Fantastic Metropolis

 

For Michael Moorcock.

 

Every so often, the old Id grows weary of the Gothic style and declares a return to Classicism. He doesn’t take it so far as to pull down Nightmare Abbey and erect a villa in its place. He settles for wrapping togas around the gargoyles. It’s an attitude thing apparently. At such times, what he doesn’t know about the glory that was Greece, or the grandeur that was Rome, isn’t worth carving on an olive-stone. First he starts up the wine-presses in his cellar. Then he excavates the original amphitheatre in his extensive grounds, piles cushions on the tiered seats and throws a decadent party.

I think Engelbrecht was expecting to compete in some sort of gladiatorial contest when he received his invitation. I remember the last Imperial Bash at the Abbey. Tommy Prenderghast got confused and assumed he was attending the Highland Games. He took one of those big Roman catapults, onagers I believe they’re called, and launched the Id’s prize Doric Column into the extinct volcano moved there especially for the occasion. It was no Etna, that conical mass, but this novel method of tossing the caber wasn’t appreciated when the pillar plugged the crater. Magnanimity was as scarce as magma in the grounds that day, and we were all asked to leave.

The Id had clearly forgiven that insult, for now he sent us a fleet of chariots with rubber practice scythes attached to the wheels, and they clattered the entire membership of the Surrealist Sporting Club down rutted lanes. The awful bulk of the Abbey loomed ahead, but the dreadful effect was softened by the sweet strains of a lyre plucked from one of the turrets. Presently our host came down to greet us with blistered fingers. He had a garland of ivy on his head and sunglasses fashioned from two halves of an enormous grape. I looked out for slave-girls but there were none to be had. All the other ancient details were in order, so there was no room for complaint. Baths of milk fed by miniature aqueducts, lions in sandals and poisoned eunuchs.

He led us into the Arena and Engelbrecht drew out a sharpened salad-fork from under his robe, turning it so that the starlight reflected into my eyes. He realised he was going to be disappointed at about the same time I did. There was a musical play going on right at the centre, some dreary rubbish entitled The Sound of Mastic, and we had to sit and watch it. Hardly the orgy of violence hoped for by the plucky dwarf. But he put his modest trident to good use when the refreshments were passed around, for when I dipped my thumb into a dish of Pisum Indicum he took this inverted digit as a signal to stab three poor peas at once.

 

Our host had a covered gallery all to himself and sprawled on a couch like an Emperor, but this wasn’t evidence of extreme megalomania. The Id has almost no ego. He just cares to do events properly, and his bad taste is always highly refined. But the audience was growing bored and an uneasy squeaking of cushions began to drown out the songs. It was at the exact moment when Tommy Prenderghast or Chippy de Zoete might be expected to enliven proceedings with an elaborate jape, such as dragging the Ides of March into April with a pulley and a chain of flowers, that the Id stood up and shook his fist at the rows of spectators.

“So you plebeians don’t like my show? Well I hope you can suggest something better to be getting on with!”

To which there was no answer but a bashful silence, with little Charlie Wapentake finally summoning up enough nerve to confess that perhaps the production was a touch overlong, though by no means unworthy, and rather austere for modern viewers, who nonetheless were keen to become acquainted with Greek and Roman traditions, it being simply a matter of relative cultural values, and speaking of relatives, he had a sick uncle and wondered whether he might be excused the remainder of the play to rush to his bedside, escorted there by a few kindly helpers in the crowd, not that the multitude of arms suddenly raised to volunteer for the job was any indication of defeatism, but probably a general expression of sympathy, and one really ought to be grateful for such generous support.

How deep an impression this blather made on the Id is difficult to ascertain. I suspect not much. But it’s an academic question, because Engelbrecht suddenly jumped up and cried: “Culture be rotted! What we want is action!”

I slapped my brow in despair, though I could hardly help but feel a measure of admiration for the tiny fellow. There was a low murmur of anguish from the audience as the Id kicked over a platter of Pullum Anethatum and tore off his wreath. “Action, you say? Very well. I shall provide it in dark abundance.”

And he made a gesture which brought guards running with whips. The amphitheatre was cleared in a minute and we were all herded back onto the chariots. Then with an exhortation to follow him, our host set off at a stupendous rate across the fields. There was no moon and the rubber scythes were useless against the local brambles. More than one chariot tipped into an unseen ditch and we lost a dozen club members leaping the first hedge. But Engelbrecht stood on tiptoe and peered over his rail as if he was enjoying a leisurely tour, while the Id’s wild laughter from ahead provided the only clue as to in which direction we were headed.

Presently the lights of a big city twinkled on the horizon and I understood we were being driven into the heart of London. As the urban glow grew brighter, I noted that right at the rear of our convoy was a vehicle which didn’t resemble a chariot. It was too far behind to make out details. And now we had entered the outlying suburbs of the metropolis and I was so embarrassed by the disapproving stares and tongue cluckings of pedestrians that I bowed my head and looked at my feet. The rest of the journey wasn’t too eventful, though we ran someone down on the Hammersmith flyover, or so Engelbrecht claimed, but I don’t trust his geography, and when I checked later the blood on the wheels had more of an Acton consistency to it.

At last, after what seemed an age, our chariot stopped and the guards who held the reins allowed us to climb down. I was with the dwarf, Nodder Fothergill and Skeletal Bartholomew, and because all three are of slight girth, my muscles weren’t too stiff. The same can’t be said for those members who had to share with Dreamy Dan and his attendant visions, all six hundred of them, some fatter than mirages even, and now these unfortunates came limping and staggering along, calling out for Dr Sadismus, the surrealist surgeon, to put them right, unaware that he was in one of the vehicles which hadn’t made it.

We were standing in front of the British Museum in Russell Square, but the building was locked up for the night. The Id was busy picking the lock on a side-door with a toga-pin and when he finally managed to force entry, he beckoned for us to follow. It was rather eerie inside with all those dinosaur bones creaking in the cooling air. I had to restrain Engelbrecht from letting fly with his trident at an Archaeopteryx fossil which he insisted was giving him a challenging stare. Fortunately, the exhibits soon became more abstract and his passion vaguer, and before he actually killed anything on display, the long undulating line of intruders had tiptoed to the threshold of the room containing the Ancient Greek Collection and were gathered in a semi-circle around the Id, who held a finger to his lips.

The only sound came from the spitting candles fixed to the spines of Chattox, the pet hedgehog of Tommy Prenderghast, which the Id had requisitioned as a source of illumination, tugging him along on a leash. Tommy himself was nowhere to be seen. I attempted to peer past the Id into the shadowy room, but he shook his head and I wisely drew back. I already knew what was in there anyway, so I wasn’t put out by this rebuttal. It was Engelbrecht who shattered the grim hush of anticipation.

“What’s the new game, boss?” he shouted.

The Id frowned so deeply that his face was pressed into his double-chins and his ensuing chuckle was muffled. “Why, nothing more than Running the Gauntlet.”

“Let me at it!” the dwarf replied.

I nudged him to keep quiet, but it was like trying to discourage a bad cold from setting up home in a nose. I suppose Engelbrecht’s compressed audacity keeps him safe from a comprehensive thrashing. If Charlie Wapentake spoke to the Id like that he’d be out on his ear, if he was allowed to keep one, and none of the other clubmen, not even the Oldest Member, would dare to hope for better treatment. But the dwarf has the pluck of a giant and the popular theory is that it has been coiled down tight to fit inside him, and anybody who ruptures him is liable to cause an explosion. Fanciful, I know, but too neat to be just a metaphor.

Now the Id purred like a cat which has been swallowed by a dog, the dog by a horse, the horse by an elephant, the elephant by a whale, the whale by a whirlpool, the whirlpool by a dying star, and the dying star, with difficulty, by a mouse.

“This is no ordinary gauntlet! Oh no, my friends, for the room yonder contains two Gorgons, brought over from Greece in crates with the marble frieze from the Temple of Apollo at Bassae. They aren’t supposed to be here at all, but they fell asleep in the ruins and the archaeologists thought they were part of the original structure. They are dormant and harmless during the day, but at night they stir and anyone who catches a glimpse of them turns instantly to stone!”

Engelbrecht wanted to dispute this. “Gorgons? Weren’t they slain by that Percy chap?”

The Id held up a burnished shield, or maybe it was a wardrobe mirror, which are easier to obtain, and angled it across the threshold so that the light from Chattox went in and the chamber’s reflection came out. Whatever is in a Gorgon’s face that literally petrifies a man doesn’t work when bounced from a shiny surface. Don’t ask about the physics of this, because even if I knew I wouldn’t tell you. I saw rows of ancient vases, carved figures of nymphs, exquisite metopes and pedimental sculptures, and lounging on either side of a reconstructed tomb, a pair of hideous monsters with reptilian scales, yellow tusks and hissing snakes for hair.

The Id lowered the mirror and popped an olive into his mouth. “True, one of the Gorgons was killed. Her name was Medusa. But her sisters are immortal and are ready to play. Which of you will be the lucky one?”

And he spat the olive-stone into the crowd. Most of us recoiled, but Skeletal Bartholomew and Louis Aragon misunderstood the meaning of his words and dived to catch it. They assumed it offered an exemption from the game. They each managed to pinch an end of it as it span through the air and an undignified tussle followed as they sought to pull it from the other’s grasp. Naturally the Id decided to select them both, which was an outcome neither was too pleased about, especially as it seemed a redefinition of the luck mentioned earlier. I wasn’t distraught to witness them treated thus, for they had never been wholly committed to surrealism and were probably the most disposable members of the club.

Engelbrecht spoke up: “Just a pair of volunteers for the run? Let’s make it a three victim race and get some proper betting going!”

The Id nodded languidly and I fretted at the dwarf’s impulsiveness. There was so little flesh on him he wouldn’t even make a decent garden gnome if petrified. But it was too late to save him now. I noted that Tommy Prenderghast and Chippy de Zoete had joined the gathering at last and were already calculating survival odds on the runners. The rules were simple enough. It was a case of dashing into the room and coming out through the door on the other side. Skeletal Bartholomew’s knees knocked violently as he was forced over the threshold. His technique was pitiful and the betting reflected this. At such long odds it was worth a very minor flutter and I laid a penny on him, but he didn’t manage six yards before turning to granite.

“No good squinting at them through your lashes,” the Id remarked. “I believe it was the elder sister, Stheno, who got him. Well, it’s another addition to the stock of exhibits.”

I wondered for a moment whether he had a little business venture going with the curator, but my speculations were interrupted by Louis Aragon, who covered his eyes with his hands, loosed a wild sort of howl and accelerated into the room. He didn’t get much further than his predecessor. In fact he ran straight into Skeletal Bartholomew, knocked him over and shattered him. He regained his feet but slid on the rubble so that he was no longer pointing in the right direction. Then he proceeded to run in tight circles, the circumferences of which, if joined together in a straight line, might have sufficed to carry him to the exit. Finally he froze in his tracks.

The Id sniffed. “Sandstone, I believe. It was the younger sister, Euryale, who bagged that one. No good peeping at her through a gap in your fingers. Now who’s next?”

I turned to bid Engelbrecht farewell and shake his hand, but he was engrossed in a conversation with Tommy and Chippy. They were hunched over the Roman wax tablet on which they’d been calculating odds with a stylus and when they separated I saw how the terms of the bet had changed. Now they were offering odds on a runner’s demise. In the light of what had happened to the previous contestants, this was suspicious. But there was a rush to lay bets and I admit I was caught up in the mercenary mood and staked the entire contents of my pocket against him reaching the far side. Not that I wanted him transformed into a mineral, you understand, but it seemed ludicrous to waste such an easy opportunity to recoup my earlier loss.

The Id would tolerate no more delay. “Hurry up!”

“I’m ready boss,” replied Engelbrecht, “but first I need a decent run-up. Takes me a while to attain maximum velocity.” And without waiting for permission, he paced back down the corridor. Soon he was out of sight and a few of the members offered the opinion that he had scarpered, but I knew him better than that. He’ll cheat if he can’t do his best within the rules.

Just when my confidence on this matter was waning, there came a curious kind of twanging sound, and Engelbrecht zoomed past me a second later. His little legs were in motion but I can’t say he was really running because he happened to be suspended a foot above the ground. I reckon he broke the sound-barrier as he shot into the room, for the Id’s burnished shield shattered into innumerable long splinters which duelled with Chattox’s spines on the way down. The dwarf ran that gauntlet in less than one blink, though he found time enough to box the Elgin Marbles as he passed them, connecting a tremendous uppercut which knocked them through a window all the way to Greece. I hear they are still there and that the British government has been reduced to begging for them back.

Then he yelled as he landed safely in the adjacent Egyptian Collection and I knew he was still made of flesh.

But the Gorgons weren’t entirely cheated of a prize, for Engelbrecht’s progress through the chamber was so rapid it left an afterimage in the air, and although he never looked at the sisters, his afterimage did. It immediately turned to stone, a solid bridge of obsidian running right through the room, like a solidification of time, for its length was a chronological extrusion of the dwarf, and at every point it betrayed characteristics belonging to him, such as its downward arc and the twinkle in its depths.

I trembled to think what the curators would say when they discovered this anomaly on the morrow, but I was spared my worries as the obsidian bridge started to melt. So much friction had been generated between the body of the dwarf and the musty atmosphere that the heat turned the stone into lava. It puddled over the floor. I was as surprised as anyone when the Id jumped into the room, crouched down in the bubbling liquid and scooped up blistering handfuls of the stuff. Rather foolishly I stepped over the threshold for a closer look, but my luck was in, for the two Gorgons were covering their heads with their wings, terrified of the Id’s countenance.

On the way out, I spied the olive-stone which had been dropped by Skeletal Bartholomew and Louis Aragon and idly picked it up. It was covered in writing, all the stuff about the glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome which the Id doesn’t know.

 

Engelbrecht was in a fine humour during the drive back to Nightmare Abbey. We were at the rear of the convoy this time, and not on a chariot. We shared with Tommy and Chippy and I learned what trick they’d played to fix the game in the dwarf’s favour. The Id was far ahead, already over the curve of the world, and on foot, his guards with him. They were whipping the lava all the way to his estate and they had to hurry before it cooled and set. Just as well, I suppose, for if our host had seen what device stood outside the Museum when he left, he would have declared the event void. But he was too concerned with herding the blazing stream to notice his environment.

It was a giant catapult, of course. At the precise instant in the musical show when I’d anticipated a jape, Tommy and Chippy had slipped out of the amphitheatre to wind the onager, which hadn’t been used since the caber fiasco. They planned to launch a few lions over the heads of the spectators onto the stage, to spice the songs up a bit. But as they were trying to load the machine, the laces of the beasts’ sandals became entangled in the workings. By now the rest of us were leaving in the chariots and the lions scented prey and chased the horses, which is natural for them, having something to do with terror and sublimity. The catapult was heavier and slower than our vehicles which explains their late arrival at the contest.

The onager stopped in front of the Museum entrance, still primed, so when they went inside and saw what was going on with the Gorgons, they suggested to Engelbrecht that he be used for ammunition. A profitable missile he made too, as I discovered to my cost. But I couldn’t deny his triumph and he had enough large bruises from his landing on the Rosetta Stone to make me feel guilty about my annoyance. This time when we ran over a pedestrian, I collected enough blood in a phial to have it properly analysed for a post-code. Details like that bother me.

Back at the Abbey, the performance was still playing, to an empty Arena. The first show had ended, but the second, Evita Caesar, was packing them out, with the Id’s housekeeper, Lamia Lobb, in the starring role. It was pretty appalling and the third item on the bill, Seven Sacrifices for Seven Altars, was rumoured to be even worse. But we plugged our ears with grapes and hid behind the volcano. Actually there was a solitary spectator on the tiered seats, the Kaiser, who somehow had avoided the enforced exodus. He looked badly shaken up, I can tell you, almost as if he wished he was running the gauntlet instead. With that neck-brace, he wouldn’t stand a chance.

It soon grew too warm to stand next to the volcano, for the Id was filling it up with his captured lava. That’s what he’d wanted it for all along. Nothing like a domestic Pompeii to give a party the authentic ashen touch. When it was topped to the brim, we waited for it to explode, but it seemed rather reluctant. Maybe the Doric Column was still blocking the vent. Or perhaps pyroclastic flows are just lazier than they used to be. Anyway, the Id got so fed up with its refusal to erupt that he turned against Classicism and ordered the whole thing dismantled, together with every other ancient prop. I heaved a sigh of relief at this.

When his guards swarmed onto the Abbey’s roof to tear the togas from the gargoyles, I experienced a sudden shock. One of the stone figures resembled Engelbrecht, and I wondered whether he had been nabbed by the Gorgons after all, with a delayed effect glance, and moved to the eaves by the Id, but when I looked down I realised the diminutive fellow was right by my side, sparring with one of those water-clocks, a clepsydra. He jabbed its calibration into next week with his trident. All the other stuff, including the volcano, went into one enormous bag. The Id wanted a return to his former style, and I guess sacking Rome is the most Gothic act imaginable.