Sprout Mask Replica by Robert Rankin Page B

compensated for
the new train time tables and fished out my private eye tape recorder.
    I’d set
it recording back in the Gents and was eager to hear just what was really on
it.
    In my
business, tape-recording your conversations can sometimes mean the difference
between a revelation and a REVELATION.
    This
was one of those sometimes.

 
     
     
    HOTEL
JERICHO
     
    The last time I saw Sparrow
    He was leaning on his barrow
    Where he sold the spud and marrow
    And the sprout of ill repute.
    He was tall and tanned and well advised,
    His ego too was over-sized,
    And I looked on in wonder
    At the brightness of his suit.
     
    For he would swagger to and fro
    En route to Hotel Jericho.
     
    The last time I saw Norman
    He was working as a storeman
    And a part-time western law man
    Of the Wyatt Earp brigade.
    He was dressed in rags and tatters,
    Versed in all the legal matters,
    And the natives came to watch him
    As he strolled the esplanade.
     
    For thus he strolled, both thus and so
    En route to Hotel Jericho.
     
    The last time I saw Wheeler
    He was training as a Peeler
    And making quite a mealer (meal of)
    Doing press-ups for the boys.
    They were standing round in motley knots,
    Like leopards who were changing spots,
    You couldn’t see or hear or think because of all the
noise.
     
    The blighters come, the blighters go
    En route to Hotel Jericho.
     
    The last time I, well, never mind
    I’m leaving all those lads behind
    They really are the common kind
    And quite below my style.
    I’m selling up my stocks and shares,
    The dogs I’ve trained for baiting bears,
    My bingo halls and wax museums on the Golden Mile.
     
    It’s hi de hi and ho de ho
    I’m
buying Hotel Jericho.

 
     
     
     
     
     
    5
     
    IN HOTEL JERICHO THE BEDS
ARE NEVER CHANGED, THE WINDOWS never opened. Flies
circle the naked light bulbs, static crackles on the broken TV screens. The
taps all drip and the plugs all leak and the people all smell bad.
    Someone’s
crying in the basement, someone’s lying in the hail. No-one notices as I glide
by, nobody at all.
    I speak
to no-one now. I dare not speak. Words have power and power corrupts. I spend
all the time I can in my room. I only shop at night and I’m very careful what I
buy. I have to keep the balance right. Too much salt and there might be another
war. Too little sugar and who knows what might happen? I know, so I always take
three in my coffee. No milk though, that might be dangerous.
    I write
only on lined paper in red exercise books. Thirty lines to the page, twenty
pages to the book. I count the number of words on each page very carefully. The
number of mis-spellings. The number of letters to each word, where to put the
punctuation marks. If I’m wrong by a comma the results could be catastrophic.
    I work very slowly. Very is in italics. I have to be very careful about italics.
    I’m
remembering back again now. Back to how it started. Back to when I became
aware. The REVELATION.
    So long
ago.
    I
walked home from Fangio’s Bar that night. I didn’t take the free bus. It was a
long walk home, but it seemed the thing to do at the time. I walked on the
pavement cracks to compensate for the new trees they’d planted in the park and
went part of the way barefoot because Sonic Energy Authority were at number one
for the third consecutive week.
    Of
course I didn’t know I was doing it.
    Not
then.
    But
later. Later I would. Oh my word, yes.
    I
entered our house through the unlocked front door. No-one ever locked their
doors in those days, not in our neighbourhood. It wasn’t that people were more
honest back then, it’s just that no-one had anything worth nicking.
    Muffled
screams issued from the kitchen. Mum was ironing Dad’s shirt again. Since Dad
had pawned the ironing-board, clothes had to be ironed while still on the body.
It was a messy business, but wasn’t everything?
    I
wandered into the front parlour. Brother Andy sat in the armchair with a
strained expression on his face. He was