The Fandom of the Operator (22 page)

I awoke with undoubtedly the worst hangover I have ever had in my life. There is no mistaking a hangover. You can’t pass it off as a migraine. It hurts like the very bejabers and there’s no one to blame but yourself.

I made dismal groaning sounds of the “I must have had a really, really good time last night” variety and felt about for that elusive something-or-other that folk with hangovers always feel about for when they awaken in this terrible state.

But then I became aware that I couldn’t seem to feel about for anything, as my hands wouldn’t move at all. I opened a bleary eye and viewed my immediate surroundings. At first glance they didn’t look too good. On second glance they looked worse.

It appeared as if I was strapped into some kind of large chair. I tried to move my head, but found that I couldn’t. I tried to move my feet, but this was not, as they say, “a happening thing”.

I did some more glancing, just to make sure that the conclusions I had drawn from my previous glancings were not mistaken. No, it seemed that they were not.

I was in a small, rather surgical-looking room, with, walls to either side of me and a glass screen in front. And beyond the glass screen I could see another room, larger than mine and all decked out with rows of chairs. Upon these chairs I could make out a number of people, some of them strange to my eyes, but others most familiar.

Amongst the familiar persuasion, I spied out my mother, weeping into a handkerchief. And beside her my brother, whom I hadn’t seen for nearly ten years. And there were several of my mother’s friends. And there was a long thin man in Boleskine tweed: Chief Inspectre Hovis, he was. And there was Dave and sitting beside Dave, being comforted by Dave with an arm about the shoulder, was Sandra. She was dressed rather smartly in black and her face was well made up.

I began to struggle, as one would, and I
did
, but sadly to no avail whatsoever. So I decided that shouting would be the thing to do. But I couldn’t shout because my mouth was gagged by what felt to be a strip of adhesive tape.

So I made ferocious grunting noises and struggled and struggled. And then a rather brutal-looking individual in the shape of a large prison officer appeared in my line of vision and menaced me with a truncheon.

“Shut it, loony boy,” said this fellow. “Or you’ll get one in the ’nads with this stick.”

I quietened myself, but with difficulty. I felt truly panicked. How had I ended up here? Wherever here was, it looked awfully like an execution chamber. And how come I had a hangover? I hadn’t been drinking. I’d been falling. Oh yes, I remembered that – falling into a dark whirling pit of oblivion.

I confess that I was confused.

“All rise,” came a voice. And I tried but failed. “All rise for the Honourable Mr Justice Doveston.”

And a chap in full judge’s rigout mooched past me and moved beyond my line of vision. And now all the folk who’d risen on his arrival sat down again.

“Remove the prisoner’s gag,” came a voice, which I assumed to be that of the Honourable Mr Justice Doveston. Great-grandson of the wonder-bed’s creator?

The prison officer tore the tape from my mouth.

“Oooow!” I went.

“Silence in court,” said someone or other that I couldn’t see.

“Let me loose,” I demanded. “Set me free. I’ve done nothing.”

Now this, I know, was not exactly true. But these were the words that came out of my mouth. I couldn’t seem to stop them at the time.

“Silence,” said the voice once again. “Or you will be sedated.”

“What’s going on here? Where am I? What are you doing?”

“Silence, for the last time. Officer, prepare the truncheon.”

The prison officer raised his truncheon.

“I’m cool,” I said. “I won’t say anything else.”

The voice said, “Gary Charlton Cheese, you stand, or, rather,
sit
, accused of arson – to whit, the wanton destruction of the Brentford Telephone Exchange. And of multiple homicide – to whit, the murders of …”

And he began to read out a list. And it read as some litany of the damned. As damned as those on the list had been, at my hand. But the list went on and on. And name after name that I didn’t recognize, of folk that I certainly hadn’t put paid to, came one after another, after another. “… And Elvis Aaron Presley.”

“Elvis?” I choked on the name. “
I
didn’t kill Elvis.”

“How plead you?” asked the voice.

“Innocent,” I said. “Absolutely, uncontroversially innocent.”

“Oh dear,” came the voice of Mr Justice Doveston. “I hope this doesn’t mean that we’ll be here all day. I have an urgent golfing appointment at three. Who represents the guilty party?”

“Guilty party?” I said. “A man is innocent until proven guilty.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Mr Justice Doveston. “So who represents this vicious killer?”

“I do.” A lady now stepped into my eye line. And a very pretty lady too. She had a slim yet shapely figure, hugged by expensive black. And she wore, atop her head of flame-red hair, one of those barrister’s little white wigs, which look so incredibly sexy when worn by a young woman but just plain stupid when worn by a man.

“Ah,” said Mr Justice D, “Ms Ferguson. Always a pleasure to see you in court, no matter how lost your cause.”

“Thank you, Your Honour. I will represent Mr Cheese and it is my intention to prove to the court that, although Mr Cheese is guilty of multiple homicide, he is a victim of circumstance. A pawn in a game so great that it is beyond his comprehension. That a conspiracy exists, which, if the truth of it was exposed to the general public, would rock society to its very foundation. You spoke of lost causes, Your Honour. And indeed I have pursued many. But now I am privy to certain information, which I feel certain will—”

“Yes, yes, yes,” said Mr Justice. “This all sounds terribly interesting. But do try to make it brief. Let’s get it over by lunchtime, fry this villain and take the afternoon off.”

“Thank you, Your Honour. It is my intention to prove that a secret organization exists, possessed of an occult knowledge. This organization supplies the government of this country with information gleaned from certain sources that …”

“Are you sure this has any bearing on this case?” asked Mr Justice D.

“Every bearing. I will prove that although the hands that caused the murders belong to Mr Cheese, the mind that ordered those hands to commit those horrendous deeds was not the mind of Mr Cheese. The thinking did not go on in his head, the thinking came from elsewhere. From a distant point in the universe.”

I stared at Ms Ferguson and then I glanced towards Dave. Dave was giving me the thumbs-up. He mouthed the words, “I’ve sorted it.”

“This all sounds very esoteric,” said Mr Justice D. “And a less erudite and well-read magistrate than I would no doubt dismiss this line of evidence out of hand. But I like a good laugh and this nutty stuff has a certain appeal to me. As long as it’s over by lunchtime, of course, and we can enjoy the frying. I’ve never seen an electrocution before and I’m really looking forward to it.”

“Quite so, Your Honour. I will try to keep this brief. Might I call the first witness for the defence?”

“As quickly as you can, yes.”

“Then please call Mr Reginald Boothy.”

“Call Mr Reginald Boothy,” called a voice. And presently Mr Reginald Boothy appeared. They sat him down in a chair facing me, which was decent of them, although after a glance or two at Mr Boothy I wasn’t altogether certain. There was something distinctly odd about Mr Boothy. A certain unworldliness. I felt that here was a man who wasn’t what he seemed. And what he seemed, whatever that was, wasn’t what
that
seemed either.

Mr Boothy was tall and oldish-looking, and in his way was rather handsome. He had gunmetal-grey hair, decent cheekbones and a clipped gunmetal-grey beard. He looked a bit like a graphic designer. Because graphic designers always look like that. It’s a tradition or an old charter, or something.

Mr Boothy wore a very dashing black suit cut to a design that I didn’t recognize and was accompanied by two small and friendly-looking dogs.

The chap whose voice had urged me to be silent was in fact the clerk of the court. He stepped forward to Mr Boothy and placed a Bible into his hands. “Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?” he said.

“As much of it as I know,” said Mr Boothy. “Which is some, but not all.”

“Good enough,” said Mr Justice D.

“No, it’s not,” said Ms Ferguson.

“It will do for me,” I said. Because I recognized if not Mr Boothy, then at least his name. I’d come across it only once before in my life. And I’d never heard of any other Mr Boothy, for it didn’t seem like a real name at all. The only Mr Boothy I’d heard of was the one referred to by Nigel and Ralph, the two young men I’d overheard in the restricted section of the Brentford Memorial Library all those years ago when I was a child. Was it the
same
Mr Boothy? Who could say? Not me.

“You are Mr Reginald Boothy?” asked Ms Ferguson.

“I am,” said Mr Reginald Boothy. “And these are my two dogs, Wibble and Trolley Bus.”

“Quite so,” said Ms Ferguson. “But I will address my questions solely to you, if you don’t mind.”

“I’m easy,” said Mr Boothy.

“Splendid. So, Mr Boothy, am I right in assuming that you are the head of a secret underground organization, known as the Ministry of Serendipity, which supplies information to the government of this country and in fact influences every major decision made by the government?”

“I’m proud to say so, yes,” said Mr Boothy.

“Er, excuse me,” said Mr Justice Doveston. “But, Mr Boothy, you are aware of what you are saying to this court, aren’t you? You seem very eager to divulge secrets.”

“I’m easy,” said Mr Boothy once again. “I know that nothing I say will go beyond these walls and, even if it does, no one beyond these walls will ever believe it. That is the nature of a
real
conspiracy. Even if you own up to it, even if you can prove it, people, on the whole, will never believe it.”

Mr Doveston nodded, although I didn’t see him do it. “I wonder why that is,” he said.

“It’s because it’s the way
we
keep it, Your Honour. It’s the way
we
want it to be.”

“This
we
being the Ministry of Serendipity?”

“This
we
being the powers that run not only this country but the entire world.”

“How exciting,” said Mr Justice D. “But time is pressing on, so please have your say as speedily as possible.”

“Mr Boothy,” said Ms Ferguson, “will you tell the court, as briefly and succinctly as you can, what
exactly
the Ministry of Serendipity does.”

“It co-ordinates interdimensional communications. Which is to say, communications with the dead.”

“Did you say the
dead
?.” asked Mr Justice D.

“I did, Your Honour. If I might
briefly
explain?”

“Be as brief as you like, Mr Boothy.”

“Thank you, Your Honour. Back in Victorian times a scientific genius by the name of Nicoli Tesla invented a number of remarkable things: alternating current, the Tesla coil, for which he is still remembered today, and wireless communications. He sold out alternating current and wireless communications to the Thomas Edison organization. He was a genius, but not much of a businessman. Mr Tesla discovered, when he first perfected wireless communications, that his radio equipment was receiving all kinds of odd noises that he couldn’t account for. He fine-tuned his apparatus and he found he could hear voices. These were not the voices of his employees testing his equipment. These were other voices. But as no other radio equipment existed on the planet, Mr Tesla was somewhat baffled by what the source of these voices might be.
[23]

“He was to discover that he was listening to the voices of the dead.

“But his equipment was crude by today’s standards and he could not tune it precisely. Tesla kept quiet about what he had discovered, for fear of ridicule. Before his death he was working upon the wireless transmission of electricity. It is said that he perfected it. His papers on that, however, are lost.

“His papers on his radio transmission received from the dead, however, were found shortly before the Second World War, languishing in the restricted section of the Miskatonic Institute in Arkham, New England, America. Happily, by an Englishman doing research over there. He brought them back to England. War broke out and the government enlisted every scientist in the country to help with the war effort. Our chap, the researcher, showed Tesla’s papers to Churchill, who gave him the go-ahead.

“Mornington Crescent tube station was closed down. It had extensive storage areas beneath it and they were commissioned for the war effort. For Operation Orpheus, which was a project to communicate with the dead via radio. To interrogate high-ranking German officers who had died in action. To this end a gentleman named Charlie Farnsbarns, a music-hall entertainer, who specialized in impersonating Hitler, was called in. Mr Farnsbarns impersonated Hitler down the Operation Orpheus phone line to the dead. He was convincing enough for the German officers to pass on information that helped the allies win the war.”

“Incredible,” said Mr Justice D. “But time marches on.”

“Indeed it does,” said Mr Boothy. “And so does England. After the war, Operation Orpheus was not disbanded. It was too good to disband. It was such a winner. Every successive government pumped money into it. Numerous impersonators did their stuff. Some impersonated the Russian Premier, some the President of the United States, etcetera, etcetera, depending on which particular dead person we wished to glean information from.”

“This is – how shall I put it? – somewhat
sneaky
,” said Mr Justice D.

“That’s the nature of covert operations, Your Honour.”

“Quite so. Please continue.”

“Well, Your Honour, back in the nineteen fifties, with radio equipment becoming ever more sophisticated, wavebands were being expanded. We discovered that there were wavebands within wavebands and others within them. It seems that there is an almost infinite number of wavebands. And when you tune into each of them, you find something there. Radio-wave transmissions are somewhat universal. If intelligent life exists somewhere in the universe, it inevitably stumbles upon radio waves. They are natural – part of the running order of the universe.