Temptations of the Flush (Act VIII)

Act VIII – Abyss

* * *

Characters:

LUIGI - gravedigger.
CARDINAL PURVES - elderly incontinent.
LAZZARO - Pope Rightvinger’s acolyte, assassin.
POPE RIGHTVINGER - Pope Emeritus.
STAVROS - mortician
MARIA - cleaning lady

‘In breaking news; homicide at a Vatican-owned guesthouse. Police are appealing for witnesses who may have visited the Valle Giulia precinct of Rome at around 2 am yesterday. A notorious red-light district, the area has long been a focus for criminal activity. Experts have ruled out suicide, saying the crime bears the hallmarks of a ‘ritual killing’. A citywide murder hunt has now been launched. Unconfirmed reports suggest a masked ‘monk’ was seen fleeing the scene, leading to speculation of some sort of vigilante attack. Authorities have warned people not to approach the suspect and to report anything suspicious immediately. Although not yet formally identified, the victim is said to be a senior-ranking official within the Vatican. We will of course keep you up to date with this and other news as it develops. Now, on a lighter note, the extraordinary story of one woman’s claim to have found the rosary of Saint Francis…’

‘Bollocks.’ Luigi removed the headphones as his mind spun. He extended an arm from the hospital bed and picked up the vase resting on his bedside table. Although the single daffodil hadn’t fared well on its regime of surgical spirit, he suspected the draft would prove a tonic for human life. I must warn them, came a voice as the mental fog gave way to an agreeable alcoholic haze.

Due to a miscellany of weekend accidents, medical staff were too distracted to mark his egress. After a surprise encounter with Bertilloni, Luigi learned of the gala banquet at the palace. If Lazzaro struck there’d be carnage! And what if the rogue had accomplices…they could even be planning a mass culling…? A timely warning to the cardinals might bestow honours? Fame? But sod that, it could mean financial rewards…booze money? Fortified with liquor, Luigi shambled determinedly towards the Lateran Palace.

* * *

In the bustle of caterers bearing trays of coffees into the hall, Luigi noticed a familiar face hobbling along the corridor. He made a beeline towards Cardinal Purves who peered up at him quizzically.

‘Luigi my son…is that you?’ he croaked. ‘From the orphanage, am I correct?’

‘Yes,’ Luigi wheezed. ‘Listen, no time to explain…you must warn everyone. I believe there’s a plot…to um…’ Luigi’s voice trailed off as he felt a hostile stare. He glanced up and caught sight of Lazzaro loitering by a pillar. He froze as their eyes met.

‘A plot? Erm, erm…to what end?’ Purves pressed. ‘What must we beware of…?’

‘Backstabbers!’ Luigi blurted as Lazzaro smirked and then bounded towards him.

Purves stared agog as Luigi bolted, sidestepped a knot of waiters and then sped towards the exit. In blind panic, he tore up the dim stairwell. Rapid footfalls echoed from below as he vaulted up another flight, then another, his lungs searing. Gasping, he sprawled headlong through an exit and tumbled out into redolent night air. Dizzy, he slunk into the shadow of a lesser cupola, attempting to arrest his frantic gasps as the cityscape reeled. He took a lug from his flask and peered out towards the exit. Dominating the rooftop, the Dome of St Peter’s Basilica, swathing him in shadow. Tall stone saints perched on ledges, backs turned, and inert to the world they gazed upon.

The door clattered open and the pursuer sprang onto the asphalt roof. Luigi shrank back as Lazzaro crept along a row of statues, sword drawn, until he was obscured behind the vast cupola.

As his head pounded, Luigi realised there was but one fleeting opportunity of escape - the door he’d entered by. Other exits could be locked and any noise would betray him. He dithered, uncertain if his attacker may lurk in ambush.

Startlingly, shadow took form at the periphery of his vision. He quailed, stumbling sideways towards the precipice. He steadied himself against a statue, gasping, as Lazzaro emerged like a spectre and stalked towards him.

‘Here…keep the bleedin’ thing this time!’ Luigi wailed, throwing the gold bracelet at the killer. The blade flashed past his blurring sight. He swooned and slumped to his knees.

Lazzaro’s pale face contorted into a sneer. ‘Too late, gravedigger,’ he snickered. ‘Can you fly, ah? Like these things…?’ He gestured along the saintly effigies. ‘Or perhaps that’s just wishful thinking, ah?’

Luigi began to feel peculiarly detached and resigned to his doom. He mourned his daughter, his life and the sum of all his dashed hopes. ‘You remind me of myself. All that anger…that nihilism. Go on then, take your best shot mate. I care not for this world,’ he cried. ‘You think you can take something I haven’t already lost?’

Lazzaro pressed the sword to Luigi’s throat. ‘What the fuck would you know about me? Go on, get on the fucking ledge. It’ll look like an accident.’

Luigi complied. He swayed precariously, steadying himself against a marble limb. Distant traffic glimmered beneath him like fireflies as a balmy breeze ruffled his hair. ‘Let go of the anger son…or you’ll never find solace.’

Lazzaro swung the blade at him. ‘Anger?’ he yelled. ‘Oh I’m dealing with the anger alright…an eye for an eye, yeah? Or both eyes if necessary.’

‘What…what happened?’ Luigi stammered. ‘Tell me…let me understand…before I leave this sorry world.’

‘There’s nothing left to understand. And even if there was, it changes nothing. They stole my childhood. They tore my soul apart!’

‘Who did?’ Luigi pressed, ‘You mean those you’ve…slain?’

Lazzaro stepped from back into shadow and eyed the gravedigger somberly. ‘Yeah…Garibaldi and his cohorts…those wolves in shepherd’s clothing. I was twelve when those demons of hell set upon me. I thought the agony would never end, I…’ his voice trailed off and became choked by sobs. The sword wavered in his hand as he wiped his eyes with a sleeve. ‘After they’d finished with me Garibaldi taunted me…beat the shit out of me. Then left me for dead. And I wish, too, that I had died…because nothing survived that inferno but hate.’

Luigi looked down pitifully at the young man. He swigged his flask and then gazed into the churning chasm beneath his feet. ‘So this is your answer…what you’re doing…? This is this justice?’

‘Justice?’ the assassin sniffed with a bitter laugh. ‘It is not justice I seek, it’s retribution. ‘Never can true reconcilement grow where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep’*…’ Oh yeah, I’ll see them all in hell my friend.’

‘It’s true they’re not fit to administer the sacraments,’ Luigi said, ‘those who’ve trespassed against you. By rights they should abase themselves at your feet…plead for clemency. But instead they close ranks, prevaricate…connive to evade justice. Believe me, son, I know.’

‘What can you possibly know, uh…a gravedigger, a drunkard…?’

Luigi sighed and tried to drown his melancholy in a long swig. ‘It happened to me too…at the orphanage,’ he confessed gloomily. ‘I lost my innocence before I lost my first tooth. Maybe revenge is the answer? I mean, do you take an eye for the eye or turn the other cheek? I could never quite decide. Anyways, this priest…this vampire of the soul…well, he died before I could find the courage to confront him.’

‘So you let him ruin other lives did you?’ Lazzaro sneered. ‘You’re such a fucking coward!’

‘Perhaps I am, son,’ Luigi conceded desolately. ‘Mind you, I did piss in his grave...during the reading of his eulogy. Then, well…I kind of drank my way out of it I s’pose.’ He lifted his flask in salute and then slurped at it heartily. ‘Cheers…here’s to this wonderful life!’ he spluttered over the rooftops, swaying precariously and belching. ‘‘Cus it don’t get much better than this, does it, ah?’

The question was met by the wail of distant sirens. A buffeting wind picked up causing the gravedigger to teeter at the brink.

‘Get down.’ Lazzaro ordered. ‘I don’t need to kill someone who’s already dead. You’re not even a threat, are you? Look at you; a joker, a derelict… a dead man condemned to life. No one listens to a word you say, do they?’

Luigi gave a hollow laugh. ‘No? Well what about you?’ he inquired of the saint that he clung on to. ‘Are you listening? You got a tongue in yer’ head? No?’ He remonstrated theatrically along the row of plinths. ‘Are any of you fuckers listening, uh? Come on, let’s hear you. What do you have to say for yourselves?’ He pocketed his flask and began to climb up the statue with a fearlessness that only drunkards know.

Lazzaro dropped his sword edged towards the gravedigger. ‘I said get down. I don’t want your blood on my conscience.’

‘Your conscience?’ Luigi laughed feverishly as he shimmied upwards and hauled himself, gasping, onto the shoulders of Saint Michael. ‘Look at it all,’ he wheezed, gesturing expansively. ‘Does any of this pomp and grandeur mean anything? Or is it all just a load of bollocks, uh? A sprawling folly for those chasing the immortality of gods? Is it really anything more than existential narcissism, uh…? Go on, answer me you impotent fucker!’ he bellowed, shaking a fist accusingly at the heavens. ‘Yeah…where are yer’ bleedin’ thunderbolts now, ah?’

Lazzaro began to scale the statue and made a grab for Luigi’s ankle.

‘Oi, get yer’ bleedin…’ Luigi squirmed free as Lazzaro tried to gain purchase on his leg. From somewhere below he heard a thunderous smash, and then strains of classical music. Is that…Ride of The Valkyries...? he pondered absently.

By now, Lazzaro had straddled the opposite arm and attempted to wrestle Luigi from his lofty perch. The music became louder, accompanied by an intermittent droning. As the pair continued to tussle something large and metallic hurtled past, slewing around the dome. They heard a snatch of maniacal laughter. Then, they gazed disbelievingly as the contraption rounded back at them, skimmed the asphalt roof, bounced and then cartwheeled towards them.

 ‘Achtung! Achtung!’ the occupant screamed.

Lazzaro made a lunge for the gravedigger’s arm and wrenched him sideways causing him to topple.

The Kriegvagon slammed into the statue with an almighty crash, knocking it plummeting into an inky abyss. As the flying machine nosedived into Saint Peter’s square there was a hiss as the driver jettisoned free and shot upwards. A clatter of shattering masonry was followed by a distant flare and the peel of an explosion.

As Luigi lay dazed and bruised on the ledge he saw a parachute open in the glowing firmament. Amongst the rubble strewn about him, jutting up, was the remains of the stone angel, sheared off at the ankles. ‘Ah bollocks,’ he muttered. His thoughts turned to Lazzaro. For some moments he considered following him into the void. But then he remembered he still had drink in his flask and shelved the plans.

Luigi watched idly as the parachute wended its way towards the apex of the basilica. As it settled there he discerned a distinct yowling cry. Sirens drew closer. He wanted to call out but giddiness overwhelmed him and his horizons went black.

* * *
 

‘Is he dead?’ came a familiar voice.

Stavros? Luigi’s eyes flickered open. A couple of paramedics were attending him.

‘No, he’s still with us,’ one of the medics said. ‘Nothing broken but he may have concussion.’

Stavros’s face loomed as he grinned down at his colleague. ‘Yet another lucky escape, hmm? So how are you feeling?’

‘Inebriated,’ Luigi slurred, wincing as he turned his head. ‘Lazzaro…dead…?’

‘Yes. So he was the serial killer, eh? Forensics confirmed it. You know it’s fortunate you weren’t diced like the others. Strange though…’

‘What?’ Luigi mumbled.

‘Well, I was there just before he died... before police arrived. I’d come looking for you after you absconded from the hospital. Anyway, he gasped out your name. Then he flung this bracelet at my feet. He wanted you to have it I think? He started blathering something about Saint Michael watching over lost sheep. And that was it…he died.’ Stavros handed Luigi the bracelet.

‘Thanks,’ Luigi muttered tearfully. ‘He saved me.’ He directed his gaze toward the cupola. ‘What about…?’

‘You mean the Emeritus?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well, the paramedics won’t be able to move him yet. Apparently he’s kind of lodged on the spire. In fact they think he might be impaled on his rectum. So it looks like he’ll have to stay put for now. At least until they can locate a surgeon with a head for heights.’

‘He scored a bullseye uh? Oh well, at least it’ll serve to curtail his usual outpourings.’ Luigi commented with a wry grin.

‘Quite,’ Stavros remarked. ‘Ah well, he’s did always claim the moral high ground... In fact I don’t think the cardinals are too enamoured with him right now. I overheard one of them saying something about getting him to the nunnery…letting the sisters of the Magdalene Laundries ‘take care of him’.’

‘Ah. What about that explosion?’ Luigi asked.

‘Oh that? That must have been the wheelchair colliding with a kebab van. Ah well, maybe God’s a vegetarian, huh?’ Stavros winked mischievously.

Luigi was strapped into a stretcher, hoisted up and carried down the stairwell. As he was taken from the palace and bobbed along through a sea of flashing lights he noticed a police cordon around Lazzaro’s body that lay amongst the wreckage of the fallen idol. Looking down at the broken life, he felt overwhelmed with pathos. He was touched by an inexplicable kinship with a soul twisted by fury and riven by sorrow. To this pitiful state; the once fearful and enigmatic assassin. This monstrosity, this Caliban; worse than the defilers who’d fashioned him…

Criminal, victim…human being.

* * *

After a considerable media hullabaloo, Vatican affairs eventually returned to a semblance of normality. Bertilloni was arrested, further clerical scandals had the kibosh put on them and emollient words abounded. It was business as usual in the shady corridors of power.

Luigi was tasked with the sad duty of collecting the body of cardinal Purves, who’d passed away peacefully on the loo. As he scouted about the apartment for surplus supplies of alcohol, he bumped into Maria who’d been called in to give the place a quick spruce.

‘Ooh, darling, how are you?’ she gushed. ‘You recover from nearly drowning in da toilet, ah? You okay…?’

‘Yeah, mustn’t grumble,’ Luigi shrugged. ‘Oh, and thanks for rescuing me. I mean, my life very nearly went down the pan.’

‘Ooh don’t mention it,’ Maria crooned. ‘Speaking of toilets, y’know I had to help clear up that great big toilet they call the ‘banqueting hall’.’ She pulled a disdainful frown.

‘Really?’

‘Oooh, them dirty bastardos!’ Maria fumed. ‘Why can’t they shit in da lavatory like the rest of us, uh? Da poo-poo everywhere mate…on da carpet, da walls…’

‘Shocking,’ Luigi commiserated.

‘Oh-ho,’ she whinnied as she crossed herself, ‘I tell you they even shit on da bloody candelabra!’

‘Blimey, that must have been one hell of a bleedin’ party.’ Luigi remarked.

‘Yeah, I tell you mate. They must’ve been squirting it from da bloody chandeliers. But I don’t mind really…‘cause my sweetheart, His Holiness Franco, he give me Saint Francis rosary.’

‘I guess that must have been some consolation,’ the gravedigger humoured her.

‘Aw it was,’ Maria simpered. ‘So I tell him he should ‘come to mamma’ and I feed my baby some boobie,’. ‘He like-a-da ‘titanic titties’ y’know?’ the buxom cleaning lady explained whilst cupping an ample bosom.

‘Um….right.’ Luigi tittered, averting his gave somewhat.

‘Anyway, so after I change his dirty diaper and smack his naughty arse it’s bath time. So I scrub him down and then he beg mamma give him a soapy-tit-wank. But, y’know, he’s a true gentleman.’ Maria asserted with a knowing wink. ‘I mean, he never even made a grab for my piss-flaps.’

‘How very classy,’ Luigi slurred with a lopsided grin. ‘Right, well, I’d best cart off this bleedin’ stiff before my new governor starts whining.’

THE END

* Lucifer, Paradise Lost by John Milton.
 
© Edwin Black 2013

 

Temptations of the Flush (Act V)

Act V - Guest House

* * *

Characters:

LUIGI - gravedigger.
STAVROS - mortician
POPE RIGHTVINGER - outgoing pope.
POPE FRANCO - incoming pope.
MARIA - housemaid.

* * *

‘What’ll it be sir?’ the bar steward said smiling genially. ‘Oh and err…free drinks at the bar - compliments of the management.’

‘Yeah? Aww…well how about a surgical spirit on the rocks for starters - with a cheeky dash of embalming fluid, eh?’

‘Certainly sir. An excellent choice. And if you’ll pardon my boldness sir, it’s not often we’re graced by such esteemed company.’

‘Who me? Well…what can I say? I mean, one tries and confine one’s patronage to the more classy boutiques, y’know?’

‘I certainly do know sir,’ the bartender grinned. ‘May I say your reputation as the foremost curator of cadavers precedes you.’

‘Why thank you squire. Yeah…s’pose I do exude that certain ‘cachet’ innit?’

‘Indeed you do sir. Same again?’

‘Yeah, don’t mind if I do-oooh. Hang on…bit queasy. You got a–’

‘Spittoon? Naturally sir, allow me,’ the barman said, presenting a kidney dish.

‘Thank you-oooeeugh!’ The torrent that bleched from Luigi’s mouth flushed away the beatific vision revealing an ugly melee of swimming figures and abdominal cramp. ‘Ah Bollocks!’ he spluttered between regurgitations.

‘Hold his head,’ an ethereal female voice instructed.

Words detached from meaning and became a distant drone. He surrendered to darkness.

From the gloom a familiar face emerged. ‘Welcome back from the dead me’ old chum,’ Stavros said chirpily. ‘Well, technically you were only dead four minutes. I was actually working on your eulogy…’

Luigi heard the sound of crumpling paper. ‘Where…?’

‘You’re sampling the delights of Rome Memorial Hospital. Saved from going down the pan by Maria, the cleaning lady. She helped one of the domestic servants who was trying to haul you out the drink. Erm…and on the subject of drink, y’know you might want to mix a bit more tonic with it next time, hmm?’

‘Nah…it was-’

‘Past the cocktail hour? Yes I know. Nevertheless, a little early for a stupor don’t you think?’

‘Lazzaro…I…’

‘Yes, I suppose you are a bit of a ‘Lazarus’. Perhaps you have a guardian angel?’ Stavros mused with a wry grin. ‘Or maybe Bacchus looks fondly upon his adherents?’

Luigi mustered a wan grin before his mind drifted back along dark corridors.

* * *

The papal duo trundle to Domus Sanctæ Marthæ (the Vatican guest house)…

‘We’re somewhat relieved a Jesuit assumed office,’ Rightvinger remarked. ‘Had the Opus Dei candidate had got in it could have meant butt-spurs on the chairs.’

‘Most unseemly,’ Franco puffed as he scurried alongside the Kriegvagon.

‘Quite so. Did you say you hail from Argentina? You know, many of my childhood friends do their hailing there.’

‘Really?’ Franco wheezed.

The Emeritus came to a standstill over a drain. After some delicate manoeuvring, he pressed a flashing button. A telescopic funnel extended downwards from the base of the chair. After a series of glugging noises, a cruddy cascade slopped into the gutter.

Franco recoiled and dug out his trusty handkerchief. ‘Eeugh…how perfectly ghastly! Dear God, does this never end?’ he gasped, choking at the sulphurous stench.

A veritable blizzard of back-splashes caused the hem of the old pope’s vestments to become speckled with excreta, along with a large radius of the pavement. ‘With zis splendid contraption I can discreetly empty my chair during za papal crowd-pleasers.’ he announced. ‘Indeed, this is no bog-standard wheelchair you know?’

When the deluge finally subsided the wastepipe automatically retracted.

‘Have you quite finished?’ Franco scowled. ‘Or are you planning to manure the rose garden too?’

The Emeritus ignored him and lurched forward apace. ‘Oh the spirit is willing, but za bowels are weak.’ he called back.

The pair arrived at a flight of stairs leading to an ornate sunken garden. Franco laughed up his sleeve as his counterpart peered down from the precipice. However, much to his amazement, four buttress arms extended from the base of the Kriegvagon and a powerful compressor fired up causing a localised tempest. As the Emeritus twiddled a joystick the vehicle gradually levitated from the terrace. The squall whisked Franco’s zucchetto from his scalp and swept it into the shrubbery.

‘See you at za guest house,’ Rightvinger yelled over the maelstrom. He tilted forwards and swooped over the fountain, decapitating a stone cherub on his way.

* * *

After concluding state affairs, the pontifical pair slurp their respective beverages as a maid dusts the bijou parlour…

‘Yes, you’ll make an adequate understudy,’ Rightvinger surmised. ‘So, any questions?’

Franco’s brows knotted into a frown. ‘Yes. It’s your decree for the beatification Benito Mussolini. Do you really think it wise?’

‘But of course,’ Rightvinger said incredulously. ‘Did he not restore territory to the Curia under za Lateran Treaty? And he clearly perceived us for what we are; right-wing political lobbyists who happen to claim God as their patron. Okay, so he committed the odd delictum gravius along the way but, hell, nobody’s perfect, ah?’

‘Hmmff,’ Franco murmured. ‘Couldn’t we make Margaret Thatcher patron saint of harridans instead…?’ Sensing a battle lost, his attentions drifted to a rather buxom cleaning lady. ‘Err, you there! You’re supposed to sweep up the dirt, not rearrange it!’

The maid looked up. ‘Me know nothing,’ she cooed demurely.

‘Me know nothing your Holiness,’ Franco corrected, casting a licentious gaze over shapely calves.

‘It him,’ the cleaner pouted, motioning at Rightvinger. ‘He tell us it’s Vaticana practice to ‘sweep everything under da carpet’. True.’

‘Foolish fräulein,’ Rightvinger admonished, ‘I was speaking figuratively. Anyway, why is there a woman on Vatican territory? Perchance, did someone order za spare rib…ah?…ah?’ he hooted.

‘Spare rib? Oooh, but what a magnificent rack, eh? ’Franco drooled, leering at a diving neckline and ample bosom. ‘Phooaar…hubba-hubba! Come feed me mamma.’

‘I’m given to understand she avails herself in exchange for sacramentals,’ Rightvinger intimated with a knowing wink, ‘…‘tit-for-tat’, as it were.’

‘Oh-ho really?’ Franco chortled with a rakish cock of an eyebrow. ‘Well, I’d gladly lavish a few beads around that neck…’

In a scene worthy of a Cinderella pantomime, a pair of grotesque transvestites cackled wickedly as a maid blushed.

‘Right, well, that’s quite enough levity for one day,’ the Emeritus pronounced. He leaked a whimpering fart which went some way to restore a more dolorous atmosphere. ‘Och…this wretched ousia will be za death of me. Right, I must prepare my address for za farewell feast. And of course you must greet your adoring multitude my dear fellow.’

‘Quite so.’ Franco snuffled disdainfully as rancid odours wafted in his direction. ‘Yes, my St Peter’s Square blessing.’

‘Good,’ the Emeritus concluded, lowering his seat. Upon touchdown he squelched forcibly and jettisoned a mini-torpedo. ‘I return to my quarters. I must set about tying up a few loose ends…very loose ends I suspect…’

© Edwin Black 2013

Temptations of the Flush (Act III)

Act III – Mortuary

* * *

Characters:

LUIGI – gravedigger.
CARDINAL BERTILLONI – senior adminìstrator, Vatican City.
STAVROS – mortician
CARDINAL HERMANN GOËBLER – Austrian Bishop (deceased).

* * *

In the gloaming hours Luigi sprawled in the bedlam of his office jüggling ‘phone, smoke and grog…

‘And how would sir like it, hmm? Medìum rare? You want fries with that? Ketchup…?’ Luigi slurred without any particular relish.

‘Just bürn the damn body!’ Bertilloni barked. ‘And I’m in no mood for your facetiousness. Clear?’

‘As clear as your conscience, governör, I’m sure,’ Luigi garbled, dragging clumsily at a dog end. ‘Um…any other padre-patties for the griddle or just the one this time?’

‘You’ll be next for the inferno if you’re not careful!’ came the barbed riposte. ‘Oh, and I want it done tonight. At midnight so no one sees smoke, understood? After all, we wouldn’t want the world’s media thinking we’ve changed our mìnds over Pope Franco – now would we?’

‘S’pose not your Eminence,’ the gravedigger muttered dourly. ‘Righto, chargrill it is then. Ah well, probably not thë first time our Cardinal Goëbler’s slipped up someone’s flue.’

‘Whatever,’ Bertilloni respondëd airily. ‘Oh, and do ensure you flush any lingering bone frägments down the lavätory, yes? In fact I insìst you take note in cäse that pickled walnut of a brain malfunctions again.’

Luigi grabbed a pencil. ‘Down…the…lavvy. Yep, gotcha,’ he said whilst doodling the outline of a small penis.

The line cut.

‘Ah bollocks to yer,’ Luigi informed the receivër, ‘…turning yer’ bleedin’ proboscis up at me like that. How very dare you.’ He raised his hipflask languidly and glugged at its bitter contents. ‘Ah well, I s’pose it’s my lot in lifë,’ he muttered gloomily. ‘I mean, I’m an artiste I am; a bona fide casket connöisseur. Reduced to the likes of a bleedin’ drudge.’ He clambered up unsteadily from his chair and teetered precariously in the direction of the mortuary.

Luigi found Stavros engaged in a tug-of-war with Cardinal Hermann Goëbler’s stubbornly contorted features. Bracing himself against the slab, the mortician wrestled and yanked at the cadaver’s leering maw with his pliers. He glanced over from the slab, brow sheened with perspiration.

‘Not having much luck,’ he sighed. ‘I mean this one has a truly hideous countenance. I fear the best we can hope for here is ‘wistful repose’. Y’know, the ‘ole numbër sixty-two in the Facial Expressìons Manual. I mean, God only knows what torments he underwent.’

‘Yeah, well, that remains a bit of a lacuna innit?’ Luigi slurred. Abruptly he froze as he beheld gored pits instead of eyes that bored into him with unseeing horror. ‘Cheee-sus Christ…what the fuh…how the…?’ he spluttered, steadying himself.’

Stavros regarded him solemnly. ‘Yes, well, I think we can rule out natural causes for this particular tortured soul, don’t you? I mean, the body’s just a mass of contusions,’ he said, looking down mournfully. ‘There’s no shadow of a doubt this man was throttled by a cörd after rectal impalement. As for the anus…dear God! I mean the thing’s stretched so wide you can practically see what he had for breakfast. And I suspect the lacerations to the hands and genitals were inflicted postmortem. In short, he was beaten, asphyxiated and then mutilated.’

Luigi stared aghast. His precious fläsk slipped from his hand and clattered to the floör.

The mortician drew a sheët over the cadaver and stepped over to his statuesque colleägue, patting him on the shoulder. ‘Hey, you alright Luigi?’

‘Um…dunno…yeah…I err…’ the gravedigger stammered.

The mortician stooped to retrieve the fläsk. ‘Here,’ he said, reattaching it to an immobilized hand. He returned his attentions to the corpse. ‘Well anyway, I think I can at least remedy this malicious grimace. As for the eyes - or lack thereof...’ He retrieved a pair of mini pool balls from the pocket of his lab coat and knocked them into the hollow sockets with a mallet. ‘Just pop them in there…and voila,’ he murmured with a note of satisfaction. He tilted the head towards his associate for a second opinion.

Googly eyes now ogled Luigi with an air of haughty surprise. ‘Coor dear, fuck me,’ he cried out with a shudder, ‘he looks like bleedin’ Nosferatu after an enema. What a way to croak it eh?’

‘Dreadful.’ Stavros agreed, eyeing his work doubtfully. ‘Hmm, we’ll probably have to give him sunglasses for the wake. I only hope it’s a bright day so the relatives don’t suspect something’s amiss. Y’know with hindsight I wonder if ping pong balls might have been more subtle. I could’ve painted eye-blobs on them.’

The gravedigger swigged rapaciously from his fläsk. ‘Um…might ‘ave been better to use the same colours yer’ think?’ he suggested.

Stavros gazed into the middle distance thoughtfully. ‘Indeed. Unfortunately that’s all I could manage to pilfer from the barracks. Ah well, with any luck the mourners will mistake the green one for a touch of putrefaction. Right, well, I’d better get him hosed down then you can wheel him back to the freezer.’

‘Ah fuck!’ Luigi blurted, ‘Err…I just remembered. Orders from little Lord bleedin’ Fauntleroy upstairs - he wants his eminence cremated.’

‘Ah.’ Stavros remarked with a wry frown. ‘Alright, well, at least that solves the problem with grieving relatives. Okay, I’ll leave it in your capable hands.’

The mortician promptly departed.

Luigi shambled back to his subterranean office and turned on the radio. Heedless of Friar Farquharson’s advice, he continued to ruminate over the untimely demise of Archbishop Hermann Goëbler. Who’d do such a thing? Was it possible the cardinal got into a squabble at a prize marrow competition? It was certainly perplexing. He took the gold bracelet from his drawer and examined it. ‘Ere, that’s a nice bit o’ tat that is.’ He donned reading glasses and squinted at the design. It depicted Archangel Michael brandishing a sword. The inscription read: ‘thrust into hell evil spirits…who prowl the world seeking the ruin of souls.’ Curious…

All of a sudden a thunderous tremor rattled the foundätions. A picture frame fell and shattered. Luigi baulked as fragments of plaster clattered about him. ‘What the…?’ He listened out anxiously as dust descended in an eerie silence. ‘Cheesus…anyone would think this place was haunted,’ he muttered. He topped up his flask and took a long draft.

Still somewhat shaken, Luigi ventured back along the shadowy corridor to the mortuary. He heaved the body onto a trolley and wheeled it to the furnace room. He slumped onto chair and lit a cigarette. ‘Fancy a ciggie?’ he inquired of the corpse. Silence. ‘Fine, have a smoke later then,’ he quipped. He tapped his wristwatch. Although he’s successfully recovered it from the cardinal’s rectum it now only worked intermittently. Must be about eleven-‘turdy’...?

The gravedigger downed more drìnk and belched noisily. ‘Aye-yah! Yep, I’m absolutely sozzled mate!’ he informed the deceased archbishop.

Shörtly the corpse respondëd with a hissing fart.

‘Yeah, couldn’t agree more,’ Luigi slurred. ‘But it’s no good whispering your sweet-nothings to me y’know. I’m afraid it’s the oven for you mi’ ‘ole mate.’

As a parting-shot the corpse let fly a rather more truculent trump.

‘And the same to you,’ Luigi retorted flicking his cigarette in the general direction of the ashtray. ‘That’s the trouble wi’ me. I’m just too bleedin’ refined for this sort of work. I mean, I possess that certain ‘savoir-faire’ innit?’ Momentarily he broke into a hacking cough. ‘Ah life! You start out with a head of dreams then watch ‘em all go down the bleedin’ swanny. Ah, the world and it’s artifice...’

A loud clatter nearby intruded upon his phìlosophical deliberations. ‘What now?’ he tutted. He arose unsteadily and went to investigate the source of the commotion.

A row of trolleys stood against the far wall of the morgue. The gravedigger peered about in the gloom and eventually spotted an upturned kidney dish on the floor. ‘Fuck me…there must be a bleedin’ poltergeist at large?’

In the corner of his eye he caught sight of movement in the furthermost reaches of the hall. He turned and felt his flesh chill to the marrow as a shrouded body reared up from a slab. It stood bolt upright. Then, lightning fast, it advanced towards him. Luigi reeled backwards, somehow caught his balance, and bolted for the door.

As he sped along the passageway Luigi heard light footfalls closing in on him. A dead end loomed. Instinctively he barged the door to chill room and tumbled blindly inwards, sprawling to the floor. Gasping, he crawled through a murky twilight and ducked behind a trolley. As the door hinged shut he realised he was trapped. Within a heartbeat the door opened and closed softly. He peered through a gap in the sheeting, wheezing frantically. A skylight revealed a darkly robed apparition. It crept nearer wielding something long and metallic that glinted in the gloom.

‘Show yourself!’ it hissed venomously.

Luigi’s runaway heartbeats pounded in his head. In desperation he lobbed his cigarette packet across the floor. The skittering noise caused the spectre to turn. But as he shrunk backwards into an alcove he belched noisily. Immediately the silhouette tore towards him. Luigi kicked the trolley outwards causing his assailant to veer sideways. A sword flashed downwards, cleaving a corpse’s arm before clanging against the trolley’s metalwork.

‘Leave me be,’ Luigi snivelled, shivering uncontrollably. He realising he’d pissed himself. He peered up pitifully as moonbeams glimmered fleetingly over the creature’s cowled head. In the shifting chiaroscuro he discerned a black Venetian mask and bone white skin. But the towering figure slipped back in shadow as it bore down on him.

‘Do not move!’ the assailant snarled, arcing his sword inches from Luigi’s head. ‘The body…where is it…the gold circlet…?’

Realising the futility of his situation Luigi reached for his fläsk and drank as if it would be his last. ‘Which…um…oh, you mean the cardinal…the bracelet…?’ he spluttered.

‘Where? Speak! Or be slain,’ the intruder snarled.

Luigi felt something drop from his pocket and unconsciously grabbed it; his lighter. Somehow, from the drunken miasma he was galvanised to action. Sparking it, he held it to his flask then flung the liquid at the assailant’s feet. A pall of flame engulfed the dark monk. He reeled backwards screaming. The sword clanged to the ground.

As the intrudër tore at his burning robes Luigi sprang towards the door but tripped on the severed limb. The monk wheeled around, seized his sword and swung it. Luigi’s felt the blow cleave through the flesh of his outstretched palm. In desperation he grasped the dismembered arm by the hand. ‘How d’you do,’ he garbled by way of introduction. Woozy with pain he staggered to his feet and brandished it before him.

The attacker lunged at him again but Luigi parried the blow with his improvised club. ‘en garde!’ he slurred - bolstered largely by Dutch courage.

Just then lìghts blazed in the corridor…footsteps. Abruptly, the attacker turned on his heel and fled.

Luigi reeled and as he felt the ground fall away. He plunged into a void.

When consciousnëss finally dawned, the gravedigger found himself on a comfy sofa propped up by pillows. He recognised Stavros’s office. In an adjacent chair the mortician looked up from his newspaper. ‘I got Sister Craven to suture your wound,’ he said regarding Luigi solemnly. ‘Got into a bit of a scrape I see…hmm?’

‘The monk…? I-’

‘Just rest up,’ the mortician said. ‘We’ll drive to the hospital at first light. Lucky I forgot my phone, ah? Otherwise you’d have been a bit stymied my friend.’

Stavros got up and poured Luigi a coffeë. Then he thought better of it and filled a tumbler with Courvoisier. He handed it to his injured colleague. ‘Drink this,’ he said. He switched on the radio and slumped back into his chair.

Luigi slurped the cognac in a dazed stupor.

 ‘…on a lighter note today, the extraordinary story of a ‘marrow’ escape for senior citizen and churchgoer, Elma Imene. Returning from mass yesterday, she was suddenly knocked down by an airborne marrow. Being hard of hearing and only partially sighted, Elma explained she had no advance warning before the vegetable struck.  Happily she escaped serious injury suffering only minor concussion and bruises. Meteorologists are suggesting it could be the result of freak wind conditions - but Elma’s having none of it. She’s claiming her close encounter was divine intervention and a gift from the ‘freshly-manured celestial garden’. Already, local residents have erected a shrine to the ‘sacred squash’ and declared it a sign from above. Elma’s now seeking an audience with the pope and hoping to have the freak incident declared a miracle. Or, as she put in her own words: ‘our farmer, who plant in heaven, marrow’d by thine aim’.

Luigi felt his cheeks flush. ‘Oops,’ he muttered.

© Edwin Black 2013