Five to Twelve (3 page)

“Aha, I thought you were old-fashioned.”

He smiled. “Let’s say just quaint. Eccentric would be an even better word.”

“And you really do write poetry ?”

“It has been called that, chiefly by me. I have a most appreciative readership—of one.”

“Widen your horizon, then. Expand it to two.”

“The time is out of joint,” he said drily.

“O cursed spite,” she retorted, laughing, “that ever I was born to set it right… But were
you
born to set it right? In the twenty-first century, Hamlet would rate a grade one analysis on about ten separate counts.”

Dion’s mouth fell open.

“Please don’t be too amazed. It might offend. Not all doms are illiterate.”

“Not even Peace Officers?” he managed to say.

“Especially not Peace Officers… The job is almost a sinecure. Sports like you tend to have a built-in death wish. You dig nothing but a one-inch epitaph.”

Again he was nonplussed.

“The query is,” she went on, “what to do with a doomed meistersinger? Shall I keep you-or shall I let them hang you out to dry?”

“Have fun,” he said, trying to sound indifferent. “It’s a sweet and lovely world.”

“Then I’ll keep you. The horizon shall be expanded.”

“How much a lay?” he demanded coldly.

“Or how much a roundelay?” she countered. “Sex before sonnets, or sonnets before sex? Perhaps even sex
and
sonnets. Orgasm, rhyme and rhythm in a package deal. Twee, grotty and deviant, withal.”

Dion sighed and stood up—somewhat unsteadily. “Send for the cleaners, and we’ll sing a duet. You’re a paper doll yourself. Thank you for the brandy, chicken and all such; and I’ll bid you a very good night.”

“Sit down, dimhead!”

He blinked at her and sat.

“Now listen carefully. Pm sixty-two and less than ugly, and that makes you twice lucky. You, I’d say, are late forties and needing time shots. You’ve got as much future as I care to allow. A single word, and a few cuts and bruises on each of us-less than difficult to arrange-and you’re fully programmed for a grade two with a five-year denial of shots. Do I make the signals clear?”

“Loud and pellucid.”

“Then keep the short wave channel open, love, and don’t make a sound like unrestrained mirth or I’ll chop you in two. Pm sixty plus—in the first bloom, no less, on my ageing sequence t- beautiful rather than ugly, even by your depraved standards, and my credit key is good for ten thousand lions. I am also a little lonely—not too much, but a little. I have an insatiable curiosity, and I don’t worry greatly about how much time I spend or don’t spend with my legs apart. I like to take reasonable chances, and I think I’d like to find out what happens, if anything, inside a reconditioned meistersinger… Still receiving signals?”

Dion hiccupped. “Locked on the beam.”

“If you want independence, stripling, I’ll buy it for you. Squire me, that’s all. Sex is your problem, not mine. Scribble verse, if you wish, and stick it in a radio locker. I won’t pry. All I require are civilized motions—and an absence of analysable crime… Now, drink another brandy, rattle the marbles in your head, and don’t speak for two minutes.”

Dion did as he was told. The marbles rattled with a most peculiar sound.

Juno Locke, Peace Officer, blonde, sixty-two, was less than scrutable. No rape, no dry-cleaners, no flesh wounds—except a couple of introductory laser holes. Most interesting.

She had a nice box, no recent signs of squiredom and a voice that was softer than many.

He yawned. “Stopes, Fm tired. It’s been a nocturne plus.”

Juno smiled. “Less than elegant, but it’s an honest answer.

Let’s go to bed.”

T
HE
bar was called
Vive le Sport
. It was a drab little place on the Piccadilly sub-level, occupying some of the space that had been taken up about a century before by the London Pavilion dream house.

Dion had more than enough trove in his pocket to cover an evening of serious drinking—which was not his primary intention, but merely plan seven, in case the first six serendipities fell flat.

He had squired Juno for the best part of a week, not unpleasantly. Off duty, and that was most of the time, they had cavorted cautiously, observing each other’s psychic profile, noting when to hit the go button and when to reach for the abort switch. Aberrations were minimal: they matched velocities well enough.

One evening, just for repercussions, they had hovered through the tunnel to Paris simply because Dion wanted to walk by the Seine and then eat raw onions and fresh French bread. Juno was amused, but only just. Afterwards they went to one of the absolute music spots on the Champs Elysefe.

But tonight, tonight the dom was in her Peace Officer guise—or, at least, improving her career by personal attendance at a scholarly little conclave on Prerecognition of Deviance in Adjustment Feedback. The conclave was at the Cambridge Psycholab, and would doubtless consist of a twittering of profs and big-breasted P.O.S with nary a sport in sight. He wished her great joy of it.

Meanwhile, the night needed no time shots—and here he was at the
Vive le Sporty
, complete with its sun room, hourly rented bed-chambers and basement steam bath.

The bar itself was almost deserted—a long, wonderfully hideous bar of genuine twentieth century tiles, instant antique oak and dull red neon tubes. There was even a century-old juke box (for ornamental purposes only) and synthetic sawdust on the floor. It was, thought Dion, as near as you could get to the age of the masculine pre-twilight.

He was, however, fascinated by the
Vive le Sport
in spite of itself and because of its bartender.

The bartender was simply called No Name—because, more often than not, he couldn’t remember it. He was a fat, blank-faced man, looking just like anyone aged a hundred and seventy-three who had run out of time shots half a century before. In fact, he was exactly Dion’s own age, and the last living political assassin in England. Just about ten years ago, he had cut the Minister of Creative Activity in two with a laser rifle. So he had collected total recall, a grade one analysis and suspension of time shots in perpetuity.

No Name was a celebrity and something of a hero among unattached sports. One entire wall of the bar was covered by a badly scrawled citation which described his crime and punishment and wound up by proclaiming him to be a Heroine Mother of the Soviet Union, Tenth Class. It had become a tradition of the house that sports visiting the bar for the first time should add their signatures to the citation, thus endorsing No Name’s Canute-like gesture against the advancing tide of women. It wasn’t that he had ever had anything personal against the previous Minister for Creative Activity (who, inevitably, now rested in the Abbey). But she had been a dom’s dom, and she had been responsible
for the Restrictive Employment Act. And both reasons were excellent.

According to legend, No Name had once been a slightly brilliant architect. But that, of course, was woman’s work. Hence the big joke with the laser rifle—and the subsequent nocturnal
après-midi
of a quasi-human monolith.

“Beer,” said Dion, propping himself up at the deserted end of the bar.
“Lowenbrau
Special. Cold.”

Expressionless, No Name found the bottle, selected a glass with the care a brain surgeon might take in choosing his scalpel, and poured. “One lion fifty.”

Dion slapped some mobile money on the bar. “You, too?”

“Danke schön
, sport. That makes three. Best goddam gnat piss. Who can afford to drink it but you, me and slumming doms? Here’s lead in your pencil.” Expertly, No Name downed the
Löwenbrau
in one.

The three sports at the other end of the bar unsubtly moved a little nearer. They liked the sound of the word
Löwenbrau
. Clearly the lad with largesse was a squire playing truant.

“The bestest,” said one with a carrying voice, “is to sterilize all infras. It needs big battalions, of course. But it’s a surefire bestseller. That way the doms drop flat.”

“Square root of nix,” said another, “on behalf of the human race.”

“He’s right, matey,” said the third. “Leave us snatch selected top doms, shoot them full of contra-contra, pump a few squires full of afrodiz to fertilize same with high speed enthusiasm, and then watch their bellies grow. Hara-kiri for top people. Haw haw.”

“Switch channels,” said No Name. “Crap talk. They want to ride you.”

Dion surveyed the three sports. “So I’ve squired, jacks,”
he said. “So I have lions aplenty. Make an edifice of it. What shall it be—free style, karate or kunq-fu? Or
Löwenbrau
Specials for any who care to drink with the fallen?”

“Spoken like a sport,” retorted the would-be sterilizer.
“Lozvenbraus
five, No Name. Let there be a glad sound in Israel.”

Dion emptied his glass and nodded. Fresh glasses appeared on the bar, bottle caps whooshed and the three sports became temporary blood brothers.

“Gents,” said Dion, raising his second glass, “I give you Renaissance man.”

“Renaissance man,” said the three in unison.

“And you know what you can do with him,” went on Dion, putting down his glass. “Because you and I, dear drinking friends, are jackals. We have outstayed our welcome. We are craven bloody cowards. We are the ultimate excreta of mankind. Because the doms made it and we didn’t.”

“I’ll drink to that,” said No Name, with some enthusiasm.

Dion looked at him. “What the hell
is
your name ?”

No Name scratched his head for a moment or two. “James Flamingo Bond,” he said. “Now what the hell is yours?”

B
LOOD
brotherhood waxed gaily with the frequent appearance of
Löwenbrau
Specials. The three sports, slightly-built, cadaverous creatures who looked as if they might all have been extruded from the same consignment of flesh-coloured plastic, Were named Pando, Harvil and Tibor. None of them were productively employed. They lived by scavenging, petty larceny and prostitution. Despite the fact that Dion had descended to squirearchy, they magnanimously forgave him. The colour of his trove was inherently beautiful.

“All we need,” said Pando, disposing of his fourth, “is just one mad bad drainbrain, male.”

“All drainbrains are doms,” protested Tibor. “You know that. No big tits, no I.Q.E.D.”

Pando burped. “Dinosaurs we are not, yet,” he announced. “There has got to be a drainbrain, m., somewhere—even if hiding in the sewers and operating with beer bottles and coke straws.”

“So we have the drainbrain, hypotheoretically, then what?” demanded Harvil. “One drainbrain maketh not a multiplicity of sports.”

“Nein, non and nyet
. One drainbrain maketh an anti-dom bug, streptococktail of some perception. Both bug and manufacturer being, of course, fully programmed. Then we slip the bug in the reservoirs, casting much upon the waters, and sit back while the doms pop balloonwise and preferably with some discomfort.”

“Dreams,” said Dion in exasperation. “Chronomyths of the illiterate. What the Stopes would you do with the world on a silver plate? The doms will stay for ever if it depends on sports droning bee features in a million drowning bars. The need is not for bugs, bombs or bludgeons. The need is only for men. Stand up, sports. Stand three feet taller and be counted.”

There was a brief silence. Finally it registered with Pando that he might possibly have been insulted. “What’s with you, squire?” he sneered. “The spiel comes big from a hired hole filler. Climb a ladder and count yourself.”

“Gents,” said Dion patiently, “the point I make is that jackal v. lioness is grotty stone cold. If there were men aplenty the doms would keel in rows. Ergo rethink.”

“Square one point five,” agreed Harvil solemnly. Then, recollecting his basic loyalty, he added: “Your face affords some slight offence.”

“Oh dear and lovely fellows,” said No Name, coming suddenly to life, and with tears in his eyes, “I drink to the universal brotherhood of man… Christ Jesus, a war party!”

Dion and the three sports followed his gaze.

Seven large and physically magnificent doms had just entered the bar. They were a little grimy and carelessly dressed. Three of them wore battered fibreglass helmets.

“Irish Sea cows,” whispered No Name. “The big bitches came here last week. Five hundred lions damage, and they pay from waist belts. Live gently, sports. These red hot mammals don’t care like zero cubed.”

“Gas?” enquired Dion, observing the doms with interest. “Oil? Minerals?”

“No. Submarine hotels and suchlike. They tell me there are doms and high-spirited squires who like to lie double
and gaze up at the naughty little fishes through carbon glass.”

The doms arranged themselves noisily around a table in one of the bar’s semi-oubliettes. Evidently they had already had much to drink, for their actions and verbiage were larger and louder than life.

One of them, a tall and startlingly masculine brunette, slammed the table with her fist.
“Vino! Vin! Vinho!”

“Attending, dear doms.” Expertly, No Name vaulted over the top of the bar and went to take their orders.

At the same time, one of the doms detached herself from the group and sauntered a trifle unsteadily over to the bar. She surveyed Dion and his companions critically.

“One for loneliness,” she said, “two for companionship, three plus for conspiracy. Have at you, sports. The night needs no shots.”

“No shots, indeed,” said Tibor, sticking out his chest. “Have at you, dear dom, now and hereafter.”

She looked him up and down, then flung five lions on the bar. “You’d never make the second round, infant. Have a glass of milk.”

Tibor gazed at the lions and swallowed the jibe. “Largesse and loveliness. Let us drown what might have been in
Löwenbrau.”

Harvil looked at the dom and tried to make his eyes smoulder. “Five rounds at least,” he said softly. “Genuine, vintage, bona fide, guaranteed.”

The dom smiled. “Conviction and courage,” she said. “A possible combination. You are thin, but no matter. I’ve seen better and I’ve seen worse.” She threw out a hand and efficiently arrested No Name on his way back to the bar to fulfil orders received. “A bed-chamber, minion. Your little jack presumes to be a giant killer.”