Robert Rankin - Necrophenia

Table of Contents

Also by Robert Rankin

The Brentford Trilogy:
The Antipope
The Brentford Triangle
East of Ealing
The Sprouts of Wrath
The Brentford Chainstore Massacre
Sex and Drugs and Sausage Rolls
Knees Up Mother Earth

The Armageddon Trilogy:
Armageddon: The Musical
They Came and Ate Us
The Suburban Book of The Dead

Cornelius Murphy Trilogy:
The Book of Ultimate Truths
Raiders of The Lost Car Park
The Most Amazing Man Who Ever Lived

There is a secret trilogy in the middle there, composed of:
The Trilogy That Dare Not Speak Its Name Trilogy:
Sprout Mask Replica
The Dance of The Voodoo Handbag
Waiting For Godalming

Plus some fabulous other books, including:
The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of The Apocalypse

And its sequel:
The Toyminator

And then:
The Witches of Chiswick
The Brightonomicon
The Da-Da-De-Da-Da Code

Necrophenia

ROBERT RANKIN

Orion

www.orionbooks.co.uk

A Gollancz ebook

Copyright Robert Rankin 2008

All rights reserved
The right of Robert Rankin to be identified as the author
of this work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in Great Britain in 2008 by Gollancz
An imprint of the Orion Publishing Group
Orion House, 5 Upper St Martins Lane, London WC2H 9EA
An Hachette Livre UK company

A CIP catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library

eISBN : 978 0 5750 8678 4

ISBN 978 0 575 08240 3 (Export Trade Paperback)

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

www.orionbooks.co.uk

This ebook produced by Jouve, France

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED,
WITH LOVE,
TO MY GRANDSON

TYLER

THE MAGIC BOY

It was about a week after Id almost saved mankind.

And I was having a lie-in.

It had been a late one, the night before, I so remember.

A reunion of old school buddies. The class of 63. Of course, there are fewer of us every year now. Not, I think, because we are dying off. No, I suspect that it is because we have, over the years and through the many past reunions, learned just how much we all truly hate each other. How little we ever had in common when we were at school together and how, with the passing of the years, that little has become less and less.

And less.

So fewer turn up every year.

There were just the three of us last night.

And we didnt really have a lot to say to each other.

There was Rob, who is always jolly, come what may, and who is responsible for putting these get-togethers together. Rob is of medium height and about as broad as he is long. He is always jolly. Although last night he was less jolly than usual. This lack of jollity probably occasioned by the less-than-impressive turnout.

Rob is in advertising. He is a copywriter and he has, over the years, worked on some quite famous campaigns.

You can earn big money in advertising as a copywriter if you have the ability to come up with snappy catchphrases that touch the publics imagination and through so doing subtly influence the public to purchase whatever product it happens to be that is having a snappy catchphrase applied to it.

You will no doubt recall the Get Some Cheese campaign a few years back, with that bloke out of that series on the telly saying Get some cheese to all kinds of famous people in unusual situations.

That was one of Robs. I never quite got it myself. But, like almost everyone else at the time, I would say, Get some cheese, to some stranger on a bus, or the lady behind the dry-cleaners counter. To much mirth.

In fact, now that I come to think about it, I really miss saying Get some cheese to complete strangers. I might take it up again today and see how it works out.

So thats Rob, really.

And then theres Neil.

Neil did really well. He went into radio, started as a sound engineer, became a DJ, then a producer. Started with the wireless, but later moved onwards and upwards.

As they say.

Neil is now a film producer.

And hes promised me a part in the next film he produces. Not that Im altogether keen.

There is something decidedly odd about the films that Neil produces. They arent ever shown at regular cinemas. They receive special showings in art houses and the DVDs cannot be purchased legally in this country.

I have one of Neils DVDs. And I hope very much that what is shown on the screen is actually acting.

And so that is Neil.

And that is Rob.

Which leaves only me.

The Third Man, as it were. A bit like Michael Rennie, or indeed Orson Welles, depending upon which version you prefer.

And I am a bit like the Third Man. A bit. Im enigmatic, me. I move in the shadows. Im a sort of private investigator. A rather strange sort. You see, I developed this technique that I call the Tyler Technique, because my name is Tyler and it is my technique. If I take up just a moment to explain it here, it will save time later, when something will occur that will need an explanation, but in all the excitement of whatever is going on (and there will be excitement, lots of it, because in my business there always is) wont get one and therefore may be found worrying by those who worry about such things.

Put simply (and theres a lot more to it than this, let me tell you, but this will suffice for now), the Tyler Technique involves letting things happen naturally. Not pushing things. Not being the cause and effect of things. For Ive found that things tend to work out for the best, eventually. If you leave them alone.

And so, with all that said by way of a brief introduction to myself - with a brief aside regarding my two ex-school chums Rob and Neil, for more will be spoken of them later - let us take ourselves back, back to where this story began and the events that led me to become the greatest detective that ever was. And how I almost saved Mankind as well.

I was a very musical youth.

I harmonised with hairdryers. And whistled along with the rhythm of life. There seems to be music everywhere when youre young. And there certainly was a lot of it about back in the nineteen-sixties, when I was growing up. I know they say a lot of silly things about the nineteen-sixties now, such as all that rot that if you can remember the nineteen-sixties, you werent part of them, man. A lot of tosh and toot, that is. They were very intense and colourful, though. And very musical, too, and when it is said that The Beatles tunes were the background music for an entire generation, this is not without some truth.

But there was a lot more music about than just what you heard coming out of a dolly-birds transistor radio.

For instance, there were The Sumerian Kynges, who were my favourites. Still are, really. But then, I know where the bodies are buried, so I can have The Sumerian Kynges come and play at my house for free whenever I want them to.

Which isnt often, because theyve never really added much to their nineteen-sixties repertoire.

I was the lead singer with The Kynges for a while back in nineteen sixty-three, which is why I mention them here. I was in the original line-up when they formed. And not a lot of people know that.

The Kynges were a school band then. Because we were all at the same school together and the only instruments that there were to be played belonged to the school.

We couldnt afford to purchase our own instruments because we were poor. And poor people cannot afford expensive musical instruments. You will note that whilst you may see many a drunken down-and-out jigging from one foot to another and engaging in a bit of the old unaccompanied singing, you will rarely, if ever, see a drunken down-and-out sitting in the gutter playing either the harp or a Bechstein concert grand. Its a monetary thing. A fiscal thing.