It is Always the Professor that Trumps!

Volume II, Chapter 3

Professor McQueen enjoys the latest number of the "Journal of the Bibliographical Society of London" (well, who does not?). It contains a delightful review by Basil T. Brush (not the celebrity fox), and a series of fascinating advertisements for tools and paraphernalia of use to the bibliographer, both professional and amateur. After getting a little too much pleasure from the Journal, McQueen cools off with the next episode of "The Tannochbrae Horror" on the wireless, and the reader learns more than they really want to about the "final problem", that collision of good and evil, dark and light, cheese and onion, when Sherlock Holmes confronted Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls.

Written and performed by Paul W. Nash

With special guests

Elizabeth Crowley
William Hale
Rebecca Howard
Lucy Matheson
Georgina Shomroni
Iona Spark
David Stumpp
Stewart Tiley

Transcript

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The Adventures of Donald McQueen, Bibliographer!

Volume II, Chapter 3: It is always the Professor that Trumps!

Announcer: The adventures of Donald McQueen, bibliographer … Volume II, Chapter 3. It is always the Professor that Trumps!

Donald McQueen: Welcome back to these, the adventures of Donald McQueen, Professor Emeritus of Bibliography at Timor Mortis College, and Unrewley House, Noxford, in the beautiful county of Noxfordshire. You find me in a rare good humour this evening, for my great enemy and nemesis, Cornelius Bunce, has recently published his so-called study of aboriginal dung-pellets, a work which he has been cobbling together for some years, and this morning the latest number of the Journal of the Bibliographical Society of London arrived, containing, among other delights, an excoriating review of the book by Professor Basil T. Brush of Bourbon College, Cambridge. Of course, this Basil Brush is no more to be mistaken for the celebrity fox of the same name – who is not, so far as I know, even a member of the Bibliographical Society of London – than Bourbon College, Cambridge, is to be mistaken for Bourbon College, Noxford … He adds the middle initial ‘T.’ to his name when publishing scholarly work to prevent any such confusion. Basil T. Brush is an earnest man, and a serious scholar … as perhaps the fox is too in his private moments. I had been asked to review the monograph myself, but had of course declined, because of the … personal history … between myself and Bunce, a decency and a courtesy not extended to me by Bunce himself who has twice given my bibliographical masterpieces unfairly critical reviews for purely personal, petty and pusillanimous reasons. But I can rise above all that. Especially when Professor Brush has given him such a sound thrashing on my behalf. The publisher of Bunce’s book was, to their shame, the Noxford University Press, a publishing house with perhaps the most ill-deserved good reputation in the world … I made a mental note to call upon their Editor-in-Chief, now called Master Administrator of Engagement, Outreach and Diversity, a greasy toad by the name of Samuel Pillbrook-Potter, and to tell him what I thought of this book, and of his having published it, in no uncertain terms.

Having turned first to this pleasing condemnation of the ‘worst bibliographer in Noxford’ – not my words, but Professor Brush’s – to which he added his signature sign-off, ‘Boom Boom!’ – I settled down in my favourite wing chair beside the fire – with my beloved cat Doggerel upon my lap – to read the remainder of the Journal, now under the editorship of the great Milton Person, the foremost expert on books bound in all innocence, in all probability, in terror and in error. There was, of course, a report on the forthcoming election at the Temple for the post of President of the Society, a position so hotly contested, controversial and of such importance that the cover of this number of the Society’s Journal bore a ‘parental guidance’ warning concerning the foul language and adult themes of the invective of the candidates in the election, which invective I naturally read with a keen interest. As the reader will no doubt know, as this election is of importance to all, far beyond these shores and the narrow confines of the bibliographical community, there are now eight pretenders to the throne. Several kind and well-meaning scholars had begged me to stand myself, but as I remarked to one of the other candidates, the odious Telemachus Wee, at the age of seventy-four I am just too young to be President of the Bibliographical Society. I remarked this a couple of years ago, when I was seventy-four.

Apart from Wee – a grey-faced man with a stooping, scholarly appearance, but who craves power, smells like a rotting haddock, and has made almost no contribution to the rich world of bibliography but has spent most of his life trying to complete, at Noxford, his doctoral thesis on references to lavatories in the first three novels of Jane Austen – the candidates are these. By the way, I should perhaps mention that those – like myself – who are granted their doctorates at Noxford put not ‘PhD’ after their names, as those who achieve a similar laurel at any redbrick, Ivy League or even Cambridge University are wont to do, but use instead the acronym DIPSHIT, which stands for Doctor In Philosophiã Superque Homo In Toto, usually translated as ‘doctor of philosophy and an all-round super chap’. It has been pointed out, by the politically correct brigade, for which I am of course a fifth columnist in today’s Noxford, that doctors of philosophy have not necessarily been chaps since 1976, when ladies were first permitted to proceed DIPSHIT, and indeed as far back as 1764 when wombles were first admitted to the scarlet gown. This right was extended in 1994 to the undead and indeed to all matriculated members of the University, regardless of their species, gender, ethnicity or whether they were, technically, alive or not. I need not point out, of course, that although I am myself a DIPSHIT I do not call myself ‘Doctor’ because it is always the ‘Professor’ that trumps. 

But to return to the candidates in the Presidential election listed, with their personal statements, in the Journal of the Bibliographical Society of London. In addition to the malodorous Wee, there are the following seven:

First and worst, worse even than Wee, is Cornelius Bunce himself. No one would, surely, countenance having such a man as President of the Society, especially after the drubbing he has received at the hands of Basil Brush. But there is, I suppose, a remote danger of his having his followers, and those who are themselves evil might, perhaps, be attracted to his rather showy, facile, low-budget version of malevolence. His personal statement is merely ‘I am simply the best. Better than all the rest. Better than anyone, anyone you’ve ever met. Vote for me.’ which sums up his vast ego and tiny brain very neatly. After Brush’s review perhaps he will be known as ‘Simply the worst’.

The third candidate is, for the first time ever, a mechanical bibliographer. Could a clockwork scholar really fill the massive shoes of the late great Michael Ribwright? Does a clockwork scholar even wear shoes? I could not imagine a mechanical brain to have the necessary powers, but perhaps the metal man (and he is a man, or at least a male machine, for he has a male member beneath a flap in his forehead – some mechanical workers are male, some female, the latter having their metal lady-parts concealed behind similar cranial flaps – one wonders what these machines may do with their genitalia … or perhaps it is better not to wonder), perhaps the metal man might be seen as a safe pair of hands, or steel grippers. Perhaps the reputation of the mechanical workman for being emotionless and purely rational might be seen as an advantage, although there have been reports lately of these clockwork people being less emotionless, and a little bit more murderous, than the manufacturers have led us to believe. His personal statement is brief and runs as follows. ‘I am a mechanical bibliographer, and am incapable of error, like the Pope, so to elect anyone else would be the merest folly’.

Fourth on the list of candidates is Gorvang the Magnificent. I know Gorvang well – we have played many a game of Twister together, and shared the platform at last year’s colloquium on insoluble bibliographical problems and their probable solutions – and can confirm that he is no mean bibliographer. The problem with Gorvang is that he is, when all is said and done, an evil wizard and has been known to collate books and prepare quasi-facsimile transcriptions by magic, which is considered unsporting by many, and in 2015 he turned the then Protobibliotecarius of the Bibblybobbleian into a toad for twelve weeks, although many did not notice the difference, and many of those who did considered it an improvement. His statement is somewhat offputting beginning thus ‘I am Gorvang the Magnificent, tremble before my rod and fear my wand …’ and concluding ‘A vote for any other candidate is a vote for your own death. Think on!’ He also has terrible dress sense, going around most of the time in flowing purple robes, and a pointed hat decorated with crescent moons, stars and two of the Teletubbies. So I think his chances of election are slight.

Next comes Inigo Nox, a former student of mine, who may thus be regarded as the young pretender to the throne. He is tall and winsome of appearance, with floppy hair and the perpetual look of a lovestruck cartoon rabbit. When I knew him at Noxford, he was a dull fellow, only somewhat interested in books, and whenever I encountered him in the Fellow’s Library at Timor Mortis he was not reading, but playing on his mobile telephone, a game he informed me was called Winkle Out, which had something to do with shellfish. However, in his personal statement he now says ‘I am Inigo Nox, a former student of Professor Donald D. McQueen, and when I was at Noxford I was bitten by a radioactive bookworm, which transformed me into Bibliography Man. Now I have superpowers, and can see through endleaves to the printed and manuscript waste beneath, and even into the pasteboards themselves, to detect the bibliographical treasures hidden therein. I can tell the precise age of a binding at a single glance, and can attribute any printer’s type in use before 1500 to its correct location and printer in less than a second, which is faster even than Robert Proctor could do it. I can also fly.’ I fear he may have lost his marbles.

The sixth candidate is Ginger the Sapient Pig. I have known Ginger for many years too, and we have often dined together at the Duodecimo Club where his table manners are quite remarkably good, for a pig. He speaks in squeaks and oinks, however, and has some difficulty making himself understood so that I cannot believe the members of the Bibliographical Society will consider him a realistic candidate, despite his great popularity. Ginger has never, so far as I know, upset anyone with a bad review or a cutting remark about their codicological prowess, and is known to encourage younger bibliographers and amateurs in the field with a few kind, if barely comprehensible, words. He has been promising to write a monograph on his pet subject – not as some wags have suggested the tangled bibliography of Bacon, but the surviving fourteenth-century manuscripts of the Wycliffite Bible, with a concentration on their textual variants in a geographical context – for many years, but, unfortunately, he has great difficulty holding a pen, or operating a keyboard, with his trotters, so that this great work will probably never see the light of day. His personal statement was written for him by Gorvang the Magnificent and so reads ‘I am a pig. Don’t vote for me. Vote for Gorvang. Or else!’ A form of words rather inclined to increase Ginger’s popularity than Gorvang’s I suggest.

Seventh on the list is the mysterious Franciscus Morningstar. He was, as far as I can tell, completely unknown in our world before he put himself forward for the Presidency. He joined the Society, and the Duodecimo Club, on the same day he announced his candidature, and rose into the bibliographical spotlight as if appearing through a trapdoor in the earth itself. He is tall and handsome, with dark hair and a magnificent Zapata moustache, which he is fond of stroking; he dresses in black, often with a black cloak about his shoulders, and a very small black felt top-hat. Although he looks, somehow, foreign, his voice and manner could hardly be more English and more upper class, so that some have speculated that he may be a nob. He has begun a charm-offensive, and has announced his intention to publish a study of the earliest European printed books attributed to the almost equally mysterious Crispus Rossfleisch of Mainz, and his brother Jimbo, the inventor of the barbecue. This is a subject of great interest to me, of course, as Rossfleisch is the supposed printer, or manufacturer at any rate, of the first edition of the Codex Assinorum, my own great mystery. Morningstar has given a magnificent silver bowl to the Society, filled with golden guilders, and has offered to endow a chair at one of the great universities, perhaps even at Noxford. His personal statement says nothing about himself, but rather seeks glory through praise of his rivals; he describes each of the seven other candidates, even Wee and Bunce, in golden terms. This generosity and modesty has naturally been met with deep suspicion by the curmudgeons of the Society, who see him as an upstart attempting to buy and charm his way into the throne.

Finally, there is the delightful Daniella Oz, the mistress of the long-octodecimo, known as the ‘devil’s format’, for obvious reasons. She apparently took some persuading to stand for the position, which is all the more reason to admire and support her candidature, of course, for no one who actually wants to be President of the Bibliographical Society should ever be allowed to achieve that end. Michael Ribwright, her predecessor (whom some say she murdered – but this is of course an outrageous slander – he just happened to die of pure pleasure in her company) was, of course, only persuaded to become President after a long campaign of blackmail and bribery. Daniella’s personal statement is just right, I think. She writes ‘Vote for me, and I will do my best to keep the Society going in the liberal and scholarly traditions that have been established for a century and a half; I will also give everyone who votes for me a warm smile, or a smiley emoji, depending on whether they are here in Albion or are a corresponding member elsewhere in the Empire. P.S. Rumours that I killed Michael Ribwright are, of course, perfectly true, if by “killed” you mean “loved” …’. You may readily understand why I shall be voting for Daniella myself. But I fear she may not be elected. While the Society is perhaps ready to accept a sapient pig, an evil wizard, a clockwork mannequin, a loony, a scoundrel, another worse scoundrel, or a neophyte of satanic appearance, they may not yet be quite ready to countenance … a woman.

I riffled on through the Journal of the Bibliographical Society of London. Here was an article by Binky Pauling on the life-cycle of the silverfish, here an analysis by Ella Weeblethorpe of the third edition of Milton’s Paradise by the dashboard light of 1702, an edition which is known to be, in fact, three editions, one genuinely printed in 1702, and two counterfeits, created some fifty years later when Milton’s poem on sexual activity in automobiles was at the peak of its fame; the two false editions are hard to tell apart, and indeed from the true edition, but Weeblethorpe has indicated that the watermarks of the papers used were quite different and distinctive. The true 1702 edition was printed on paper with the conventional Swiss watermark of a camp bear smiling while eating an ice-cream cone, while in both counterfeit editions the paper has also been imitated, carefully and evidently at some expense, but with the bear eating a hotdog and grimacing in one edition, and giving the finger to a passing dinosaur in the other. The presence of the hotdog, and the dinosaur, rather mark these two editions out as the forgeries. 

As I leafed on through the Journal, a panoply of joys opened before me. Being the third number of the year, it included a bibliographical crossword by Diabolicus, a mysterious figure sometimes believed to be Michael Ribright himself. Of course, his death some three years ago was no bar to his having continued to compile the crossword from beyond the grave … or perhaps he had simply created a great number of them while still living and placed a treasure-chest of crosswords at the editor’s disposal. Or perhaps Diabolicus is somebody else entirely. In addition to the exquisite review by Basil T. Brush (which I had of course turned to and read first), there were others by Sententia Smiles, of the latest volume of Flora Van Driver’s collected essays entitled Subjects I do not properly understand but am determined to write about anyway (volume six), by Fred Gubb on Anne-Marie Crinkle’s new bibliography of tram-tickets, entitled A book so expensive only institutional libraries can afford to buy it, and Hans Gobknocker, another of my former students and a quiet man with an enormous ego, and moustache, on Joanna Lumley’s short study of Brazilian editions of The old curiosity shop, of which there had turned out to be … none. Gobknocker had given Lumley a rather harsh notice, rather harsher than I thought she deserved, and I suspected him of that failing so common among university men and professional bibliographers, dilletantephobia, the fear and hatred of the amateur.

Finally, in that noble volume, were around seventy pages of advertisements. Many of these were for the Bibliographical Society’s own publications, but a few were for aids to the work of the serious student of the scroll and codex. I already possessed two balls-spotters, small telescopes which could be focused on a printed or manuscript page to find the most sententious sentences (which were illuminated in blue). The tool would also work on individuals. I had tried looking at myself in the mirror with it, and was pleased to observe no more than a faint blueish tinge around the nostrils, while glancing at my nemesis, Cornelius Bunce, through the balls-spotter showed a man lit up like a flaming Christmas pudding … The device also worked for spotting balls in spot-the-ball competitions, which had been driven underground as a result of its invention.

There was also a moving image of the latest innovation from Undead Industries, the Vampire Stick. One might have assumed, a few years ago, that this was some means of dispatching, or at least diverting, the undead, a variation on the traditional wooden stake. But happily society today is a little more tolerant, of all genders, religions, heights, species, creatures and manners of creature … except of course for Smurfs … and the Vampire Stick is actually a tool for pleasing vampires. It consists of a small, double-headed brush on the end of a stout handle, around thirty centimetres long and fashioned so that it looks nothing like a Christian symbol of any sort. The brush-heads have short, stiff, black bristles, and one pleases the vampire, apparently, by brushing his, her or their neck with it, all around, exfoliating the surface which becomes hard, dry and itchy, because vampires develop an extra integument around their throats to prevent accidental biting by other vampires, which would, scientists tell us, be inclined to cause illness or even death in the bitee. The advertisement in the Journal of the Bibliographical Society of London noted that the Stick could also be used on other undead creatures, on lycanthropes, who love to have their hairy backs scratched, and on mummies all over, to relieve their two-thousand-year old eczema, although there is a warning not to scrub too hard with a mummy, or the brush can start to unravel their bandages, from which unravelling all sorts of unpleasant consequences can ensue. I have one of these Vampire Sticks myself, but have never quite had the nerve to apply it to any member of the undead community. But I have used it on myself, and on Ginger the Sapient Pig, who was delighted to have a really good, hard application of the Stick between his should-blades. These moving advertisements, with little audio clips accompanied by jingles or fanfares, seemed really remarkable a few years ago, but now everyone is used to them. Apparently the sheet of paper on which the advertisement is printed is laminated with a liquid-crystal screen, some few molecules in thickness, which is powered by nanotechnology, a tiny flat computer with a memory which, being so small and flat, can only hold a few seconds-worth of data – perhaps a scene extracted from the latest Chav Superman film, or from Mr Spittlebug’s movie of my own adventures, or – as in this case – a pleasing clip of a Professor Van Helsing, of the University of Delft, dandling Dracula with a Vampire Stick, while the latter coos and gurgles like a baby … Listen to this.

Dracula: Ah the Vampire Stick … what beautiful music it makes!

On the next page was an advertisement new to me, for something called ‘The Bookman’s Footwear Exchange’. It was an agency for bibliographers, codicologists and librarians who had an odd number of legs, or feet anyway, so that they could team up to buy pairs of shoes and socks and share them equitably without having always to throw one away. I considered this for a moment. How many bibliographers have an odd number of legs? I have heard tell of a Russian woman who was born with eight legs, and had been dubbed the Spider of Dubrovnik at birth, before one of her legs had fallen off … so that she now had seven. Which is an odd number. But, as far as I can recall, she went on to be exotic dancer, at which she was, due to her abundance of legs, remarkably adept. She had never tarried, so far as I knew, in the city of books. The only bibliographer I could think of with an odd number of legs was that dastard Cornelius Bunce – whose left leg was bitten off at the knee by a Nile crocodile, of course, while I was attempting to rescue a beautiful maiden and a group of Wakicucu tribesmen from said crocodile and Bunce was attempting to escape into a bog, in Africa some decades ago – and I made a connection in my mind … Yes, this advertisement must have been placed by Bunce himself, in an attempt to make a few paltry Euros by selling off his supply of odd socks, shoes, boots and other footwear to the one-, three-, five- and seven-legged members of the Bibliographical Society of London. It was a typical piece of Bunce trickery, and meanery, and one-leggedry, etc. The swine!

The final page of the Journal bore an advertisement for ‘The Bibliographer’s Companion’. This was a device I had heard about – indeed I had been asked to endorse – but had not seen on the market before. It consists of a long and corrugated rubber tube attached to a small cylindrical chamber on wheels, looking not unlike an old-fashioned vacuum-cleaner. The free end of the rubber tube attaches to the user’s genitals. The idea is that a reader my sit at a desk or lectern for the whole day, without having to break off in their reading, collating, scrutinizing, textual comparisons, transcriptions, or typographical analysis in order to make water from the moment the library opens until it closes. Many of the Noxford college libraries never close, of course, so the bibliographer could, perhaps, sit in comfort for many days, immersed in a single work of scholarship without any distractions save, perhaps, the occasional need to eat or sleep. Making toilet would no longer be a problem, because the reader could simply relax and allow their urine to flow freely down the tube and into the cylinder, which was said to have enough capacity for seven days at the common average rate of micturition. If necessary, the reader could move between desks, or even libraries, dragging The Bibliographer’s Companion behind them as they went, while the cylinder filled slowly with fluid. The cost of such a Companion was two hundred Euros, which seemed a little steep. This was for a device with a male-genital attachment, with two ring-clips and a screw-operated collar, which was shown in the advertisement and looked reasonably comfortable. For female genitals, the price was two-hundred-and-eight-five Euros, and the attachment looked like a studded metal gasmask with numerous straps, which I could not imagine was at all convenient to wear. There were endorsements from several well-known names, although some were more equivocal than others. And, thanks to the recent advances in miniaturised electronicals, the advertisement was able to speak, in the form of very short audio clips reproducing the voices of the endorsers.

Peter Pinkelman of Princeton said:

Pinkelman: I never go anywhere without a Bibliographer’s Companion clamped to my penis. 

DM: Coriolanus Gibbs, recently appointed Protobibliotecarius of the Bibblybobbleian said:

Gibbs: I don’t care how convenient it is, the Bibliographer’s Companion will never be allowed through the doors of the Bibblybobbleian Library. 

DM: Gorvang the Magnificent said:

Gorvang: I do not need the Bibliographer’s Companion myself as, being an evil wizard, I have cast a spell of unweeing upon my privates and can spend all eternity in the library by magic. But I can see that, for mortal creatures, with mortal bladders, the Companion would be a great boon.

DM: And the lovely Daniella Oz, mistress of the long-octodecimo, said:

Oz: It sounds disgusting. I would never use it.

As I mentioned, I too was asked to endorse the product, but remain content with my decision not to do so.

I closed the Journal with a contented sigh. Before retiring, I decided to use The Ear Trumpet of Death in the manner to which I had become accustomed in past two years, as a medium of bedtime entertainment. I inserted the instrument into my ear, and allowed by mind to wander. And I caught, by chance I suppose, the next episode of the very radio drama I had listened to the previous evening.

Announcer: And now on BBC Radio Noxford, Dr Thinly’s Casebook, the everyday story of haunted Scottish medical folk.

Stiff announcer: Dr Thinly’s casebook. With Andrew Crookback as Dr Cameron, Barbara Sullen as Janet, and Bill Simpleton as Dr Thinly. This week ‘The Tannochbrae Horror, part 2: Ghoulies and Ghosties’, written by Smudgminda Poe and adapted for the wireless by Hamish Thistlecock.

In the previous episode, Dr Thinly’s spectre – he has been a ghost since his mysterious murder at the end of series twenty-seven – witnessed the demonic possession of a young patient of Dr Cameron’s, one Archie Slender. The demon had unexpectedly transferred itself into Cameron’s body, leaving slender apparently dead. Now listen on …

Thinly: I watched my old friend Cameron, now possessed by a demon but seemingly undisturbed by the matter, complete his surgery that morning, before returning to the kitchen at Arden House where Janet had prepared a light luncheon for him.

Janet: That’s right doctor, you sit down there and eat your neaps …

T: Cameron took up his usual position on the floor and Janet put down a bowl of lightly stewed turnips for him.

J: You look tired, doctor. Was it very busy in surgery this morning? Did Old Jock McGoolie treat you cruelly? Was Aggie MacBride in with her craggy backside again? Did Virginia McGonagall from Falkirk and her dear sister Dinah renew their demands for a fully clockwork ear and a mechanical vagina?

Cameron: No, Janet, nothing of that sort. But it was a rather … taxing surgery. I had a patient, a young man, die, right there on front of me.

J: Ohhh … not again? Do you think it is something to do with the deal chairs, doctor? Are they proving more fatal than you expected?

C: No, Janet, I don’t think it has anything to do with the chairs. 

J: What was it then? You didn’t tell him one of your anecdotes, did you?

C: I didn’t have time, Janet. He had a sore throat, and one minute I was asking him to open his mouth and let me have a look, and the next minute he was stiff as a board.

J: What did you do with him, doctor?

C: He’s still out there in the surgery. He was a scrawny wee fellow, so, when I perceived he was dead, I merely folded his body into the fire-bucket and carried on with the next patient … He’s out there now, doubled up like a hairpin in the corner by the side-door. I will send his remains off to Leekiemonkie for autopsy when I have a moment.

J: I see. And what do you think it was that killed him, doctor?

C: I am doctor, not a soothsayer, Janet. He presented only a sore throat, and no one ever died of a sore throat.

J: But that is a symptom … 

C: Aye, Janet, a symptom of malingering, or deviant sexual practices, as often as not … But I do hear there’s a virulent strain of French Idiocy decimating the fishermen of Muckiedoon, and there have been cases or Bangkok Knackers reported beyond Loch Cullencrief … Perhaps it was one of those ailments which carried off poor Archie Slender.

J: Archie Slender? Was that the young man’s name?

C: Aye, it was. Do you ken the man?

J: Only in the Biblical sense, doctor Cameron. He was rather poor specimen, I am afraid. Archie was staying with the McSillies up at Parson’s End, I gather, and was a firm favourite with old Mad Margaret McSillie by all accounts … I suppose, if it was a case of French Idiocy or Bangkok Knackers he may have infected, or been infected by, the McSillies, and you will have to drive up there and warn them to remain in quarantine until Michaelmas … Doctor Cameron … Are you asleep again, doctor?

C (snoring, then waking noisily): No, no, Janet, merely contemplating Bangkok Knackers … it’s a nasty business … and (suddenly in demonic voice) I will tear you from your lips to your lips, and devour your liver and kidneys for my pleasure!

J: What was that, doctor? I did not quite catch what you said.

C (recovering his usual voice): Oh … I was wondering whether you had any dips, or chips, which I might have, perhaps with a little liver or kidneys, for my dinner?

J: Well, yes, I bought some liver yesterday from Georgie McKane …

C: Not Georgie McKane, the Butcher of Dunblane?

J: The same. 

C: But he’s a brutal murderer, Janet! It was probably a human liver! They don’t call him the Butcher of Dunblane for nothing!

J: Oh, Doctor Cameron, I am surprised at you. All that talk of murder, and mutilation, is just gossip. They call him the Butcher of Dunblane not because he was a brutal murderer who dismembered the bodies of his victims, but because he was a butcher … in Dunblane … He was famous for his sausages before he moved to Tannochbrae and set up shop in the High Street. I doubt very much that the piece of liver I bought from him yesterday is human. But if you fancy some chips and dips with it, then I am afraid you are going to be disappointed … Though I suppose I could go out to one of the McDonalds and get some chips if you really want them. Both Flora McDonald in the High Street, and Trevor McDonald in Squeaker’s Lane, make lovely chips, and never put any monosodium glutamate in them …

C: Thank you, Janet. That sounds delicious. Now, I must get up and out on my rounds … I have a dozen patients to visit before sundown, which as you know, falls around 4:00 p.m. in these parts, summer and winter …

J: Aye, doctor, if only we could move Scotland a little farther South, so that we would cease to be the land of eternal winter!

C: I like the winter, Janet … (suddenly in demonic voice) In the morning I will dine upon your flesh, make leather from slivers of your hide, and wrap my naked body in the steaming froth of your hot, hot entrails!

J: I am afraid I did not catch that, doctor. Your voice sounds rather gruff. I do hope you have not caught something nasty from Archie Slender. What was it you said?

C (normal again): Oh … Janet … only that I like the winter, when the morning, shining and fresh, makes the heather silver on the mountainside, and I can wrap up my aching body and take a steaming broth, and all that that entails … 

J: How very poetic, doctor. I wonder, have you been possessed by the spirit of Rabbi Burns, the great Scottish-Jewish poet?

C: Possessed you say? Hmmm. Why does that ring a bell?

Thinly: You may have forgotten that I am here, and have been here all along. It’s me, doctor Thinly. I would not blame you. I had almost forgotten it myself, listening to this mind-numbingly tedious conversation. Indeed, so weary and distracted had I become that I had moved from the corner, where I had been crouching, as was my wont when I was alive, out into the room, and was sitting, as best an incorporeal being may, on one of the kitchen chairs, near where Janet was standing with her back to the stove. I drew myself wearily up … and, as I did so, it seemed that Janet’s eye caught the movement, and she looked, for a moment, right at my spectre, as if she saw me, or a faint intimation of my form at any rate.

J: Dr Cameron, I have just seen a faint intimation of the form of Dr Thinly.

C: Where?

J: There on that chair.

C: Where on that chair?

J: Right there … A faint intimation, with specs on, and unruly hair, now it’s faded away, it’s not there …

C: A bespectacled spectre, eh? I do not believe you, Janet. There is no such thing as a ghost!

J: I tell you, I saw it doctor Cameron, as plainly as I see you … Well, not perhaps quite that plainly, but as plain as day, as plain as young Jeanette McConkie from the Post Office …

C: Aye, well, she is very plain …

J: We are haunted, doctor Cameron. The spirit of doctor Thinly is unquiet.

T: You’re not wrong there woman! I have been talking to you for the past eight weeks, but you never bloody hear me!

J: There are no two ways about it, doctor. We will have to call in at the Kirk and ask the Reverend MacPortillo to come and exorcise the surgery.

T: A thousand strange emotions shook my spectre … Well, three or four perhaps. Why did Janet see my ghostly presence as in any way a threat, and want to have me exorcised? And what would happen to me if she succeeded in this aim? Would my ghost simply be dissipated, or would I be sent to some sort of judgement by the Almighty, as MacPortillo and his kind would have us believe? One thing was clear. If I was going to be exorcised, I had to tell my story first, to let the world, or at least my friends, know that I was murdered by a familiar hand, and of my sojourn in the land of the Sea-King … But, quick as a flash, before I could really advance the narrative at all, Cameron burst forth with demonic power.

C (demon voice): Curse you Janet Macpherson! I will not have that bloated prelate in this house! If he comes here I will tear him from loins to cake-hole, and make a satchel from his belly and a wee purse from his scrotum!

J: Oh doctor, your voice does sound very rough. But I understood you well enough that time. Is it something personal you have against the minister?

C (recovering himself): No, no, Janet. Just a general dislike of the clergy, a disdain for their bells and sanctimony … And a desire to rip them open and make satchels from their bellies, and wee purses from their scrotums, of course. That’s perfectly normal, I would say, round here, in Tannochbrae, there are not many folk who would not wish to make a wee purse out of the Reverend’s ball-sack.

J: I cannot entirely agree with you, doctor. And I think I will have just a wee word with the minister on Sunday, about ghosties and ghoulies.

C: I rather wish I hadn’t mentioned goolies. I cannot stop thinking about them now.

T: So that was the way the plot was going. I was beginning to wonder. It seemed to be wandering wildly. And now I have to believe both in demonic possession and in exorcism, and to understand that the evil creature inside my old friend fears the Reverend Portillo … Are we in for a monstrous battle between good and evil, with myself, an innocent spectre, caught in the middle? Tune in next week, to find out … But wait! The episode is not over yet. What’s this? A scratching at the door from the surgery …

J: There’s someone in the surgery doctor.

C: Nonsense Janet, the street-door is locked now.

J: Can you not guess who it is?

C: I don’t know what you are saying, Janet. There cannot be anyone there!

J: I will let them in.

T: It was Archie Slender. He was not dead, or not fully dead anyway. But he looked ghastly as he shuffled forward, doubled up, with his arse stuck in a fire-bucket.

C: Mr Slender, you’re not dead!

Slender (wheedling voice): No, doctor, I am nae dead. But thanks to you I am cured, free of the daemon that once inhabited me!

C: Aye, and your throat sounds rather better too …

S: There was nothing wrong with my throat, doctor, as you weel know. When I consulted you this morning I was possessed, held prisoner by an evil homunculus, and the next thing I remember I woke up free, but bent over and stuffed into a fire-bucket. I am most grateful, doctor, for your attentions, whatever they may have been. Was putting me in the fire-bucket part of the cure?

C: No … not really. That was more … housekeeping …

S: How did you do it then, doctor? How did you … Ohhh, I see. There’s a fire in your eee now that I ken weel enough … My wee daemon is now your wee daemon! Keep away from me Cameron! I d’nay want it back!

T: And so saying he fled, very clumsily, just like a wingless bird … with its arse in a fire-bucket.

C: He’s gone through the window, Janet … Ah such a shame, that he should survive all this – a sore-throat, sudden death, being folded into a fire-bucket, and then unexpected resurrection – only to be quite mad!

J: Is he mad, doctor Cameron? Or is he telling the truth? Have you been possessed by a devil since this morning’s surgery? It would explain all those peculiar things you have said about tearing vicars open and abusing their scrotums and the like … you usually only approach subjects of that nature after your third scotch … I believe it may be you that needs the ministrations of the good Reverend MacPortillo.

T: Cameron’s eyes flashed with green fire but he mastered himself.

C (mastering himself): No, no, Janet. It is only children who believe in ghoulies, and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties possessing elderly medics. I can assure you … it is so much moonshine! (demonic voice) And if you ever mention it again, Jezebel, I will tear your tongue from your head and your lungs from your breast … and make of them … a haggis!

 Stiff announcer: You have been listening to ‘Ghoulies and Ghosties’, the second part of ‘The Tannochbrae Horror’, an episode of Dr Thinly’s Casebook. The cast was as follows: Dr Cameron, Andrew Crookback … Janet, Barbara Sullen … Dr Thinly, Bill Simpleton … Archie Slender, Alexander Horsethief. The play was produced by Pottie Winkles.

DM: By this stage I was, I confess, slipping from the shores of the real world into the ocean of sleep and erotic dreams. With an effort I ejected Doggerel from the throne of my lap and began to make my stumbling way to bed …

Announcer: That was The adventures of Donald McQueen, bibliographer. Today’s chapter was sponsored by the Bibliographical Society of London, and by The Bibliographer’s Companion, manufactured by Johann Sebastian Bach and Sons: you will never have to leave the library for a widdle, or even rise from your chair, again with The Bibliographer’s Companion. It was written and performed by Paul W. Nash with special guests Elizabeth Crowley, William Hale, Rebecca Howard, Lucy Matheson, Georgina Shomroni, Iona Spark, David Stumpp and Stewart Tiley. The Dr Thinley theme was stolen from Trevor Duncan.

Next time in The Adventures of Donald McQueen, Bibliographer. 

Holmes (narrating): My dear Watson, I write these few lines through the courtesy of Professor Moriarty, who awaits my convenience at the Reichenbach Falls for the final discussion of those questions which lie between us … I am pleased to think that I shall be able to free society from any further effects of his presence, though I fear that it will be at a cost which will give pain to my friends, and especially, my dear Watson, to you … (shouting above the waterfall) Moriarty!

Moriarty (also shouting): Ah, Holmes, we meet again!

H: Could you come a little closer, Moriarty? I can barely hear the stupid things you are saying!

M: Is that better?

H: Yes, that’s better. Now, Moriarty, what were those stupid things you were saying?

M: There is no need to be rude, old fellow. We may be sworn enemies, and I may be about to fling you from this mountain path into the raging waters below, but we must maintain the niceties of cultivated intercourse …

H: Sod you, Moriarty! You’ve got on my tits for the last time!

M: Holmes! What has got into you?

H (mocking): The worst man in London? The Napoleon of Crime? The organizer of half that is evil and of nearly all that is undetected in this great city? My arse! You know what you are Moriarty? You’re a wanker!

M: What? Holmes, I do not understand you. Why are you saying these things? Surely the deal is that we meet here at the Falls, exchange some symbolic rhetoric, then disappear in such a way that no one knows whether you have killed me, or I you, or whether we have both perished.

H: Fuck that! I have had a belly-full of your symbolic rhetoric, Moriarty. You’re a tosser, man, a bastard, a git, a sod, a prat … a slag … a pillock … a chuffer!

M: What is a ‘chuffer’?

H: I don’t know! It’s some sort of insult! I heard Wiggins call one of the other Irregulars a ‘chuffer’ and thought it sounded … very insulting!

M: Holmes, is everything alright at home?

H (after a pause): Yes!

M: Are you sure?

H: No … It’s Watson. We’ve had a row!

M: Really? You’re upset because you’ve had a row with Watson?

H: Yes, it was stupid … about … you know, the cocaine thing! But now I am going to disappear in an ambiguous way, and I won’t be able to make it up to him.

M: Bear up, old chap. You know you’re coming back.

H: Yes, but not for years. I have to hide out in India and Tibet, for some reason, and all the while it will be playing on my mind. That stupid row! If only I hadn’t called him … I can’t tell you what I called him … but it was bad.

M: Listen, Holmes, we don’t have to do this ... We could just call it a day. Everyone will assume you have chucked me off the ledge, and I can go back to teaching mathematics at the University of East Anglia, which is what I really want to do … I am sick of being the Napoleon of Crime ... It’s not as much fun as you might think. I have to deal with a lot of nasty criminal types, and I am always hiding from the authorities, and being obstructed in my dastardly plans …

H: By me!

M: Yes, Holmes, by you! It has become a bit of a bore. That is why we are here on this ledge beside the roaring of the Reichenbach Falls … What say we call it a day? 

H (after a pause): I’m listening.

M: We can both get taxis. I will go back to Norwich, and write that treatise on differential calculus which has been on my mind since 1892. And you can go back to Baker Street and make it up with Watson.

H: Are you serious, Moriarty?

M: Deadly serious, Holmes.

H: Then I take back what I said about you being a wanker, a tosser, a bastard and so forth. You are … okay!

M: Thank you. And you are … okay too!

H: I can think only of Watson, now! Goodbye Moriarty. We will not meet again!

M: Goodbye Holmes. If you love him … go to him!

H: I will! I will! … Damn me, this path’s slippery … Ohhh … Ahhhhhhhhh! 

M: Oh dear … What a shame. It wasn’t supposed to end like that!