all! The most astounding part of all?

He is Scottish!

Elvis Aaron Presley is a Scotsman and should actually be known as _McPresley_ , as he is a direct descendant of the very same Eoan McPresley that I have already heard so much about!

It has been said that the course of history is usually shaped by just a few special individuals, remarkable men and women whose actions bring about sometimes deliberate, but often unforeseen consequences. It is down to these people alone that sociological inertia is shaken off and any change occurs, allowing Humanity to be steered off along a new path, hopefully more enlightened path. An interesting theory, possibly not all that far from the truth.

It would appear that our Mr. McPresley, Eoan that is, was one of these very people. Not only was he the first European to tread on American soil, he inadvertently caused the Haggis to be brought into existence and he is also the distant ancestor of Elvis himself - who, after all, is another of these 'makers of history' in his own right. Perhaps there is something in the blood. It would be damnably difficult to do, but maybe it would be interesting at some point to try and trace a few more members of this remarkable family and see if any of the rest of them has had any notable achievements.

I must marshal my thoughts. I feel this account is going to go all over the place. OK – I'll tell Elvis' story first, a précis version at least, and leave the actions of our adversary for later. Right? Here goes.

"Long before I became famous," Elvis told me, "when I was only a little boy actually, my mother took me on a trip to Scotland, to trace our roots."

"So you knew you were from Scotland, the family?"

"My maw had some iddy-biddy bits of our story, scraps that got handed down for generations. Using what she knew, we started off in the Grampian Mountains. We went from the Forest of Atholl and headed north-east from there.

"You see, although to the rest of the world the McPresley Clan had faded into obscurity when the name was stricken from the record books, the individual members of the family were still very proud of their name, of their kin, and were loathe to give it up. So the memory of the name carried on in private, behind closed doors."

It turns out that young Master McPresley found out a lot about his heritage on that trip, his youthful mind soaking it up like a sponge and he remembered it all, every little bit of it. Later in life he filled his songs with the things he had learned, written in as hidden meanings that went largely unnoticed by the world. Only the members of his own original clan had any inkling of what he was really saying and of course they were not going to be telling anyone.

"That hairstyle I had? The quiff?" he laughed at the memory of it. "That was the traditional way of wearing your hair if you were a McPresley. You go to _our_ country, the land we still look on as McPresley land and you'll see loads of 'em, quiffed up and greased and all dyed black.

"So where is your land? I've heard all about your ancestor Eoan, but he lived around Skye and I didn't see any quiffs while I was there."

"Uh-huh. That's because Eoan was a wanderer, see? He moved away. No, no, the McPresley's have always been – because we're still there you understand - based in the Cairngorm Mountains. The heart of our territory is the grand peak of Ben Macdui."

He explained the real message behind his music, which was quite simply a tribute to his own family, the Clan McPresley. He also gave us the real meanings and stories behind some of his songs.

"There's a particular spot at the foot of Ben Macdui where all our internal clan disputes were traditionally settled. Criminals or the accused were judged there and sentences were passed out by the tribal elders."

"And you went there?" I interrupted in my excitement.

"Sure I went there. Now, because of this, the mountain was known throughout the Clan McPresley as the _Jailhouse Rock_. After the self imposed exile of Eoan, the entire clan, or at least those who were able, would meet once a year on the anniversary of the day we were forced to renounce our name - the blackest date in the McPresley calendar. They would gather in secret on this day and hold a clandestine celebration of all things McPresley, to keep the memory alive. To honour this I wrote the song 'Jailhouse Rock', but my manager misinterpreted it."

"Unbelievable."

"Well, I could see the funny side, so I went along with it."

Most of his songs followed a similar pattern. Elvis, always seeing the humour in the mistakes, allowed them to take the forms that are now known by people all over the world. Not every alteration was taken so lightly though. Something he was forced to change and was never happy about - and it still rankles him to this day - was _one_ of his songs being split into two distinct titles by his record company.

The songs 'Love Me Tender' and 'Return To Sender' were, in their original format, only one song, all about the love he had found for a local girl on one his trips back home. He had met and fallen deeply in love with a young Scottish _lassie_ and they had made the promise to each other that one day they would be married, when they reached the appropriate age. However, as the years went by, with them writing to each other once a month, she suddenly stopped all correspondence with the young man and he found himself cut off from her without warning.

His eyes teared up at the telling of what was obviously a very painful memory. I looked at Geeza, but although I'm sure he was listening, his attention was taken up elsewhere and I couldn't catch his eye.

It transpired that poor Gretta had tragically developed schizophrenia and whilst one personality still loved Elvis dearly, the other more dominant one didn't want to know, immersing herself instead in the study of crustaceans in a seaside town on the Moray Firth, between Portknockly and Fraserburgh. That town was called Banff and is still there today, on the mouth of the river Deveron.

The record company insisted that the song be changed, as in those days there was not the more liberal attitude towards insanity that we enjoy today. This splitting into two of what was for him his magnum opus, that he had wrenched from the depths of his heart and bled onto a song sheet, caused his view on life to become jaded.

"Every other song after that," he said to me, "was rubbish." Fairly harsh criticism I thought, but they're his songs, so he should know.

"From that day on I began to see the industry for what it was - a money making parade of egos, where fat men in suits came away with most of the profits." He leant forwards and gently touched my knee, his voice laden with sorrow. "They weren't interested in _me_ , in anything I had to say, anything I _felt_ ; just how much they could make out of me.

"Well now, once I'd realised that I thought, 'fine' and I chose to play the game. They didn't know it, but I was making fun of all the people who thought they were pulling my strings. Look at Viva Las Vegas," he said by way of an example.

"But how could you bear it?" I asked him. "Not only all the manipulation, but the loss of your love? Didn't you get cynical, or bitter?"

"I didn't have time for that. What, you think, I was sitting idly by all that time, eating burgers and smoking cigars? No sir! I was spending all my spare time and the best part of everything I made trying to find my childhood sweetheart." I saw him sneak a glance at his snowy-haired companion. "Looking for my sweetheart..." He turned back to me.

"And let me tell you son, it wasn't easy. Remember I was fully in the limelight back then – everything I did, what I ate, what I wore, where I went – everybody wanted to know. But I couldn't let anybody find out what I was doing. Let me tell you, I had an _army_ of private detectives on the payroll. You can't believe how much I was paying them, for their silence as much as their work."

"Pity Geeza wasn't around for you," I joked. "He'd have probably got her within the week." Elvis looked questioningly over at my friend, but said nothing. "Did you find her?" I asked, already knowingly the answer.

"Oh I found her alright," he turned again to Gretta, to where she was busying about with a pot of fish stew. The warmth and the tenderness in his smile was touching. It seemed to light up his whole face. He breathed deeply. "Yeah, I found her."

When eventually he _had_ found her, he flew over to Scotland immediately, managing to stay away from the prying eyes of the media. And there, on the windswept shores of the north-east coast, he won her heart once again – well come on, what girl could possibly refuse to succumb against the hopelessly romantic backdrop of Troupe Head on an overcast night in February?

Right there and then he began the intricate process of faking his death and escaping from the world he had grown to hate. They chose Banff – Canada - because not only would no-one ever find them here - until now - but also so that when the crustacean loving personality 'came through', she would think she was still at home, and happily scour the river for her beloved crabs and whelks. Without her glasses she was apparently so short-sighted that she was unaware of the 'slight' differences in her new and old homes - the vast, three thousand metre Mount Amery being but one of them.

What a world eh? And what a lamentable, yet beautiful tale. When I still betrayed a few doubts – hey come on, who wouldn't have done? - he showed me the gold disc for _Heartbreak Hotel_ and a silver lame suit that he wore on stage - both kept as reminders of the ironic lifestyle he had pretended to live.

Incredible. I am still pinching myself, and will be for some time to come I expect.

But now back to the darker side of the story - Humphries. He had arrived here the day before us and had seemed genuine enough to allow into the cabin. Elvis had talked with him at length about the McPresley name and history and had shown him some of the artefacts he held dear to him - the most significant of which was a two by four foot ancient wooden chest, carried over here all those years ago by Eoan McPresley himself. This chest, the most treasured family heirloom this side of the Atlantic was filled to the brim with possibly some of the most ancient Scottish coins on the face of the Earth.

I say 'was filled', but should really have written 'used to be filled' - well, in actual fact, the chest is more than likely _still_ full of coins, but the point I am trying - rather unsuccessfully - to make, is that none of them were here any more. Like a thief in the night \- or very early morning anyway - the mad Professor has made off with them.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

When Klondyke Sal had said that my friend would find it interesting, or whatever it was he said, I didn't know what to expect, but it certainly wasn't that!

I have never been an Elvis fan myself, but I must say that in the flesh the real Elvis Presley is a sound bloke. I liked Gretta too, bustling about, feeding us home made jam and chattering away to herself. Lovely woman and it warms even my heart, alone for all these years, to see that true love can triumph in the end.

Love. It is something I have never really known myself, until meeting Malika back in Nairobi. How long has it been now? Not even two weeks! It is a feeling you know nothing about until you have experienced it and then you never want to let it go. It's not something you can talk about without reverting back to a bunch of old clichés. I suppose they have become clichés for a reason, but that doesn't stop them sounded tired.

Poor old Elvis. The recluse. I can completely understand what he's done, getting away from it all, although some would undoubtedly question why he would have wanted to leave the bright lights, fortune and fame. It's my guess that living in the spotlight isn't all it's cracked up to be. I shudder to think what he would make of today's media, should they ever find out about him hidden away up here. Not that they ever will of course, because Elliot and I both swore ourselves to secrecy. I reckon he's been through enough - they both have - and they deserve their little bit of happiness. So unless the Prof blurts something out before we catch him no one will ever know.

Humphries must have headed back to Lake Louise only that morning, so we hoped to catch him before he left town. We must only have missed him by a couple of hours – maybe even passed him on the road!

To be honest I had wanted to get away again as soon as we found out he had left before dawn, knowing that if he spoke to almost anyone in the village he would find out someone had been asking about him - especially the woman at the _Larder_. Elliot insisted on staying though, what with all his weird, new Scottish revelations flying through the air. By the time he was finally ready to leave Gretta was just bringing out an early dinner and we'd have felt awful throwing it back in her face and rushing off.

Maybe if we had done, or if we had left straight away when I first wanted to we could have stopped him and averted this disaster. Doesn't really matter - it's irrelevant now.

Excusing ourselves as early as we politely could, we high-tailed it back to the car, having to risk driving back just as dusk was closing in. The people back in Lake Louise had been right about night time driving, and we fell victim to our own desperation, coming off the road at a pretty nasty bend neither of us had remembered.

Elliot was driving and conditions were bad. It was darkening and the roads were just beginning to ice up as the Sun went down. Plus we were desperate to catch up with Humphries, _plus_ Elliot was gibbering like an idiot about McPresleys, tartans and God knows what else. I'm not saying that if I'd been driving I'd have stayed on the road, but at least I'd have been paying attention.

Still, it could have been a hell of a lot worse. The car wasn't damaged and we weren't hurt, but it did mean that were delayed about _nine hours_ waiting for help. Nine hours! We could have bloody walked it by then!

By the time we finally showed up in Lake Louise we were too late. He had already left for Calgary Airport and by the time we eventually got _there_ all hell was breaking loose. As soon as we stepped out of the car we knew something was up. There was an atmosphere about the place, dark and terrified. People were stunned, confused, frightened. The next thing that hit us was the news on the TV and then we saw all the newspapers sitting in their stands.

Oh boy.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

The wonders of this time I am now inhabiting are many, from water that boils itself up, long distance speaking tubes through which everybody has their own identification number and other things far too numerous to mention. I have previously spoken about some of the delights to be found here - candles that ignite themselves, quills already filled with ink, the horseless carriages and other marvels that surround me, yet there is one thing that I have never been happy with, ever since the Reverend Pinball introduced it to me on the second day of my arrival.

The offending article is a black, metallic box of huge dimensions, nearly a yard across and two feet in height. Its corresponding depth by my reckoning would lend to it the same volume as one of those large chests used to transport fine linens by those that possess such accoutrements and may need the strength of two burly men to lift it. There is a smoky pane of glass covering the front almost in its entirety.

When 'switched on' as my host explained it, you can see pictures 'beaming in' from all around the world, like a whole gallery of masterpieces brought to life within a single frame! It accomplishes this with the aid of what I had assumed was a poorly erected sun dial jutting haphazardly from the gable end of the house. This, unless Gawdley is enjoying a joke with me (at my expense, but good naturedly I am sure) is called a _satellite dish_ and catches invisible rays that are fired off into the Heavens from here on earth and bounced off the stars! These then fall back down again in the form of moving pictures which can be seen through the dark glass!

It must surely be a most hilarious jest, although Gawdley's face as he told it was as straight and serious as if he were delivering a sermon on the Sodomites!

Whether his tale was jocular or not, I cannot dispute the fact that moving images _do_ appear, for I have caught glimpses of them as my friend sits down to watch in front of this box every single night, or has done just lately. He claims he mainly uses it to watch the cricket, whatever that may be, or sometimes a story or two which can be especially entertaining during the long winter evenings.

Personally, I had put it down to some form of heathen magic and was frankly surprised to find it in the home of a man of the cloth. As soon as he moves to activate the thing I arise and come upstairs to my chamber, to write within the pages of this book, say my evening prayers and then take to my bed – indeed, this bed is of such kingly comfort that I must confess it is difficult to resist.

Earlier on today the Reverend was called upon by one of the peasants who quite brazenly asked him to assist them in some task which they probably should have already finished well before that time. The man's stomach declared to one and all just how slovenly he was and yet he seemed in no way ashamed of it.

As the sun fell into the western sky, Gawdley opened the door to a Mr. Thomas Acre from the village, who asked him if he would join a few of them where they were 'getting the jars in.' Maybe a large consignment of butter had arrived for the local shop. Almost without hesitation the good Reverend thrust his arms into the sleeves of his coat and agreed, at once following Acre out into the night.

I wonder whether he is not a little _too_ lenient at times, the Reverend. Although to be kind and charitable is perhaps the most Christian attribute of all, it is a sad fact of human nature that people will oftentimes take advantage of a Good Samaritan, so I was pleased when my friend laid down the law from the outset and told Mr. Acre that he would only help for a limited time.

"I'll come," he said, "but just for a quick one. No more than that."

I nodded a silent approval at the time, for he is such a selfless man and can easily be generous to a fault, but it is as I feared. They have taken advantage of his good nature and must have persuaded him to stay until the task is done, for it is now approaching the chiming of midnight and still he has not returned. These jars must be heavy and numerous indeed.

I must report that my own night has not been without incident either, for the devil has somehow managed to get a foot back in the door, again! Oh, this most relentless of foes!

Although it shames me to admit it, admit it I must - this very evening I finally allowed my curiosity to get the better of me. Ahh, temptation, withdraw thine ugly head! How it happened I know not, nor even when, but the truth of the matter is that at some point in the evening I was enticed by whatever lies the demons living inside that metallic box managed to spin. Their abominable machinations gave rise in me the desire to summon forth the pictures contained in the hellish casket, so I crept back downstairs and pushed the button as I had seen Gawdley do several days ago.

My first impressions of the machine as being pure evil, or heathen at the very least, were all at once proved correct! Without warning and with his face burning with anger, my satanic foe appeared right there before me, ranting and raving and speaking in tongues!

Thankfully, my weakness was dispelled immediately on seeing his tyrant's visage and though I was mortified by the fact he had so easily been able to cloud my judgment and weaken my resolve into calling him forth, I was suddenly filled with the vigorous strength that is born from the love of God!

I did not waste time in listening to his poisoned words. I closed off my ears and with grim determination began to yell an exorcism rite!

And once more it worked! As I finished the incantation, he simply disappeared, banished to whence he came, to be replaced by dozens of differing images that flickered confusingly past my vision. I hastened to deactivate the box, my head pounding, my palms sweating. I shall inform Pinball tomorrow morning - that machine must go!

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Being stranded there at the roadside was awful. There was no damage to the car, but we had to flag someone down and get them to phone the rescue services - and it took _ages_ for anyone to drive by in the first place. Then when the mechanic showed up a couple of hours after that, one look was enough to tell him we needed a bigger tow truck. By the time we were finally pulled back onto the road and were able to get on our way again, Geeza was right – we probably _could_ have walked back to Lake Louise Village!

At the time I remembered having seen somewhere that you should always stay with your vehicle as it is easier for spotter planes to find a car than it is a couple of people wandering aimlessly about, but on reflection maybe I was being a tad overdramatic. That advice was for when you have broken down in the middle of the desert, not for when you've gone about fifteen feet off a tarmac road which you could easily follow straight into town. In my defence though, while it could hardly be described as scorching heat that would dehydrate you in less that an hour (it was pretty parky in fact!), it _was_ still around forty miles to Lake Louise and it was not a well travelled road. Still, it doesn't really matter now.

The frustration we felt at being stuck for so long was made much worse when we finally screeched into Calgary airport to find that not only had we missed Humphries by some time, but also that things seemed to have escalated out of all proportion.

We have massively misjudged the man it would seem. Our Professor is no mere lunatic, acting in random, largely whimsical if dangerous ways. We now know he is actually a criminal mastermind of the very worst kind and the plot we have become embroiled in is of a global scale! It would be far more suited to the likes of James Bond, Steed and his Avenger friends or even perhaps Superman.

Not us though.

But having come so far, can we just back down and keep the lowest of low profiles, hoping that 007 turns up and saves the day? Of course not. Criminal genius he may be, but we are still hot on his trail! Probably closer than anybody else anyway, so we can't stop now. And there is no doubt whatsoever that he is quite mad - we only need this insanity to cloud his reason once and he will make a mistake. And when he does, we will have him high and dry.

Dumping the car in the hire company's drop off bay we rushed unsuspecting into the terminal building. The first things we noted were the numerous television sets dotted around the building, suspended from the ceiling on high tension steel cables like some sort of cubist's mobiles, put up there to distract the public's attention from the tedium of hanging around. On each of these TVs, a news story that has just rocked the world was beaming itself out at us.

There, standing in front of a dark, grey backdrop shouting furiously into a single microphone stood Alan Humphries, dressed in the same suit I had seen him wearing in the MacPlimsol Conference Hall back in Eilean Ban. However, gone was the smiling, unruffled Professor who had so easily lulled us to sleep with his hypnotic ramblings on the subject of Mathematics. This time his hair was unkempt and sticking out at all angles, his eyes burning with a cold, blue fire. The most striking part of his apparel though was the frown he wore upon his face, which was ugly and terrifying.

"Are you listening world? Ha! Of course you are. You have no choice!" Quite clearly mad, his ranting continued. "Listen and listen well – I have amassed over seventy per cent of all the Scottish money still in existence. Now I am aware, as are your governments, that to the common man and woman this might not seem even slightly important, but ohhh, it is! Important enough for me to jam every TV station in the world and to reveal myself - to show my hand at last!

"I am going to explain to you all a little something about global economics now and it would be well worth your while to pay attention: you have been deceived people. Your governments have lied to you."

No, you don't say!!! Surely not!

"For many, many years – as long as there have _been_ any governments, they have lied to you about how the world is financed. It is generally well known that global markets choose to trade in one popular currency, as much for simplicity's sake than for anything else. The common misconception is that it is currently American dollar – in making you believe this, the governments around the world have been able to perpetrate the biggest on-going fraud the world has ever known. It is this terrible secret which I am about to expose.

"In every country around the world the governments and the big, multi-national industries deal amongst themselves exclusively in _Scottish_ money. As they negotiate contracts, trade deals and aid packages, they speak behind closed doors in Scottish currency and only once all the t's had been crossed and i's dotted do they make it public, converted to the currency of the day. It used to be pounds sterling; now indeed, they talk in dollars.

"Most people look upon the Scottish currency as a joke. Put out by Westminster to appease a conquered, but unruly nation, it's not _real_ money. In reality however, the Scottish pound is unbelievably strong – on the markets this morning for example, you could have got around five hundred million dollars for your one pound Caledonian, were you able to do such a thing - which of course you are not.

"There is a very good reason behind all this secrecy," he explained. "There have always been a few pounds here, a few shillings there, kept as curios and keepsakes by everyday folk such as yourselves. Now while any average person may have held onto these coins simply for posterity's sake - for the memory of a treasured holiday spent traipsing around the Highlands, or visiting the ghost of Edinburgh castle or whatever - had the truth ever emerged as to their _real_ value it would have made them richer beyond their wildest dreams – richer probably than eighty per cent of all of the countries, individually, on the planet!

"The global economy would have been devastated over night. The entire financial infrastructure that has been built up so painstakingly over the last few centuries would have come crashing down in an instant. Current world powers would have toppled as certain individuals, perhaps just common laymen or housewives from Selkirk would have overtaken them in wealth. It would not have taken long for the world to sink into a sea of anarchy and chaos.

"Oh yes, there would be bedlam if the truth ever got out. The whole of our Coca-Cola civilisation would implode and humanity would face its biggest crisis since the Ice Age. Bigger even." He smiled an evil looking smile. "That is, of course, if the truth ever got out. Which now, thanks to me, it has."

He laughed insanely as he went on to explain how for years now he had been steadily accumulating all those loose bits of change, claiming to have traced almost every single penny ever hammered out on the Scottish Mints, long since destroyed.

This is the reason why almost every nation on earth is billions of dollars in debt. That much has been made clear in the media over the last couple of years with all these _financial crises_ , but in debt to _whom_? That much was never explained. The IMF, the World Bank – it was never really adequately explained where any of this money was actually coming from.

As the Professor went around somehow collecting in all that Scottish money for himself though, governments began finding it more and more difficult to foot the bills. Humphries, it seems, has single-handedly plunged the world into a vast economic crisis.

I must confess though that despite everything, I still found it fascinating to learn that these archaic Scottish Mints stood on the site where Balmoral Castle now stands, itself built specifically to ensure that no trace of the ancient mines, mint and treasury could ever be exposed to the modern world.

"How else do you think Britain, such a tiny, windswept little cluster of islands become the world's first Super Power?" the Professor asked.

It had all been won by the wealth of _Cairn Crathie_ , the world's first bank, back in antediluvian times. What he told us next may have seemed an irrelevance to some, but it tied off a loose end I have pondered over for years. Has anybody else, I wonder, ever given thought as to how the Polo, that certain 'mint-with-a-hole' was brought into being?

Most of the people who work in the marketing industry could just as easily be labelled as 'care in the community' folk, their brains not functioning on quite the same level as the society they are living in. However, this ring shaped mint was not the innocent result of the surreal imaginings of a fractured mind in the middle a board room somewhere. It was in fact a tribute, calculated and deliberate, dreamt into life by somebody in the know - a long dead governor of the Bank of England, who also happened to sit on the board of a certain confectionary company.

You see, all coins started life as rings, or discs with holes in them. Historians would be able to show you monies thousands of years old from Japan or China that would verify this in a moment. In the days long ago when coins were still made out of gold this was done for two main reasons:

Firstly it would have been disastrous to lose any of them – this was _real_ gold we are talking about, not just something you can afford to let fall down the back of the sofa. It was therefore deemed much safer to be able to carry the things on a length of knotted cord, or a finely wrought, close-linked chain. That way no one could easily lose them. Only a fool would let slip his entire fortune, clustered together as it was. Incidentally, it was around this time that key-rings were also invented, as were candy necklaces, but neither of those facts are really important.

The second reason was simply one of weight. What most of us do not realise is that gold is very weighty - much heavier than people think and it was very soon understood that just by pinching a piece from the middle, the coins could be made much more user friendly.

The reason Polos were made into mints as opposed to any other sort of sweets – liquorish or chocolate for example – was yet another gesture, paying homage to _Cairn Crathie_ itself: the worlds first Mint.

The word _mint_ has always been associated with coinage, ever since the very first excavations were made around _Cairn Crathie_. The site on which it was established was originally covered by acre upon acre of wild Scottish mint, _menthus caledonius_ , an ancient forebear of the various types of plant sharing the same genus found today.

It is a quite natural phenomenon in any virgin environment, one completely untouched by the exploitative hand, for mint to thrive in soil found over areas in which quantities of gold have formed deep underground. All mint, and Scottish mint in particular, loves something that occurs and spreads through the earth during the metallurgical process of gold developing and _Cairn Crathie_ was built at the opening of what was to become the deepest gold mine in the ancient world. The gold found there was the richest seam in the British Isles and ran thicker than a man's arm half a mile beneath the surface.

The Professor explained that Scottish gold is far more pure, chemically speaking, than gold from anywhere else on our fair planet. Something to do with geological pressures within the Earth's crust and the permeability of igneous and non-igneous rock. He lost me for a minute with all that, as he did, I suspect, the majority of his audience. Apparently the introduction of naturally occurring mineral impurities which are absorbed over several millennia by gold found everywhere else _other_ than Scotland is key.

How? Why? Well he did explain, the sinister Mr Humphries, but I can't say I understood anything of what he said, no matter how many times he went over the theory of plate tectonics.

Anyway, eventually he moved on. "The only Scottish money I do not yet possess - and _yet_ ," he stressed, "is such a small word - is that being held in certain repositories of various national treasuries, along with a very few dribs and drabs I still have trickling in courtesy of my numerous agents." Thugs such as those that accosted me outside the stock exchange I suppose. Geeza had been right about that all along. "I am issuing an ultimatum here and now to all those nations who still hold Scottish money in your vaults - you know who you are. Starting with Japan, you will hand over to me," a brief glance down at the notepad he obviously had on a table beneath him, "the seventeen pounds, three shillings and ninepence you have stockpiled. You will do this by placing it in a locked case on the roof garden of the Billy McAngus Cordon Bleu Eatery in the centre of Kyoto City."

He then gave a deadline which equated to ten o'clock this morning, Canadian time (this had been a recording first shown last night). "Or suffer the consequences," he continued, "which, I can assure you with the utmost sincerity, will be most dire."

The screen then turned on to a couple of very graven-faced newsreaders.

"That was a recording from last night when this psychotic madman, yet to be identified, interrupted broadcasts all around the world to issue his demands," one of them said, the distinguished looking, silver-haired, male half of the pair – you know how these formulaic news teams are put together. The younger, attractive-but-serious looking woman then took over in the same 'concerned' tone (honestly, these things are serious enough without some cretinous pair trying to dramatise things even more. Just read the damn news!)

"That's right Graham. Just coming in, we have the chief Minister of the Japanese Treasury who is about to give a statement."

"Thanks Jane. Let's cut to him now. Is this live?"

"Yes it is Graham."

"Live to Japan then."

The camera cut quickly to a frail looking Japanese gentleman, who seemed genuinely worried. He was assaulted by a barrage of camera flashes before he spoke in heavily accented English.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the world. It is my duty to inform you all that the Japanese people will not be held to ransom by the actions of a solitary, highly questionable madman." Though clearly rattled it was obvious to all that, true to form for any politician, he was lying through his teeth as he continued. "Further more, I would like to take the opportunity on behalf of the Japanese government to assure citizens of all nations that this craven terrorist's spurious talk of world economics and about Scottish money is completely false. This man, whoever he is, is clearly delusional and cannot seriously hope that the Japanese public would fall for his far fetched panic-mongering.

"I am not aware of how he has managed to hijack the media to such an extent, but I am sure that Japan is not the only country putting every available resource into finding and stopping this deranged criminal. On behalf of governments all over the world we request that people remain calm and to carry on as if none of this had happened. Let us be clear about this. There is no threat. Please, carry on with your lives as before."

Ten o'clock this morning was the deadline.

It was now nine forty-seven.

***

### AN EXTRACT FROM THE DAIRY OF THE REV GAWDLEY PINBALL

Relief at last! Or on the way at least. My prayers have finally been answered, the first sign coming in with the mail. Stumbling blearily down the stairs this morning I spied a solitary white envelope lying on the doormat, bearing the official stamp of the Holy Hidden Hierarchy themselves! Inside was a letter signed by Slush at the CIA telling me that Sadfael's story has been clarified, accepted in its entirety and the Triple H would be sending someone to collect him and take him down to Canterbury within the next few days. Mercy be!

Not long ago, the fact that the very highest echelons of the Church have decided that this buffoon is somehow important would have caused me no end of consternation and worry: 'My Church is losing its mind', I would have thought. Now though, I would happily swear blind that he was the Angel Gabriel himself, just so long as it got rid of him!

Hee hee hee! Happy? I'm over the moon!

Opening the fresh bottle of silver top I collected from the doorstep, I went through the letter at the kitchen table, reading: "...all the facts in his tale have been double-checked and corroborated," bla bla bla, "...by cross referencing," bla bla, "...with church records," bla, bla. Yeah, whatever. Like I said, I don't care anymore, just as long as someone takes him away.

The latest debacle (can I pray that it may be the last?) came this morning, before I had even finished the letter! I had risen quite late because I went for a few pints last night at the Bladder and Stick in the village and stayed longer than I had intended, so I was still eating when Sadfael burst into the breakfast room insisting that we perform a purification rite on the TV!

" _Douse thee thynge with water made holy_ ," he went on in his appalling Chaucerian, insisting that we follow this up by performing a full Christian burial for the thing, setting it to rest " _in amongst thee blessed gravestones of thee Church yard_."

I happened to have just reached a point in the letter where it said "The Triple H are satisfied that this Sadfael appears to be a genuine time travelling monk, sent by the authorities of his day to track down and defeat a satanic foe." Oh really? Frankly I don't care _who_ he is - I'm not getting rid of my tele. Or what's left of it anyway.

There I was, enjoying my bowl of Shreddies and a slice of the nut loaf Mrs Scudamore had baked for me on Thursday last, when he charges in, ranting on about some story he's concocted that " _thee box in thee livyng room has been possess'd by demons_ ," and that we must immediately " _consecrate this dweomer'd casket and inter it forthwith in hallow'd ground!_ "

I tried to calm him down and tell him – again! - that it was not the work of evil spirits in fact, but that of _electricity_. I took him into the lounge and as soon as he clapped his eyes on the TV he starting breathing heavily, working himself up into in a right old flap. I bent down and turned it on to prove to him that all he was worrying about was his bloody stupid imagination, but it just made him yelp in alarm and hold up the large crucifix he has taken to carrying round with him everywhere he goes, ever since that incident with the hedge trimmer.

_Surprisingly_ , instead of a demonic entity from the very depths of the Netherhells, there was instead a news bulletin and I was shocked to see that some sort of major global crisis has sprung up suddenly overnight! On the screen stood the Japanese Prime Minister, hanging his head in shame and desperation in front of the global media.

He informed the peoples of the world that the Japanese economy was in ruins. Somehow, the Japanese fishing industry had collapsed without warning and he went on to urge the other nations "...to give up your Scottish money and agree to this man's demands, whatever they may be. There is nothing with which we can fight him. We cannot possibly hope to win, so please, for your peoples' sake, give him what he wants."

The cameras cut back to the studio and the newsreaders then went on to explain that the identity of this mysterious and menacing individual was still not known, at which point his face appeared on the screen from a recording taken from last night.

From behind my left ear Sadfael let out a blood curdling scream and began shouting at the top of his voice one of those archaic, spurious cants in Latin. He then proceeded to drive his heavy wooden crucifix straight through the television screen, causing glass to fly about the place, electricity to spark and crackle dangerously and pungent smoke to slowly fill the room!

If the CIA are coming to pick him up, let it be soon. Please God, let it be _today_!

***

### TAKEN FROM THE FRONT PAGE STORY OF THE DAILY TELEGRAPH, THE NEXT MORNING

JAPANESE FLEET SUNK BY MADMAN

Following the ultimatum set by the enigmatic figure who first appeared on news channels across the world two nights ago, it has become overwhelmingly apparent that his promises of dire consequences in the event of non-compliance are very real.

Although his appearance was found by most to be somewhat unnerving, it was assumed quite quickly to be the beginnings of some huge global joke, or perhaps the latest development in the advertising war being fought in ever more elaborate ways by some of the larger soft drinks manufacturers.

The question remains to be answered as to how exactly _has_ this man managed to hijack the worlds networks to such a total extent? From people watching the BBC in London, NBC in downtown New York to viewers tuning in to _Ouagadougou Un_ , everybody's favourite programs are being simultaneously replaced at will by this madman's monologues.

Having made his initial demands that, on the face of it, everybody thought were utterly ridiculous - for all Scottish moneys throughout the world to be delivered to him, starting with the Japanese Government - it would now appear that these were genuine enough threats which have resulted in a devastatingly frightening scenario, with civilisation itself standing on the brink of collapse.

The Japanese fishing fleet, which accounts for approximately one half of the nation's economy, has effectively been sunk by a mysterious disease \- housed, it is believed at this early stage, somewhere in the metal of the ships themselves. The effect that these bacteria are having is to increase the rate of decomposition of fish to such rapidity that by the time they reach land they have already degenerated into a state totally unfit for human consumption.

Ports across the world have categorically forbidden Japanese ships to dock, and the naval forces of many countries are now patrolling their national waters to keep the members of the Japanese fleet out, in the fear that the contamination they carry will spread throughout their own ships, and possibly to the fish stocks themselves.

Early reports from speculative tests carried out by British military scientists dropped on board several of the ships by helicopter, seem to point towards the presence in massive amounts of a substance thought to be related to a commonly used additive found in Scottish whisky which speeds up the fermentation process. This naturally occurring bacterium appears to have been tampered with genetically and has been transformed from a passive variety of yeast into a highly aggressive and fiercely prolific pathogen.

These reports are as yet unconfirmed and even if they prove to be the verified cause of this mass infection, there still remains the question of how it can have effected such widespread devastation in such a short period of time?

And the other, more pressing question is, of course: what can be done about it?

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

I find myself sitting in my room at the Beaver's Teeth guest house, Calgary, where all I can do is read the papers, watch any updates on the news and wait for Geeza to return. He really is our only chance now. I can only hope and pray to whichever Gods he is currently working with that he will find something - anything - using his unusual methods that would be frowned upon by many should they ever come to light. He has never failed me yet though, so fingers crossed that his luck stays with him.

At lunchtime three days ago, Humphries once again appeared on the television from his unknown location and told the world how he had done what he had done, thereby leaving no room for doubt that his power is almost limitless. His explanation seems _utterly_ far fetched, ludicrous even, but as it is the only one that has been put forward...

"People of the world," he announced, cutting in over all other broadcasts once again. "They didn't listen did they? By now you have all seen the consequences of Japan's decision to try and defy me," he leaned forward towards the camera with venom and megalomania written all across his face. "Give up!" he yelled. "You cannot resist me! You cannot defeat me! Nobody can - I am invincible!"

In true James-Bond-Super-Villain style he then went on to explain to us all just _how_ he was able to do it all. I don't know why they all do that – we've all seen the films where the baddy has the hero tied up and chooses to reveal his master plan to him instead of just killing him and being done with it.

"... _and only by pressink zis big, red button here can it be stopped. I vill now leave you to be guarded by a complete numbskull vhile I go and stand near some extremely flammable barrels of somethink, havink taken avay all your possessions except for your special watch..._ "

The thing is, world domination is just not enough for these super villain types. What they want is _recognition_. They want people to know what evil geniuses they are. They were probably all bullied at school.

"You cannot hope to defeat me, people and governments of the world because I have unlocked the secrets of the Fourth Dimension! _I_ have gained mastery over Time itself!

"So many hours have I laboured, so many years I have spent unravelling the helicoidal threads of Chronos - but it was all worth while. All those lost years are mine again, for Time now belongs to me!"

This Humphries is not just a mathematician it would seem, but a scientist of some note, holding doctorates and other certificates of expertise in many diverse fields. Astronomy, history, mathematics, pure mathematics, engineering, chemistry, human and environmental biology, genetics, astro-physics, nuclear physics – the list goes on. It has been said that the line between genius and madman is a thin one. Professor Alan Humphries, I fear, has not just stepped from one side to the other, but has taken a good, long leap.

Having studied and experimented for over two decades, he claims to have built himself a Time Machine, which he knocked together all by himself in his garage over the last three years.

"There is no period in the Past to which I have not travelled," he declared with pompous grandeur, "no continent I have not trod upon." A shame really that he is such an obvious loon, as this is no mean feat and would have no doubt have landed him fame and fortune enough, had he not become driven totally insane by his own power. He also explained that his machine could function as a teleportation device as well, enabling him to go anywhere in the 'here and now' as well as being able to flit at will between the Past and Present. He never mentioned the Future funnily enough, but I guess the future comes about due to the actions taken in the present and the past, so there would probably be not much to be gained from going there.

Hey, ask Stephen Hawking, not me.

"It came as no surprise when I teleported to Billy McAngus' roof garden and found that the Japanese had decided not to pay. And I regret to inform you it was child's play, the work of a moment to elude the clumsy Special Forces team put in place to capture me. I am a master of _Time_ , don't you understand? No matter what pathetic traps you set, you can do nothing to stop me!"

He told us that he had then travelled back in time to the various shipyards of Japan and somehow managed to impregnate the ships of the Japanese fishing fleet with some form of genetically modified yeast. As a result of this chemicular tampering, way back when the ships were being constructed, he ensured that once the yeast had matured, meticulously engineered to coincide with last week, as soon as a 'catch' was hauled aboard any of the vessels, the fish would instantly absorb this substance from contact with the hull, or deck or whatever and quickly decompose into nothing but a pile of rotting flesh and fish bones, which themselves would eventually go the same way and disintegrate into nothing.

A few people tried to scoff at this, but what could you do? The evidence was there for all to see aboard the titanic ships that are now drifting wraithlike, sailing silent as ghosts under the flag of the Rising Sun.

He went on to set more and more demands and though the nations of the world have tried to stall as best they can, in the end they have all had to capitulate, giving him everything he has asked for. The effects of these demands have been wide ranging, right across the globe and are currently spread out before me in the various newspapers I have been buying which, after four days here, are covering every available surface in the room. From governments and royalty, right down to the common man and woman in the street, no one has remained unaffected.

The _Ottawa Herald_ gave coverage to the plight of the oil sheikhs of the Arabian Gulf, whose fortunes that had once been vast beyond belief, were now as nothing, as they were forced to hand over their Scottish currency - Kuwait, eleven pounds and four pence; Iraq, twenty-eight pounds, six shillings, and five pence; even the vast wealth of Saudi, nearly seventy-four pounds held in Scottish coins, now lay in the hands of Professor Alan Humphries.

The hand-over routine had been the same in each and every case. The money was placed in specific, isolated locations, before being removed by the Professor. He would materialise with some strange contraption wired up to his head, grab the money and disappear again into thin air.

I managed to find a copy of the UK's _Daily Mail_ at the airport, which is one of the best places to go as they have such a wide variety of international newspapers on sale there. Humphries' third request, which particularly infuriated the _Mail_ readers, was that the coat of arms of the Royal Family at Buckingham Palace be melted down, made as it was with Scottish gold taken from a vein deep in the soil under _Cairn Crathie_ many centuries ago.

They managed to lay the blame, somehow, on the European Union, waffled on for pages about the effect this was having on the Royals, and especially 'the boys' William and Harry and how our sovereignty was now being destroyed by Eurocracts and illegal immigrants. They're special aren't they? Mystifying how they consistently manage not only to grab the wrong _end_ of the stick, but to actually get a hold of the wrong stick altogether! And their circulation runs into the millions... Good God!

Returning to a slightly more serious newspaper, the _New York Times_ focused on the riots now threatening to engulf the whole of Europe. The former Eastern Bloc countries, along with the various 'Stans' - Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, etc - the young nations which have sprung up since the fragmentation of the Soviet Union, were already fairly turbulent for the most part and have now been thrown into further disarray by the total collapse of their fragile new economies.

Closer to home, a regional newspaper, _The Albertan_ , examined a different angle, talking about a local man, Geoff Flumps, who has become so impoverished by this catastrophe that he has had to sell the shirt off his own back. Having invested his family's savings into the currency markets, which have all now plummeted due to the revelations about the way world economies actually worked, he was now destitute, left with nothing. His wife, Sandra, has taken their three kids Jaynie (14), Thomas (11) and Michelle (9) to live with her mother, blaming Geoff for the entire fiasco.

Yet another paper I brought back from the airport was our very own _Sun_ , which informed the readers that lager was expected to become so expensive - about £350 per pint - that not only would people not be able to afford it, but they wouldn't even be able to get into the pubs themselves, having to quench their thirst (or rather their desire for beer) by looking at it through the windows. A horrifying vision of things to come, I think you'll agree.

So I sit here, sick to death with the sight of waffles, muffins and maple syrup (I have to admit that I _have_ become quite taken with Poutine though. I'd better watch out otherwise I'll be shooting off down the tattoo parlour soon to get a beautiful big maple leaf slapped across one of my buttocks), wondering what is going to happen next. I myself still have one hundred and ten pounds, thirty in Scottish money, the remnants of the compensation doled out by the hotel in Eilean Ban. Does the Professor know? And if so, what will he do about it? Is there anything _I_ should do about it? That makes me phenomenally rich...

And where the hell is Geeza?

***

### INTERNAL MEMO FROM PORTLAND DOWN RESEARCH LABORATORY, ENGLAND

STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL

For the attention of: Base Commander Sir T G Staples, KCG, MBE, BA (Cantab)

Tim,

After over seventy hours of round the clock work, the boys in the lab have come up trumps! We have hit gold! Literally.

I gave the chaps their new brief as you'd requested: that they put aside all ongoing projects and concentrate all efforts into this one vitally important task. To change base metals into Scottish Gold.

The boffins achieved normal gold in a little over a day and a half - it was a simple enough procedure - but to produce Scottish gold, we realised, was going to prove much more difficult; fiendishly so in fact, but at last I am happy to be able to inform you that we have triumphed!

So far we have made just twelve bars of this very precious metal, in the form of gold bullion, ingots of the standard size which we have already stamped with the Royal crest. The entire procedure has taken place in a completely controlled environment and all but one bar is being kept in a sterile chamber. We are currently subjecting this control bar to a number of tests and exposing it to certain climatic conditions.

We believe the metal to be stable, but this has yet to be verified beyond all doubt and we have to make sure this purest of gold is not likely to be contaminated or corrupted at this delicate, early stage. The chances of any of these things are so slim as to be negligible, but we are all scientist here so I'm sure you can appreciate my thoroughness.

Now, the only question that remains is how much of the stuff do you want? Do you intend to completely flood the market, or simply enough to re-stock the world's wealth after this chap has been apprehended? I presume that whichever of these options you decide upon you would like a little extra added to HM's coffers? Speak, old chap, and it shall be done.

I'd appreciate it if you could let me know as soon as possible, as I've a golf comp. on at the weekend that I'd really rather not miss.

Yours

Charley

Sent from: JBC Roebuck-Smythe, PhD, MA, BSc (Camb), Chief Scientific Officer, Dept. of Metallurgical Research, Portland Down.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

I have been out here for four days and I've seen a lot of things - you never stop learning eh? It wasn't until today though, that what I had actually come looking for was revealed to me.

I knew I wouldn't be able to get any help from the airport or from Calgary itself - I just didn't have the feel of the place. Despite the Pantherina, my mind was still filled to the brim with thoughts of Africa and I had to get out into the wilds again to get a proper grip on things.

Old Elias had said to me that all I had to do for help round here was ask and listen, so I drove myself back out to Banff Park, the Southwest corner this time, where it borders with the Kootenay - another big National Reserve. I abandoned the car at another Auto Termination Zone, this one encircled by tree stumps and headed out into the woods.

I also remembered that he warned me to be more careful next time and not go plunging blind into anything, so I took a few minutes to get a proper note of my bearings. Having established which way was East and which was West, I fixed some good, solid landmarks in my mind's eye, before setting off into the tall, thick Forest.

It took just over two hours as near as I could tell - all I had to go on was the position of the Sun - to find a spot that felt just right. It was set back slightly from a fast flowing stream running through the woods, where the huge, straight trees met briefly with thick, low lying greenery.

What initially caught my eye and drew me to the place was a large Blue Heron who landed conspicuously on a thick branch overhanging the water's edge. The Heron turned a beady eye on me and held my gaze for some time, only turning away when he was sure I'd noticed him. I sat quietly at a distance from him, respecting his space until he flew lazily away, at which point I moved in.

I knew immediately that I'd come across a Power Place, where the Earth's heartbeat was particularly strong and I scattered some herbs on the ground in recognition of this. There was a vibration in that spot which was simply perfect and I could almost taste the energy as it pulsed and throbbed though my body, filling me with feelings of peace and warmth.

On that first night I lit a small fire and waited. I ate nothing and I drank nothing. The morning dawned of the second day and I went through the pangs and pains of hunger that normally take a grip at around that time. Stripping off I dived into the river, the ice cold of the mountain waters instantly killing off the feelings gnawing away at my stomach which threatened to overwhelm me. Sitting naked, wrapped in a blanket which I had brought from the car, I poked the coals into the life once more and got the fire going again. I knew that all I could do was sit there and wait patiently.

That evening the hunger returned for its last attempt to weaken my resolve. I've been there before, so I know how to deal with it. Walking a short distance away from my site I stuck my fingers down my throat and purged my body of all the remaining rubbish that was hanging around in my system.

Heading back to the river, I swilled some water around my mouth and spat it back out again. I still wouldn't eat or drink anything until my vision had come to me. I slept for about two hours that night, under the stars. It was beautiful, utterly beautiful, but still at the end of it I had seen nothing that could help me with the problem of the Professor.

Day three and things began to filter through. It was both stunning and profound, but most of it I can never reveal - it was so personal and close to the heart and besides, how could I hope to put such wonders and all encompassing truths into words? It is impossible. Nothing would even come close to describing the things I saw. It was truly magical. I bathed at Sundown and slept more fully that night by the dwindling fire, the warmth of the Spirits cradling me in their arms.

The Sun was not that high above the horizon on day four - this morning - when I was awoken by a soft, rhythmic noise, low pitched and gentle and very close. As my dehydrated eyes cracked painfully open I saw that I had been honoured with a visitor. Standing over two metres tall at the shoulders, with massive antlers denoting his status and maturity, was a large, lone bull Moose, grazing not four feet away from me.

As he nibbled and picked away at the vegetation around me, his big bell - the flap of skin that hung below his jaw - wobbled with every mouthful. It was his chewing I realised, that I had heard upon waking and I lay for several minutes simply enjoying the sound and the closeness of such a magnificent animal.

I moved slowly, not only because I did not wish to clumsily frighten him away, but also because I could do very little else. My body was weak from four days without food or water. Rolling stiffly onto my side and groaning in pain from where I had obviously been lying on two sharp rocks, I bade the Moose good morning.

"Hello," I said. Well, what else do you say to a Moose? He barely stopped his chomping as he greeted me in return. "So I, err, I hope I'm not intruding."

"Nope," he said munching on a long string of duckweed. I waited for him to say more, but he was not forthcoming.

"Just as long as I'm not in your way or anything," I persisted.

"Nope." Munch munch munch.

"You'll let me know though, won't you," I said, struggling to think of how to get him to open up. "If I am that is."

"Yup." Scoff scoff scoff.

I gave up. I decided he would talk to me when he was ready so in the meantime I just carried on as normal. With difficulty I dragged myself to my feet and lit my small fire, then simply sat there and watched him as he wandered around the clearing sniffing at this and chewing on that. He was magnificent. The size and power of him, the self-confidence and the raw _wildness_ of him... Truly awesome.

Eventually he had obviously eaten enough for now and finally he spoke. "So, you like it here?"

"Beautiful isn't it?" I grinned.

"We like to think so. Course it's all changed so much since my Mother's day."

"Really," I interjected.

"Yup. It's so noisy now." I wondered at this as he scratched his rump against the rough bark of a Hemlock Tree. It seemed blissfully quiet to me. "You two-leggeds jabber on so much, always rushing around," he continued, pausing to _really_ get into an itchy spot. "Ahh! That's better. Yeah, it's almost as if you never came down from the trees," he said.

Now this shocked me. How could a Moose know about Monkeys? I asked him.

"I suppose you think all _I_ should about is where the Salt licks are, or where to find the Chokecherries, or how to escape from the Wolves... Not that there's many of them round abouts any more - avoid the trucks would be more like it, thanks to your kind." He stopped his scratching and lifted his head high, staring down at me from his full height. "There's more to Mooses than meets the eye, two-legged, as well you know." He cocked his gaze slightly, refocusing on me with only one eye. "As well _you_ know more than most..."

We spent some time in idle chit chat and making pleasantries, during which my parched, croaking voice grew steadily stronger as my throat found some moisture in the damp morning air. It was a wonderful experience, talking with him; he was both eloquent and astute. I have never spoken with a Moose before, so they may all be like that, but I got the impression that this old boy was something pretty special.

When he spoke his words came slowly and thoughtfully, as if he were giving even the simplest of questions his deepest thoughts. He never answered in a straightforward way either and when I tried trapping him into a 'yes' or 'no' answer he just looked at me with his enormous brown eyes, chewed for a moment whatever he had in his mouth at the time and then said "...possibly..." while slowly nodding his head.

A good hour or two of this passed by, our conversation interspersed with several breaks whenever he wanted to graze. Then, once again only when he was finally ready, the elderly Moose gave up what he had come to tell me.

"We've been picking up a disturbing amount of interference just lately," he said in his thoughtful, deliberate way. "Human noises where there shouldn't ought to be any."

I was confused. "I'm sorry? I... don't think I understand."

"Oh. Which part?"

"Err, all of it, sorry. Who's 'we'?"

"All of the Antlered creatures," he said and then he must have noticed I was still perplexed. "Do you know _why_ we have antlers?" I thought back to all the books I've read and the documentaries I'd seen.

"It's some sort of display isn't it? For protection and for displaying your... attributes; your age, your strength and virility. I think that's the general consensus among my kind."

He nodded sagely, his bell swaying gently back and to beneath his chin. "Yes," he agreed, "but there's more to it than that."

"Oh?"

"Animals communicate in a variety of ways," he began.

"Like _body language_ ," I suggested.

"Stance, yes. Amongst other things we have use of a basic inter-species body language as you put it, which is understood by all in a particular class of Animals. The fish have one, the mammals another, the reptiles another and so on."

I had to ask something. "Excuse me a minute. You say 'mammals' and 'reptiles' – you know our terminologies?"

The Moose snorted a gentle sigh. "Of course."

"So... you can speak?"

"Well of course we can speak!" he said. "What do you think we've been doing for the last half a day?"

"I just thought that was just, you know, _you_. Me. The Panther Fungus, the rituals, the fasting..."

"We can _all_ speak two-legged, all Animals."

"Then why don't you?"

"Two reasons," the Moose replied. "First of all, when you start speaking you stop _listening_ ; you stop taking notice of all that's going on around you. Most of your kind's esoteric schools insist on silence for their meditations do they not?"

"Most of them, yes."

"Well they're right and you only have to look at the changes that have overtaken your kind since the advent of mobile telephones to prove the point. With all that constant chatter going on, do you not think the two-leggeds have become somewhat _less aware_?"

I thought about it and had to agree with him. "True," I said. "That's true."

"Indeed. And the second reason we choose not to talk aloud is just as simple – it's just that there are _much better_ ways to communicate. More efficient ways; more subtle. I take it you are familiar with the concept of telepathy?" he asked. I replied that I was. The Moose took a minute out to dig a bit of lichen from behind a tooth. "We are all born with certain appendages," he continued, "be they antlers, or the spines of certain fish, the whiskers of a cat, or the antennae of the insects. Each species has their own particular telepathic organ. For Primates it is located within the inner ear.

"By using a mixture a words and imagery, symbols and feelings, we are each of us able to broadcast any message we want to, or need to, to anybody else in the World. You two-leggeds have your radios, your satellites and the internet, but you don't _need_ any of them. You have just forgotten, that's all; you alone of all the Species.

"However much you have tried to remove yourselves from Nature though, you are still intrinsically linked. You are and have always been 'a part' of the web, not _apart_ _from_ it."

"So every one of us, Man and Beast - no offence intended -"

"And none taken."

"Every one of us is capable of telepathy?"

"Yes. And one of your kind has just rediscovered this."

"The Professor!" I gasped.

It turns out that Humphries has somehow tuned into the same frequency used by all the Animals and that is how he's been sending his messages and demands out across the airwaves.

The Animals were not paying much attention to _what_ he was saying exactly, the individual words he was using; it was the tone. It's like my Grandmother always used to tell me: "It's not what you say, it's the way that you say it," and they did not like the way _he_ was saying it at all.

They thought the tone of his voice carried a distinctly destructive timbre. My large friend had been picked as the most appropriate Spokes-Moose to come and inform me that they have managed, using their antlers, spines and who knows what else, to pinpoint his broadcasting signals to a precise location many, many miles from here.

Collectively, they are all equally as keen as us to see him silenced. The main reason they want him stopped however, is nothing to do with shiny bits of rock or world domination. It's much more simple than that: they're just not happy with the fact that he's using their frequency bands.

"You two-leggeds are so very noisy already," he said. "If you remember how to tune back into this frequency we'll _never_ get any bloody peace and quiet!"

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDRLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

I have been through much of late. I know I have already said this countless times and in no way do I wish to complain, but it is an unavoidable fact that my tale has taken yet _another_ mind-boggling turn and I find myself once again feeling dazed and completely at a loss.

This latest turn of events began shortly after I had driven the evil once and for all from the house of the Reverend Pinball. I am still as baffled as I was at the time as to quite why this provoked the reaction it did in my otherwise gracious host. The devil must have had an even greater hold upon my friend than I realized, because instead of being as pleased as I was – as one presumes he should have been, the Infernal Prince of the Stygian depths having been banished from this world at last! - he gave no indication of it at all.

Quite the opposite in fact: he stood stunned and speechless - as admittedly did I, breathing heavily - but then he glared at me in a most unhappy manner and muttered some choice, angry words which I did not understand, before stomping off with his speaking device which he refers to as his mobile, or 'telle-y-fone'. In a most unbecoming manner, he slammed the door quite forcefully behind him!

Puzzling, I am sure you will agree. But where was I?

Oh yes. Later on that evening, with Gawdley having said not two words to me all day, three rather stern looking clergymen turned up at the door and informed me that I was to go with them to Canterbury!

I find it embarrassing in the extreme that the very first thought which entered my head at this juncture was that maybe I was to be given some sort of award. What arrogance! Where does this vanity come from I wonder and how is it able to constantly force its way into my mind, despite my better efforts to maintain my humility and shield myself from such unworthy thoughts? Needless to say I was utterly wrong in my supposition.

Tut tut Sadfael. Perhaps I should find a good, thick thorny branch and thrash these unwelcome frailties from my system.

As I was shown to the carriage they had brought, bright vermilion in colour, I was pleased to see that the effects of my exorcism from that morning were now showing visibly for the good on the face of Gawdley. He stood at the Lych gate and waved us off with the largest smile upon his face I have ever seen. A weight had definitely been lifted from his shoulders. Ahh, finally!

It is times like these when your faith is reaffirmed and you know that what you are doing is right and proper. No words of appreciation are necessary. The warm feeling you are left with inside is thanks enough.

With my three new companions I travelled mostly in silence. Personally, I could not have uttered a word even if I had desired to do so, as I was enraptured completely by the speed with which we appeared to be travelling and also by the sights we saw along the way. As for my escorts - they were sombre men with serious faces and I was able to ascertain quite quickly that they were disinclined to make any sort of small talk.

From the very moment that Canterbury Cathedral hove into sight I knew straightaways that this was truly the seat of God. It was of course the first time mine humble eyes have been blessed by seeing it, though I had heard much from the Abbott back in my own time, but it exceeded even my heady expectations! Although we arrived in the dead of night, the streets were illuminated so brightly it appeared that the grounds of the Cathedral and surrounding area were lit by the glow from a thousand amber haloes

I suppose it is to be expected is it not? This is, after all, the holiest piece of earth outside of Bethlehem itself.

Walking through the Cathedral proper I was filled with an awed reverence, but we did not stop for a minute. Instead I was rushed along whenever I paused to stare at the wonders surrounding me and found myself herded through a series of anti-chambers and another few elaborately carved portals before one of my escorts pushed upon a wooden panel in the wall. I heard a click and the panel slid open! A secret passage!

I was led down this dimly lit corridor, from where we entered what appeared to be a tiny, tiny room although its precise dimensions were difficult to assess on account of all the walls being made completely of mirrored glass. A hundred Sadfaels stretched away in every direction, and my reticent companions did the same. It was so disorienting I was forced to clamp my eyes tight shut, but not before I saw the doors sliding closed of their own volition! As if that were not enough for my already overwrought senses, suddenly I felt the whole room was moving!

Ridiculous though it sounds, 'tis true.

"By St. Malcolm's thumbs!" I yelled out and gripped the sides for support. I quickly brought a prayer upon my lips, but I must confess to stumbling over the words in my panic.

I had intended to keep my eyes firmly closed, but as nothing further untoward happened I _did_ peek out at the other three with one eye after a moment had passed, only to see them seemingly unperturbed about the fact that we were descending into the very bowels of the earth!

Without warning we stopped. The doors opened once again with the aid of a hand unseen and yet more passageways were traversed by our silent quartet. With nothing to support any contrary arguments, I had to assume that I was inside a massive, subterranean labyrinth of geometric caves, carved deliberately as is the sett of a family of badgers. Only these had been formed by the hand of man, directly beneath the Cathedral itself!

After several minutes we came across a small room where two jovial and very young nuns, surely no older than seventeen years of age, were sat behind a desk. They spoke softly to the men I was with, looking at me from time to time with kind eyes. I did not try to understand what they were talking about, nor what they were doing, as one of them kept tapping repeatedly on some kind of... board? Plank? I know not what it could have been, being about two feet in length, beige in colour, with many lumps and bumps that became indented when pressed upon.

I tensed with alarm though as I noticed more of the box-like objects which had housed the Satanic personage back in the vicarage, but thankfully there was no sign of the devil.

"Is there something wrong Father?" one of the nuns asked.

"You honour me unduly Sister," I replied as courteously as I was able, though I had not removed my stare from the box. "I am no Father, Sister, but a humble Brother. Brother Sadfael from St. Malcolm's, that is all."

The nuns gasped and looked at each other. One put a hand to her mouth, but it did not stop her from stifling the laugh it had been sent to prevent.

"So _you_ are brother Sadfael," the other one spoke.

"Indeed, verily I am," I confirmed which set them to giggling again like foolish schoolgirls are wont to do when sharing some secret joke, or perhaps the fancy of a man...

The first of them brought her tittering under control after a few short moments. "You seem tense though brother. Is there something wrong?" she repeated her initial question.

"It's... it's those _things_!" I pointed a damning finger at the boxes atop their desk. "Beware sisters! Does the devil not reside within? Beware I say!"

"No, no Sadfael, it's alright," she soothed me. "Come," she beckoned with a delicate hand, "come and look."

Seeing their young faces, pure and unafraid, I moved toward her, albeit with a slight amount of trepidation still – well, after the things I have seen...

I was soon able to laugh my nervousness away however. When I think about it now I realise how preposterous it was to think that even Lucifer, darkest of foes, would be able to penetrate as much as a single toe this far into the heart of the church. I relaxed a little and took a closer look at the glass frontages, with the young nuns smiling in encouragement.

There were no diabolic moving images as there had always been in the Reverend Pinball's box back in Bramfield. Instead there was a radiance, a white light emanating somehow from within, bright yet static. I dared to reach out and trace what I thought to be engravings, but the glass was as smooth as a morning lake. Amazingly the engraving was _inside_ , beneath the surface of the glass, and ran line upon line of text – that same uniform script I had seen in my letter from Slush. So to all his other fine attributes must be added that he is an extremely prolific author - there were thousands of words of text!

"It's just a computer brother, see?" the nun assured me with a voice filled with compassion. I nodded although I did not understand.

Two of the men who had brought me thus far left by whence we came at this juncture, but the other of my escorts disappeared through another door while I was bade to sit by the still giggling nuns. After a few short minutes this man reappeared and I was taken into a small room where once again I met Geoffrey Slush, together with one of his colleagues, one Doctor Franklin Bwop, a man who had the look of a great and serious urgency in his eyes.

"Brother Sadfael I believe," the man called Doctor clasped my hand and shook it. "I get to meet you at last."

"Hail and well met Brother Doctor," I replied.

Slush and this Bwop fellow exchanged glances and then Slush coughed in an almost embarrassed fashion before halloing me.

"Sadfael, 'Doctor' is his title, not his name. He is the man who has overseen the analysis of those items we dug up from the Bramfield Parish grounds. You left Father Pinball in good health I trust?"

"He couldn't be better Geoffrey." This informality came unbidden to my lips. It was a surprise to me that I could be so bold, yet if I had broken any protocol by addressing him thus, both men were too polite to tell me so. "When I left he saw me off with such an abundance of happiness as I have rarely seen," I said and it warmed my heart to remember.

"Yes... From what he told me I can believe it," and then he coughed again. "Sadfael, I will be straight to the point with you – we wish for your assistance once again." I was humbled and though a sense of fear rose immediately in my gullet, I bowed my head.

"I live only to serve the will of God."

Again I saw the two esteemed men share a glance, and then Brother Bwop spoke. "Sadfael, we have constructed a device - a holy relic if you like – which we are sure will enable you to complete your Holy mission."

"Then the devil is _still_ not banished?" I cried out in alarm.

"Sadly no," said Franklin and then Geoffrey took over.

"We know now that the foe you have been chasing is not Satan himself, but one of his... arch-demons instead. Still terribly monstrous and evil-"

"Of that you speak most truly!"

"Yes. Anyway, this arch-demon, as you know only too well brother, has garnered the ability to travel through time at will; on a whim even." I crossed myself. "The machine that Franklin here has built here in the Cathedral laboratories will be able to detect-"

"Using divine omnipotence," explained Brother Bwop.

"Yes, very good Franklin," Geoffrey smiled. "What was I saying? This device has the ability to pick up on exactly where and when this arch-fiend transports himself through time and space and will transport you there to confront him."

They went on, the two of them to explain many of the principles of what this device was designed to do and also the intricacies of how it worked. I understood nothing and of all the phrases bandied about the room there were one or two which stuck in my mind. For some reason I remember them distinctly, even now. _Reverse Engineering_ was one and the _Bi-polarisation of DNA molecules on a quantum level_ , the other.

What any of these convoluted prosaics actually meant I do not think I would understand, even if the Good Lord _Himself_ were to come down and explain them to me face to face, such was their tangled complexity. Messrs Bwop and Slush must have enjoyed a diet very rich in fish in their formative years to have developed brains that can understand all of this, for it sounded to me – as I believe it would have done to most people – like utter gibberish.

The overall principle of their plan did hit home in the end though. Having detected the demon's next movements, their device will 'lock on' to the signal and instantaneously transport me - for it is only I who can complete this Holiest of tasks - to the exact location in both time and space where this spawn of Satan has materialised himself. And there, with the element of surprise on my side, I can best this monster once and for all!

I say it is a task only _I_ can complete, but a little helping hand from my God would not go amiss...

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

I had been in contact with Ollie Donald several times by phone, as I have been since we left Kenya. He had discharged himself from hospital in Mombassa and gone back to South Africa where he thought he would be more comfortable, but now that he could walk around again he was restless. Mr Donald is a man of action and although I tried to dissuade him - as it seemed no more than an exercise in futility - he remained adamant and insisted on flying out to meet us in Calgary. Of course Geeza was not yet back when his plane was due to land, so I met him at the airport alone.

"Ollie what are you doing?" I reprimanded him as I watched him step gingerly down from his Lear jet. "You shouldn't have flown in that condition – look at you! You should still be in hospital!" The lumps and bruises had faded somewhat since I saw him last, but they still betrayed the fact that he had been through quite an ordeal.

"Yeah, yeah, good to see you too. You sound like my doctor," he grinned.

We clasped and shook hands heartily as I took him back to the taxi I had waiting outside Arrivals.

"Of course it's good to see you Ollie," I said as we walked, "but really, _should_ you have come?" I noticed that he winced in pain whenever he forgot himself and moved too sharply, his tender ribcage reminding him in no uncertain terms that he was not yet fully fit. Carrying him through his obvious discomfort though was his mood of cheerful optimism, and determination.

"I'm fine Elliot."

"Well you don't _look_ fine. Come on Ollie, you're a mess. You should be in bed man." He turned to me and laughed.

"And now you sound like my wife! Look, I'm here, ok; get over it. Anyway what else was I supposed to do? I can't just lie around doing nothing knowing you guys are out here with the pedal to the metal."

"Hardly that Ol. I can't say I'm actually doing _anything_ myself," I said. "I'm pleased to see you, really - I just don't know what you can do that's all. What either of us can do."

"Look, Elliot, don't get me wrong here," his South African accent was thick and strong, especially as he pronounced _here_ the way they do – _h'yerr_. "I'm under no illusions that I'll be able to _do_ anything. I'm pretty sure my being here won't make the slightest difference, but at least if I'm with you two there's a chance – hanging around in my sick bed in 'Toti - that was just driving me mad, you know?

"You guys are the two men closest to stopping this Humphries and I just want to help. My jet, my houses if you need a place to stay – I'm putting it all at your disposal. We _have_ to stop this guy..."

Well that much was true. The situation _had_ worsened further.

"Anyway, where's Geeza?" he asked as our cab made its way through the Calgary traffic. I sighed and shrugged my shoulders dejectedly.

"I don't know. Not back yet."

"Where did he go?"

" _Out there!_ " I widened my eyes and gesticulated expansively, giving him the best impression of my friend I could muster: " _It's too closed here Elliot! Too closed. I've got to get back – back to the wilds!_ " I sighed again. "God knows Ollie; god alone knows. We split up a couple of days ago. I stayed here to keep up with the news; he headed back to the Park. I haven't heard a thing from him since."

We booked another room and Ollie went to shower. Despite all I had said about him coming here in that state, I was relieved to see another friendly face to be honest. Company had been sadly lacking since Geeza had gone walkabout, other than whoever happened to be occupying the front pages of the numerous newspapers I've been trawling through on a daily basis. Once Ollie had freshened up I introduced him to my pathetic routine of waiting, watching and listening to the reports as they came in from around the world.

The situation was bleak. Society as we knew it was teetering on the brink of collapse. The barriers between rich and poor had been all but broken. Nobody could afford anything anymore, stock markets had crashed, there were riots, there was looting - everything that had been so laboriously built up by our fathers and their fathers before them had all too suddenly come crashing down, lost and gone forever. At least that is how it was being reported.

And there didn't seem to be anybody coming up with any answers. All the politicians, police, armies, and organizations like the UN and NATO, all those people we as a society have been persuaded to put our faith and trust in over the years – nothing. They were all completely conspicuous by their lack of action. I think everyone knew that they couldn't do anything anyway - they just wanted someone to shout at. To blame.

It is always easier to apportion blame rather than to try and solve a problem, but it was actually fair enough in this instance. These people, these rulers of society have lived very privileged lives thank you very much, while supposedly looking after our best interests and now there was a _real_ crisis they were nowhere to be seen! There was just the Professor, beaming out his stream of demands from his still undiscovered location, to which there was simply no answer. No one could see where this was going and no one had any idea where it was all going to end.

At first there had been a purpose to what he was asking, but by now he had the world on its knees and had obviously become drunk with the power. Not only did his commands become more and more imperious, but there was no longer any rhyme or reason to them. They were becoming more and more surreal with every day.

One of the last announcements he made for example, was a proclamation stating that all people throughout the 'westernised' world must cast off their shoes and socks and go about barefoot. Otherwise he would make all bananas turn blue and taste like fish paste! What could people do? What choice did they have? We had all witnessed the destruction this man was capable of with his time machine and his scientific meddling and manipulation, so barefoot it was. How he could ever have checked up on us all I don't know, but most people were not prepared to take the risk.

Some ignored these more absurd demands – probably people who didn't like bananas in this case – but that only caused more trouble. Factions quickly sprang up and non-conformers soon found themselves ostracised, abused, or even hunted down. People were beaten, people were killed!

Maybe this is just what Humphries wanted – to throw the world into total confusion and anarchy. Perhaps that's what was behind these otherwise seemingly purposeless insanities. To set people against one another.

It's an ugly thing, Mob rule. Everybody has begun to watch everybody else and an atmosphere of dark suspicion has crept around the world like a... well, like a big... creeping cloud of... suspicion. It happened during the French Revolution, when friends and neighbours suddenly began turning each other in to the Mob; it happened in Nazi Germany and it was drawing ever closer to us with the ridiculously Orwellian _War on Terror_.

Sad to see how easy it is to bring the worst out in people. And as if all the violence and suspicion wasn't enough, the compensation culture has also managed to rear its ugly head. Many people have started claiming they will be crippled for life due to this period of shoelessness. Personally I doubt it, but that's another thing it is always easier to do than find a solution – complain and try to milk things to your own advantage. Geeza would have probably welcomed everyone being made to _go native_ as he would have put it, had he been with us. But he wasn't. Still!

It was not until two days after Ollie had arrived that, sometime early in the morning, Geeza finally crawled in, haggard and frail looking. He was painfully thin and so weak he could hardly stand - God knows how he managed to get back here from wherever it was he had gone.

"The wilderness," was all he told us when we asked him, which is scarcely sufficient to narrow it down around here. To be fair to him though he probably doesn't know. Having found out a little more about the way he works, I guess he just went off at random until he felt he was where he needed to be.

I began drawing him a bath which he insisted he didn't need – but which both Ollie and I insisted he most definitely _did_ – and ordered up some food for him. Having managed to get some fruit and bread and tea down him and while the bath was cooling, he told us the staggering news.

"I know where he is."

"You do? I exclaimed and helped myself to an apple. "Geeza you're amazing!"

"Don't thank me – thank the Moose." I didn't even ask.

However he had done it, he had somehow got a map reference which he scribbled onto a napkin. Ollie Googled it on the hotel computer and it turns out that our elusive, megalomaniac, nutcase professor is not holed up in a hollowed-out volcanic cone, or hidden away in a subterranean base underneath a frozen lake in the wilds of northern Sweden, or something like that, but in a semi-detached house in Troon, just up the coast from Ayr, back on the west coast of Scotland! I should have known this would all lead us back there.

Ollie was animated in an instant and leapt to his feet, although he must have regretted it an instant later as he crumpled to the floor clutching his battered ribs, howling as the pain lanced through his side. Asking if he was all right, I helped him more slowly to his feet, but then shooed me away, reaching for his coat.

"I'll phone my pilot and have the plane fuelled up and ready to go. Are you going to be ok to fly?" He put this last question to Geeza, who really did look ill. Vermies insisted that he'd be alright, so Ollie made the call. "Ready to go in two hours, landing at Prestwick Airport. I've got some paperwork to attend to down there, so I'll meet you guys at the plane." And with that he was off.

I let Geeza sleep for an hour or so while I packed. Then I had a bit of a brainwave. I remembered that back at the hotel in Eilean Ban there had been a delegation of officers from Interpol and that was only a hundred miles or so to the north. I was not too sure whether they would still be there or not, but I chanced a phone call. It was a good thing that I did.

Interpol had set up a temporary mission control, right there in the hotel. With so many of their top brass and head honchos still there at the conference when the crisis had broken out, they had quickly established communications with their main offices wherever they are - Belgium probably. Most things like that are in Belgium - and worked from there.

When I gave one of the chief inspectors the address of the semi in Troon he seemed highly sceptical, but as it was the only lead they had - that anybody had - he said he would look into it. I didn't actually believe him to be honest, but to his credit he set wheels in motion. Deciding not to take any chances he put in a request for an anti-terrorist unit to stake out and storm the house.

Not that we knew any of that at the time of course. Red tape being red tape, even in the midst of such a catastrophic global crisis, we beat them to the house in Troon – 127, Grassy Lane (doesn't sound very sinister does it?). It turns out that it took a while assembling the squad as the SAS were already stretched to breaking point and all _that_ was only possible after permission had finally been granted by Whitehall.

So it was that the three of us found ourselves in the deserted Scottish street, crouched behind the yew hedge that surrounded the garden of 127 - in our minds, all that stood between this maniac and the civilisation as we knew it.

And what a sorry bunch we were! Ollie was still moving like an invalid, Geeza was weak through lack of food and sleep (and then the trans-Atlantic crossing) and as for me – I was scared out of my wits and fairly gibbered at the very first problem we encountered – that of getting into the house.

"Leave that to me," said Geeza. The way he stealthily crept through the front garden was amazing, keeping low all the time and hardly making a sound. To look at him you would never have known he had spent four out of the last five days exposed to the harsh Canadian wilderness. In no time at all he had twiddled with a couple of bits of wire in the lock and the door swung slowly open.

I had absolutely no idea what to do now. We were in, clustered nervously in the narrow hallway just inside the door, but what now? We were only moments away from finally catching the man who had brought the world to its knees, but how could we hope to confront him? Geeza was running on pure adrenalin and when that ran out he'd be sluggish as a snake in hibernation. Ollie had already been battered nearly half to death by this lunatic and could barely walk, let alone defend himself and I was becoming more and more terrified with every breath.

"Elliot," Geeza whispered harshly, putting a hand on my shoulder. "Panic is a killer. Don't worry. We've got him three to one. Breath deeply; we'll be fine." I followed his advice and gulped down several lungfuls. "Ok," he continued, taking charge, "we split up. I'll take the upstairs, Ollie, you take that door," he pointed to the first door on the left, directing me to the other one at the bottom end of the hall. "No heroics; whoever finds him, yell for help. Then find something big and heavy and whack him with everything you've got! No matter what happens, he isn't walking out of this house. Ok, good luck!" And without another word he started tip-toeing up the stairs.

I looked at Ollie and Ollie looked at me. We both went to our doors and listened, but neither of us heard a sound. He winked at me and went through. Heaving in a deep breath I did the same.

I found myself in the kitchen and it was empty. A further door led off to the left and I heard electronic noises coming from whatever lay within. Swallowing nervously I looked around for a weapon. This was insane! I'd never been in so much as a school fight! Geeza had warned me not to pick up a knife, as most people might do in a similar situation, because unless you knew what you were doing you'd probably end up stabbing yourself. My fingers closed around the comforting weight of a rolling pin and even as Ollie was going through the lounge and downstairs study I pushed aside the door and entered the garage.

What had once been a garage anyway. Although it still bore all the hallmarks of your typical garage – a lawnmower clogged up with old cuttings, various tools, pots and extensions cords lining the walls, an old video recorder, that sort of thing - the resemblance ended there. One wall was taken over completely by stacks of computer towers, monitors and keyboards, with wires splattered about everywhere like an explosion in a noodle factory. Several benches held the debris from old experiments, their multitude of test tubes, vials and retorts each clutching their crusted secrets to their unwashed sides. A threadbare carpet, dust-ridden and stained, hinted at a more colourful past in a Moroccan bazaar.

Standing with his back to me and looking like Heath Robinson's worst nightmare, the professor was hooked up to his machine by a series of tubular attachments clamped to his head.

Whether it was this hideous sight that stopped me I don't know, but for some reason I did not call out for my friends. Hearing or perhaps sensing something, Humphries spun around.

"You!" he screamed.

"You!" I hissed in return and brandished my rolling pin, taking a two-handed stance that I'd seen in a Japanese film about samurai back in the Beaver's Teeth. Humphries glared contemptuously at my posture.

"What are you going to do, lay an egg?"

Perhaps I did not look quite as I had imagined. With a four foot katana of deadly sharp, folded steel, I would probably have looked more impressive, but the rolling pin was obviously not doing it for me. I stood up straight again.

"Err, no; I'd rather hoped that was the _Sentinel at the Castle Gates_ actually."

The professor sneered at me with disgust. "Do you know how long I've been looking for you?"

"About three weeks isn't it? About the same time I've been looking for you," I quipped back. "And I think we're winning in that respect," I continued, suddenly emboldened. "You found me once; we found you twice in Africa, almost got you in Banff and now again here. 4-1 to the good guys I make it."

"Shut up!" he yelled, unimpressed by my bravado. "How the hell did you get away from McCourt and his bikers?" he snarled.

"Do you know, I'm still not too sure about that myself. It involved pigeons though. Lots of pigeons."

He took a step towards me, an evil fury written all over his face. "It doesn't matter," he took another step. I brought the rolling pin up in front of me and slightly to one side, Jedi style. He came no further, but whether it was the rolling pin or the wires on his head having reached their full length that stopped him, I couldn't say.

"So what are you going to do now? Why have you come here? What can you _possibly_ hope to achieve? You can't stop me now, nobody can! No matter how much Scottish money you've got; no many how many _pigeons_ -" he spat the word - "you choose to keep!" Whirling on his heel, he stepped back to his machine. He spread his hands wide and laughed insanely before turning to face me again.

"We have passed the point of no return... what did you say your name was? I still don't know."

"The name's Cripplesby. Elliot Cripplesby."

"Hmm, doesn't exactly trip off the tongue does it? More sort of _stumbles_. Well Cripplesby, you're too late. I have destroyed the balance of power. I have smashed economies and toppled governments. I have the whole of humanity eating out of my hand! The World is mine!"

"Not any more!" I snapped, having had quite enough of this bloated egomania.

"Oh, and what are you going to do? Got a time machine of your own have you?" he asked laughing.

"No," I replied.

"Or what," he pointed to my weapon which I still held out in front of me, "are you going to roll me out and bake me for twenty minutes?" He reached out and snatched a golf umbrella from a dusty shelf. "I used to fence for Edinburgh University. How about you?"

I took one look at him and gulped.

"Ollie!" I shouted, "Geeza!"

"On guard!"

I charged, my fear giving way to desperation and we met in the middle of the faded rug with a clash of...blades. I was quickly made aware of the gulf between our skills however, as he parried each of my frenzied attacks with ease, a nimble flick of his fencer's wrist being more than enough to deflect my clumsy strikes aside.

I never even looked like landing a blow to be honest, until suddenly his machine clicked and beeped behind him, drawing is attention momentarily. Seizing my chance I lunged, striking out with all my force. At the very last minute though, as if warned by some sixth sense, he spun around and opened the umbrella up to its full extent! The ribbed, tartan material acted as a shield and my blow bounced off.

He deflated his umbrella as I struck again and our weapons met in mid-air. Our faces pushed up against each other as we jostled for supremacy.

"Don't you know it's unlucky to open an umbrella indoors?" I snarled as we tussled.

"Don't _you_ know that it's dishonourable to strike at a man when his back's turned?" he spat in reply.

I was about to question the honour of using a time machine to fiddle about with reality and take over the world, but at that moment he clicked a button and his umbrella whooshed open again, throwing me backwards! With the speed of an Olympian he danced half a step forward and rapped me sharply on the wrist, causing me cry out in pain and drop the rolling pin to the floor.

Had he pressed home his advantage I would have been doomed, but fortunately the wires connected to his head prevented him from finishing me off. Staggering back, I looked around the room and rushed over to the corner near the door, grabbing the lightweight, aluminium standing lamp that stood there.

"Ollie! Geeza!"

I leapt at him again in the eerie red glow that now illuminated the garage - my wrenching the lamp from its socket had cast the room into near darkness, the only light now coming from the numerous coloured bulbs glistening evilly from the Time Machine. We were cast as dark silhouettes against the infernal crimson glow.

It was not long before Humphries was forced to abandon his tattered brolly, realising he needed a different weapon to match this new onslaught. With an agility I would never have suspected, he discarded the sorry umbrella and replaced it with a 16" hand saw from a nail on the wall, and backed it up with a plastic dustbin lid in his other hand. These he used to savage effect and in the short space of time it took for my companions to burst into the room I was covered in bruises and saw-toothed gashes.

The lamp-stand had gone by then and I was barely defending myself with one of those long, plastic extension tubes you get with your vacuum cleaner. As I screamed for help I saw my friends arming themselves from the corner of my eye, Geeza with a glue gun and Ollie with an old bronze flower vase. Before they could come to my aid though, all hell broke loose!

Little did any of us know, but moments after we'd entered the house a handpicked team from the SAS had silently sped in, blocking off the street with black vans. Thirty men had quickly encircled the house, and evacuated the neighbours from next door.

They may not have blown a bugle like the cavalry do in all the films, but they _did_ arrive in the nick of time. I couldn't have held out any longer and my two friends in their weakened states would have been no match for the Prof.

I caught a quick glimpse of a masked and balaclavad man knocking my friends to the floor, then there was a flash and a bang and then it was all over. The next thing I knew I was lying on my belly out in the street with my hands fastened behind my back and a hood over my head.

***

### OPERATION STOPWATCH: INTERNAL REPORT

Level IV Security.

HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL

The operation was carried out exactly according to plan. We had already been given the internal layout of the house, but did not have sufficient time to gather any observational intelligence on site. Using thermal imaging intensifiers through the wall of the adjoining house we detected four individuals within the target property.

All possible exits to the house were covered by two operatives and on the command the house was entered from five separate locations simultaneously - both front and back doors, two windows in selected bedrooms, and a skylight in the loft.

The house was rapidly searched following the standard procedure – room by room on all floors, three men entering each room. All four persons were located on the ground floor in the garage area. Three of them were unknowns, the fourth was our mark. These three were later identified as friendlies, their statements being attached at the end of this document.

Two of these non-combatants were stood in the doorway to the garage and were quickly incapacitated before a flashbang was thrown in. This disabled the third non-com who fell to the floor in the centre of the room.

The target individual was wired up to a series of computer banks on the far wall. Unfortunately the fraction of a second it took to disable the two non-coms in the doorway had given him time to react. He was seen to lunge for one of the keyboards mounted onto the side of the machine as the flashbang went off.

Shots were immediately fired by all three members of the team on seeing the target's movement. There was a large burst of light independent of our flashbang and the mark was not recovered.

Despite not finding the body or any trace of the target after this, I can categorically state that the mark did NOT - repeat NOT - leave the building using any of the available exits.

The mission from entering the property to final extraction took seventeen seconds.

Captain Adam Ventnor.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

For several days I remained in the catacombs of Canterbury, being attended to by nuns, undeservedly receiving the treatment of a Prince from a foreign land. During this time Slush was finalising my plan of attack with me, as Father Bwop completed the finishing touches to the transportation device I would be using.

And then the hour had arrived. 'Zero Hour' Geoffrey kept calling it, but refrained from elaborating why. We had planned all we could plan. I had prayed all I could pray - well, obviously not _all_ , but I'd prayed a lot, I can assure you. The machine, and my preparation, was finally finished. I was ushered quickly into the room I had first met Father Bwop and there he was again in his immaculate white smock. Placing the device upon my wrist like a bracelet, he spoke most gravely.

"Sadfael, it is possible for you to be taken at any time, so I want to wish you luck now while I still have chance." A more dramatic greeting I have never received!

"But surely there will be some warning," I put to him, my already nervous sensibilities intensified beyond belief.

"I'm afraid not brother. The next time our foe makes a move, you will follow, so you must be ready at any moment to confront him. Not long ago, the device you now wear picked up his movements in the æther. The demon travelled a long, long way back into prehistory. Fortunately it had not been activated otherwise I would have gone instead of you."

"Heaven forefend!" I ejaculated. Not long ago, it is true, I would have been quite vocal in my insistence that anybody here would have been far more able than I could ever hope to be, even one of the young nuns! However, since my arrival at the Cathedral my learned hosts have persuaded me that, seeing as it was I who was hand-picked by God Himself to complete this mission, it is indeed only I, Sadfael, who can rid the world of this Luciferian menace. This being the case, had Father Bwop been sent for the final confrontation I shudder to think what might have been the outcome.

Turning my wrist he pointed to a flashing green light emitting from the device clamped around my arm.

"It's alright brother," he assured me, sensing my disquiet, "it is perfectly safe. That light means that it is switched on, that's all. The very next time the fiend travels through the ages you will disappear from us here and be sent after him, hot on his heels. Geoffrey has been through all the contingencies we can think of with you? You will know what to do?" I nodded. "Then all we can do now is wait."

Time passed by. The bracelet, which not only bestowed upon the wearer the ability to move as freely as they wished between the aeons, but also worked as a miraculously small sundial (despite the absence, here underground, of even a single shaft of sunlight) told me that I waited approximately two hours, and was just about to bite into a leg of chicken brought to me by Sister Berriman when - _Zapo-Kapow!!_

My fortitude must have been bolstered more than I knew by my stay in the caves of Canterbury, as this time I did not faint dead away. Instead, the confines of the room I stood in vanished in a mesmeric swirl of colours and I then found myself standing only slightly dazed before a small keep, in delicately landscaped grounds.

My surroundings felt strangely familiar, yet did not look so. However, I soon learned where (and indeed, roughly when) I was. Listening to the sounds around me for a moment - the birdsong and a distant lowing of cattle - my head soon stopped spinning and I cautiously approached the building through its finely manicured lawns and flowerbeds.

No flag flew from any of the turrets and all seemed disturbingly quiet. The door yielded to my touch, so I stepped inside the carpeted hallway, lit by the sunlight which streamed in through the lead lined windows to my left. Then without warning a tall, transparent figure lurched towards me, having just emerged straight through the wall!

I cried aloud and held out my trusty cross to ward the demon off, but he seemed not to be troubled by this - though troubled by _something_ he evidently was. Stopping but a few feet away from me, he rattled the huge chain he carried upon his person before letting out a hideously mournful wail.

Quite abruptly he ceased the gnashing of his teeth as he stared carefully up and down my figure. Finally, he spoke:

"It is you!" He turned his gaze towards the Heavens. "Oh Lord, can it be true? Hast thou seen fit to save me at last, to free me from all of my sins of the past? To release me after so long from these terrible bonds!

"Great indeed is Your mercy, that Thou hast sent Your finest of champions to quash this scurrilous demon, who hath cursed me so by residing here! Perchance in Your wisdom Thou hast forgiven my sorry soul at last and are allowing me one more chance to gain entrance into Thine glorious Kingdom?"

He went on for several minutes in this vein and then it was that I finally realised that I recognised the man - it was none other than Duke Duster of Nine Feathers Castle, the nobleman upon whose land I had had my first battle with the Prince of Darkness! I tried to give him my halloos, but had not the chance, as he continued to wail his sorrowful monologue.

"So dark have these last, lonely centuries been, and so cold as you couldst ne'er know. Long have I endur'd the life of a prisoner here in this, my castl'd home, with narry but the scuttling vermin to hear my sorry tale.

"By lonely night and tortur'd day, bereft of sleep and all the comforts known to Man, I watch, as the spiders weave their silken webs, and verily do I long to feel but one more time, their gossamer touch. Nay, to feel anything in this, my pitiful undeath, for since I slipp'd my mortal coil, but a sorry two of mine five senses remain extant!

"The sensations of smell and taste have been like closed doors unto to me these last seven centuries! Ohhh, wouldst that I were able somehow to feel again that keening draught, which whistles so swiftly through this woe begotten hall! Why, 'twould bring my face to break a smile, and such a joyous expression this bearded chin has long since forgotten." His wild eyes swum my way and he stretched his hands imploringly out towards me.

"Oh redemption! Oh tonsur'd knight, 'tis not just the habit of mine life that hast been missed, but also your own brown smock, for in thine gather'd robes do I dare detect Salvation's light! Verily, 'twixt every strand and fibre I see woven my most heartfelt prayers; only you can open Heaven's Door for me! Only you can cleanse mine humble abode from the profanities committed in this once so Christian a castle! Ohhh, 'tis only you who is possessed of the strength that can cast out this foetid daemon, who hath so long bespoilt my keep, and thus can grant my sweet release, and give this tortur'd soul its much crav'd sleep..." The phantom fell silent and remained so for some minutes.

"Duke?" I asked in scarcely a whisper. "Duke Duster, that... that is you isn't it?"

"Aye, 'tis me for my sins," he wailed. "'Tis I brother, if the likes of I have any right to call you that."

"The likes of you? But were you not a fine, upstanding man while you yet still lived?"

The ghost groaned. "Alack! Are mine agonies not sufficient brother, but that you must remind me of what I once was? As upstanding as ever a man could hope to be was I, though little good it did me! I have been forsaken! Forgotten into this void and gone; a mere shadow, existing between Worlds, yet belonging to none!"

"But what happened? What force could possibly have kept you from the bosom of Our Heavenly Father? Whyfore are you not now reclining in the Glories of the Hereafter, basking in the Light of the Lord?"

"Well mayst thou ask brother, well mayst thou ask! 'Tis the very Hellspawn you didst seek to destroy – fools that we were to ever have hop'd you had! 'Tis he and he alone who is responsible for my sorry plight!

"That denizen of the Flamed Realm, that Whisperer in the Dark! That leech-headed Mephisto – he hast brought upon this house its ruination! The Duster seed has long since died, just punishment perhaps for giving sanctuary to the Fallen One, though most strenuously do I protest that I never had but a choice in the matter, and had I lock'd and bolted the door, 'twould have made not the slightest difference."

"I'm afraid I... I don't really follow you... Are you saying the demon resides here? In this very castle?"

The ghost howled a most plaintive moan. "Ohhh, yes Brother Monk! That same Son of Satan you so bravely confronted returned hither soon after, amidst a wild cacophony of banshee howls and sulphurous, ashen smog! He hath befouled my keep ever since, has claim'd it as his own nefarious haven, and returneth here whenever he so chooseth, as to a port in a storm, storing many an ill-gotten gain inside mine own cupboards and closets!" He swung an incorporeal hand about. "Look for yourself brother, please I beseech thee, and I'll warrant 'twill not be long before you find evidence of his evil plunderings!

"I beg that thou wilst go about my castle as you see fit; cleanse my keep with your perfumed step even as you gaze upon his treacheries! To the tarnish of his darkened lies bring the Light of God, both Just and True, for wheresoever thou dost humbly tread will the poison'd ground spring life anew!"

Sure enough, after only a brief search I found the relics stolen from the Church of Bramfield, and many more riches besides, piled high in a wine cellar reached by the servants' stairwell in the kitchens. No coinage - strange, I thought, for a treasure trove - but many were the finely crafted artefacts from who knows what exotic places; stolen, each one of them, I was sure.

The dead Duke pleaded anew with every step to vanquish this monster once and for all and to free his home from the tainted treasures that the devil had dumped there. I informed him reassuringly that it was my express desire and indeed my purpose to do that very thing!

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

It was only with the greatest reluctance that we agreed to attend the press conference and when we were brought out from behind the purple curtain it was to a rapturous applause. Scores of camera crews had been squeezed into the room and reporters from all over the world, each of them wanting a piece of us.

We had been dubbed both _saviours of the world_ and _heroes of the hour_ , along with a colourful plethora of other ill-fitting titles, the strangest and most far-fetched of which came from a 'reputable source' - always a bit of a give away that one - and declared that the three of us, Ollie, Geeza and myself, were in reality _the best of the best - top MI5 agents... answerable only to the Prime Minister and the Crown_.

Laughable I know. Wherever the 'reality' is that some of these journalists live in, I have absolutely no desire to go there. Somehow they had got my name - the hotel in Eilean Ban probably. It could have been the SAS I suppose, as I sang like a skylark (albeit an extremely frightened one) when they interrogated me in the back of one of their vans; but I doubt that lot give much away to the press somehow. So yes, all of a sudden _Special Agent Sir E. Cripplesby and his associates_ , as we'd been called, was splattered all over the papers and TV screens from here to God knows where. We were being heralded as national - even global - heroes.

It didn't help that somehow somebody had discovered that my home phone number ends in 001. You can imagine what the imaginative editors of the tabloids made of that!

But that was it. Finished. Done and dusted. The crisis is apparently over and although the Professor has disappeared along with all the money he collected, stability is beginning to return. The governments of the world are trading as usual - perhaps they have turned to the Andorran Florin, or some other obscure monetary denomination - and the stock market is beginning to rise again like a phoenix out of the financial ashes of its predecessor.

Peace has largely been restored and loathe though I am to admit it, I suppose I _do_ have to hold my hands up and agree that we were, in part - only in part mind you - responsible for, and I am not really comfortable with this expression: 'saving the world.'

Interestingly, no more has ever been heard of the fiendish Professor Alan Humphries. Let's hope it stays that way.

***

### TAKEN FROM THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

From the decor of the keep itself I knew that we were many hundreds of years ahead of our own time in the reign of the good King Stephen and from what the ghost of Duke Duster had told me I ascertained that I was probably between one and two hundred years back from the time I had just come from. Somewhere between 1800 and 1900 years after the birth of our Lord. I also learned that the creature I was after had appeared but stayed only briefly before he had gone out somewhere on foot. He was sure to be back though, as his repulsive, many tentacled head gear was still here, in the so-called _billiards room_.

Creeping into this high ceiling room, crucifix in one hand, holy water in the other, I cast my eyes upon the abomination sprawled out before me, the very same jumble of boxes and sinews that had been glowing with the fires of Hades the first time I saw them. Splashing my holy water all over the room, I once again performed a rite of exorcism.

This act being complete, I then took a long cudgel that was lying on the central table, which was uniformly green and fuzzy as if smothered by lichen. I then proceeded to physically smash the apparatus into as many pieces as I possibly could, all the time murmuring incantations of protection and blessings to cleanse the air which this demon has defiled with his Unholy presence.

It was then time to put another part of the plan into action, which we had discussed for this very eventuality. I remembered Geoffrey Slush's advice, to look for a telle-y-fone, should I happen to find myself in an era in which they were commonplace, and to call for the _police_.

It was not without some difficulty that I contacted a policeman and strange though it was, I began communicating with him through this strange tell-y-fone device.

"I wish to speak, if I may, with a _policeman_."

"This is Constable Dab speaking sir. How may I help you?"

"I wish to report a goodly horde of stolen property which I have found," I told him.

"Is this right sir?" he asked after a moment. "And what property would this be? You can go ahead, I have a pencil."

"It is gold Brother Constable. Lots and lots of gold." The tone in Constable's voice noticeably changed.

"When you say 'lots and lots,' sir, what are we talking about here? A couple of necklaces? A bagful of rings?"

"Oh no, more than that Constable. Enough to fill up a horse drawn cart and perhaps enough for a second trip."

I heard many background noises at that point and then a second voice spoke.

"Good afternoon sir, this is Sergeant Hickles. Could you tell me where you are exactly?"

"I am stood by the telle-y-fone in the billiards room of Nine Feathers Castle," I replied. I hoped I had been exact enough. I could have explained that the _fone_ was positioned by a west-facing window for example. In the cup which I held to my ear I could hear a muted conversation going on.

"Nine Feathers Castle? Where's that?" the man called Sergeant was asking.

"Isn't that the old name for Lorrimer's place sir?"

"Brasshouse Gardens; yes, I think you're right. Get over there with as many men as you can find Dab." The voice grew louder as he addressed himself to me once more. "Is there anybody there with you sir?"

"No Sergeant, I am alone, but the miscreant responsible will not be long in returning I fear, and he is a most dangerous and desperate man."

I did not say anything about Duke Duster's ghostly presence and Geoffrey had told me that it would be for the best if I did not mention the Satanic origins of our foe, as this would only bring unnecessary hardships and confusion to those sent to apprehend him. Brother Sergeant took my name and told me not to go anywhere; some men would be arriving presently.

Replacing the receiver as I believe it is called on its little hook, I then set about performing a special prayer of banishment. Slush had been through it with me several times, for though it was a simple rite, it was very important to our plans. The ritual would consign the larger portion of the demonic soul back into the fiery pits of Hell, leaving only a small portion behind in human form. Not enough to be able to spread its evil influences, but just enough to be aware of the punishment meted out by the forces of humanity and our Holy Father, the Lord God Himself. That way it was safe for us to involve any outsiders so I would not have to tackle the daemon, physically, alone.

Not long after I had finished the _police_ turned up. They are upholders of the law in the same way the militia and town vigils kept order in my day, and they quickly got to gathering up all the treasures secreted throughout the house. They recognised all, but for the sacred icons of the Bramfield parish, which I had already procured and placed inside a sack, ready to take back with me when the time came.

Later that night, the devil - or whatever was left of him inside his mortal shell after my incantation - returned to the castle. Upon entering the billiards room where I had nervously seated myself, he drew up short, unbelieving at what he saw. Which affected him the more - seeing me or the sorry remnants of his machine lying in tatters across the room – I can only speculate.

"What the...?" he began as he cast his gaze about the scene of destruction. Then, upon finally seeing me, the full fury of the Seven Hells was writ clear upon his face. "You!" he roared and before I knew it he had barrelled into me and we tumbled to the floor.

I can only be thankful that the ritual of banishment had already robbed him of most of his strength – even as it was he was inhumanly powerful. I found myself upon my back with him sitting astride me, his hands closed around my neck! The fiend had sinews of tempered iron and I was like a newborn babe in arms in my attempts to remove him. A thick black curtain began to descend as my body struggled for air and a goodly part of me began to prepare for me to meet my maker.

He must not be ready for me yet though because suddenly the curtain lifted! A dozen of the policemen hidden in the house had jumped upon my assailant and were even now setting about him with stout cudgels as well as their heavily booted feet. His screams were tremendous and as I rolled around gasping for air not ten feet away I realised I could not but pity him in the end.

When the burly men dressed in darkest blue considered that the demon had been sufficiently quieted they took him away in a horse drawn carriage and threw him ungently into their dungeons. My quest was finally at an end and I had succeeded! Against all the odds, I had triumphed!

I must try to keep the glee from my mind as I remember how downcast and pathetic he looked as the judge sentenced him the very next day to spend the rest of his life inside a prison for his many thefts, some of which had been quite violent. It is only now, after the celebrations held by the local townsfolk are over (and during which I was embarrassingly carried shoulder high) that I have been able to have a moment to myself.

The Lord's work has been done. My faith has been fully restored, and my heart is once again filled with the warmth of the love of God. I will allow myself some sleep (despite the fact the bed I have been given for the night looks nowhere even close to being as comfortable as the one I have been enjoying of late) before I push the button on my time travelling device which, I have been assured, will take me back to Canterbury.

Still in the year two thousand and nine though. Whatever happens after that, well, I put that definitively in the hands of my Heavenly Father.

***

### THE CASEBOOK OF GEEZA VERMIES

Thankfully I have managed to avoid most of the attentions of the media and all that goes with it. Poor old Cripplesby hasn't fared so well though and is currently doing a mammoth tour of chat shows all over the country, as well as appearing as guest speaker at hundreds of big functions, giving interviews to countless papers and magazines and all that kind of stuff. Not for me mate, not if I've got anything to do with it.

I've been given a nice lump sum to help me get back to Africa and a wee bit more besides, which will come in handy. I have absolutely no idea what to do with it all. It will figure itself out I guess; I'm not going to worry about it too much. I am currently on a farewell tour of certain sites I've had dealings with through the years, to say goodbye, as I will not be returning.

I've been to Avebury and a few of the other stone circles dotted around and I paid my last visits to several special spots in the New Forest, Romney Marsh and the South Downs, Curbar Edge in Derbyshire, Wood Henge - all that lot. I went to the Bullring in Birmingham, more ancient than anybody really knows and also to Sutton Park and Brownsea Island, two of the last strongholds of the Red Squirrel in the whole of England.

And of course, to Stonehenge. It is normally impossible for people to walk amongst the Stones themselves these days, ever since a bunch of drunken bloody idiots ruined it for everyone back in the early 90's, but in light of my contributions to "restoring global balance and security," they closed it off to the public for three days and left me alone there. The official excuses they gave for the closure was that seismic tests were being carried out in and around the site, or something like that, so even the traffic along the A303 and 360 didn't disturb me, as it was all temporarily diverted. Blissful.

On my first night there I sat down on the bare Earth right in the middle of the main Circle, as the ancients had so often done many years before. I lit a tiny charcoal fire and flicked one of the smaller glowing coals into Old Smokey, setting off the pungent mixture I had prepared.

I had emptied and filled the Smokey's bowl two times before the Stars began to spin high above my head and the Dancers - the name given collectively by the ancient Britons to the megaliths that surrounded me - began their age old, merry cavorting.

As the Stones came to life, taking the forms of five foot fairies as I had seen them do a few times before, they began to whirl around me in ever decreasing circles, gyrating and spiralling about in a dance copied by the Whirling Dervishes of Sufi Mysticism. The fairies' dresses, spun from stardust and morning dew, came to life of their own accord, billowing out airily one moment and in the next clinging tightly to the delicate legs of the beautiful denizens of this sacred site.

They closed in on me, alluring, enticing, and seductive.

Once they recognised me and sensed that I was spoken for already, the presence of my Denubari friend wrapping me up in a cocoon of her Love, they laughed their playful little laughs and a couple of them, the lead dancers, whose names I know but will not mention, stepped out of the dance and came towards me. We embraced. It had been a long time since I was last here and I felt an almost heartbreaking sorrow at the thought that I was never going to see this place again.

"You've found your place little Geeza," cooed the one on my left, reaching up and stroking my cheek with a soft, fragrant hand. They always called me _little Geeza_ , despite the fact that I stood nearly a foot above them all. Then again, compared to the Stones they inhabit, I suppose I must be tiny to them.

"Do not be sad," she continued. "Most people never find what you have found," then she flashed her dark eyes teasingly at me, "and will never be fortunate enough to know the kind of joys you will be enjoying very, very soon." The two lead Dancers glanced at each other and giggled girlishly, which made me feel blissfully embarrassed. I smiled and 'tutted' at them as I felt my face flush red. They've got a one track mind these fairies!

Laughing delightfully, they wished me well and then excitedly told me that they had a secret and asked me if I would like to know? The way they act almost childishly most of the time has made some people find out the hard way that these oh-so innocent Spirits should _never_ be underestimated, for any reason. They are very fickle and highly, highly dangerous, despite their whimsical appearance.

They cannot be rushed, or made to change their playful ways; you just have to go along with their games and let things develop in their own time. So I begged and pleaded with them to tell me and only after some time spent cajoling and persuading them, they eventually beckoned me close, so close I could smell the moisture of the morning on their skin, fresh as a Forest at Dawn. With voices heavily laden with melodrama they finally gave up their secret to me in a string of gorgeous whispers.

They told me that a vast amount of treasure has been buried, deep beneath the ground within the outer circle of the Henge! The Professor used his machine to come to Stonehenge way back in antiquity and buried all the World's old Scottish money here for safekeeping, before vanishing once more into the seas of time. And he has never been back to reclaim it.

They also warned me not to tell anyone, as it would undoubtedly cause great upheaval if people came looking for it. Which inevitably they would, in their droves. I agreed, of course, and I left them on my second afternoon, giving them that third day to dance alone and undisturbed, as they used to do many, many years ago.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

Well, thank God that's over! I am talking here about the national tour I have just been forced to endure, appearing on just about every TV and radio station you have ever heard of and then dozens more you haven't. Since when have there been _so many_ channels? I can only assume that what with the monetary upheaval the world has just undergone, the price of cameras must have plummeted, as have subscriptions for a broadcasting license. Why on earth would _Woodwork TV_ be interested in me anyway?

I kept on telling them all that I didn't actually _do_ anything, but they constantly told me that I was modest to a fault and that seemed to make me even more popular! The people, it seems, want a hero and in the absence of a proper one have got me instead.

At least Ollie Donald came with me and he was a tower of strength, he really was. Of course he is an old hand as far as the media goes and helped me to deal with it all wonderfully well. The Press loved him coming along because he is a good looking celebrity whose image they were only too happy to have plastered all over their pages. He is far more photogenic than I and they positively lapped him up. The wounds on his face have healed enough now to let those looks shine through, but still give him a certain rugged look, a bit of a rough edge and this made him all the more appealing.

They even turned the absence of Geeza, whose name we never told them, into a selling point - sorry, a _personal, human interest aspect_ to the story. Nearly got cynical for a minute there.

The third member of this world saving trio has been affected badly by ill-health, suffering not only from the arduous strains of their mission, but also bearing the scars of a face to face confrontation with the evil Professor. He remains in a secret government hospital where he is receiving the best possible medical care and is visited everyday by Her Majesty the Queen.

What? Come on! We all know the papers exaggerate things a bit, adding a bit here and there, but really! How can they lie so openly? So blatantly? Yet the readers just gobbled it up, baying always for more.

Needless to say, this turn of events has pleased Geeza no end. He wanted a way to get out of the media circus that was looming over us and he got it. Lucky sod. I only hope he hasn't gone to Africa already without saying good-bye first.

He hasn't handed in the bill for his services either. I'm not sure either of us especially wants to mention that anymore. I'd like to think that we have become firm friends, rather than just employer and employee.

I don't think there has been a single, solitary angle that hasn't been poked at and investigated by the media - someone even tried to interview the milkman whose patch included the house where the Professor was finally cornered, but it was a bit of a flop as far as cutting edge media was concerned.

They still showed it on ITV though:

The screen shows an ordinary semi-detached house from across the street.

_It was the house in which the world was held to ransom and millions of lives were ruined_ , the report began in that awful sort of glossy-magazine seriousness the main stream media is intent on spooning out to us these days. _A normal street in a normal town where somehow the madman had managed to live undetected amongst the good, honest, normal people going about their normal, honest daily lives – some of these other people were children._

Oh my God. The way it was heading there was going to be enough syrup to keep a Canadian happy! Mercifully, it got cut short.

Brian, you deliver the milk around here. Was there ever any indication that this Humphries was, in fact, a maniacal super-villain plotting to overthrow the world?

[Cut to shot of Brian, wearing his Prestwick Dairies cap]

Err... I dunno. He didnae have his milk delivered. Must have got it from the One Stop.

I laughed.

One thing I was still confused about was why he had taken those few paltry items from us all, back in the MacPlimsol conference hall. No matter how many times I tried to twist my mind around it, I just couldn't figure it out. Watching an interview with Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight I finally got my answer.

A senior member of staff declared that Humphries had approached the hotel with an offer to buy their Scottish money off them and had been refused. It was only after that, two weeks later, that he booked out the hall for his 'Maths Can Be Fun' lecture (I _knew_ it was a facade - well, it had to be didn't it?) In further interviews, every person present was tracked down and they each told the same story.

After receiving the compensation from the hotel, two hundred Scottish pounds in each case, along with the free nights, each person was then visited \- once they had returned home - at around three o'clock in the afternoon by a disguised Humphries, posing as a hotel spokesman. He explained to them all that the management and shareholders had agreed that they had not received enough for their ordeal and promptly offered to buy the money back off each individual for three hundred pounds, English.

Who was going to refuse? I was the only one he did not visit in this manner, presumably using his time machine and for a while I wondered why? But when the answer came to me, it was perfectly simple - I had come in to the lecture late and did not have my name down on any register, so he didn't know who I was and therefore couldn't approach me like the others.

He must have had all sorts of thugs and ne'er-do-wells out looking for me though and those Bikers at the Stock Exchange nearly got me. Geeza's hunch had been right from the very start - they were indeed working for the Prof, but whether they knew the full story or not...? My guess is probably not.

Oh yes - I almost forgot the most bizarre thing of all! I don't know why, but everybody in the media has labelled me as being Scottish!! We were _a_ _brave threesome of international super spies. Donald, the South African, the mysterious Englishman_ , – Geeza – _and the leader of the group, Scotsman Sir Elliot Cripplesby_!

I'm not Scottish! But then of course, I wasn't a Knight of the Realm either, but they soon made me one! They wanted to bestow upon me some land, so that I could be "Lord of Somewhere," and they insisted - despite my protestations - that because I was Scottish born and bred, it was only appropriate that I be Lord of somewhere in Scotland!

_Unfortunately_ , however, all of the land in bonnie Scotland was already taken, and had been lorded over by some peer or other for hundreds of years. As a goodwill gesture though, Denmark handed back the Faroe Islands (which they had wrestled from Scottish control way back more than a thousand years ago), purely so that they could be 'given' to me!

Thanks a lot Denmark!

So I am now officially Lord Cripplesby of Faroe. This leads interestingly on to the true origins of the pyramid builders and God-Kings of Ancient Egypt, but I'll not go into that right now, except to say that there are some stone slabs up here with archaic writing on them and rumours abound amongst the locals claiming these stones contain information which reveals who was _really_ responsible for the ancient civilisation built along the banks of the Nile.

Talking of which, many of the greatest treasures of ancient Egypt are in fact feared lost and gone forever. The Death Mask of Tutankhamen for example, already priceless, has been made more so by the discovery that it was made using Scottish gold - if only anybody knew where it was. It had been handed over to the Professor, along with so much more and has never been seen since.

And neither has the Professor. Still. He was never caught by anyone in _this_ day and age, but wherever it was he disappeared off to he must have met with a sticky end, as he has never showed his face again in our time.

And so the world has begun to rebuild itself. The wars and riots have been stopped. Economic stability is returning, gradually. Somehow or another, all the governments who had any in the first place, have managed to recoup all the Scottish money they lost to Alan Humphries. They have not thought it necessary to explain how, but are now quite open about the fact that they trade in Scottish money, now that all the trifling pounds and pennies kept here and there are gone. And I don't know whether it is just me and my over active imagination, but Britain appears to be throwing her weight about on the stage of international politics _far_ more than she ever used to in my memory. The way our Statesmen are posturing and the rhetoric they are using, it is almost as if we are as powerful again as we were in the days of the Empire. Strange.

So yes, all the loose Scottish money is gone. All except mine that is. I still have my one hundred and ten pounds, thirty pence, which makes me one of the richest men in the world.

With it I am financing several environmental projects to try and bring a halt to the destruction that Humanity has brought upon the Earth with so much vim and vigour. Spending only that little time with Geeza has rubbed off on me I think, in more than a couple of ways, because I now feel a tenderness for the world that we live in similar to that which a son feels for his mother. My first project is one that I hope will flood the seas with fish again.

The problems of over-fishing were already being felt across the globe long before the Japanese ships contaminated much of what was left. Cod stocks had almost been wiped out, tuna had become seriously depleted, many species of shark were already facing extinction and as for Salmon – well, where to start?

Atlantic Salmon in recent years have somehow become mixed up with their Pacific relatives, which is an absolute disaster as far as biodiversity is concerned and the wild Atlantic stocks themselves are being wiped out by diseases originating in the over-crowded fish farms up and down the western coasts of northern Europe. Positioned in the estuaries that lead to the traditional spawning grounds upstream, these diseases have, of course, escaped from the farms and got out into wild populations, decimating entire shoals.

Several fishermen had long since hung up their nets complaining that they sometimes caught just one fish – or nothing at all – in the latter days of their ocean going lives and that had been up to _ten years_ before this latest calamity.

Yes, the seas were already in a mess, but the Japanese 'plague ships' have only made things worse. However, since Humphries disappeared the world has got together and taken action. All the ships have been clustered together off the shores of Sri Lanka and are being broken up at sea, the parts being placed in specially made, vacuum-sealed containers prior to being jettisoned into space.

Every tiny, dismantled fragment of these contaminated ships is to be loaded up into one of NASA's newest, giant Super-ships which have replaced the Shuttle fleet. When its vast storage bays have been filled, _The Caber_ will be sent off on a trajectory out into deepest space. Once the conventional rockets have run out of fuel they will then switch over to a new type of solar powered engine, to ensure that they are blasted from our Solar System and cannot possibly return to do the Earth anymore harm.

I am pleased to say that I have received the backing of many of the world's environmental groups such as Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace and Captain Birdseye, and was very pleasantly surprised a few days ago when I was visited by a Japanese delegation with a most unexpected gift. A high ranking Japanese civil servant came forth holding two fish, the genus of which I did not recognise.

They are the sole survivors, one male and one female, of what used to be Emperor Hirohito's private aquarium. Not only that, they are the two remaining members of a species of fish thought to have become extinct over one hundred and fifty years ago. They are Loch Ronnoch Koi (Japanese for cod), and have been donated to my hatcheries by way of a thank you from the Japanese people!

***

### THE RIGHT AND ORDERLY NOTEBOOK OF SADFAEL THE MONK

Well, what a turn of events! Most surprising. My fortunes have changed to such a degree that I can only assume it is God Himself who has rewarded me for the successful completion of my quest. There can be no time for complacency though, despite my most enviable situation. I must make sure I enter into my new task with the view that it is just as important, though admittedly more sedate, as was my battle with the eternal enemy.

Having spent a day and a night in the nineteenth century I twiddled with my bracelet as Father Bwop had shown me. Immediately the air began to swim before my eyes and before I could mutter the Lord's Prayer I found myself back in the catacombs beneath Canterbury Cathedral! After the Father and Geoffrey had questioned me exhaustively I was allowed to rest some more, having already handed back the lost treasures of Bramfield Church. The mission had been a complete success! With my incantation I had returned the Devil's soul back to the pits from whence it came and his human manifestation had been locked up, with the key thrown away.

In reward for this a representative of the Holy Hierarchy told me I had a choice to make: I could either be taken back once and for all to my own time and resume my life where I had left it or, if I preferred, I could stay in this current period, where they would allow me to take on the mantle and responsibilities of a vicar! If this was to be my preferred option, I was told, they would give me the freedom to choose whichever parish I wanted to oversee.

In their wisdom they knew that this was a huge decision for me to make and were patient enough to allow me three days to make up my mind. After a further night of humble prayer (and sleep upon a lovely thick, soft mattress with duck downed pillows) and then another and then another, all the while being fed like a King at court, I finally requested that I stay in order to continue the Lord's work in these rather colourful, exciting times! To keep my humility however, lest my mind run away with me, I asked not for my own diocese, but wondered if it would be possible if I could share Bramfield with the Reverend Pinball, as we had got on so well together.

The Church assented to this, which made me smile as broadly for their kindness as the Lord Jesus must have smiled at Mary, as she soothingly anointed his brow. I could not be made any more happy than by teaming up with my old friend again – or so I thought, but alas it was not to be, because when I arrived in the village I found that Gawdley had vanished!

On hearing the news that I was to rejoin them once again he had become incredulous and told the parishioners – somewhat moodily, I have been informed – that he was off to South America, wherever that may be! No one has seen or heard from him since. Oh well, I will just have to look after the place by myself until he returns.

***

### THE JOURNAL OF ELLIOT CRIPPLESBY

It was a happy few days, despite being tinged with the inevitable sadness that you always feel when saying goodbye. Thankfully Geeza had not already left for Africa and came up to the Faroes to see me one last time before he did. I tried in vain to persuade him to come and live up here, but his mind was set.

"The decision has been made for me already," he said. "I don't think I could change it even if I wanted to."

He has spent the intervening time since we had last seen each other travelling to his favourite places up and down the country and bidding them all a fond farewell. When I asked him if he was really going for good his reply left me in no doubt whatsoever.

"Elliot, you'll always be welcome to come and visit, to stay as long as you like, but if I ever leave Africa it will be because something has gone horribly wrong. I am going, heart, mind and soul, for good." He laughed and put a friendly hand on my shoulder. "I promise you'll be the first person I look up if everything crashes down around me. Not that it's going to," he smiled a huge smile. "Life is going to be great."

For three or four happy days we wandered extensively around the islands, exploring every little crag and bay of my new island home. I joked with him that maybe one day I would call this my 'family seat,' but for now it was just home. Towards the end of the second day he helped me release the two Loch Ronnoch Koi into the mouth of a river – he had persuaded me that we should set them free, despite their rarity.

"Let them be Elliot, let them be."

So we did.

And as they swam out into the ocean, away from the confines of a tank or pond for the very first time, we sat and reflected, talking about a good many things such as the undoubted genius of the Professor, who had somehow been able to calculate exactly what he would have to do in order to get the hotel in Eilean Ban to release its Scottish money.

No mean feat in itself, before we even began to touch upon the fact that Humphries had not only discovered the formula for time travel, but he had also single-handedly built himself a time machine in his garage! Astounding. He could have been such a great man, with a brain like that.

Time travel. Hmm yes. Now that is something we spoke about for a surprisingly short length of time. There are those who still argue, despite everything that has gone on, that time travel is impossible. They claim that if it were ever to be invented some time in the future then we would already have it - and always would have done - because somebody would have come back and told us its secrets.

Personally I disagree. Having seen and experienced what the Professor had been able to do I just find it astonishing that there are people out there who seem happy to write the whole thing off as 'the actions of some lunatic.' I mean, that doesn't explain anything does it? But I could never find a way to argue my case.

Geeza wrapped it up nicely for me though, in a neat and tidy way.

"Bread," he said to me sitting on a rock watching the waves crashing in one evening. Seeing the dumbfounded look on my face as I failed magnificently to guess why he had suddenly gone off on this tangent, he continued. "The fact that bread exists proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that time travel is, was, and will always be with us."

His explanation was simple and succinct:

"There is no way that bread could possibly have been _invented_. It may well have first been eaten," as I had pointed out to him earlier, "in the North-eastern Highlands of Scotland, but it wasn't invented there. In fact, bread wasn't invented _anywhere_! It couldn't be. Never. Not ever, under _any_ circumstances could bread ever have been made by somebody who did not already know how to do it.

"Think about it. What goes into bread? How is it made? What are the ingredients? Flour. A by-product of wheat, which has to be ground down with a considerable amount of deliberate, physical effort before it takes the powdery form it does - it doesn't just occur like that naturally. Then there's yeast. What the hell is yeast anyway? Some sort of mould or something?" He held up a hand and started counting off his fingers. "Salt; optional I suppose," one finger down. "Butter or margarine, or fat of some sort or other," another finger "and warm water. All in the right quantities, all added at the right times. You have to leave it to prove, or rise, and then there is the temperature of the oven to consider. Not until every one of these things is put together with a high degree of accuracy do we get a single loaf of bread." He shook his head gently and gave a light, little laugh. "I'm sorry, but no one can tell me that all this was stumbled on by accident. It just isn't feasible.

"More likely the Professor, or perhaps some other unknown voyager through time, stopped off somewhere in the remote past and fancied a sandwich. Of course, he couldn't get one, so he had to show the local people of whatever time it was how to make one and for _that_ he had to show them how to make bread. That way he could have his snack and at the same time unwittingly introduced bread into humanity's... well, to humanity.

"It all exists in some sort of time loop. No time travel, no bread. We have bread, therefore we must have time travel."

He didn't say QED, but he would have been well within his rights to do so. Every time I've thought it over since he left, I have found myself agreeing unreservedly with him.

Bread. Yes. It really is that simple.

I know I shall miss him not being around. In the short time we were thrown together I grew accustomed to all his eccentricities and strange, unfamiliar ways. Perhaps I will go and see him in Africa, who knows?

Not just yet though. A world tour is looming, similar to the one that has just taken me the length and breadth of Britain, but all I want to do right now is rest, well away from the spotlights of the media. I can fully understand now why Elvis wanted to escape all the lights and the cameras - I only hope I don't have to go to the same drastic lengths as he did!

No, for now all is quiet here in McPresley, as I have renamed capital of the islands, and hopefully it will stay that way. Someone has asked me if I would like to read a diary that was recently discovered behind a brick in an old Victorian prison cell, penned by a Dr. A Humphries. Apparently he was a Scotsman by blood.

Do I want to read it?

Nah. Not really.

***

###The End###

If you enjoyed this book, please review it on whichever site you found it.

It should only take two minutes and makes a big difference!

Then why not look at Geeza and Elliot's next adventures in McRoots and Corazon!

For details, see below

***

Other Works

### The Trilogy Continues...

Book Two of The Cripplesby Diaries

McRoots

Elliot and Geeza are thrown together once more, travelling through Africa in a race against time to stop a mysterious, but hideously evil entity. As ancient as the Earth itself, it has remained dormant for millennia, but is now shaking free.

Together with a maverick scholar, an expert in archaic forms of writing, they discover that the fate of the World somehow revolves around the three Great Pyramids of Egypt which were actually built by... Scotsmen?

Discover a host of earth-shattering revelations such as the real truth behind the origins of Man while Elliot & Geeza desperately fight against their malevolent foe, avoid being over-run by hairy, black caterpillars and try to stop the authorities from opening a tiny door set deep within an air shaft of the Great Pyramid itself!

The Da Vinci Code meets Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, McRoots takes you on a wild and totally weird ride – can you hold on long enough to save the world?

***

For a print version, please visit my website: http://www.thestephenbrown.co.uk/

Or Smashwords ebook: www.smashwords.com/books/view/327390

***

Book Three of The Cripplesby Diaries

Corazon

Geeza Vermies, Shamanic Detective is hot on the heels of a gang of poachers. Bumping into his old friend Elliot, they join forces and follow the trail to Mexico, but their investigation quickly uncovers a far deeper plot, and once again they find themselves in a race against time to save the World!

Meanwhile Father Sadfael, the bumbling, out of time Benedictine monk, also finds himself in Mexico, sent to stop a vitriolic campaign of destruction being carried out against the entire Christian Church.

Who are the sinister figures orchestrating their deadly schemes from the shadows of the jungles? Could a rogue vicar burning down churches have any connection to a plot to bring back the bloodthirsty Gods of the Americas? And if so, what can anybody do to stop it?

Not a lot really, not when you don't know what it is that's supposed to happen, who's going to do it or where it's going to take place!

And especially when you're up against a Jaguar Priest of exceptional power – not to mention the small matter of the Aztec Gods themselves...

***

For a print version, please visit my website: http://www.thestephenbrown.co.uk/

Or Smashwords ebook: - <https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/332734>

***

The Greater Good

An assassination attempt on the Burghermeister of Werpenstad sets in motion a disastrous chain of events that threatens to engulf the entire Stad in a horrifying wave of blood and violence.

As rumours of inhuman monsters and the tell-tale signs of a bloodthirsty cult emerge, Vice-mayor Karl Kreigel is left but one option - to send for the Jaegers of the Holy Order.

When they arrive however, the Stad is plunged into a living nightmare as their brutal practices threaten to tear the city apart. Forced to tread a dangerous tightrope between cooperating with the Jaegers and reining in the worst of their excesses, Karl must also somehow attempt to uncover the roots of the sinister Cult of the Half Tail, whose tendrils appear to grow disturbingly close to home.

With events fast spiralling out of his control, Karl knows he is in a race against time not only to catch the assassin and root out the insidious cult, but also to put a stop to the insanely-dangerous Jaegers from pulling his Stad apart or else burning it to the ground...

***

For a print version, coming soon, please check my website: http://www.thestephenbrown.co.uk

*

Or Smashwords ebook: <https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/560066>

***

Stalking the Shadows

A FREE short story, taken from Part One of The Greater Good

Karl Kreigel is Vice-mayor of Werpenstad, an important trading town in Bergen, the westernmost Province of the Empire. When an assassination attempt is made against the Burghermeister, it is up to him to lead the investigation and take control of the town.

With the killer still at large and rumours flying around about man-sized rats stalking the sewers, Karl knows that whoever - or whatever - he is, it is only a matter of time before the assassin returns to strike again...

*

Free Smashwords ebook: <https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/560069>

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Agilka

A Sci-fi novella

The definitive proof - we are not alone. In November 2014 the European Space Agency landed a scientific module on comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko to great acclaim. Barely two days later it was lost, power failure being cited as the reason. Eighteen years on and the much criticized return mission is due to touch down, but just why did they go back? What secrets does comet 67P hold? A novella.

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Smashwords ebook: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/538785

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The Way of Ghee

A FREE short story.

Joshua Laden is tired of ashram life. Setting out with a group of friends, he goes in search of a mysterious Yogi living in isolation far up into the mountains. It is said that this man has achieved Enlightenment - the divine state of bliss - and not only that, he is willing to share his experience with anyone willing to make the effort to go and find him...

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FREE Smashwords ebook: <https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/348070>

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About the Author

Painter, photographer, Reiki healer, traveller and horse trainer, Stephen Brown is a lover of Creativity in all its guises. His writing is varied, from fantasy, sci-fi and other novels to poetry and haiku. He tries to be both deep and thought-provoking as well as humorous and nonsensical at the same time. In no way does he see the two things as contradictory. Feel free to drop by and take a look at what he's up to. Come on now, don't be shy...

Website: http://www.thestephenbrown.co.uk/

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Chosen Charity

The author supports:

The Native American Rights Fund

A non-profit organisation providing legal representation to Native American tribes and villages to help untangle the maze of laws impacting their lives.

http://www.narf.org

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