That Friday vesper I wasted in the Fruit & Nut Flake. There, I imbibed a vast amount of Munters Blinding Cider and, following a prolonged supplication at the white porcelain altar of the purging god Emetos, fell into my bed. My repose was disturbed, for all night long the gales howled and the storm imps rattled my windows, and the rain drummed and formed an ill-timed and worse-tempered counterpoint to the twanging blood-wires in my skull. At some point in the middle of that dreadful night, I rose and staggered through the cold and gloaming vestibule, to my dirty little kitchenette, where I bent and supped some of the rusty stuff that dribbled from the faucet over the Himalaya of unwashed crockery teetering in the basin. I returned after thus slaking my thirst to my bedchamber, and lay down once more upon my stony unforgiving plain of a mattress, and twisted and writhed between my knotted and mildewing sheets, and listened as the vengeful gods set up an artillery of hail outside. —
Emetos
Passing along by the sick-house, and then down by Bir Ya’qub took I my way between that ritual Well, holy to the Hebrews, and the Hopeless Wanker facing the Well, where worshipped the adepts of the most sanctified Eglise de la Bouteille, although that morning it was an anathema to me which I did forswear. The roundabout at the bottom intersected the Hotwells Road, where was moored Pex ‘n’ Quads. Down there, I did espy Aeromonas Annie lurking across the way, who scoping me seemed knowingly to smirk, and then skulked off in the opposite direction into town, whilom with a cackle she flung over her shoulder a Parthian shot:- —
Pex ‘n’ Quads, Aeromonas Annie (Cassandra the Prophetess)
I did not stay her, for my head was reeling and I had not the least taste then for her badinage, nor moreover being inclined to complete the aphorism which she had initiated. And so I forsook the way of that Cassandra, and turned my face, and took my way along the pavement, still slimy from all those weeks of drench, to the portals of Pex ‘n’ Quads. —
Pex ‘n’ Quads
Herod as ever was in Reception, staring out through the plate glass, gloomy and severe of mien, mug in hand, and cantilevered coat jutting over the White Willy. He had evidently noticed my encounter with the prophetess Cassandra, for he said as I entered —
Herod
That butter mountain Peggy was behind her desk, and she looked at me, and her laughter bubbled forth over her infinite plurality of chins. —
Peggy
Herod smiled then one of his rare smiles, and exchanged with Peggy a look of some significance, though what this might be I knew not, and he cleared his throat and said —
Herod
- Be not dismayed, for it may yet come about that your frustration be eased. As it happens, and that most serendipitously, Kylie the Southmead Jezebel has chosen this delightful weekend morning to grace us with one of her rare appearances. —
Kylie the Southmead Jezebel
A strange and bestial snouting emanated then from the portal to the inner sanctum, and I thought the Jabberwock was come upon us to stap our vitals and gnaw upon our bones. But it was only the other Cerberida Billy, who sallied forth with the Great Book in which were inscribed all the appointments that were to come for the three handmaidens of that dreadful zone. —
Billy
But that revolting castrato only bid me defiance with that hollow laugh of his, which had scarcely died behind me before I stumbled upon the subject of his foul insinuations, coiled like a Gaboon Viper and suffusing the air with its foul odours. At that very moment, looking up, I caught sight above me of a clean pair of heels escaping into the Spa Elysium. Seeing as I was headed that way myself, I quickened my stride, taking the stairs two at a time, and as I broached the door to that Spa, did espy Marshall Petoman the flatulist vanishing into the galley wherein were kept the Nautilus machines. This incident caused me to re-evaluate my previous prognosis blaming Peggy for the foul depredations of the Phantom Crapper, and I considered whether I should return downstairs and unmask Marshall Petoman as the prime suspect in the case, but thought better of it, for that ogre Herod would be sure to rejoinder my new protestations with the principle that negavit ille malum, qui fecit. And so, reflecting thus, I made my way to the treatment room aforesaid. —
Marshall Petoman, the flatulist, Spa Elysium
In that room, a well-upholstered hussy came and went talking on her mobile, about the K**d*shians and diverse other celebutards. She paid me no mind, and so I assumed, this being evidently that very Kylie the Southmead Jezebel of whom I had heard others speak, that my presence was not objectionable to her, and therewith I divested myself of my apparel and laid me down upon the treatment table that was in there, this being as I thought the selfsame apparatus whereon previously Dives the billionaire had shed his skin. After some minutes of pointless yacking in the corridor, the hussy reappeared, and commenced a perfunctory rubbing of arbitrary portions of my person, these attentions accompanied by audible mastications of the gum she chewed, and periodically interrupted by the nerve-shredding r&b of her mobile’s ringtone, which she ever was most eager to answer, by this means not in the least assuaging my derangement. Occasionally, Kylie the Southmead Jezebel would bend over me, stretching to reach some farflung part of my person which it then seemed mete to her to rub, and thereby assailing me with her gob odours of stale tobacco and bacon flavoured crisps, also suffusing the atmosphere of that treatment room with the sour emanations of the goddess Perspira. And her straining girth did brush against my moderately svelter form, conjuring in my imaginarium unwanted notions of being smothered by some obese and implacable dominatrix. And my head reeled then, so that I thought I should be compelled to pay further obeisance to Emetos. Eventually, and greatly to my relief, the Jezebel announced a unilateral ceasefire, instituting a halftime interval so that she might pop out for a gasper upon the pavement outside Reception, it being such lovely weather for a change. Upon her withdrawal, carpe diem! I gathered my clothing and fled the treatment room, determining in my breast that I would sacrifice my comeliest heifer or woolliest ewe to Jahweh in thanks for my salvation. —
Perspira
But that sorceress returning from her ciggie break pursued me unto the very gates of the Spa Elysium, casting the foulest execrations upon me, that I did not stay for the full treatment and sooth did forgo the happy ending which she did compass to bestow upon me. And I bethought myself that this harlot would bear false witness unto my lord Herod, and say unto him that it was I who was culpable for the depredations and foulnesses wrought by the Phantom Crapper, and that way sustain the animus which that vengeful eunuch nourished in his breast against me. And I turned my face unto her, and in my bitterness and contumely, I said unto her —
Spa Elysium
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