The Secretive Seven

about fooking time.

 

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN

4

"We will need to keep a very close eye on them," Amy was saying decisively after all Seven met in an upstairs lounge. "I don't know what their motives are but I smell something fishy."

"I thought it was fisky," Halfred averred.

David frowned. "Well, a fisk is a fish, Halfy."

"No it's not, it's more like an eel."

"I thought fisk were like dolphins...." Peter offered. "Well, at least mammals of some kind."

Both Halfred and David laughed at him.

David said, "Halfy may be mistaken - and generally a dolt - but that is pure rot, Peter!"

Halfred added, "Yes, however buccolically stupid David is a mammal a fisk a'int."

"How would either of you know, anyway, it's not like they're more than a Fjordianlandian legend anyhow?" Peter shot back testilly.  

"Come on you lot," Julia said bossily. "If it helps, let's say, we smell a rat."

"Well, it wasn't me!" Petty grumbled.

"What do you think, Odovacar?" April asked. "You have a keen nose for the smell of subterfuge and iniquity. Do you trust these foreigners?"

"I don't know," Odovacar answered disantly and gave a half hearted shrug as he at on a settee staring out a gabled window over the gardens.

"What's got into you?" Julia wanted to know. "You've been all funny ever since that affair with the Smugglers - well, different funny than usual - but still funny."

But Odovacar appeared to be off with the fairies again, or at least with one of them.

The others looked at each other in confusion.

"You know, I haven't caught him trying to look up my dress for weeks," April said.

"Yes, that's right, hasn't begged me once to show him my thighs," Amy said suspiciously.

"And it's like he's gone off pre-marital sex altogether," Julia opined.

"What's funny about a boy wanting to see a girl's lady-parts and make love to them anyway?" David asked. Though he quickly added, "I mean, after they're married that is." And he went a bit pink.

"Nothing - after you're married," Julia agreed. "So long as it's all kept private and no one ever knows you've done it lots and lots of times and you never talk about it ---- after marriage," she added hastily.

"Then why are we talking about it now?" Halfred wanted to know, looking uncomfortable. "I mean, I've made a close study of animal reproduction - before I switched to physics - and it's a rather inefficient means of procreation anyway."

"I think it's rather nice," David put in.
       
"What?" Julia asked.

"Well, animals making love, I think it's rather nice --- no, I don't mean nice as such - I mean, it's all kind of natural and therefore pleasant in a way... apparently..." David's voice trailed off.  

"Julia appraised him carefully, was about to say someting, but shook her head thoughtfully. Then she did speak. "Anyway, as to Odovacar. It's not so much his interest in.... umm... lady things... but all his suggestions about what is involved in inter-sexual relations. I mean, thigh fettishes, his peculiar interest in thighs, and his idea of sexual intercourse being akin to a rodeo event, or his theory that it should be... Funny I'd call that."

"Whatever do you and Odovacar talk about?" Peter asked, eyebrows raised in a very keen question mark.

"Nothing," Julia hastilly replied. "Nothing at all. I'm just speculating."

"But..." Peter interjected, very interested in the conversation.

"Shut it, Peter!" Julia scowled. "Just shut it!"

"The point is," Amy interupted. "Odovacar seems to have lost focus. He hasn't once asked me go skinny dipping with him since four weeks ago --- nor mentioned butt plugs."

"Butt plugs?" April asked in apparent perplexity, though there was a queer glint in her eye just then.

"I assume he meant the ones you stick in buckie barrells," Petty suggested in an effort to help.

"Perhaps -- but it was the context -- didn't seem about buckie barrells.... Never mind that though. We still haven't worked out why he's so strangely preoccupied lately."

"I wonder if it's got anything to do with his Roddy felllow?" David asked.

"Roddy?" Amy asked. Then she remembered. "Oh that young chap he writes to who is in one of the King's Transvestite Units?"

"The same," Peter told her. "He seems obsessed with the friendship. Even dreams of him."

"Dreams?" Julia asked.

"Yes, even last night I heard him. 'Oh Roddy my dear,' he says in his sleep. 'That sausage is good enough to eat, why ever would you want to snip it off?' Then he starts sucking his pillow. I mean, I like my food as much as anyone, but sausages are poor man's food surely. If he dreamt of gourmet sausages, I could understand, but he was dreaming about your working class type sausage I believe."

"How do you know that?" Julia said and could not help laughing at Petty's silly talk, as usual.

"Well, smarty britches, he also said, 'Oh you are so common, Roddy. You common, common little man. Let me get my mouth around your sausage.' That was when I turned my torch on and saw him sucking his pillow."

"Sounds positively unsanitary," Amy squealed.

"I don't know," Julia said, though she appeared to be thinking aloud. "I, of course, prefer gourmet sausages - that goes without saying."

"So this Roddy?" David said thoughtfully. "What's the attraction?"

Odovacar came out of himself. "Who are you talking about?'

"Your friend," Halfred explained. "This Roddy chap of yours. Is he exchanging secrets with you or something? You write every day and in some peculiar code you've invented. What's going on?"

"Oh you idiots," Odovacar hissed. "Have you no idea what's going on between us?"

The six blank stares he received told Odovacar everything he needed to know.

"Well, it's all very secret. All so secret I can't even tell you what it is... So don't ask!"

"Okay..." April said. "At least you're sounding your own arrogant self. So.... about these Fjordianlandians. Especially the tall one with the lawyer-like poise and latent potency. Do you think he's a spy?"

"Well," Odovacar said thoughtfully, for a moment seeming to have regained his old pompous spirit. "The thing we need do is keep a close watch on them. We'll have to do it in shifts though. Halfy and David and Peter, you take turns to watch Blue. April and Amy and Julia, you can look after that horrid scowly girl... Nora isn't it? Yes, and I'll keep an eye on that Ringo. Yes, I might need to keep both eyes on him day and night."

"Do you think he's the leader?" Amy gasped.

"No, why do you ask?"

"Because you've chosen to look after him all by yourself!"

"Oh... yes.. about that.. Well, he may not be their leader but... err.. well, I sense he's dangerous... in unexpected ways.... possibly very flexible ways..."

"Do you think he's so very dangerous that you'd go without sleep to watch his every move?" Peter gasped.

"I do think he's dangerous enough," Odovacar answered bravely and gave them an enigmatic smile which made his lips tremble.      

"Does this have anything to do with your secret affair with Roddy?" Julia asked.

"What affair?" Odovacar burst out angrily. Then he seemed to quickly reconsider.  "Oh sorry - I see what you mean. No, no. no... I'm sure Ringo and Roddy have nothing to do with each other... or, at least, they better not!" Odovacar caught himself again and smiled weakly. "Of course, Roddy need never know about Ringo. One must not mix up one's secrets - confuses things you know."  

"Well, it's confusing me, I know that much," Halfred frowned.

"Yes, even last night I heard him. 'Oh Roddy my dear,' he says in his sleep. 'That sausage is good enough to eat, why ever would you want to snip it off?' Then he starts sucking his pillow."

  

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN


5


That evening, the Secretive Seven met in Amy's enormous bedroom and sat about on her sofas and ginornmous frilly sheeted bed. They compared notes.

".... and Eric smokes...."

"...unbelieveable...."

"... push up bra...."

"... you have got to be joking...."

"... oysters and tomato sauce...."

".... revolting customs..."

"... three times a day..."

"... on such a low fibre diet....?"

"... or so Ringo would have us think I think..."

"...paints and a easel..."

"... a Red Robin on a cherry tree twig, you say....?"

"... symbolic...?"

"... a coded message...?"

.. rather large breasts...."

"...the Red Robin...?

"...no, Eric..."

"...Eric, you say!..."

.. yes, the greedy chap...."

".... I had my eye on that breast...."

"...to be fair, he would not have known you liked honey basted chicken breast..."

"...a Red Robin's....?"

"Hold on!" Amy raised her voice. "I think best we not talk all at once. It's frightfully confusing."

"I haven't the slightest clue what's going on," Peter admitted.

"That would be right," Julia said.    

"One at a time! One at a time," Amy exclaimed. "Now, did you detect anything suspicious, Peter?"

"No. Nothing obvious."

"Halfred?"

"No."

"David?"

"No as a matter of fact."

"Odovacar?"

"Ringo doesn't wear underpants."

"Anything else?"

"He oils his thighs."

"So - um -- what's suspicious about that?"

"I'm just reporting the facts, not analyzing them!" Odovacar retorted on his dignity.

"April?"

"Nora paints."

"Really?"

"Red Robins on twigs," April added sardonically.

After a pregnant pause, Amy said. "And... so...?"

"Well, I at least find that suspicious," April said.

"I thought she painted a honey basted chicken breast," Julia put in. "Which I thought strange not suspicious. I prefer portraits of people myself."

"She didn't paint a honey basted chicken breast," Peter scoffed. "Hafred was upset because Eric ate the one he wanted to at luncheobn."

"Did you happen to see Nora's painting?" Julia asked.

"Well... no... no I didn't..."

"Then shut the fuck up!"

"This Red Robin," Amy mused aloud, somehow managing to ignore them. "Could it be a code of some sort?"

"Or a symbol," David offered. "I did mention that earlier."

"Was that you who mentioned that?" Aprl quizzed.

"I don't don't know really, but someone must have."

"I heard someone say it," Peter agreed.

"Well," Amy said thoughtfully. "If it is symbolic, then I guess we don't have to see it as suspicious necessarily. Would that be right, Julia?"

Julia, an Arts Major, said. "True. Not impossible it could be both symbol and code, but usually not. Though I'm Majoring in Late Nineteenth Century European Art - mainly portraiture - so can't be sure of other eras. And I know absolutely nothing of Chinese Art..."

"But what if it is, after all, a code of some sort?" Halfred asked. "What do you think, David. You're into animals."

"For a start," David said testily. "Just because I'm from the Farming Aristocracy doesn't make it a natural follow on that I'm in to animals. And anyway, a Red Robin is a bird , not an animal." His eyes gleamed with the glint of an (admittedly minor) victory.  

"Pedantic bugger!" Halfred protested.

"Well, even if a Red Robin by some stretch of the imagination is in some way an animal," David pressed his perceived advantage. "It's clearly not a farm animal."

"What if it were to fly onto your farm?"

"Who's being pedantic now?" David said, rolling his eyes.    

"Look, we can leave nothing to chance," Amy interupted, somewhat irritably (and who can blame her really?) "Julia, I want you to follow Nora out into the gardens tomorrow and watch her every move. Every brush stroke. Every smudge of yellow into blue. Every accent. Every dab of water -- unless, of course, she's using oils. Do you understand?"

"I do know the difference between water paints and oils, you know."

"Julia!"

Julia smiled. "Can't I have a little joke now and then? .. Now, if that picture Nora is painting is a code of some sort, I'll soon decipher it."

"I'm actually a very good code breaker myself," Halfred coughed modestly (apparently).

"Alright," Amy said. "Then both of you follow her."

"I know something of Red Robins," David coughed modestly too.

"You yourself said a Red Robin is not a farm animal," April appraised him critically.

"Yes, best leave this to the experts, David," Halfred smiled sweetly at him.  

David went red in the face and he seemed ready to say something, but refrained in the end.  

"I'll still keep a close eye on Ringo though, will I?" Odovacar piped up, a little anxiously.

He oils his thighs."

"So - um -- what's suspicious about that?"

"I'm just reporting the facts, not analyzing them!"

  

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN


6


Odovacar had only just put a keen eye to the keyhole when noises behind him made him jump up and try to look like he was doing something perfectly explainable. The circumstances were: he was loitering in the passageway outside Ringo's bedroom near the servant's quarters. Such  circumstances did not offer much in the way of the obviously explainable. Quick witted, he stuck out his hands in front of him, closed his eyes and pretended to be sleep walking.

The butler, Eldorion appproached with three servants behind him carrying pails of hot and cold water; Eldorion himself carried a big fluffy towell hung over each of his forearms.

"Oh dear!" Odovacar said pretending to wake up. "Oh fancy that!"

"Just so, Sir," Eldorion said, appraising Odovacar patiently. "Sleep walking again, Sir, like you did outside Lady Chatterley's chamber last Autumn? And then there was..."

"I don't like the drift of your words," Odovacar said sternly.

"As you wish, Sir," Eldorion said without expression, though his eyes were filled with anything but respect. "Stand aside please. I am preparing Master Ringo's bath."

Not pleased to take instructions from a mere butler, nonetheless Odovacar reluctantly stepped out of the way, so as not to look pompous in front of the other servants, Lance the mechanic, Rodney the chimney sweep, and Bungo the sewerage brusher. The three went into the room - Odovacar heard the gloop gloop of poured buckets -and then they were gone again.

Eldorion proceeded to enter Ringo's room.

"Hold on there a moment, my good man."

"Yes, Sir?"

"What do you plan to do with those towells?"

"I intend to dry off Master Ringo upon the completion of his bath, Sir."

"Is that so?" Odovacar said rubbing his chin as a plan began to form.

"That of course, will be after I first give him a thorough sponging with this sponge, Sir," Eldorion said.

The butler held up a big spongey sponge in one hand and a tablet of scented soap in the other, causing the towells draped over his forearms to sway suggestively - or, at least, Odovacar thought they swayed suggestively.

"Perhaps I might do that myself," Odovacar averred. "I think it would be the right kind of hosty thing to do."

"But, Sir, you are a Lord's son of the very minor aristocracy, not some servile underling with soft palms and a male touch full fit to alert the senses!"

"Pardon?"

"My father was a batman to Lord Crikey during the First World War, you see. He taught me the right and proper way to sponge down a young man."

"That may be as may be," Odovacar replied, between gritted teeth, as he did not like something in the butler's tone. "But I myself will extend this courtesy to our honoured guest. Now - hand over those toiletry items."

"No, I cannot in all conscience do so, Sir," Eldorion replied. "Master Ringo specifically asked me to perform this service."

"You liar!"

"Sir!"

Odovacar made a lunge for the sponge. Eldorion resisted. A fight ensued.


* * *


"Why ever would you get into a fist fight with the hired help?" Amy wanted to know as she applied raw steaks to Odovacar's blackened eyes.

"I meant to eke out information from that Ringo lad by getting into his room and cunningly interrogating him."

"While sponge bathing him?" Halfred asked.

"Yes," Odovacar answered sharply. "I thought if I could relax him into a vulnerable position he would reveal all his sordid motives and plans! But that wretched butler refused to let me try. Said he'd been asked to perform the function himself."

"What?" David asked. "Eldorion was also planning to relax him in to answering delicate questions by sponge bathing him?"

"No, not exactly - just the sponge bathing butler part."

"I wouldn't mind sponge bathing him," April smiled.

Odovacar fixed a vastly disapproving gaze on her. "How you disgust me sometimes, April..." He then blushed a little and addressed the room. "The worse thing was how far the butler went. Not only did he kick me in the baubles and yank me very hard by my embarrassing bit, he then threw me down the stairs and proceeded to punch my eyes out repeatedly - or, at least, he tried to. After doing all that, he stood back and laughed. Laughed! It was like he'd been wanting to commit such vicious and outrageous atrocities on my person for years and years and finally had the opportunity to do so, exploding with all the pent up emotion of an erupting volcano. I think you should sack him, Amy!"

"Oh no, we can't do that. I mean - he is such an excellent butler in so many ways. I couldn't possibly do without him."

"I wonder if he can be trusted though?" Julia asked suddenly.

"Eldorion? What do you mean? I've always found him more than satisfactory."

"No, not trust him to do a good job --- what if he's in cahoots with them?" Julia said. "I've noticed the way the two of them look at each other. Like there is some kind of history between them."

"Master Ringo and Eldorion?" David asked.  

"Yes, now I think about it, why would Ringo specifically ask to be sponge bathed by Eldorion?" Amy mused aloud. "I, of course, know exactly how good a sponge bather he is - but how would Ringo know?"

A silence fell on the room. The others stared at Amy, their expressions clearly showed that her words had given them much food for thought.

   
"How you disgust me sometimes, April..." And the 'soap argument' with Eldorian ! Love it   

Sometimes I dont see the point in buying books.......just come here for a read, AND you get a great giggle  

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN


7


"I'm not sure this was one of your better ideas, Julia," Halfred mentioned somewhat mournfully from where he sat in the cherry tree legs dangling.

"There was no better place to hide," Julia hissed at him. "Anyway, we can see Nora at paint, and these leaves conceal us."

"I don't want to seem pedantic, but these leaves barely conceal us at all, and Nora sits across the lawn facing us and we can't even see what's she painting, though I assume it's a cherry tree with two English members of the lower English aristocracy sitting in it looking rather foolish..."

"Oh you cry baby, I wish you'd shut it. Hey! Look at that!"

"What?" Halfred asked, still glum.

"There's that Red Robin. On a twig. See."

"Amazing. It's so still."

"Shouldn't it be doing little fidgets?"

"Do Red Robins fidget?"

"You pedantic dick... I'll rephrase the question: Do Red Robins ever move?"

"I think David's the pedantic one --- at times... But.... oh yes, they should move I guess, but whether they hop or bob or whatever, I just don't know...  Maybe David should have come along after all..."

"Never mind that. The point is: the thing's not moving."

"Oh I do see your point after all," Halfred said triumphantly. "And is that an aerial sticking out of it's head? It must hurt."

"Strange..." Julia looked across at Nora who seemed to be studiously painting. But no. The Fjordianlandian all-in-black-dresser neo-Goth wasn't actualy painting at all - she was talking into the end of her brush. "The Red Robin must be a relay of some sort."

"Is that an introduced species?" asked Halfred with sudden interest.

"What?"

"A Relay? Sounds oriental."

"You idiot. It's not a bird, it's part of a wireless set up."
 
"My Gawd! You're right. Why didn't I see that?"

"Because you're stupid," Julia frowned.

"That's a bit harsh."

"A bit harsh and even more true. Hey! Nora's got up and... yes... she's gone into the house. Quickly now. Let's see if she's left a clue in her painting."

They dropped to the lawn and hurried over to Nora's easel. They saw she was still working on her painting of the cherry tree with the Red Robin.

"She hasn't painted us," Halfred said in relief. "This is a realistic depiction so I assume she didn't see us."

"Mind you," Julia said authoritively. "She's an artist and would only see what she wants to see."

"Well, hello you gorgeous thing," said a sweet male voice accented nicely with a Fjordianlandian hint.  

"Don't try to smarm me with your Fjordian charms, Eric Bluebottle-Herring!" Halfred said sternly as he span around. "What's with the wireless set up?"

"I think he was talking to me," Julia flushed red. There he stood in all his Nordic beauty. Her eyes obeyed her heart and not her mind and dropped to admire his rather well formed knees. "I'm not really that gorgeous," she added fetchingly.

Eric took his appraising eyes off Halfred... "Oh yes. Of course. Julia, I'm sure you are a delight. Now, about this wireless. I assume you think we're spies or something." And Eric laughed gaily in a very modern sense. "Spies?" he laughed again. "I assure you nothing could be further from the truth."

"Don't try your smarmy rubbish on us," Halfred said sternly.

"I assure you I would not lie over such things, dear dear Halfred," Eric said and took one Halfred's hands. "I mean - could I ever think to fool such an intellectual young fellow as you, dear dear Halfred?"

Halfred looked at his hand in Eric's hand. Eric had a very manly hand, a very thoughtful manly hand, a hand that said, 'Trust me, Halfred. Would I seek to smarm you, oh perish the thought!'; a hand that seemed to know Halfred's hand's every thought and emotion and desire...

Halfred giggled (slightly), "Well... seeing as you put it like that..."

Nora arrived carrying a small pot of Nelson Red paint. "What are you two doing here?" she asked rudely.

"They think we're using our wireless for nefarious reasons, Sister," Eric smiled suavely, innocently, delightfully.

Nora's eyes widened and she slowly reached into the pocket of her black painter's smock, her scowling face a picture of sinister scowliness.

Eric dropped Halfred's hand and took up Nora's before she could take out the mysterious gun-shaped item out of her smock. "Come, Sister, let's all retire to the house for a soothing cup of tea."

"Jolly-o," Halfred said brightly and he instantly followed the two Fjordanlandians.

Julia ran to take up a position beside him. "I don't trust them, Halfy. Not one bit."

"You seem to have taken a sudden dislike to Blue."

"I thought you weren't going to call him Blue? It's the name his friends call him, remember."

"Well, a lad can change his mind, can't he?"

"Well, I for one don't plan to fall under his spell."

Halfred said knowingly: "You're upset about that 'gorgeous thing' thing, aren't you."

"And you're happy about it?"

Halfred was about to say, "Oh aren't you the jealous one', but something stopped him. He looked at Eric as he walked ahead of them. What a sinuous neck he had, and finely crafted back, and round taut buttocks, and rear-of-the-legs to die for... To die for!

"Oh Gawd!" Halfred thought in sudden consternation, trying to shake the enchanted fuzz from his brain. He instantly tried to deflect certain unacceptable thoughts he was having about Eric by transferring his emotive attenion to Nora. In desperation, he undressed her with his eyes. He took off her black smock, her black knickerbockers, her black blouse, removed her black ribbons and let her ponytail fall loose, slipped off her black walkabout shoes, drew down her black industrial underwear...

Suddenly, all thought of Eric dissipated....  

Nora seemed to sense some change in the emotional atmosphere. She turned her angular face toward him and scowled fetchingly. "What are you staring at, pig?"

A compartment in Halfred's heart fully opened then, and tinsel and fairy dust flowed in...

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN


8

Halwise might be besotted by that pretty Fjordianlandian minx of scowling visage and expressive hand gestures, but Julia was not so easily fooled by gorgeous Fjordianlandians.

She scruinized Eric Bluebottle-Herring closely. Handsome, yes. Tall, yes. Academic in that bureaucratic 'Come into my office, you must trust me, I've looked into more divorcee briefs than you can poke a stick or similar implement at, Maam' way, yes. 'Smooth,"  Julia thought in her young woman's head - which proved something was in there. "Smooth like the shaved body and limbs he no doubt smears all over with herring oil, luxuriously, lovingly, with a lawyer's soft fleshy hands - though smelling suspiciously of rose petals. "I don't believe you,"  she got out as Eldorion the butler poured their tea in the sitting room. "Why would you have a wireless set up if your plans are all ship shape and above board? And who was Norc talking to on her paintbrush?"

"Just her Mother, Helga."

"The same Helga as Amarie says died when still a child?" Julia threw at him, her eyes cynical, her breasts pushed forward forbodingly as she brushed back a curl of beautiful red hair, her legs set slightly apart in his direction but not enough to admit anything other than a certain careless self-possession and a little old fashioned gay abandon, her mouth pouting slightly in their perfectly applied pink lipstick.    

"Reports of Helga's death were premature," Eric said cooly and carefully, his face a sheet of blank A4 paper, his eyes squinting slightly disdainfully at the slight gap between her knees, revealing himself for the typical Fjordianlandian that he was.

"Amarie's Mother did say she went to her funeral,"  Halwise said politely, trying to defuse the tension between Julia and Eric. "It is hard to imagine her getting that wrong.""

"There was a mix up," Eric said softly, thoughtfully. "But that very same night the Bellman was wandering among the graves and heard a faint tinkling. He immediatelly took his ice pick to the pack ice and removed Helga from the grave. She was alive! But barely! She was rushed to the hospital where it was discovered she was full of the nicer drugs."

"How does that explain anything?" Julia wanted to know.

"It explains everything," Eric said.

"It does explain the Fjordianlandian impassivity and whiteness of skin," Halwise helped. "Well-to-do drug addicts don't go out much in the weather much..."

"I thought that was due to the boring white environment and the lack of sunshine they live in," Julia said, not convinced. "I didn't know they were all drug addicts."

"We like our drugs, but we control them, not them us," Norc said, nonchalantly, as if she was talking about chedder cheese on crackers. "But you're wrong, beautiful sexually potent English girl! We do have sunshine." Her voice now was like an angry icicle. "I sunbake naked three times a year."

Halfwise blushed.

"Does that mean you sunbake three times a year - or you sunbake naked three times a year?" Julia asked, giving her a menacing stare, determined to find everything suspicious.

Norc scowled. "Why would you want to know? Have I prompted thoughts in you of my beautiful nakedness spread eagled in the wan Fjordianlandian sunshine, my Nordic blue eyes concealed partially by Italian sunglasses, my waxed legs gleaming like curvaceous lemonade icypoles, my hair loose and wild above my head flowing like pure seaweed upon a tame bull seal?"

"No, I'm not!" Julia hissed.

"Well, Halfwise is," Norc scowled knowingly.

Julia turned to appraise Halfwise. "Is that true, Halfy?" she wanted to know.

"Umm... err...""

Julia shook her head in disgust. Addressing Norc again, she said,"You may divert the conversation of boys, Norc, but you'll never divert a hetereosexual girl like me with your erotic word-paintings of your succulent beautiful Fjordianlandian body nestling against a big warm wobbly-fleshed bull seal. I suspect you to be a spy. A beautiful sexy spy, yes - and somewhat cold and in need of the kind hearted rubbing of another young woman, as boys have no idea about these things, much as they like to think they do - but you're a spy nonetheless!"

Norc began to reach into the pocket of her smock, but Eric stayed her hand.

Noticing, Julia asked herself, 'I wonder what that mysterious gun shaped item in her smock pocket is?'

"I think we should all just settle down a little and drink our tea," Eric said in his smoothest tone. "Eldorion?"

"Yes, Sir?"

"Would you kindly take Norc up to her room. I think her sore back is playing up again. She is out of sorts.""

Norc was about to say something, but Eric gave her a hard glance, and she scowled but said nothing. She followed Eldorion to the door.

"Oh yes," Eric added before they left. "You might give my half-sister a thorough massage if you would, Eldorion. It always helps to relieve her tenseness.""

"With pleasure," Eldorion said, his usually inscrutable professional expression allowing itself a flicker of amiability.

Halfwise saw it - and frowned.

"You haven't answered my question," Julia wanted to know after they had gone. "Are you a spy, Eric?"

"No, I'm not," Eric answered, squinting, licking his lips slowly as if in pain, a nervous twitch accosting his right eye... "No, I'm not. Now - you'll need to excuse me." And Eric quickly hurried from the room - perhaps too quickly.

"I don't trust him - not in the least," Julia mused aloud, her eyes a study in suspicion deep and cynical.

"Nor do I," Halwise agreed, somewhat bitterly. "I think Odo's right. Amarie should sack him!"

pink lipstick sucks  

here to help   

Mmmm... pink you say...   

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN

9


"No clothes at all?" Amarie was saying as she brushed twigs and leaves from April's hair in the former's room. April sat in the chair at Amarie's vanity mirror, while Amarie stood behind her, a petulant look upon her rather pristine and chiseled and blemish free pale rather fetching Nordic face. "In Lover's Pond?"

"Yes, I had to climb through the bushes to see him, but when I did, it was certainly worth it."

"Oh dear," Amarie gasped, but smiled. "Did you learn anything of value while you were oggling?"

"That was why I was oggling: to learn something," April grinned, her handsome rosy round-cheeked Manchurian complexion becoming even more rosey.

"But what of his motivations, do you think? Is he a spy? Did he reveal any secrets?"

"I don't think he has any secrets... not visible ones. Seemed to feel very comfortable in his nakedness as he floated on his back upon the pond periscope up."

"Periscope up?"

"He did seem to enjoy the feel of the cool clear pond water washing over him as he glided like a shaved otter," April told her in rapt tones. "I know I did."

"Do you think he knew you were there?"

"Who can say?"

"But you learned nothing about this spying business?"

"I don't know, I think I'm learning more about spying every time I do it."

"You know, of course, Odovacar was meant to be spying on Ringo, not you," Amarie said. "You were supposed to be watching Norc."

"Julia and Halfred were tasked with that, if you remember. I was looking for something to do. And Odovacar was useless anyway."

"What do you mean?" Amarie asked as, having removed the last twig from April's hair, she began to run her fingers slowly and lovingly through it.

"Well, he was hiding in the bushes on the other side of the pond, but he didn't do much of a job of hiding. His face kept poking out as Ringo passed by. At one stage he set the bushes rustling wildly as Ringo came past. Ringo maust have seen him because he grinned... queer business..."

"What are you saying? Ringo isn't...?"

"He is from Skattykatzenberg."

"How shocking! And what of Odovacar? How did he react on getting caught out? Did he find a cleverly cunning excuse for being there?"

"He explained nothing... just looked like he was in physical pain. It was like he was having a turn or something. His face went bright red, his eyes stared, and he had an almighty grin on his face: shock I'd guess - and mental pain - so intense to look at... Umm.. if I said it was  'exquisite pain to behold', I think I'd only be half way to describing what I saw."

"Queer business."

"Indeed!"

Just then Julia stormed into the room. "I despise Blue. What an arsehole!"

"What ever is the matter?" Amarie asked in Motherly concern. "Has he done something untoward toward you?"

"Not in the least - the arsehole!" Julia cursed. "Though he called Halfed 'gorgeous', if that's what you mean?"

"He called Halfred 'gorgeous'!" Amarie said in surprise.

"Yes. That was not long before Halfred undressed Norc with his eyes and fell in love with her. It's all so hard to explain in a few words, and I really can't be bothered telling the whole thing. Blue is from Skattykatzenberg, you know. I don't even think he even noticed the small gap between my knees, except disdainfully. You had to be there..."

"Oh my goodness" April said. "No I don't. I've noticed that delightful gap many times. And what of your perfectly globular breasts, Julia? Did he not notice them either?"

Julia looked at April with a peculiar new understanding. "Umm.. Well... Err.... Well, it's like he could not see me for the stunningly beautiful young woman I am: couldn't care less about that!"

"What about your shapely shaved egs that go all the way up, supple and smooth enough to tantalize the eye even of a girl like me?" gasped Amarie. "The cad!"

Julia glanced at her with a peculiar new understanding too, but could think of nothing to say just then.

"So what does it all mean?" April asked.

"That you two are more affectionate to me than I knew here to now!" Julia opined, her mind rather confused yet pleased. But then it all came back to her, the grievous insult to her vanity committed by Blue, and her porecelaine skin became even more poreceline in her taut aggravation, and her pink painted lips pursed in rather fetching consternation, and she cried out: "Am I chopped liver?"

And she began to weep dramatically - which is what girls did in those days at times of heightened exasperation - and for all sorts of other inexplicable reasons too, as a matter of fact, which of course never happens nowadays.

April and Amarie went to her immediately and threw their arms around her and pressed their pulsating young soft breasted bodies against hers, and snuggled her neck with their noses in an act of girlfriendy solicitation.

"Oh there, there..." Amarie cooed reassuringly and began to kiss her left cheek.

"Indeed!" April said, kissing the other.

"Oh how lovely to have such solicitous friends," Julia wept tearfully. "A girl couldn't be happier to have friends like you."

"Oh let's be friends forever and never ever think of boys again," April said.

And they pressed their pulsating bodies even closer together in innocent but incredibly tactile feminine affectionate. So closely did they cling, when Halfred wandered in a moment later he could hardly tell where one ended and the next started, and it warmed his cockles to see such intimate girly affection, indeed.

  tsk tsk pulsating indeed   

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN

10


Peter sat in a rose covered arbour in a rather fabulous pottager on the east side of the manor trying to work it all out in his slow witted way as he distractedly watched a Red Robin - though it may after all have been an Fjordianlandian Relay - bobbing about on the rim of a pot of lemon balm.

"Blue and Nora and Ringo are up to something but I have exactly no idea what."

He scratched his rugged northern chin and took out his hip-flask of buckie. Surreptitously he took a swig and then hid it up his kilt again.

"I have thought and thought and thought about it and got exactly nowhere," he said, and took his flask out again for another quick swig before concealing it again.

"It's almost like I'm in a story where the Author has absolutely no idea where to take the story and just makes it up as he goes along without any rhyme or reason relying solely on whim and little acts of creative desperation."

Just then a figure in lanquid movement rustled a pink flowered clematis in the next arbour along the garden path. Peter looked that way and caught bits of her beauteous human shape between the trailing leaves.

"What's that girl up to?" he asked himself, for he knew by the jet blackness of her gothic clothing it was that repulsive - though handsome - young bandersnatch of a girl, Nora. "I think I'll follow the unwholesome wench!" he added quietly.

Peter followed the thin but shapely Fjordianlandian ice-beauty, sneakily bolting from pot to pot in the pottager, losing her among the foliage of the multiple arbours now and then, but finding her again, keeping about fifteen to seventeen feet behind her, though once within eleven feet (behind a giant lavandula hidcote in an urn) and once nineteen feet away (when he stopped to smell a rather brilliant  old world rose with a huge yellow many-petalled bloom, possibly one of Gertrude Jekyll's). Finally, he saw her disapppear into the gardener's toolshed.

Peter ducked beind a barrel with a dwarf Gravenstein apple in it. Then to his greatest suprise, he saw David arrive along the path from the kitchen bearing a rather large carrot - probably a Nelson Red if Peter didn't know better, though it was hard to be sure as the carrot had a rather odd and tantalizing shape...

 The Bugles back! (And its front!)

 It's back!     

And good thing too, as I had unaccountably missed several of the latest episodes.    I suspect someone has been hiding them from me.

...a rather large carrot - probably a Nelson Red if Peter didn't know better,

As well he should! Nelson Red indeed!   

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN

11

If Peter a little earlier had been in a quandary as to what the Fjordianlandan Cousins might be up to, with David's arrival with his mysterious red object - possibly vegetative - he was now truly in a quindary - or whatever dary was one worse than a quandary. Could David really be in cahoots with the Herrings? And, if so, what could cahooting with a Herring possibly entail? Peter had once cahooted with a Haggis - but surely...

Peter scratched his head, thinking very slowly at his usual pace. Think! What could David possibly be doing with that horrid lovely ornately boned white ice-maiden Nora? And was she in fact an ice-maiden? What if she was something else? An ice-Martian for instance. Peter had, afterall, read William Rice Buroughs and knew something of Mars, though mainly the hotter regions and not the ice caps.

As her ponderously pondered on these rather Antarctic thoughts, the sound of bare feet slapping pleasantly and provacatively on the cobble path reached his largish wind-ragged ears. Peter ducked further behind the apple pot which was mentioned in the last chapter. One of his eyes peeped between the leaves.

Ringo was arriving, clad in only a towell. A short towell that revealed his stupendous abs and oiled brawny - though shapely - thighs. Among the pots behind the sumptuous Fjordianlandian slunk and scurried a  huge rodent-like figure with reddened beady eyes --- and dressed in rather fine gentlemanly clothing --- it wasn't a rat afterall, it was Odovacar. Ringo padded into the garden shed. Odovacar slunk forward and tried to peep inside the door.

"Psst!" Peter psst.

Odovacar jumped in startlement and spun to stare like a rabbit blinded in headlights at the kilted figure behind the dwarf Gravenstein.

"I wasn't!" exclaimed Odovacar in a peculiar strangled hiss-whisper. "I was watching not peeking!"

"Quick. Over here. They'll catch you at it."

"I wasn't even at it -- not really..." Odovacar explained quietly as he slunk over to hide with Peter. "It may have appeared like it but nothing could have been further from the truth. Notice, my trouser zip is zipped --- and has been all day, I assure you." And Odovacar gave Peter the most open, friendly and sincere grin he could muster.

"Must you distrort your face like a gargoyle, Odovacar! You give me the heeby jeebies sometimes."

Odovacar frowned.

"That's better, you look more like yourself now - goblinish if you know what I mean."

Odovacar was about to say something perfectly true and applicable about Peter - something about haggises and the lonely adventures of Scots in the heather - but changed his mind. Instead, he said, "What do you think he's going to do in there, wrapped - if not poured - into a towell and so scentedly oiled.. and all..?"

"I hate to think... Did you know Nora was in there? And David too!"

"My gawd! He isn't the type? Is he? David Farmer, you mean?"

"Yes."

"Well, I'll be hornswaggled! What a perfectly unwholesome trio!"

"I wonder what they're doing together?"

"It sickens me to think. That girl is obnoxious and  a bit too thin for my taste. And as for David - not my type at all, if you know what I mean..."

"What?"

"Pardon?"

"Do you think David has switched to the other side?"
l
"He appears to be playing on both sides," Odovacar said in disgust. "I mean, that kind of thing might be fine with some... cough... but not with the likes of David. I actually thought he was fond of animals anyway --- and vulgarly shaped vegetables, that goes without saying."

"Well, I don't like chaps who play on both sides," Peter said severely.

"Well, some... I've heard...are quite okay..." Odovacar mumbled apologetically.

"What? Spying for both sides? Have you gone mad?"

"Oh, I see your point now," Odovacar giggled in some relief.

"He's sold his soul to the Fjordianlandian Cousins," Peter mused with agonizing slowness. "But why?"

"Why not?" Odovacar said pragmatically. "I assume he's getting well paid for it. Probably just a business decision in the end."

"So it's alright be a traitor to one's own country! Is that what you're saying?"

"Well, yes and no. It really depends on how much..." As he was speaking, Odovacar caught the fierce glare in Peter's eyes and decided to change tact. "But mostly, no -- of course... dear chum... Disgraceful conduct! Selling your countrymen out for mere money... But are you sure he's sold out to the enemy? And - well - have we proven the Fjordianlanadians are the enemy yet?"

"You're probably right. Quick. There's a window on the other side of this shed. We'll go and see if we can peep and listen in."

"What say I peep and you listen?"

"Good idea. You're much better at that kind of thing."

"I surely don't know what you mean..."

THE SECRETIVE SEVEN

12

The three girls were sitting on Amy's bed in their most comfortable negligees writing down their word-thoughts on little cards in an effort to piece all their thoughts together in a cohesive pattern with a view to working out what the Fjordianlandian Cousins were up to. It was Julia's idea, her thoughts on logical investigation being the most romantic.

"So what have we got so far?" Julia asked.

"I've got "Nora", "Red Robin" and  "Duke Orloff the Rude, Eighth Lord of Iceruggamuffindyk"," Amy offered.

"I've got "Blue", "Ringo" and "Large Sausage"," April proffered. "What have you got, Julia?"

""Style"."

"What?"

""Style", it's all I could think of."

"Don't be silly," Amy said peevishly.

"Well, it's all I could think of," Julia complained. "You don't have to be a bitch about it. So... what have we got? Three Fjordianlandians - four if we include "Duke Orloff"; and a "Red Robin", a "Large Sausage" and "style.".  But what does it all mean?"

The other two girls shrugged.

Julia looked at them in their fetching negligees and wondered why they had all dressed themselves that way? She suddenly felt as if they were all obeying a force beyond their control. A force that thought it could have them do just about anything it could get away with. Not so much an evil force but a peurile self-indulgent force.

"Let's get dressed properly and go outside," Julia said. "As if we can think properly when we're dressed like Call Girls."

The other two agreed.

"We do some strange things at times, don't we," April commented thoughtfully. "As if we're trying to conform to some ridiculous male image of what perfect young women do and how they dress to please them."

"I was having very similar thoughts," Amy said.

"So where are we heading with all this?"

"I have no idea," Julia confessed. "May I ask something provocative?"

"Oh yes," April grinned.

"Are we stupid gorgeous shapely young women, or intelligent young women?"

"Can't we be both?" April asked plaintively.

"I guess so, but I feel as if I'm some empty headed vixen in some childish male's limited vision of the universe?"

"Do you mean 'God'?"

"'God' of course is male, so if that's who you're ultimately talking about, then I guess we have no choice in the matter," Amy suggested fatalistically.

"I guess you're right," Julia said sadly. "Oh well. Let's get dressed properly as I said. We'll go and spy on the Fjordianlandians and see if we can make sense of things."

"What if things make no sense?" April asked urgently. "What if God has gone mad and turned our universe upside down and ridiculous?"    

Amy and Julia frowned.

Julia said: "Do you think God has gone mad or has he just got lazy and is now idly writing down whatever comes to mind in his Silly Book of Our Lives?"

Amy said: "I bet he is."

April said: "So where from here?"

And it was an excellent question really, having a slightly existentialist undertone... and all...

"I have no idea," Julia confessed. "May I ask something provocative?"

 I should twerking think so!

 A double bill of negligees and existentialism.


Mrs Figg I suspect if you tried twerking in one of your bustles there would be fatalities.   

I suppose half a ton of bombazine in the face would hurt

bombazine!   

What a totally awesome word.

And I seem to have fallen of the face of the earth.

How strangely apt.   

Mmmmm... bombazine, what!.... mmmmmmmmmm......