Forget the Fish!

“There’s stuff going on we don’t know about.” observed Boz.   “Now, what about those poor coleyfish?”

“Forget the fish.” Snapped McGoogs, “You heard; our Derbyshire venture is officially sanctioned.   We’re doing the caves.”

 Ferdy called up the Silvertown Airways control tower, situated in the Royal Docks, on his smart-phone and asked to speak to his chief pilot, Beryl Clutterbuck.   She was mid-channel, returning a Handley Page H.P. 42 from their aerodrome on Guernsey, but was able to be put through via the radio.

“Beryl, we need the flying boat for a trip up north.”

 Once Ferdinand was off the phone they finalised some of the minor details and Phoebles voiced the reservation of the majority.

“Well, I suppose that’s settled then, but...”

To toast the venture they all downed their tots of single malt and took long draughts from their pints.   Slasher performed an obscure ritual with his salt and lemon before slugging back the shot of tequila.   “I’ll be going up to Derbyshire in the Pontiac.   See you up there”

The 1938 Pontiac Silver Streak Sports Coupé, vibrant GPO red, upholstered in light tan mohair, white walled tyres, was parked, half on the pavement, opposite the Den.   It glistened colourfully against the backdrop of monochrome bonded warehouses and depositories along the narrow highway.   Slasher sauntered unnoticed, as if his Lycra one-piece rendered him invisible, through the growing crowd, drawn by the antics of Larry’s dirigible and its stunning tortoise-shell chauffeur.   Phoebles’ yellow, Multi spotted pantaloons, conversely, were drawing less than favourable remarks from pointing urchins with their noses pressed to the Catnip Den bay window.   A burbling roar of supercharged Pontiac echoed off the surrounding walls; the 8 cylinder flat-head bored out, souped-up and the tank full of jet fuel.

“That thing’s a bomb on wheels!”

 There was a grinding of gears, a high-pitched whine from under the bonnet and the Pontiac sprang forward.   McGoogs was away through the narrow, cobbled lanes of Limehousesailortown.

The remaining foursome returned to the bedsit to pack their kitbags whilst Dark Flo prepared sandwiches of Herrings In, nautically known as HITS, on white bread, piled on a blue and white Staffordshire Ironstone plate decorated with a Flying P windjammer under full sail.   She wrapped the lot – plate and all - in cling film and placed them in a small hamper along with a bottle of Pusser’s Rum and a packet of Russian Caravan tea.

As the boys came down she was adding a sealed tin of Soma Catnip to the supplies.

“How did you get that?” gasped Ginsbergbear, “That stuff’s rarer than rocking horse dung.   Never leaves India”

“The bell-hop in the Eden Hotel in Kathmandu bunged me a bit from under the counter in gratitude for a particular favour.   Cut it with your Black Alamout Catnip Shag or Phoebles’ stash of White Goddess.   There’s not much of it and it’s expensive.”

At this they became aware of the rhythmic thrub of a dozen unsynchronised piston engines.   The Dornier Do X was doing a circuit over Bozzy’s Catnip Den and the gang rushed out onto the balcony to watch it landing on the London River in a shower of spray like an obese drake on an oily duck pond.

The gigantic silver flugschiff had had the clapped out air-cooled Jupiter engines replaced with six pairs of only slightly second hand 610 hp Curtiss Conqueror water-cooled 12-cylinder inline engines and now sported an art deco Silvertown Airways logo below the portholes along the length of the hull.

Beryl’s voice crackled over the Marconi Marine Nautilus transceiver that sat behind the bar.

“Come aboard, when you are ready”

Waving goodbye to Dark Flo they dropped the kitbags into a dumpy clinker build skiff that was tied to a ladder at back of den.   The hamper and crew followed and an invigorating five minutes was spent tugging on a cord wound round the head of a recalcitrant Seagull outboard.   In a sudden cloud of blue smoke and with a tuc… tuc… hick, tuc… tuc-tuc-tuc-tuc-tuc the motor sprang into life and they were weaving their way out into the river, trailing a rainbow scar of two-stroke across the surface of the water.

Beryl met them at the starboard stub and deftly caught the thrown painter.   She was tall, slender and clad, somewhat incongruously, in a sheepskin-flying jacket over her flowered cotton frock.   Neither matched her sky blue fur-lined ankle-boots.   Inside the hull a small crew of Kronstadt sailors was lined up for inspection.   They saluted Boz as he came aboard and their  Starshina (Chief Petty Officer) piped a high-pitched whistle that hurt Phoebles’ ears.

“Commodore Desai, would you like to pilot the old girl for the first part of the trip?   I will operate the throttles in the machine centre,” suggested Beryl, addressing Ferdy, “And we can swap round once we’re over Rugby.”