Sentence The Threehundredandsixtyseventh

 

From across the road it looked abandoned, just another corner pub like flotsam on a beach, stranded in an area ripe for redevelopment when property prices rose again, with the tide; but as he crossed, he began to hear the sounds of music and occasional raised male voices, and when he opened the door the heat and smell of stale sweat, spilt beer and the smoke of cigarettes – in contravention of the smoking ban – hit him; he glanced around the crowded room, noticed that there were twenty-three men, of the canaille obviously, standing in a semi circle around a small stage on which a girl, barely

in her teens, surely, swayed and stepped, in impossibly high platform shoes and very little else, that twenty of the men were drinking beer and the other three anonymous blends of whisky, and that the barman could hardly take his eyes off the girl as she removed a bikini top and dropped it, which left only tiny panties to go, and then he registered the one man in the room not watching her; Samuel Smiles, 'Smiler' to his colleagues, Sam to his friends, sat quite openly at a corner table, one of only

two in the place, for he was never one to lurk in a miche, and indicated a glass of whisky which sat on the table by an empty chair, one of only four, the other two being pushed under the second table in the further corner; MacFarlane sat, raised the glass and smelled the peaty tang of Highland Park – typical of Sam to remember, unlikely for the bar to stock it, so MacFarlane noted the slight bulge in Sam's left pocket where he kept his hip flask, a gift on his official 'retirement' and no doubt matching the one MacFarlane always carried; “slainthe,” said MacFarlane and Sam matched him, their glasses clinked, unheard by the punters, cheering as the girl dropped her knickers (if they were even large enough to qualify for that name) and bent to retrieve them, facing away from her audience, before tottering off-stage and disappearing from view; “thanks for coming, Pan, it's good to see you again; now if I say 'Ring of Gold', what would you say?” asked Sam, and his friend and long-time colleague snorted: “just that I'm glad the evil bastard died before his son was born – but why are you asking that now?” and Sam indicated that Pan should sit back and listen: “one of our analysts, Jasmine Juniper-Green, has been in the Borders working on a number of mysterious disappearances, and before you say that you hadn't heard anything about that, we have kept a tight lid on this, not made any easier by some of the relatives involved: it started some weeks ago, with a young man, a street entertainer and stand-up comic, who goes by the name of Angus Ogg from The Bog whose friend Ronnie disappeared in a tunnel under the City Chambers and probably was involved in an attempt to stop Daphne Dumbiedykes – yes, there aren't two people with that name – investigating your ancestor, and she was locked in an oubliette, I won't go into details at this time, suffice to say that shortly after that, Ogg was stabbed in the head with a stiletto heel in a High Street pub; now, shortly after visiting him, a young woman, Bernie Westwater, a cousin of the O'Hooligan twins,” and a rare grin spreading over MacFarlane's face told him that connections were being made, “was found stabbed in a passenger lift at Waverley Station and taken to The Royal, but two days later she vanished; and then her partner, Tammy Shanter, daughter of Tabby, who you will remember well, and Tavish Dalwhinnie,” and Pan couldn't resist interrupting, “my old chum, how is he, still with The Scotsman?” and Sam surreptitiously topped up his friend's glass, although every eye other than theirs was on the natural redhead, spinning round the pole on the stage, “that's coming, Matey; Tavish was shot on a bus in Melrose, but it seems he was shot by Pherson,” and MacFarlane shook his head, “but Tavish disappeared from the BGH and then DCC Dominic Doubleday and Councillor George Gill both disappeared, as did Tammy Shanter – and Pherson Dalwhinnie,” and the other man's eyes were narrowed and fixed on his own, “and after that people began to appear: three strangers with a strange story – one claiming to be Thomas Learmonth and that has been confirmed by a fingerprint and DNA analysis, quite specific, not mitochondrial, and two others apparently Cave Women, though one, a young girl, has turned out to be Patience Scott, Sir Walter's youngest daughter who was believed drowned during a stormy evening crossing of the Tweed in spate, and DNA confirms – it's viridical, absolutely – but the other claims that she has always lived in a Cavern under or in The Eildon Hills,” and Pan nodded, “the one spoken of in ancient legends,” and Sam nodded, “exactly; but importantly, they all speak of knowing Tavish, Tammy and Bernie who had all arrived in The Cavern in recent weeks, and say that just before they gathered under the full moon to try to return to their own times, three other men appeared, all badly injured and matching police photographs of Doubleday, Gill and Pherson Dalwhinnie,” at which MacFarlane shook his head, but Sim continued: “Jasmine Juniper-Greene has been working of a theory of Quantum-Collision. . . . .” but he was interrupted, “, , , , , 

when two parallel universes brush against each other and overlap, so that different time periods are acted out in the same physical environment – like two acts of a play being performed simultaneously

on-stage, or one of those part-songs with each voice singing a different line, that sort of thing, Sam?” and it was his turn to demonstrate his mastery of the facts: his intellect, his memory and the depth of his knowledge of many arcane areas, combined with a renaissance spread of interests, was well known, but Sam was always surprised at the way his old friend had educated his brain to treat information reflexively, to pluck out the exact word or phrase, almost in the same way as a close fielder's hand shoots out to catch a fast ball even before his conscious mind has seen it, that was the way Pan's mind seemed to work, as if he was able to anticipate what you would say, even before you knew yourself; Sam laughed, a genuine, open laugh and a relieved one, for he wasn't himself quite sure if Jasmine's Theory would hold water, for if it did, that would be an exaptation, a serendipitous happenstance, or perhaps it just needed the scientific development to catch up with what was in fact a reality all the time. and he said: “she believes that in such instances, it would be feasible to slip from one to the other, accidentally, or to catch a glimpse, either of the past or the future, and perhaps believe that you have seen a ghost,” and he saw that Pan was looking away to the right, “I do believe I have,” said he!