Serial Killer Part II: Chapter 17
An hour later, Dave and Greg were jauntily heading back to The Spanker offices, taking the steps up to the third floor two at a time, leaving the ‘humour’ department far, far behind.
They had been on Laarf! for two weeks.
Dave was humming the music of The Great Escape to himself. The publisher had released them. They’d been sprung. They were out of the cooler. The film theme swelled to a triumphant crescendo in his head as they proceeded along the corridor to their old office.
How his mother had predicted this was going to happen he had no idea, but they were reinstated. The boys were back in business. Steve McQueen and James Garner could not have been more buoyant than Dave and Greg at their return to the Land of the Living.
Pete Sullivan, an assistant editor on Casino for the Man about Town had been acting as caretaker editor of The Spanker while they were serving their sentence. Pete was oblivious to Dave’s homicidal changes to The Caning Commando. He was oblivious to everything except possible sexual references in comics. Working on Casino, and freelancing for Platform, the sex magazine, he tended to see sex everywhere.
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‘Everything all right, Pete?’ asked Dave. ‘You didn’t find any references to Big Ben in the issue you edited?’
‘No. All clear,’ smiled Pete.
‘Good.’ He watched as Pete collected his things. ‘How’s things going on Platform? Is your column called Raised Platform? Or Wankers Corner?’
‘Spread Sheet, actually.’
‘Right. You make up the readers’ letters, don’t you?’ he asked provocatively.
‘Of course. So they can have a proper punchline. That’s a problem for our readers,’ he mused.
‘Still trying to master joined-up writing, are they?’ said Dave sympathetically. ‘I thought they seemed rather unlikely.’
‘Not as unlikely as someone getting off on fur, Dave. Actually, it’s not you sending in those letters about fur coats, is it? They’re creeping us out.’ And with that, he departed.
Dave turned to Greg. ‘I’m just relieved we haven’t been away longer. He screws everything up. Casino is the only publication he hasn’t been able to kill. Yet.’
‘That’s why the Casino editor makes him available as a caretaker editor,’ agreed Greg. ‘He’s desperate to get shot of him.’
‘I know,’ said Dave. ‘His touch is like weedkiller.’
Greg thought back. ‘Before he was promoted to Casino, he worked on comics featuring the Smurfs, Abba, Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes; and did for the lot of ‘em.’
‘Yes. James Bond barely escaped,’ said Dave.
‘I think he might have been responsible for the break-up of The Beatles,’ suggested Greg.
‘He is the Yoko Ono of comics,’ agreed Dave.
Freed from the misery of Mirth Row, they were back talking to each other again.
Dave enjoyed his new-found freedom. There was a catch to it, though.
Their early release by the publisher was no act of clemency for Christmas: it was on condition that, alongside their regular work, they produce the scripts for a new comic, JNP 66 (Juvenile New Publication 66), in just six weeks, ready to be drawn and published in March. JNP 66 was to be modern, rough and tough, and Ron had been warned not to interfere.
The reason was that rivals Angus, Angus and Angus had just brought out modern, rough and tough Guts, which was selling well, and the board wanted their slice of the kids’ pocket money. Faced with the alternative of losing three months of his life on Laarf!, Dave agreed to the extra project.
‘I’ve got two great ideas for JNP 66 already,’ said Greg.
‘Yeah? Go for it, man.’
‘Car-Jacks – about two teenagers who spend their lives stealing cars.’
‘Based on you and Bernie …? Perfect.’
‘And Bent.’
‘You’re finally coming out of the closet? Well, a story about a gay young man coming to terms with his sexuality would certainly fit the direction I want it to go. Mary Whitehouse would hate it, so that’s good.’
‘No. It’s about a corrupt cop,’ said Greg patiently.
‘Like The Sweeney?’
‘More G.F. Newman’s Terry Sneed series: Sir, You Bastard. You should check them out.’
‘Sorry. Can’t tear myself away from Watership Down.’
‘This time, Dave,’ vowed Greg enthusiastically, ‘we’ll break through that glass ceiling.’
‘More like break wind,’ Dave replied.
But he, too, was secretly excited by the idea of a kick-ass comic for the seventies. A little later on, he intended to make a secret trip to the vaults to find a certain notorious comic strip that would be perfect for it.
Meanwhile, it was time for him to enjoy the latest episode of The Caning Commando due to go to press. As usual, the picture strip story was told at high speed, and began with an introductory caption:
‘Because of his legendary caning skills, the War Office recruited schoolmaster Victor Grabham to be – THE CANING COMMANDO.’
This episode was a particular favourite of Dave’s.
* * *
In Victor Grabham’s study in the Golden Hind Academy, the housemaster was patiently attempting to give Alf Mast an English lesson. ‘Now … what does C.O.D. stand for, Mast?’
Alf Mast considered the question long and hard, furrowing his brow in concentration. Finally, looking inspired, he had the answer. ‘Cod.’
Grabham sighed. ‘You really have a head like a sieve, don’t you, boy?’
‘What’s a sieve, sir? And what’s an ’ed? Is that like an ’ed of cabbage?’
‘Yes, Mast. In your case, that is exactly what it is. You are more vegetable than boy. Your family album must look like a greengrocer’s gutter.’
Suddenly they heard a message over the radio, a thin, nasal voice repeating: ‘Longpants calling. Longpants calling.’
‘It’s Lord Ow! Ow!,’ exclaimed the teacher. ‘That’s his call sign. He broadcasts radio propaganda for the Boche.’
Grabham and Mast listened to the bakelite receiver. ‘I challenge the Caning Commando to a caning duel here in Berlin,’ said Lord Ow! Ow!
Grabham mused on the challenge. ‘It’s a trap, of course, but if I turn the other cheek, it will seem like Germany are the number one thrashers. Britain has got to keep its rear end up, even if I never see Lower Belting Bottom again.’
‘Who is Lord Ow! Ow!, sir?’
‘Headmaster of a British public school. He was dishonourably discharged and went over to the enemy.’
‘That’s just like me, sir,’ said Alf excitedly.
‘Are you comparing yourself to the traitor Reginald Bareback-Jones?’ scowled Grabham.
‘I was looking at photos of bumpy men and you confiscated them, sir, in case I had a “dishonourable discharge”.’
‘Indeed. We don’t want you having a repeat of the hot collywobbles, as your nan would say,’ the Commando said meaningfully.
That night, a Lysander flew the Caning Commando and Corporal Punishment to Berlin and they sneaked inside the radio station.
‘What shall I do, sir,’ asked Alf, ‘while you’re having your duel?’
‘Well, I don’t expect you to disarm the enemy with your cheeky guile, Mast. But it’s our duty to put this radio station out of action. Here’s the instructions for a pipe bomb.’
Leaving Alf Mast in the basement, Grabham caned his way through the German soldiers waiting in ambush for him, and entered the control room.
Lord Ow! Ow! turned to confront him, an evil, menacing figure, still wearing the black gown from his teaching days.
‘You know my reputation as a disciplinarian, Victor?’ boasted Lord Ow! Ow!. ‘911,500 canings, 121,000 floggings, 136,000 tips with the ruler, 109,000 detentions, 30,200 boxes on the ear and 22,700 tasks to learn by heart.’
‘That’s a record of scholastic severity any teacher would envy,’ admitted the Commando.
They bent their canes almost double and circled warily around each other as Bareback-Jones continued, ‘My punishments have subdued even the proudest, most defiant of arses. And they will subdue yours.’
The traitor’s cane looked familiar to the Commando.
‘I recognise that cane, Reginald. Made by Mafeking and Jones of St James’s, my own canemakers. A Windsor Chastiser, no less.’
‘Yes,’ sneered Lord Ow! Ow! ‘It’s the finest cane money can buy. By royal appointment. Princes’ posteriors are very familiar with the Chastiser.’
‘You traitorous swine!’ snarled the Commando, outraged by this insult to the royal family and launched himself at his enemy’s rear. ‘An eye for an eye and a cheek for a cheek, and you will pay for your insufferable cheek, sir.’
In the deadly caning duel that followed, both men showed they were masters of their art, matching each other blow for blow, cheek for cheek.
Then Lord Ow! Ow! shook the chalk dust from his gown, temporarily blinding the Commando with the white powder, tripped him up with the crook of his Chastiser, and brought him to his knees.
As the Commando was bent over, blinded and helpless, Lord Ow! Ow! brought down a ferocious series of strokes on his rear end, laughing maniacally:
‘I promise you endless canings as my prisoner, Victor!
Lashed for breakfast in a dungeon small,
Thrashed for dinner in the commandant’s hall,
The supper time’s more beating time than all!’
For a moment, it looked like it was all over. And then, to Jones’s horror, the Commando got to his feet, more menacing, more deadly than ever.
‘How … how is this possible?’ Jones gasped.
‘You forgot, Reggie,’ said the Commando, a cruel smile on his lips, ‘the many beneficial qualities of the cane, which is the reason I apply it zealously to boys.’
He advanced confidently on his foe, flexing his cane in preparation. ‘A thorough thrashing stirs up the stagnating juices, dissolves the precipitating salts, purifies the coagulating humours of the body, clears the brain, purges the belly, circulates the blood and braces the nerves!’
Bareback-Jones looked alarmed.
‘Which is why,’ roared Grabham, ‘I am now more than ready to … Carpet Bum the Hun!’
And he waded into the traitor once more. It was a most savage, superhuman caning and concluded as he broke the Chastiser over his knee and left Lord Ow! Ow! a broken, blubbering heap in the corner.
Meanwhile, in the basement, Alf Mast had made an improvised pipe bomb to blow up the radio station, but when the Commando came down to check his handiwork, he was disappointed to discover Alf had not followed the instructions.
‘It’s my fault,’ he sighed. ‘I forgot you were illiterate. I would give you one out of ten for effort, but you missed out vital ingredients which every schoolboy knows about when making their pipe bombs. In fact, there are no ingredients. How exactly would it explode if there’s no bomb inside it?’
‘Er … don’t know, sir,’ said Alf looking vacant.
Grabham sighed. ‘My simian young friend, I should have left you to be educated at His Majesty’s Pleasure at Bircham Hall Approved School.’
Alf Mast smiled happily as he remembered: ‘That’s where we first met, sir. When you were visiting guest thrasher. And you took me under your wing and gave me a new start in life as your assistant Corporal Punishment.’
‘With the permission of your nan who sold you for a sack of nutty slack and a new ear trumpet.’
The teacher having found the necessary explosive ingredients conveniently nearby and explained how they should be used, the bomb was primed and they were ready to leave.
‘Now take your gormless stare up to the Unter Den Linden and flag down our pilot.’
‘Thanks very much, sir. You’re a scholar and a gentlemen, sir.’
‘I am indeed, Mast. Unlike yourself: a poorly dressed but loyal chimpanzee.’
A Lysander landed along the Unter Den Linden and they climbed aboard. Moments later, as the aircraft climbed into the air, the bomb detonated and the radio station exploded so that Lord Ow! Ow! could never again make his traitorous broadcasts.
Arriving back at the Golden Hind Academy, it was time, once again, for the courageous couple to go their separate ways. ‘It’s your nosebag time, young Mast.’
‘Ah! Me fish and chips, sir. I likes me fish and chips, sir.’
‘And you deserve them, my boy. Then have matron sluice out your trough and you may retire to your tree ape nest or packing crate straw as you see fit.’
Serial Killer by Pat Mills & Kevin O’Neill is the first book in the Read Em And Weep series and is on sale digitally or as paperback.