***
Stomp! Stomp!
♪ ♫ ‘Oh maybe it’s because I’m a Lon-don-ner that I — love — Lon — don — Town!’ ♫ ♪
Stomp! Stomp!
‘Oh how it’d warm the cockles of me dear grandmuvver’s heart — gawd rest her soul —’ † The last-action-hero Tosa-the-Man-Mountain crosses himself with the gravity befitting a fascist psychopath † ‘— to hear you sing our new anthem.’
(murmur murmur)
The Great Escape expendables — good, bad and ugly — packed into the single cell with the collective brain power of a dead pool of porcelain dogs.
‘All white, settle down.’
(murmur murmur)
‘We’re not at the London Palladium now.’
(murmur murmur)
‘I said shut the fuck up or I’ll smash jaw faces!’
Pack members muffled for a bit.
‘Wah-ah-ah at last!’ cries Tosa-the-Man-Mountain, hands lifted to the hail-curtained heavens. ‘What we’ve been waiting for! The Great Escape!’
Pack members burst into a happy chorus of ♫ ‘Hitler has only got one ball’ ♫ ♪ J but snipped in the bud by the war lover Hess, ‘I’m Steve McQueen. Goebbels can be Charles Bronson.’
‘No no no. I’m Steve McQueen.’ Like a commando springs Goebbels from the Number Twos power seat of the toilet. ‘You can be Charles Bronson.’
‘I don’t want to be Charles Bronson.’
‘Tough!’
‘Tsch! Snot fair! You promised.’
‘Ha well if promises was horses then politicians would ride. I’m sick of this.’ Tosa-the-Man-Mountain gropes the shelf of defective relics and grapples the hideline-whip-cum-riding-crop. ‘We’ve been through this a dozen times. Goebbels is Steve McQueen. Bormann is Clint Eastwood —’
‘Clint Eastwood wasn’t in the Great Escape.’ The predator Hess a last stand in the line of fire but with total recall, ‘You’re thinking of ... Arnie Schwitzer-Nadgers.’
‘Don’t tell me what I’m trying to think.’
The Lard’s lost fighting dogs keep ranks with the parade-ground discipline of a crèche of petulant pups.
‘I am quickly losing my patience!’ snaps the pale rider Tosa-the-Man-Mountain with sudden impact and releasing a practice swing — Swisshh! Crack! — ‘My Last-Stand-day inside — hang if any of you sabotage it for me — I’m warning you — Yes what now?’
‘Why do I have to be Donald Pheasant?’ bellyaches the innocent bystander — the legend — Rohm, a double target beneath the death-line of the crop.
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘Cuss you wear glasses ...’
‘But ….’
‘... And can tell the time.’
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘Push me over the edge one more time you’ll see the dark side of me!’ The call of the wild. The call of the Essex countryside. Chin thrust forward in the profile of Il Duce, crop racing an adrenalin-fuelled tempo, Tosa-the-Man-Mountain fills both lungs with the salty uplifting Wind of Change. ‘Can’t you smell that seaside air? Can’t you taste those jellied eels?’
‘Who played that spy?’
‘Wasn’t Tom Cruise.’
‘I said military precision! Not war of the worlds! Hiff you don’t know the right moves by now — fuck it — you can hereafter ask the others beyond the grave. So say your end-of-days long goodbyes. Right, Goebbels, run down the escape plan.’
(murmur murmur)
Eyes wide shut, the uncanny narc Goebbels flushing with red heat to explain the Escape from Alcatraz — a masterplan of the prison decorating the wall and peppered with Blue-Tak. ‘Danke schön, mein Stompenführer.’ Bald shiny domes strain for a pennyworth’s — ‘Listen very carefully. I vill zay ziz only vunce ...’
(murmur murmur)
‘... Those of you who drew a white ball from the box ... a white ball ... well you is going to Sunday School with Tosa and me — no that’s a black ball, I said a white ball ... Thank you.’ Goebbels allowing pack members to consult the colour of their balls. ‘How many? Hands where I can see them …’
‘Church!’ blasts Tosa an icy anathema.
Backwards creeping, a-cowering hun a-crawling a very bad flock, white-balled folks a-wailing hun a-wishing the ground to fracture and swallow them whole.
— Swisshh! Crack! —
— ‘We wait for this Victor bloke to read his serpent.’ Not sparing the rod, Tosa taps a few good men. ‘Hun when I give the secret signal —’
‘Signal?’
‘Who said that!’
‘It was him!’
‘Liar!’
‘You bunch of wet whining Whitneys! How the hell would I know what they get up to in Church?’ The black tented Heavens conspire a crash-course days of thunder. ‘Sing! I’ll stand! When I shout “Rock of Ages!” the riot begins. Couldn’t be simpler.’
Goebbels the Number Twos taps the wall-plan with a swagger stick — ‘Except when he stands to sing a hymn.’
‘Except when I stands … exactly. Now, gentlemen, remember. I want you saying your prayers — Not now, stupid! In the church!’ — Swisshh! Crack! — One Hail Mary of the riding crop and peace upon the prates of the multitude — ‘And make it look convincing. You know. I want hands closed, eyes to Heaven, the works ... You do know how to say your prayers, don’t you?’
Lost fighting sheep bah! with the collective confidence of a loaf of bread and a few dozen fishes.
‘On any Sunday — has anyone here been to church before?’
But the faintest signs of conversion.
‘Has anyone seen Songs of Praise? I’m talking to you white balls.’
Bormann ducking the deviating rule of law. ‘But what if this Victor bloke doesn’t let us in?’
‘He’s got a point, you know.’
Solid Sessions’ Janeiro escapes by the square window.
‘Look. Fascists are bang on trend in your modern Church of England,’ enlightens Brother Tosa-the-Man-Mountain. ‘God loves everyone. Jews. Gentiles. Even accountants.’
Lost fighting sheep of Springwood oven-ready for roasting with the Word of the Lard.
‘Discipline! The key is Discipline!’
(murmur murmur)
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘— I symptoms think you lot dunce know how lucky you are —’
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘— Thousands this holiday has cost me.’ Far-away eyeballs fill with the colour of money. ‘Fucking thousands —’
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘— Hun I want no fuck-ups. You hear? —’
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘— Operation Armageddon runs like clockwork.’
Black-balled sheep hun white-balled sheep set fair for a Journey into Fear to the shadows and fogs of Essex.
‘Right. How many o’ ewes with black balls? Come on. We haven’t got all day.’
— Swisshh! Crack! —
Black-balled sheep, a breed apart, terror in the aisles beneath the risky business of the crop.
— Swisshh! Crack! —
‘Right. Black balls — the Magnificent Seven — you have volunteered — for a mission impossible — Orders are orders — You stay here on home turf — and kick-start the riots.’
(rebellion rebellion)