Mr Cameron Bell laughed gaily. ‘What a wonderful thought,’ said he. ‘But I must veer towards the pragmatic now. Whether or not the chickens’ theory is valid there is no way whatever of proving. But as to whether you will ever board a time machine and travel back to the dawn of Creation? Of this I am absolutely sure. You will not.’
‘Absolutely sure?’ asked the well-read monkey. ‘Absolutely sure,’ said Cameron Bell.
10
ome to order if you will, please, gentlemen.’ The liveried servant’s voice rang out above the hubbub of men and monkeys alike. ‘Be upstanding and make your appreciation felt for the chairman of the British Showmen’s Fellowship, Mr Anthony Lemon-Partee.’
Amidst a great scuffling of chairs, men and monkeys rose to their feet and put their hands together as a gentleman of considerable girth, sporting a red velvet smoking jacket with matching cap and slippers, made several vain attempts to hoist himself onto the tiny stage that had been erected for the awards ceremony.
Several strapping grinders of the barrel organ rose from their stage—side seats and assisted the all—but—spherical chairman onto the hopelessly inadequate erection. Its floorboards groaned ominously, but Mr Lemon-Partee affected the bravest of faces.
It was a face that was not without interest, given its uncanny resemblance to a potato. And as cheering folk reseated themselves, certain thoughts now entered the mind of Mr Cameron Bell. Thoughts concerning his most recent conversation with Darwin. For if Prince Albert’s resemblance to a chicken could be presented as evidence, no matter how improbable, that Mankind’s genesis lay with feathered fowl, here was a man whose physiognomy surely put up a convincing argument that the origins of Man were to be found in the vegetable kingdom.
Mr Cameron Bell shook his own head, the one that bore an uncanny resemblance to that of Mr Pickwick, and sought further champagne. None, however, was forthcoming as Mr Bell had emptied the bottle.
‘Gentlemen,’ intoned Mr Anthony Lemon-Partee. ‘My thanks for your kind applause. It is always a pleasure to receive a warm hand upon my opening.’
This remark received riotous mirth. Darwin the monkey looked baffled.
‘If you are a member of a society and hoping for an award,’ Mr Cameron Bell whispered to the ape, ‘the chairman’s jokes are always very funny.’
‘I am still no wiser,’ said Darwin.
The chairman continued, ‘Another year has passed, another year when men of this world and of others have been brought to the very heights of pleasure by the sounds of that most tuneful of all instruments, the barrel organ.
‘It is not strictly an instrument, as such,’ whispered Darwin.
Cameron Bell put his finger to his lips and shushed the ape to silence.
‘Standards have once more risen.’ Mr Lemon-Partee raised a hand, which in Darwin’s opinion resembled a bunch of bananas. ‘Upward, ever upward. Gentlemen, take pride in your achievements, for great achievements they are.
And so the chairman’s speech continued, extolling the many virtues of the organ-grinding fraternity. Heaping praise upon those innovators who were perfecting new techniques in the art of hand-cranking. Offering up a panegyric to the courage of grinders who were even prepared to ply their trade in the rain, that the passers-by, though wet, should not be deprived of music. Eulogising— Darwin rolled his eyes and ground his teeth. In his considered opinion, it was the organ-grinder’s monkey who did all the real work. It was the monkey’s dancing skills, the monkey’s charisma that lured coinage into the old tin cup. But were the monkeys getting a mention? No, the monkeys were not.
The chairman was clearly exhibiting an outrageous bias towards the organ-grinder and Darwin felt a growing urge to protest on behalf of his species. Though not through shouted words, as he had no wish to publicly display his gift of human speech, but rather through a protest made nonverbally. One that would involve the hurling of faeces.
Darwin set to the dropping of his trousers.
Mr Cameron Bell restrained him. ‘Please be patient,’ he said.
‘And so it gives me enormous pleasure — but then it always did—’ The chairman screwed up his little spuddy eyes and grinned. The grinders laughed and Darwin made a most unpleasant face. ‘For me to present this year’s awards — the Eighteen Ninety-Eight Golden Grinders. Each an award of the highest merit. Each award an object of the dearest desire. Would you please bring forth the awards?’
The liveried servant appeared in the company of a four-wheeled dessert trolley. This he propelled with the exaggerated reverence of one pushing the monarch in a bath-chair. Aboard this trolley stood five awards, all identical, all gilded, all imaginatively crafted to resemble an organ-grinder standing proudly beside his ‘instrument’ with a monkey topping said organ, a fez upon its little head, an old tin cup (though gilded) in his hand.
Darwin viewed the awards as they passed by his table. At least there were monkeys, thought he.
The liveried servant steered the trolley to the over— crowded[6] stage and then took his place beside it, nose most high in the air.
‘I hold in my hand an envelope,’ the chairman continued, ‘given to me this very evening. Its contents are unknown to myself, although the categories contained within are, of course, known to us all. Most Strident Rendition of a Popular Music Hall Tune. Best-Kept Organ. Liveliest Monkey.’ Darwin’s spirits rose somewhat at this. ‘That award, of course, to be accepted by the pet’s owner.’ Darwin’s teeth were grinding once again. ‘Best-Dressed Grinder. And of course the most prestigious award — the much-coveted Organ-Grinder of the Year.’
The potato-head nodded, the diners cheered, then the chairman had more words to say. ‘Winners are chosen through a democratic process governed by Fellows of the Showmen’s Fellowship. Their decisions are final and not subject to alteration.’ He waggled a big fat finger in a jovial fashion. ‘So there. But you gentlemen are all aware of the rules, so now I will open the envelope.’
Mr Anthony Lemon-Partee now applied himself to the opening of the envelope. It was a yearly spectacle that the organ-grinders very much enjoyed. He went about it as one possessed, but given the largeness of his fingers and the smallness of the envelope, the performance could be likened to that of a pugilist in boxing gloves attempting to thread a needle. The chairman worried at that envelope. He fumbled and he fought with that envelope and eventually, to considerable applause, he rent it asunder and dragged from its ruination a crumpled piece of paper and waved it triumphantly aloft.
‘The man is a buffoon,’ whispered Darwin.
Cameron Bell agreed that indeed he was.
Now freely perspiring, Mr Lemon-Partee unfolded the crumpled sheet of paper and did that little professional cough and clearing of the throat which one does preparatory to delivering any speech of significant importance.
‘Gentlemen, the Golden Grinders of Eighteen Ninety-Eight. First category — Most Strident Rendition of a Popular Music Hall Tune. The nominees are: Mr Bert Gussett for “We’re Digging a Present for Granny”.’ Bert received some mild applause for this. ‘Mr Eric Peercing for “Little Willy’s Dead and Gone, But We Still Have His Stains to Remind Us”.’ There was slightly more applause here because, after all, that was a most popular song. ‘Mr Danny Bucket for the evergreen “Don’t Kiss a Corpse in a Coffin If You’ve Got Phossy Jaw”.’ The applause at this was polite, for Danny had won the award last year for the same song. ‘And lastly—’ And here Mr Lemon-Partee paused and peered hard at the paper, shook his head and peered again and then announced the final nominee. ‘Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm for “Sympathy for the Devil”.’[7]
There came now some tut-tut-tutting and murmurs that all was not well.
‘Gentlemen,’ said the chairman, ‘show decorum, please. The choices made are those of the Fellows. Allow me to announce the winner. And the winner is—’ And once more he paused and he peered and he gasped somewhat, too. ‘The winner is,’ he said in a still, small voice, ‘Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm for “
Sympathy for the Devil”.’
Silence fell like a fire curtain and then there was warm applause. But it was a localised applause, coming as it did solely from the table of Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm.
Cameron Bell cast a glance in her direction. The High Priestess of the Great White Lodge was grinning wickedly. She arose from her seat and, moving with an almost liquid grace, threaded her way between the tables to face the potato-headed man upon the stage. The liveried servant handed her the coveted award and she turned gracefully to face the diners.
‘Gentlemen,’ she said. ‘I am so grateful. I would like to thank—’
‘So, moving swiftly on,’ said Mr Lemon-Partee.
‘If you do not mind,’ Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm said, holding high her award, ‘I really would like to say a few words.’
The chairman gazed down upon her, perspiration running freely over his lumpen forehead. The enormity of what had just occurred was causing him to tremble. A woman winning a Golden Grinder? It was unheard of Unthinkable. It was an aberration. ‘Madam, if you would please return to your seat, ‘he said, through gritted teeth, ‘we have four more awards to get through. Move along, now — swiftly, if you would.’
Miss Dharkstorrm turned and looked up at the chairman, focusing her mauve eyes briefly upon him. Then she turned once more to face the diners, curtseyed politely and slipped away to her table.
‘Next category,’ said Mr Lemon-Partee, swaying slightly as he did so. ‘Best-Kept Organ. Always a closely fought contest, this. Mr Danny Bucket has taken the award for three years in a row — will tonight be his fourth?’
The applause was … measured. ‘Good old Danny,’ said someone, without conviction.
‘And the nominations are—’ The chairman read once more from his sheet of paper. ‘Mr Danny Bucket, Mr Mickey Muggins, Mr Arthur Sixpence and—’ Syllables got stuck inside the chairman’s throat. His face grew red as he slowly spat them out. ‘Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm,’ he said, in a voice of utter despair.
The collective intake of breath sucked much of the oxygen out of the room. Darwin looked at Cameron Bell. Cameron Bell just shrugged. Ugly rumblings rumbled. Grumblings and mumblings of dissent. Made ever more so when the winner’s name was announced.
‘Gentlemen, gentlemen, please.’ Mr Lemon-Partee sought order. His was not to reason why, he was just to read from the paper. The Fellows made the decisions and their decisions were final. Mr Lemon—Partee attempted to explain this to the mumbling grumblers. The mumbling grumblers made menacing faces. They were not at all pleased. As Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm once more stepped forward to claim an award, someone blew a raspberry and another booed behind his hand.
Miss Lavinia smiled the sweetest smile. She fluttered her eyelashes, puckered her lips and blew the diners a kiss. And then in the company of her second award, she flounced away to her table.
Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm did not win the next award. But then the next award was not given to a person. It was for a monkey. For the liveliest monkey. A monkey named Pandora won this award.
The monkey belonged to Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm.
Cameron Bell leaned close to Darwin and spoke into his ear. ‘I think we should be going now,’ he said.
‘Absolutely not,’ said the ape. ‘I would not miss this for the world.’
‘There is going to be trouble,’ said Mr Bell. ‘Big trouble.’
‘I am looking forward to it,’ said Darwin as his little hairy hands steered themselves towards his braces.
‘I have a cab waiting outside. We should be seated within it before Miss Dharkstorrm takes her leave and we will follow her.’
‘Follow her?’ said Darwin.
‘Of course. Follow her to her lair, place her under arrest, retrieve the stolen reliquary—’
‘And claim the large reward,’ said Darwin.
‘Precisely,’ said Cameron Bell. ‘We are professionals, after all.’
Darwin nodded thoughtfully. ‘We are professionals,’ he agreed. ‘But if there is going to be trouble, at least allow me to hurl dung at that horrid Mr Potato.’
‘Gentlemen, please, I must insist,’ cried that horrid Mr Potato. ‘The decisions of the Fellows, arrived at through a democratic procedure that admits to no bias or possibility of corruption, are final. To doubt the decisions of the Fellows would be to doubt the honour of this noble institution.’
The grumbling mumblers stilled to a sullen silence.
‘Fourth award.’ The chairman’s hand was shaking fearfully. Perspiration dropped from his head and ran down the length of his waistcoat. ‘Best-Dressed Grinder. And the nominations are—’ He paused that he might draw breath. He was a big man, after all, and matters such as this were wont to put an unnecessary strain upon his heart. ‘Best-Dressed Grinder,’ he wheezed. ‘And the nominations are —
Mr William Stirling for his “Pirate Bill”.’ Applause faintly rippled. Someone said, ‘Good luck.’
‘That’s you, isn’t it?’ Darwin said to Cameron Bell. ‘You’re pretending to be Mr Stirling. I hope there aren’t too many of his friends here if you win and have to go up and accept the award.’
Cameron Bell said nothing. The chairman wheezed some more. ‘Mr Danny Bucket for his “Old Soldier Fallen Upon Tragic Times”. Winner the year before last for that one, I recall.’ Others recalled it, too, and no one offered applause. ‘Mr Joe Leviticas for his “Coat of Many Colours”.’
‘Joe isn’t here,’ someone called out. ‘He’s fallen down a hole.’
The chairman nodded and gazed at his paper. Then he said, ‘Oh my God!’
‘If God’s won one,’ said Darwin, ‘I hope a chicken comes forward to accept it on his behalf’
Organ-grinders were now leaning forward in their seats. That sixth sense which animals and members of the lower working classes are believed to possess was suggesting to them that the fourth nominee would not be one to their particular liking. Mumblings and grumblings rumbled once again.
‘Miss—’ said Mr Lemon-Partee, all a-jelly-wobble on the stage. ‘Miss Lavinia … Dharkstorrm.’
The mumblings and grumblings became howlings and growlings.
‘And the winner is—’ The chairman suddenly clutched at his heart and toppled from the stage onto the liveried servant. The combined sound as both bodies struck the floor was not one to inspire confidence in either man’s chances of continued survival.
An organ-grinder near at hand leapt up from his seat and sprang towards the fallen fellows, but not to offer help. Instead he tore the crumpled piece of paper from the chairman’s lifeless hand and waved it at his organ-grinding comrades.
‘Read it out!’ cried someone. Others catcalled, and one person shouted, ‘Bottom.’[8]
The organ-grinder perused the sheet of paper, then he climbed onto the back of the fallen chairman, that all might see him.
And cried aloud the name of Lavinia Dharkstorrm.
11
ot since the year of eighteen hundred and five, when Lord Byron famously floored William Wordsworth during a literary luncheon, had a gentlemen’s club in Leicester Square known such a brouhaha. His lordship had taken righteous exception to Wordsworth’s poem ‘The Solitary Reaper’, which had pipped his own great work of verse, ‘Opium for Breakfast, Laudanum for Lunch’, to win some much-coveted medal or another that no one in the present age could even remember the name of But they remembered the flooring of Wordsworth well enough. It was on a par with the Duke of Wellington’s now-legendary thrashing of Isambard Kingdom Brunel at the Great Exhibition in eighteen fifty-one because, to quote the Iron Duke, ‘That cove’s hat was taller than mine and he looked at me kinda funny.’
There is always something memorable, if not admirable, about a really good fight. Especially if it takes place at a really impressive location. Take, for instance, Oscar Wilde’s infamous bitch-slapping of Max Beerbohm in the restaurant at Fortnum & Mason. Or the occasion when Charles Dickens had the Pre—Raphaelite painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti held i
n a head-lock for almost ten minutes at the Royal Academy’s Summer Show of eighteen forty-seven.[9]
Upon this warm summer’s evening in the year of eighteen ninety—eight, the altercation at Leno’s Gentlemen’s Club in Leicester Square would prove to rank amongst the finest of the decade.
As Cameron Bell and Darwin looked on, organ-grinders great and small with monkeys at their elbows rose to their feet with loud cries of complaint. They were far from happy, these well-dressed fellows, these pleasers of passers-by, these musical bringers of joy, these chevaliers musicale de la rue. A terrible wrong had been done to them and they sought someone to punish.
Naturally their wrath did not turn in the direction of Miss Lavinia Dharkstorrm because, after all, she was a woman, and it was unseemly to hit a woman in public. The hitting of women being something one did exclusively in private, within the comfort of one’s own home. And anyway, what was she actually guilty of? As a slender young woman, how could she possibly have influenced a judging panel comprised exclusively of men? It was unthinkable. No, if anything, this was most likely to be a conspiracy — the work of some jealous rival faction of the East End street-entertainment community. Probably one of those sinister organisations that lurked behind the mask of an amusing acronym, such as BUM, for example — the Bermondsey Union of Minstrels. Or WILLY, the Whitechapel Institution for Long-Legged Yodellers. It could be any one of a hundred such evil cabals. With the notable exception of the Meritorious Union For Friendship, Decency, Individualism, Virtue and Educational Resources, who were above reproach.
The organ-grinders made and unmade fists; they needed someone to punch.
Exactly which one of the attendant monkeys hurled the first piece of dung, history does not record. History does record, however, that it struck home upon a certain Mr Danny Bucket, a gentleman most cruelly robbed of at least four awards in his own, most humble opinion.