~ Lord Likely and the Bloody Nuisances, Part Four ~

For the previous chapter, please click here.

From the Journals of Lord Likely, Aristocratic Adventurer and Gentle-Man of Action.

MR. STRIX hissed at me, and opened his mouth to reveal his fearsome fanged teeth. Any doubts I may have had pertaining to the existence of vampires were quickly vanishing in the face of cold, hard, pointy facts.

With another loud hiss, Mr. Strix lunged at me, but I proved much too quick for the blood-sucking bounder, and deftly leapt out of the way. Strix proceeded to fall over a table behind where I’d stood, and then he landed in a rather undignified and un-terrifying heap.

“By Beelzebub’s Acrid Arse-Gas!” I exclaimed as I gathered myself up. “What a turn-up for the books, eh?” I turned to my companions, Inspector Spunkleford and my man-servant, Botter (still clutching his erroneous steak), who were both trembling and white with fear. I believe Botter may have even soiled himself slightly, but I was not prepared to investigate further.

“H-he’s an actual vampire!” Spunkleford stammered, pointing a shaky finger in Strix’s direction.

“Very good, inspector,” I remarked. “I dare say you shall quickly work your way up to commissioner with such remarkable deductive skills.”

“B-but he’s a vampire!” Spunkleford repeated.

“Yes, so we have established. Now, what say we get out of this forsaken hell-hole before that very same vampire recovers himself, hmmm?”

But, even as I spoke it was much too late, and Strix was scrabbling to his feet, his eyes glowing with rage.

“I…musssst…FEEEEEED!” he snarled.

“Quick, Spunkleford! Show him your cross!” I bellowed.

“Erm…all-all right, Likely,” Spunkleford replied nervously, before stepping up in front of Mr. Strix, puffing his chest out in a feeble attempt to look braver than he actually was. “Now…now listen here, my man…I really am rather annoyed, you know…and…and I have found your behaviour quite unacceptable. Furthermore, I – ”

“No, Spunkleford!” I cried out, exasperated. “Don’t show him YOU ARE cross, show him YOUR cross – your damned crucifix!”

Spunkleford nodded his comprehension, but as he went to reach into his pocket to retrieve the cross, Strix was upon him, bashing him out of the way like he was nothing more than a portly, middle-aged rag-doll, and sending him flying into a beam on the other side of the room. That would most assuredly leave a mark, I mused, before refocusing my attention on Strix, who was gliding toward me, his arms outstretched in my direction.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” I said. “What is your obsession with me? I dare say Spunkleford had more blood in him than I! I mean you only have to look at him to realise he is positively brimming with the stuff…surely he would make for a fine feast indeed? No?…oh, to hell with it all!” I cried, as I grabbed the raw steak from Botter’s limp grasp, and then brought it sharply across Strix’s face as he leapt at me once more. The full-force of the lump of cow-meat forced Strix to spin round two hundred and forty degrees, at which point he lost his footing and collapsed back onto the table, inadvertently skewering himself on a solid-gold fountain pen which had been resting in an ink-well.

From the diary of Mr. Strix, Vampire.

Owch.

From the Journals of Lord Likely, Aristocratic Adventurer and Gentle-Man of  Action.

Strix let out a piercing shriek, writhed about for a bit, before falling silent and limp on the table.

“Well,” I smiled, hurling the steak back to Botter. “It seems he certainly got the POINT, eh Botter?”

“Very good, milord,” Botter drawled.

“The point…of the pen,” I added.

“Yes, milord.”

“In his chest.”

“Um…yes.”

“And then he died.”

“Erm…”

“Right! Enough quick-fire witticisms! Let us get out of here and – oh-ho? What now?” I exclaimed, as Strix’s body started to steam and crackle noisily, like bacon on a stove, and then – before our very eyes – the corpse began to melt, the skin slipping off the bones and dissolving into smoke.

“Bloody hell!” I remarked.

“I…I think I’m going to be sick…” Botter whined.

At that point, Strix’s maid entered the room, eager to see what all the commotion was about. “What’s all the commotion in here?” she said, confirming my previous sentence. “What’s been happening? Where’s the mast – oh!” Her eyes fell upon the smouldering remains of her former employer, moving her to emit a loud, piercing scream. Thus sated, she swiftly passed out in a dead faint into my manly arms.

“She must have been rather perturbed by the terrible mess,” I hypothesised. “I dare say there’s a good hour or two’s worth of cleaning to be done in here. Poor thing,” I said, stroking strands of the girl’s red hair from her eyes. “Listen, Botter…I shall go and make sure this poor darling is comfortable…you go and check on the inspector. I fear his pride may be slightly bruised, at least if the angle at which he hit that beam is anything to go by.”

“Very good, milord,” Botter nodded, scuttling off to perform my wishes.

“Wha…what happened?” murmured the maid, as she slowly returned to a state of consciousness.

“Do not worry yourself dear,” I cooed sympathetically. “The nightmare is over now – and forever more!”

- Lord Likely.

Next Week in “Lord Likely and the Bloody Nuisances”: The Nightmare is Far From Over!

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AND SO there I was, stood betwixt a rifle-toting huntsman and my prized pet lion Thundercock, outside London Zoo. The atmosphere was so tense you could have cut the air with a knife, taken a slice and made yourself a very strained sandwich. It really was very tense indeed.

“Cackshott,” I said, addressing the crazed hunter carefully. “Lower the rifle. Come on, just put it down now.”

“Not until I’ve bagged that creature!” Colonel Cackshott cried in return.

“You shall not be ‘bagging’ anything, you miscreant.”

“Oh no?” Cackshott retorted, raising his rifle up as he took aim at the lion.

“No.” I said sternly, moving myself between Cackshott’s rifle and dear Thundercock. “If you want to shoot that lion, you shall have to go through me first.” I paused. “And if you want to go through me, you shall have to go through my man-servant before that.”

“What?” Botter exclaimed, peeking his head out from his hiding place behind a nearby cab.

“‘Tis in your contract, you know,” I explained patiently.

“I don’t have a contract.”

“Well, I have a copy. I keep it in my head. Trust me, that clause is most definitely there.”

Botter and I continued to discuss the small print of his entirely fictitious contract; not only because I enjoy tormenting my wretched servant, but also because I had noticed Inspector Spunkleford creeping out from behind the back of the cab, and I was discreetly watching him silently motioning to the police officers outside the zoo. I reasoned that Spunkleford was formulating some sort of ambush on Cackshott while he was distracted, and thus I had hoped my continued contractual dispute with Botter would buy the officers ample time to carry out their plan.

“…milord? ” Botter continued, having gone unheard whilst I had been observing Spunkleford’s machinations.

“Hmm? What?” I said, half-watching the officers slowly sneaking toward the increasingly agitated Cackshott.

“I said, ‘is there any way that my lawyer can see this contract, milord’?”

“You don’t have a lawyer, Botter.”

“No, but I can imagine one,” Botter replied. “And I was thinking that an imaginary lawyer would be very well qualified to examine an imaginary contract.”

“Botter, that is surprisingly witty for you,” I exclaimed. “Of course, you do realise that there is a clause in your contract stating that you shall never attempt to be funnier than your master, so I am afraid you are in direct breach of your terms of employment, and -”

“SHUT UP!” screamed Cackshott, finally growing impatient of our banter. “By jove, you two do speak a load of old rot, you know.”

“Charming,” I mumbled, as I watched the policemen cautiously advance upon Cackshott.

And then everything went to hell in a handbasket.

First, one of the officers stood on a stick – or it might well have been a stick-insect which had managed to escape from the zoo itself, I cannot be sure. At any rate, it snapped under the policeman’s foot with a loud crack, causing Cackshott to swivel round quickly.

“Stop right there!” he bellowed, pointing his rifle straight at the clod-footed copper. “One more move and I shall blast you all to kingdom-bloody-come!”

While Cackshott screamed blue murder at the policemen, I saw my chance to take him down myself. Well, if you want a job done properly, leave it to an aristocratic adventurer and gentle-man of action, after all. I began dashing toward Cackshott, but he was on high alert by now, and he swung back around to face me, his gun trained on my lordly form. I skidded to a halt a few feet shy of my target.

“No second chances!” yelled Cackshott, as he raised his gun.

I braced myself for the impending bullet and a woefully unspectacular demise at the hand of a nut-bar in a terribly dishevelled safari suit.

Cackshott pulled the trigger, and time slowed to a crawl.

There was a deafening roar, something struck me hard, and then there was nothing but complete and utter blackness.

*****

OF course, it does not take a genius to realise that I had not been killed, else how would I have written up this astonishing adventure? No, instead I regained consciousness on the street, Botter’s filthy face being the first sight my eyes beheld as they flickered open.

“Eurrrrggh…” I moaned. “Is this hell?”

“Milord!” Botter beamed, gently mopping my brow with a wet towel. “You are alright!”

“Argh! Tits on stilts!” I gasped as I moved to sit up, pain flashing through the right-hand side of my body. “What the ruddy hell happened? All I remember is being hit by something…”

“Allow me to field that one!” chirped Spunkleford, suddenly coming into view beside me. “It was incredible, Likely! Absolutely incredible!”

“What was? What in the name of Dickens’ dick-end are you babbling about?”

“Well, Cackshott went to shoot you, but then – oh, my! Your pet lion suddenly bounded on up like a locomotive, and knocked you clear from danger! He saved you, Likely! He saved your very life!”

I grinned. “Oh, Thundercock! A more loyal pet one could not possibly ask for! You’d do well to learn by his example, Botter,” I said, turning to my man-servant. “So, where is dear Thundercock? I should like to thank him personally!”

Botter and Spunkleford exchanged solemn glances.

“Erm…well, you see…Thundercock did save your life…but…well, it was at a cost, I am afraid…” Spunkleford sighed. “He didn’t just knock you clear from the firing line, Likely. He took the bullet, as well.”

“What? So…so where is he? Where is Thundercock?” I asked, as I scrambled to my feet, looking around for my proud pet. “Answer me, damn your eyes!”

Spunkleford gently removed his hat and lowered his head. “I…I am afraid we lost him, Likely. I am so very sorry.”

“No!” I shouted, dropping back down to my knees. “It…it cannot be! Not dear Thundercock! Dear God, no! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

“Um…” Spunkleford interjected, ruining a perfectly good dramatic moment. “We…we did find him again, though.”

“What?” I said, mid-outcry.

“Oh, yes. You see, Thundercock DID take the bullet, that much is true. We thought he was done for, but as my men pounced on Cackshott and took him away, that old lion starts stirring, then he starts sniffing the air, and then lo and behold, he gets back up!” Spunkleford shook his head in disbelief as he recounted the events. “Before we know what’s happening, that lion of yours goes bounding off into the zoo! We managed to track him down, to the big cat enclosure. It turns out that he caught the scent of a couple of lionesses there…and…well, he went to…erm…well, you know…”

A wide grin spread across my face. “Ha-ha! That old devil! Takes a bullet and still has time for the ladies! Ha! Clearly, he takes after his beloved master, eh?”

And with that we all fell into helpless laughter, such was the hilarity of my humourous observation.

Toodle-pip!

- Lord Likely.