A Cure for Cancer jc-2 Read online

  A Cure for Cancer

  ( Jerry Cornelius - 2 )

  Michael John Moorcock

  A Cure for Cancer

  Michael Moorcock

  Acknowledgements

  Parts of this novel originally appeared in Fate, Prediction, Record Mirror, New Worlds, Billboard, Headquarters Detective, True Life Confessions, Village Voice, Guns & Ammo, Scientific American, Time, Interavia, Motorcycle Mechanics, TV and Movie Play, Man's Magazine, Screen and TV Album, New Man, Silver Screen, Titbits, Observer, Reveille, The Plain Truth, Science Horizons, Daily Sketch, Vogue and other British and American magazines and newspapers to whom acknowledgements are gratefully made.

  Note to the reader: THIS BOOK HAS AN UNCONVENTIONAL STRUCTURE.

  One: Diagnosis

  Terror is the most effective political instrument... I shall spread terror by the surprise employment of all my measures. The important thing is the sudden shock of an overwhelming fear of death.'

  Adolf Hitler

  Preliminary Consultation

  'HERE on the top of a modern and reputable London store lives a garden of incredible beauty one hundred feet above Kensington High Street — the shopping centre of the Royal Borough of Kensington — The gardens embrace some 1 1/2 acres, and comprise an Old-English Garden, Tudor Courts and flower beds, and a Spanish Garden with Moorish pergolas and a Court of Fountains.'

  Derry & Toms Famous Roof Garden

  I

  A troll across the rooftops

  The time might be July 31st 1970.

  London, England. Cool traffic circulates. A quiet, hot day: somewhere in the distance — a bass tone.

  In High Street, Kensington, where the trees of Hyde Park creep out among the buildings, stands the age-old structure of the Derry and Toms department store. Tier upon impressive tier, it is proud among its peers.

  On the roof of the store, in a lot of rich earth, grow shrubs and trees and flowers, and there are little streams and ponds with goldfish and ducks. Who better to describe this roof-garden than those who built it? In the 1966 edition of their brochure, Derry and Toms said: 'They are the only gardens in the world of such large dimensions at so great a height, over 100 ft above ground level, overlooking London with St Paul's in the distance. The gardens are 11/2 acres in extent and comprise an Old English Garden, Tudor Courts and Flower Beds and a Spanish Garden with Moorish Pergolas and A Court of Fountains. The water for the fountains, the river and the waterfall, is drawn from our Artesian Wells 400 ft deep. The depth of the soil averages 2 ft 6 in. and the distribution of weight of this and the masonry used was arranged by the Company's architect when planning the Derry and Toms building. The Gardens took three years to build and were opened in May 1938 by the Earl of Athlone, K.G.

  'From the balconies that adjoin the gardens you have the opportunity of enjoying the most magnificent views of London. You can see the spires and towers of the Kensington Museums, the great Dome of St Paul's, Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral — the Albert Hall, Albert Memorial, etc.'

  In order, the captions to the pictures read:

  1. A delightful view of the Court of Fountains.

  2. The water for the fountains, the river and the waterfall is drawn from our artesian wells four hundred feet deep. The depth of soil averages 2 feet 6 inches and the distribution of weight of this and the masonry was arranged by the company's architect when planning the Derry and Toms building.

  3. The Spanish Gardens.

  4. Fully matured fruit-bearing trees stretch up towards the sky.

  5. Aerial view of the Spanish garden where palm-trees and grape-vines live the year round.

  6. Corner of the Spanish garden showing the Well of St Theresa in a cobbled court — with vine-covered walls.

  7. Another view of the Spanish garden — showing the spire of St Mary Abbot's Church in the background.

  8. (Opposite) The magnificent Court of Fountains.

  9. Flowers bloom in profusion and green lawns flourish .10. (Below) The Tudor Gardens .11. Views of the Spanish Gardens.

  12. The campanile and convent with fountain in foreground -so typically Spanish in atmosphere.

  13. Vine-covered archways leading to the Court of Fountains -all this one hundred feet above the traffic of London!

  14. This garden has a world of pleasure in't (SHAKESPEARE)

  15. The Tudor Gardens.

  16. Entrance to the Tudor Gardens — you go back through history to the beginning of the sixteenth century.

  17. Henry VIII might well have wandered through this garden and plucked a red rose for Anne Boleyne.

  18. Another view of the Tudor Gardens and its carved stone archways and red brick paving.

  19. A waterfall feeds a meandering stream.

  20. Ducks on the Woodland Garden lawn.

  21. The Sun Pavilion Restaurant with its umbrella-shaded balconies — a modern restaurant in the quiet setting of an English garden.

  22. The waterfall — shaded by quiet trees alive with the gurgling of water and the twittering of the birds — like a rendezvous in the country.

  23. Again the Sun Pavilion Restaurant — here you will find peace and pleasure — high above London — overlooking the Woodland Gardens.

  On summer afternoons ill-clad ladies wander through the gardens; they wear felt and fluffy nylon hats, suits of linen or rayon or double jersey, bright scarves tied cowboy fashion about their throats. The place is the last retreat in London of the female of an old and dying English race — the 'Waites-dwellers' as they have often been called, although many live in pre-Waites communities and some do not always own Austins. She comes here when her shopping is done in Barkers, Derry and Toms or Pontings {they are all next to each other in the High Street) to meet her mates. Only here may she with some certainty safely take her middle-class tea.

  There are walls about the retreat. One wall has a locked gate. The key to the gate is owned by the man who secretly owns the chain of stores on this block, who secretly owns other similar substantial properties throughout London.

  Now, below, we hear the sound of drowsy mid-afternoon traffic. The banner of D&. T hangs limp against its staff. Not far away is the Kensington Gardens Hotel and the Kensington Strip, with its bazaars and eateries and bright lights. Not far from The Strip, to the west, is secluded Kensington Palace Gardens, vulgarly called Millionaire's Row, the avenue of the Embassies, running beside Kensington Gardens where the statue of Peter Pan still plays its pipes near the sparkling Serpentine. Derry and Toms faces towards North Kensington, the largest and most densely populated part of the Royal Borough, the most delicious slum in Europe.

  It is almost tea-time.

  2

  'Broken blossoms' lover in garden sex fest!!!

  Within the vine-covered walls of the Dutch garden the sultry sun beat down on colourful flowers and shrubs.

  There were tulips like blue velvet, tulips of red, yellow, white and mauve; daffodils; pink and scarlet roses, chrysanthemums, rhododendrons, peonies. All the flowers were bright and all the scents were sweet.

  The air was hot and still; there was not a trace of a breeze; but in one part of the garden a patch of cream daffodils began to move; they soon became violently agitated, as if invisible stallions galloped through them. Stems bent and broke. Then the daffodils stopped moving.

  Almost immediately a nearby field of white and red tulips began to shake and thresh.

  There was the smell of lilac, very heavy on the air, and the tulips groaned, leaves slapping against leaves.

  When they had stopped, the roses in the next bed fluttered and bent, scarlet petals falling fast, thorns tearing, branches shuddering.

  Finally, when the roses were calm again, a huge bed of mixed snap-dragons, pansies, meadowsweet, ivy-leaved toadflax, irises, hollyhocks, narcissi, violets and sunflowers burst into life; petals shot into the sky, leaves erupted in all directions; there was a great, wild, lush, ululating noise; then silence.

  Lying between damp, ivory thighs, Jerry Cornelius sighed and smiled into the unseeing face of Captain Hargreaves, member of the U. S. military advisory commission in Europe. The captain was a good, greedy girl.

  Jerry's skin, as black as a Biafran's, glistened, and he thought about all the kinds of girls he had known as he looked at the flowers above his head and then down at Flora Hargreaves's slowly cooling eyes. He rolled like the surf and reached across the soft earth for a cigarette.

  A bass tone. He glanced at the sky. It was clear.

  When he looked back Flora's eyes had closed and she was sleeping, her auburn hair burnishing the pillow of crushed petals, her perfect face at perfect peace, the sweat drying on her sweet body. He bent and lightly kissed her left breast, touched her smooth shoulder, got up and went to find her uniform where she had folded it beside the patch of cream daffodils.

  A man in his late twenties, with a healthy, muscular body, a large Liberty's neo-Art Nouveau wrist-watch like a bangle on either wrist; his skin was ebony and his hair not blond but milk white. Jerry Cornelius was a revolutionary of the old school, though his stated objectives seemed different.

  Humming an early Jimi Hendrix number ('Foxy Lady'), Jerry looked around for his own clothes and found them on the grass close to Flora's olive duds. On top of the pile lay his chromium-plated vibragun which he now picked up and holstered, strapping the holster to his naked body. He pulled on his lavender shirt, his red underpants, his red socks, his midnight-blue Cardin trousers with the flared bottoms, the matching
double-breasted high-waisted jacket, smoothed his long white hair, took a mirror from his pocket and adjusted his wide purple tie, looking at his face as an afterthought.

  A very negative appearance, he thought, pursing his lips and smiling. He picked up Flora's uniform and laid it near her; then he walked through the sunlight and flowers, knee-deep, towards the garden gate.

  3

  Wild whirlybird in one man war!!

  Beyond the wall the middle-class women walked the pleasant paths, glancing nervously or with disapproval at the creature who locked the gate behind him as if he owned the place. They mistook him for a dandified Negro, and thought it likely that he was responsible for the increasingly loud bass tone, for he carried something that looked rather like a transistor radio.

  Jerry put the key in his pocket and wandered in the direction of the Woodland Garden which, with its streams and shady trees, was flanked by the Sun Pavilion Restaurant which was not yet open.

  He passed several black doors marked Emergency Exit and paused by the lift, murmuring a word to the attendant and the ticket girl. They nodded. The girl entered the lift and with an air of finality it descended.

  Jerry turned back to the Woodland Garden. As he reached it the bass tone sounded very close and he looked up and saw the helicopter, moving in low, up over the outer wall, its rotors thrashing, the leaves of the trees whipping off their branches, the petals of the flowers flung about in all directions.

  The women screamed, wondering what to do.

  Jerry drew his vibragun. He knew an enemy helicopter when he saw one.

  The chopper was huge, over forty feet long, and flying close to the tops of the trees, its deep-throated motor full of menace, its shadow black over the gardens.

  Jerry moved swiftly across the open space towards the tree-shaded lawn of the Woodland Glade, the leaves stinging his face.

  A machine gun hissed and slim bullets bit the concrete. Jerry rested his vibragun across his bent right arm and took aim, but he could hardly see his great target for the whistling petals and leaves that lashed his face. He stumbled backwards into a pool, slipped and found himself waist-deep in cold water. There were almost no leaves on the trees now as the rotors flicked round and round.

  Someone began to shout through a megaphone at him.

  'Fuckpig! Fuckpig! Fuckpig!'

  The old ladies gasped and ran about in panic, finding the lift out of order and the emergency exits blocked. They huddled under the arches of the Tudor Garden or threw themselves flat behind the low walls of the Spanish Garden.

  Some of the copter's bullets hit a group of noisy ducks and blood and feathers mingled with the flying leaves. Jerry fired back rather half-heartedly.

  The chopper — a Westland Whirlwind with the 750 h.p. Alvis Leonides Major engine — banked slightly until it was hovering over a clear space in which a fountain splashed. It began to drop lower, its 53-ft rotors barely missing the trees.

  The machine gun hissed again and Jerry was forced to fling himself under the water and slide along until he could crouch beneath the small stone bridge. A man jumped from the copter, cradling the gun in his arms. He began to trudge towards the point where Jerry had gone down. There was blood on the surface, but it was the blood of ducks and doves.

  Jerry smiled and aimed his vibragun at the man with the machine gun. The man began to tremble. The machine gun falling apart in his hands, he shook violently and collapsed.

  The copter was beginning to rise. Jerry dashed for it.

  'Easy,' he called. 'Easy.'

  There could be as many as nine people in the copter, apart from the pilot. He dived through the hatch. Save for the fallen megaphone, it was empty. Above him, the pilot stared at him through goggles. The copter gained height.

  Jerry put his head out of the hatch. Frightened ladies, their hats like so many coloured dollops of cream, wailed up at him.

  'We're stranded! We can't get out! We'll starve! Hooligan! Go back to your own country! Help!'

  'Don't worry,' Jerry called as the copter climbed. He picked up the megaphone. 'The restaurant opens soon. Please form an orderly queue. It will assist everyone if you try to behave in a normal manner! In the meantime...' He flung his taper to the soft ground. It began to play a selection of George Formby's greatest hits, including When I'm Cleaning Windows, Fanlight Fanny and Auntie Maggie's Remedy. 'And don't forget Old Mother Riley, Max Miller and Max Wall! It is for them that you suffer today!'

  As the helicopter thrummed out of sight, the ladies murmured among themselves and their lips curled in disgust as George Formby sang about the tip of his little cigar, but they formed a long, disciplined queue outside the restaurant.

  Eight days later they would still be standing there, or sitting, or lying where they had fallen. Through the glass walls of the restaurant they had been able, every day between three o'clock and five o'clock, to see the waitresses laying out the little sandwiches, scones and cakes and later clearing them away again. If a lady signalled a waitress the waitress would wave, smile apologetically and point at the notice which said that the restaurant was closed.

  One plump middle-aged housewife in a blue paisley suit hugged her handbag to her stomach in disapproval. The George Formby songs, rather scratchy now, were still going. 'I feel filthy,' she said. 'It's wicked...'

  'Don't start a fuss, dear.'

  On the lawn, quacking cheerfully, forgetful of their earlier upsets, jolly ducks waddled about.

  4

  Sing to me, darling, in our castle of agony

  'Drop me off at Earls Court, would you?' Jerry asked, stroking the pilot's neck with his vibragun.

  Pettishly the chopper sank towards the flat roof of the Beer-A-Gogo, recently built on the site of the old Billabong Club, and hovered there with undisguised impatience.

  Jerry opened the hatch and jumped out, falling elegantly through the thin asbestos sheeting and landing with a bump on mouldy sacks of flour that filled his nostrils with a sour smell. Rats scattered and turned to watch him from the shadows. He sighed and got up, dusting his suit, watching, through the jagged hole, the helicopter disappearing into the sky.

  Jerry left the storeroom and stood on the landing listening to the lusty sounds from below. The migrants were celebrating 'Piss on a Pom' week, getting drunk on home brewed beer or 'pickling Percy's plums' as they put it.

  Jerry could hear them laughing a great deal as the jokes flew back and forth: 'That's a beaut drop of beer, mate! '/'I'm telling you, drong, that sheila was like a flaming glass of cold beer!'/'Watch you don't spill your fucking beer, sport!'

  Some of the lusty singing was also about beer or its absence. The migrants seemed fully absorbed. Jerry walked softly downstairs and sneaked past the main room. He was momentarily dazzled by the electric blue drape suits (Kings Cross Blues) but managed to make the front door into Warwick Avenue, full of Dormobiles, Volkswagen minibuses and Land Rovers covered in pictures of kangaroos, emus and kiwis, all marked FOR SALE.

  Jerry tossed a silver yen to a Negro boy with a face daubed in white clay. 'Can you find a cab?'

  The boy swaggered around a corner and came back at a run. He was followed by a skinny horse drawing a Lavender Cab, its bright paint peeling to reveal old brown varnish and its upholstery cracked and bursting. The gaunt young man on the box wore a long beard and a fur hat; he signalled with his whip for Jerry to climb into the hansom which rocked and creaked as Jerry got aboard.

  Then the whip cracked over the jutting bones of the horse; it lurched forward, snorted and began to gallop down the street at enormous speed. Jerry clung on as the cab rocked from side to side and hurtled across an intersection. From over his head he heard a strange, wild droning and realized that the driver was singing in time to the rhythm of the horse's hooves. The tune seemed to be Auld Lang Syne and only after a while did Jerry realize that the song was a favourite of the 1917-20 war.