[Brenda & Effie 06] - Brenda and Effie Forever! Read online

  I roll my eyes, but the awful thing is, I think she’s right about this. About a fortnight ago, when we were traipsing about the labyrinthine streets at the back of St Mark’s, we came across this tiny cave-like shop. It was all aglow with hundreds of multi-coloured glass bulbs. Its shelves were lined with candles placed inside blown glass baubles. A stunning sight. We shuffled deeper and deeper into the shop, holding our breath and trying not to be clumsy and knock into anything. At the very end of the cave we found the shop owner, who was an ancient woman swaddled in what seemed like rags.

  She didn’t respond to any of our queries about the price of things. She simply rocked back and forth on her chair, chuntering away in Italian.

  ‘Come on, Effie,’ I said, feeling a bit creepy in there. ‘She obviously doesn’t want to sell us anything.’

  Effie looked closer at the old woman though, and saw that she was blind. Her eyes were dull white, like glass cracked in a million places. As I leaned towards her, she suddenly switched to English, startling us both by crying out: ‘Do not go home! Please, you must stay away from your home.’

  Effie was as discomfited as I was. Then she recovered herself. ‘What do you mean?’ she snapped.

  ‘She’s crackers,’ I said. ‘Come on, Effie.’

  ‘Please,’ the woman called out, all agitated as we moved away. ‘The Final Days are coming. You must stay away from your town. Have mercy upon the poor Walkers. You mustn’t go home.’

  I shivered and tried to urge Effie out, but something in that ancient voice held us both back.

  The woman gave one last outburst: ‘My people will die if you go home. Brenda… Effie… please…’ And then she was exhorting us to stay, yammering about further messages she had for us.

  Our names sounded so strange in her heavy accent (what was it? Eastern European?) that I hardly recognised them at first. Then I seized Effie by the arm and propelled her bodily out of the shop. I scurried away through that rats’ warren of streets and she struggled to keep up.

  ‘But she knew our names!’ she gasped. ‘Didn’t you hear her?’

  ‘I heard a whole lot of ranting and moaning,’ I said. ‘And a lot of nonsense. Now come on, I want to get changed at the hotel before we go for our tea.’

  And that was the end of that mystery. We never went back to see the woman again. Effie could sense that I was very averse. In the interests of keeping the peace she never went on about it or insisted. But as we left Venice by train she admitted to feeling a few stirrings of regret. What had that old gypsy been trying to tell us? What kind of a warning was that? She had mentioned the Walkers – the local Whitby name for the perambulating undead. Now, how could she have known that?

  But she did. And for once, being on holiday, we hadn’t investigated.

  And now here was another little mystery. This strange invitation.

  ‘Let’s think it over today,’ Effie says. Somehow she can tap into my train of thought and know this is what I’m dwelling on. ‘Let’s have a nice day in the Tuilleries, as we planned, and then, if we’re not too tired, we’ll give a little knock at this address, come seven o’clock. Just to see. There can’t be any harm in that, can there?’

  I must admit I’m glad to feel my curiosity coming back. Back in Venice I came over all panicky when I beat a sharp retreat out of that spooky cave of glass. In Paris I am feeling more like my usual self. Just as indomitable as Effie over there. Effie with that particular gleam in her eye. The one that means she’s keen to sink her teeth into some new mystery.

  ‘Mr Pineapple indeed,’ she tuts. Then she peers out at the sky. ‘We might have to fetch our brollies and cardies before we venture out. It looks quite unsettled out there.’

  §

  It turns out to be quite a gloomy day in Paris. However, we put up our brollies and refuse to give in. We stroll along by the banks of the Seine, stopping occasionally to examine the books, magazines and souvenirs for sale in those funny little green barrow things attached the walls. I buy prints of paintings of Montmartre and Notre Dame, and coffee table coasters covered with pictures by Toulouse Lautrec. Effie scoffs at my plebian tastes, but I don’t care.

  So the day ambles by, with a fresh rainy scent in the air, the pavements all satiny and the streets a little clearer for once. We have lunch in a café by a church called St Severin and Effie broaches the subject of paying a visit to Mr Pineapple tonight.

  ‘I always through ananas meant banana,’ I tell her. ‘It sounds more like it should mean banana, doesn’t it?’

  She tuts at me and we spend the afternoon strolling about the tightly packed streets of the Latin Quarter, where waiters beseech us from doorways and rain streams down from awnings.

  All the while I know Effie is chomping at the bit over this invitation of ours. A number of times I notice her draw out the crumpled card and examine it, as if she could learn something more from it. Eventually I give in, of course. And at the time we would normally be striking out for the evening, in search of something to eat, we are heading instead for a doorway up an alleyway, which lets us into a certain apartment block. M. Ananas lives at the very top.

  When Effie buzzes, the distorted voice from the speaker sounds familiar. It’s our stalker friend. ‘Come up! Come up!’ he says excitedly.

  The stone steps curve round and round and it seems to take a great deal of effort for us to toil to the top landing. I think it’s a sense of dread that weighs me down. Effie’s surging on ahead, thrusting her beaky nose ahead of her.

  By the glossy black door there are a few faded potted plants, which seem reassuring in their ordinariness. Effie has barely knocked before the door flies open and there’s our disheveled friend standing before us, grinning lopsidedly.

  ‘Welcome. Good evening,’ he grins.

  ‘You never told us your name,’ Effie points out. ‘We know Mr Ananas’, but we don’t know yours.’

  ‘Er, yes,’ he says, ushering us into a musty-smelling hallway. ‘It’s, er, M. Banane.’

  Effie shoots me a look as we advance into the rather dark and pokey flat. Actually, the smell isn’t just must. There’s a felty, dusty smell. And there’s polished wood and the mildewy scent of very old books. Actually, it’s not a nasty smell at all.

  The hallway is plastered in playbills and posters from the previous century, and even the one before that. Theatre posters and concerts. You could spend hours looking them over.

  Then we can hear music. One of those twiddly diddly baroque tunes, where the notes go round and round in circles and it’s as if you’re trapped inside a giant music box. This is like an old pipe organ that’s playing though, and there are some bum notes that make Effie – who’s a big baroque buff – wince like mad.

  ‘M. Ananas will see you in his drawing room,’ says the little man, and at last we find ourselves in a larger room, dominated by spotless, shiny ormulu Victoriana. Vast cupboards and a sideboard, rubber plants and dimly-glowing glass lamps.

  At the end of the room is the offending organ, huffing and puffing its discordant tune. It’s being played by a portly fellow in a black and purple tie-dyed kaftan. His hands play the keyboards extravagantly, making a real show of it.

  Our hunchbacked friend gives a polite cough. ‘It’s not the same. There is mould in all the pipes. His place before this one was very damp.’

  Effie and I exchange a glance. What have we gone and walked into?

  ‘I will bring Turkish coffee,’ suggests M. Banane. ‘And also du vin.’

  ‘Pink for me,’ Effie says.

  Then abruptly the organ music stops and our host swings round on his piano stool.

  I must admit, the two of us give an involuntary gasp.

  He’s wearing a paper bag over his head.

  ‘Bon soir,’ he says, a bit muffled inside that crumpled brown paper bag. What’s worst about it is the fact that there is a face c
rudely drawn on the front in marker pen. I don’t know if he did it himself, or his friend did it for him. But it’s a smiling face that manages to seem sinister rather than welcoming, with its savage eyebrows and dark, hollow eyes.

  Effie struggles to keep her composure. She says, ‘M. Ananas. Your colleague tells us that you wish to meet with us.’

  He comes closer. He’s a corpulent devil, his cheesecloth robes flowing about him, his expression naturally unchanging. From the kitchen we can hear his friend (Companion? Partner?) boiling the kettle and clashing about with cups and saucers.

  ‘Sit down,’ says our host. There is a kazoo-like quality to that voice of his, coming through the paper bag. Effie and I perch ourselves on an overstuffed chesterfield.

  He plonks himself down on an armchair and waits while his chum brings in a rather fancy hostess trolley. We are each given a small cup of very gritty coffee and a side plate with some baklava, which tastes a bit mouldy to me.

  M. Ananas studies us for a moment through the eyeholes in his paper mask and then he launches into what he has summoned us to hear.

  ‘We have you at a disadvantage, ladies, and for that I apologise. You see, my colleague M. Banane and I know a little about you both, and also a little about what you do back in your home town on the North-Eastern coast of England.’

  Effie’s got her poker face on, but I can’t help gasping out loud. ‘You do?’

  ‘Believe it or not, ladies, but among the cognoscenti of a certain world, a particular underworld society, you are notorious. You with your dangerous vocation. Your unholy task. Your defending of the mortal realm.’

  He knows about us. All this way away, in a different city, in another country, this bizarre man seems to know all about us. I nudge Effie surreptitiously, but her eyes are fixed on our host with a basilisk stare.

  ‘We don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she says, and sips her coffee. She crunches the gritty grounds with her dentures.

  ‘Please, do not be offended,’ says the man in the kaftan. ‘I am not mocking you. Nor am I trying to undermine you, or threaten you.’

  ‘Then what do you want?’ I ask him. I sound a bit shrill, I know.

  ‘We are the same as you,’ he says suddenly. ‘That is why we have brought you here. M. Banane and myself. We are doing the same job as you. Right here in our city of light. We are defending humanity against the dark. In our own way. Just as your Whitby has its Bitches’ Maw, we too have our own Gateway into Hell. And my friend and I have been entrusted for these many years with guarding it and protecting our city.’

  Out it all comes in a rush, startling Effie and I. Another Gateway into Hell? Another set of Guardians? Neither of us can help it, but our first reaction – which we both share – is disappointment. We feel a bit less special, hearing this from M. Pineapple.

  ‘You didn’t think you were the only defenders of this Earthly dimension, did you?’ he asks, with just a tinge of mockery. His paper head rustles with his quickening breath as he stifles a chortle of amusement. ‘There are various gateways and maws around the world, mes dames. Surely you knew?’

  Effie shakes her head quickly, bitterly. ‘Where is it then? Where is your Gateway?’

  ‘It is among the tombs of the dead, beneath the Pantheon,’ says M. Ananas. ‘Only a mile or so from here.’

  Effie sighs deeply, pretending that she’s not that bothered by what’s she’s heard. ‘So is that why you’ve invited us? In the interests of some kind of cultural exchange?’

  He laughs and starts fussing with the coffee cups and the wine glasses.

  All the time we’re sitting there’s this noise coming through the wall. Loud but muffled, with an occasional booming. I can hear the screeching of tyres, as in a hectic car chase. Then, as I hear the loudest whispers I’ve ever heard, issuing through the plaster of the apartment’s walls. I realise that there must be a cinema next door. The hullaballoo is quite distracting, and yet it’s as if Effie hasn’t even noticed it.

  She’s sitting with her back rigid, and her eyes are bulging slightly in their sockets. I know that look. She’s frightened and she’s doing her very best to hide it. She’s like a captured animal, realizing she’s for the chop. Effie is ready to bolt and run.

  M. Ananas tries to put her at her ease. ‘It is very fortunate that you and,’ (here he turns to smile at me) ‘your esteemed friend have chosen to visit our city at this time. There is something important we must impart to you.’

  ‘Hang on,’ Effie breaks in. ‘Why are you calling Brenda esteemed..?’

  But he sweeps on with his torrent of words. ‘You see, we have our ears to the ground, M. Banane and myself. We hear the mutterings and moanings of the creatures of the night. We hear the gossip in the rooftops and the chatter from the underground crypts. And the Walkers are talking about you both, ladies. There are wild rumours about you. There are tales told about your future… tittle tattle and excited prognostications.’

  ‘Who can know anything about the future?’ I ask him. ‘Vampires are always gossiping about something. You do mean vampires, don’t you? Who in their right mind would listen to what they have to say?’

  Effie flashes me a look. She has more time for vampires than I do. Naturally she would – having been shacked up for a while with the great granddaddy of them all, and even having been transformed into one for a scary little while earlier this year. ‘No, no,’ she says thoughtfully. ‘It’s true that the undead do manage to get these glimpses into the future now and then. When they sleep their minds drift free of everyday time…’

  ‘Rubbish,’ I snap. ‘How can you criticize me for believing what I read in the Sunday papers, when you believe what vampires dream about?’

  Effie’s expression is dark. ‘I understand it all more than I want to. But you’d better believe it, Brenda. The vamps know things. Secret things. Things that no one is meant to know about yet.’

  I roll my eyes. I think she romanticizes the whole rotten lot of them.

  The hunchback looks a bit nervous, sitting there and watching us bicker like this. He suddenly says, ‘I was down in the catacombs under the city. This was last week, as part of another investigation. And they got me. The Walkers… they flocked around me. They pursued me down galleries and tunnels decorated with human skulls. I fled, but they are faster than me, of course, with my limp and all. And they cornered me. They took a hold of me. I thought my number was up. Never before have I been so utterly in their clutches.’

  I glance at the man in the paper bag and something about his drawn-on expression suddenly seems concerned as his fellow tells the tale.

  Even Effie has a touch of concern in her voice as she asks, ‘What did they want from you?’

  ‘I cursed my own carelessness,’ moans M. Banane. ‘How many times have I ventured into those catacombs and come out unscathed? But this time my mind was on other things, and those slavering cadavers got hold of me.’

  ‘Poor thing,’ sighs his friend through his paper mask.

  ‘What did they say?’ Effie demands.

  The hunchback flinches at her voice. ‘Their leader was almost green, he has been underground for so long. He had caught the mildew, hanging around, down in those deeps. He came up to me and told me that you two would be here, in our city, this week. You were visiting our city and that you were to be warned.’

  ‘Why would the Walkers want to warn us about anything?’ I ask. ‘We’re their enemies. And I’m sure they’ll have no time for Effie, now that she’s no longer Queen of the Damned.’ I catch Effie shuddering a little at my words.

  ‘That’s the curious thing,’ says M. Ananas. ‘My colleague says they even seemed a little concerned for you. They say that you are about to face one of your most extraordinary challenges yet.’

  Effie tosses her head. ‘I don’t care for that word ‘extraordinary’. It doesn’t mean anything at all.
Everything we encounter is out of the ordinary, isn’t it?’

  ‘And us, too,’ says the hunchback. ‘But as you say yourself, the vampires see things, and they know things, and their warning was very clear. I was to pass it onto you. If I fail to do so, they said, they would come for me.’

  ‘And the warning?’ Effie sighs. ‘Was it anything specific? Or just general doom-mongering?’

  I’m always amazed by how sanguine Effie can be in circumstances like these. My heart is racing at this moment with awful dread.

  ‘Do not return home,’ says the hunchback. ‘That was the essence of the warning. The two of you must not return to Whitby. If you do, something terrible will happen, with all sorts of hideous consequences.’

  There is silence for a moment in that over-cluttered flat. Even the cinema next door has gone quiet.

  Then I find myself bursting out, ‘We can’t do that! We can’t not go home!’

  I realise that I feel very strongly about it.

  The man in the paper mask gives a gallic shrug. ‘We are passing on merely what we have been told.’

  Effie starts gathering herself together, readying to go. ‘Well gentlemen, we have listened to what you’ve got to say. And it’s all very interesting, thank you. I think we’ll be on our way now. Ready, Brenda?’

  ‘Er, yes.’

  The two men are looking up at us in alarm as we get up from the settee. ‘Wait!’ gasps M. Banane. ‘Will you not take their advice? Will you insist on returning to your home?’

  ‘Of course!’ says Effie hotly. ‘We’re not that easily frightened. Don’t be ridiculous, man.’

  Paper-face looks stricken. ‘But what they said… about disaster… about terrible things just around the corner… evil destinies…’

  ‘We’re quite used to that sort of thing, aren’t we Effie?’ I smile.

  ‘I’d have thought you two would be, too,’ says Effie. ‘Specially since you claim to do a similar job to ours.’

  We straighten up our coats and start heading for the door.