EPISODE #1
As he sat in the car waiting for Detective Sergeant Zappa to emerge from the Co-Op, he remembered how he’d felt that morning, getting the washing up done just in time, just under the wire. He'd escaped the menstruated wrath of Mrs Bouquet, his cleaner, but he hadn't escaped the effects of four pints of Old Speckled Hen, a half bottle of Chianti and a pollo tabasqueña. His guts fizzed and ached. How much longer was that half-baked American going to be?
-Is that all there is? Asked the shop assistant, as she scanned in the Morning Star . There's not much to it, is there?
- Well, ma'am. Capitalists generally don't advertise in communist newspapers. And after you take out all the advertising, then, sure, you're so right, there's not much left.
- Ah! She nodded, Frank suspected to draw a line under the conversation, rather than through any raising of consciousness. But you did yer best and went about yer day.
- My god man. I asked you for a newspaper, not that leftist claptrap, snorted Terse, when he returned to the maroon XJS that the detective inspector practically inhabited.
- It's on page 3.
- What?
- Prof Stephen Chinaski of the Cambridge Institute of Bio-Technology said yesterday...bladda bladda bladda....
- So, this supports my thesis that the pills were brought in by a late night visitor to the professor's chambers on Wednesday not Tuesday. Less than 12 hours before the smoke inhalation was said to have taken place.
- Exactamundo. Someone's left the Gary Abblets on his bedside table before they blasted the smoke bomb, confirmed Zappa.
- We have a murderer to catch and, I suspect, more than one victim, mused Terse. - What? You suspect a double homicide or are we looking at a serial here?
- We're looking for a mad man. The rest is just semantics Zappa.
- It's not just semantics, Inspector: we're talking about deceit here. When the BBC calls Hamas, a democratically elected government, terrorists and the opposition police gunmen who are firing at the legitimate Palestinian authority, are not called terrorists, but the armed protesters of the Fatah movement. This is distortion and manipulation of elementary reality...
- You're talking tangential political claptrap. Let's stick to the point.
- OK. Let's focus. We know the Prof. liked a toke and a drop of the hard stuff on occasion. But you're saying that anything stronger smacks of foul play.
- Precisely. ...Did you know that smoke causes 1.1m deaths per year worldwide? I think that places it in the top ten killers globally. A weapon of mass destruction you might say.
- Like the automobile, Inspector.
- Your bleeding heart liberals'll say it's poverty. Let's make poverty history and listen to this pop star talk inane drivel about economics. Why? We don't listen to Harvard professors of Economics sing awful bloody pop songs, thank god.
- I once made a record with a Professor of Ergonomics and Kraftwerk.
- You might just as well blame wealth. As you quite rightly pointed, the motor car kills about as many people, mostly pedestrians in point of fact, as smoke does: another top ten worldwide WMD. But these arseholes don't go around saying it's wealth now, do they Zappa?
- Poverty and wealth: two sides of the same coin. Capitalism is about the power created by money.
- Nonsense, man. Your status as a musician and artist grants you a certain intellectual and cultural capital, does it not?
Detective Sergeant Zappa didn't have time to respond. A call came in over the radio. Another victim. This time at the nurses' home in Homerton. Just as before, another smoke bomb death. No signs of forced entry. No marks on the body. Death by smoke inhalation. This time the concierge had eye witnessed someone. But he talked too much.
- So, you couldn't give us a facial description to speak of? Detective Zappa enquired, notebook poised, as Terse pored over the concierge's visitor book entries for the weekend in question.
- Well, I don't normally pay much attention. You see they're not really meant to have overnight visitors that haven't already been booked in, in this here book. They stay in one of the guest rooms off the corridors. But there're usually half a dozen or so young gentleman visitors on any weekend night I'd say. We try to discourage it by having extremely narrow single beds. They tend to clear off about 2am. Done the business, got a bad back by then, I shouldn't wonder.
- Do you think you could go the whole nine yards and ID one of these six guys as the smoke bomber? On the way to the station, the garrulous concierge launched into another morbid tale...
- ... the 14 year-old goes loony with the shovel and brains his kid brother. He's already been and gone and topped the parents of course. Something to do with a masked man made him do it. Then he sets fire to the house. He's been having hallucinations about having new rich parents who were going to buy him a new home...
- Can't you desist from your monstrous storytelling for a second man? Be quiet until we get to the station or I'll get Detective Sergeant Zappa to sing to you.
The Detective Sergeant swerved the car slightly in a comedy cut to quick kind of way. He knew Inspector Terse like him really. He knew that Terse being the elitist cultural English snob he was rated him. Zappa thought Terse viewed him as a kind of hippy mid-brow Philip Glass figure. They even dug some of the same classical shit. But they very rarely talked music. Economics and murder, philosophy and crime; these were what dominated their relationship.
This odd couple had the best clear up rate on the constabulary, Detective Sergeant Zappa's US secondment adjustment notwithstanding.
Terse had had enough.
- Sergeant, pull over into The Eagle. I need a pint of beer, not to mention, a decent bloody writer with a plot and a purpose in mind other than this bloody awful post-modernist drivel with deliberate withholding of meaning instead of properly thought out structure.
- Right on man. Detective Zappa made a cannabis cigarette and talked about his incipient prostate cancer and the time he had rampant diarrhoea in Bengal....
TO BE CONTINUED... After the commercial break.
Long Gone Lennon and Hardly Harrisonback in through the outdoor, break on through to the other side to re-present for your delectation and excitation.... DE@TH BE@TLES!... produced by Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Austerity... completely available at all the bad record stores, dude. Cut to music and lyrics:
Am I in Vietnam?
Or in Somerset man?
Am I digital underclass?
or part of the precariat?
Relax, the algorithms
will work where you're @ man
and who you really are!...
You're welcome to CAPITALI$M, have a nice day y'all.
Fade to outro.
Make up studio. Inside Frank Zappa's head.
EPISODE #2
I hate having to wear make-up. That was the worst thing about going on the TV. Having to wear make-up. That and the heat. The goddam heat and having to wear make-up were the worst things about going on the box. That and the fact that you felt like you might be fucking with your karma in a majorly bad way dude. Yeah, that and the make-up.
Sgt. Zappa. Sgt. Zappa. Zappa man pull it together. I know the shit’s a bit stronger than it was in the 70’s man, but we are on an investigation don’t you now? How’s my evil English dude by the way? Am I coming across all Terence Stamp like in Batman?
-No, not that camp. I’d say like a genetically modified Edward Woodward.
Thanks, darling. I’ll never be able to remember those bloody lines. I shall have to change them. Where was this West Coast ignoramus of a screenplayist, I hesitate to use the term author, schooled, Sgt Zappa?
- UCLA’s finest brains, Inspector. UCLA's finest. Talent doesn't always rise to the top. You do class; we do nepotism.
- This isn't the States thank God. This is Cambridge. You know what your compatriot asked me Sgt.?
- Your sexuality? Your pin number? Your name?
He said: Can you tell me how I get to the Royal Cambridge Hotel where we're staying at? I told him you couldn't possibly end a question with a loose relative clause and that hanging preposition. This is after all Cambridge. I am not some snot-nosed hoody in white trainers for Christ's sake.
Ok, can you tell me how to get to the Hotel I'm staying at, comma, asshole? We had it going in the 60s. The Yippees. Sub-machine guns on the roof of the Sorbonne. Lynsday Anderson. But there's good stuff now too. Strange seeing Germaine in Waitrose. Mercedes estate car. Men being blind to their own bodies. She'd've known were my prostate was. You'd think see'd have a hybrid by now man. This isn't the States I guess.
It's PC gone mad, Sgt.
-Yes sir.
The producer popped her head around the green room door.
We'll be ready for you in five gentlemen. Jonathan'll do the whole I thought you were dead and you were a fictional character played by a dead actor thing at the top of the interview to give you both a chance to relax into it. K guys?
* * *
Turning to Karim Khalil QC if I may, isn't Sgt Zappa's point a valid one? The whole justice system is based on this. The more remorse the defendant exhibits, the lighter the sentence.
- Certainly, professional criminals know how to play the game. They know the law is about consistency and remorse. Justice is a rather abstract concept for most criminals.
Nonsense man. In the case of the Polly Beamish stabbing, how can you build a consistently solid case based on remorse if you're using amnesia as a defence. I'm very sorry but I can't quite remember: a great defence collectively, for entire governments for example, but individuals tend to get to held to account.
- Depends on the individual, added Sgt Zappa.
Feller there. Shell suit. Eye on him. Gotta watch them. She's alright, seen her before. Know her type. The lockers. They always end up in the bogs. Ditch the gear. Doing gear. I don't know what. Not letting them in at all is the best. No time to search everyone. Search this fucker though. Get his ID. Seen her before. I mean you've only got to look at her. Him, on the other hand. If you saw her on the train, ... Post Graduate Certificate in Education my arse. Wouldn't want him teaching my kids. Writing graffiti. I mean it's not like she'll have a kitchen knife in her handbag, is it? Look at this one. White trainers, hood, worra give way. She looks like that woman from the Salvation Army. Could murder a drink. Standing there stroking the knife. He refused to show me, what am I supposed to do? She might've finished her off: 17 times. Good job they're dark. You've got to challenge them that's my job. I can't get the blood off my trousers. Scallies coming in here on the rob. Gotta hold her back. Shouldn't have let her in.
Dr. Anita Carlsberg is sorry for something she says she can't remember doing. A strange defence.
-Indeed, Inspector. One might say that not remembering is no defence. Genuine remorse has to accept culpability.
Sgt Zappa? prompted the host.
- I'm not black, but there's a helluva lot of times I wish I wasn't white.
Good heavens man. Don't go quoting lines from pop songs. This is the BBC.
- White guy, powder cocaine, in the burbs, steady job will get a majorly better deal than black guy, South Compton hood, crack cocaine, no steady job. It's part of a conspiracy. This lady'll walk in 15 months tops. In a general way, she kinda knew that before she committed the crime.
Just then, Sgt Zappa outraged Terse : he wiped his nose on a Radio 3 t-shirt and took a call on his cellphone on national television. Terse wasn't best pleased. He loathed the term cellphone.
- Mobile telephone Sgt Zappa.
Yes sir. Anyway, potential homicide. Frenzied knife attack at an all-female college. Polly...
..Beamish.
Yes sir. Nice white middle class ladies in Cambridge. Not a hooded top or white tennis shoe in sight Inspector. Shock horror. Turns out the assailant's female, in her 60s. Crime passionelle. Gender politics. British Class Society. Sounds like a three-parter to me Inspector.
- Keep the class critique to yourself Zappa. I will speak to you in the Jag Sgt. As for this apology for a public service broadcast, I'll not be party to any Marxist conspiracy. I fully intend to cancel my licence. Good day gentlemen.
EPISODE #3
It was the first time Inspector Terse had seen one so small. Four feet ten was tiny, even for a fascist, neo-, crypto- or, in this case, pseudo-.
Look Mr Paxman. It was the same when the Ugandan Asians came over. Years ago you couldn't get a plumber for love nor money. Now there're Polish plumbers everywhere. Over 70% of UK plumbers are Polish. At the current rate of increase, by the year 2025 one in three of the general population will be a Polish plumber..... Immigration is no longer an issue that only racists need concern themselves with...
Sgt Zappa changed channels.
The All-Time Top 100 List of Top 100 Shows. In at number 100 …The All-Time Top 100 List Show Show....
The Sergeant zapped again.
- Didn't you use Polish subcontractors to get some work done to your £4.5m detached home, Mr Pseudo-F....
Turn this nonsense off Zappa and let's have a good old fashioned 8-track cartridge on instead. Sgt. Zappa shut down his palmtop and put Kraftwerk on. She's a model and she's looking good.... Terse tapped his finger in time on the side of the steering wheel. He quite cared for this track.
-This BNP-lite party...
- UKIP?
- That's it. Seems they want to have their cheap immigrant labour cake both ways.
- You guys use Eastern Europe like we use Mexico.
- For once I wouldn't disagree Sgt Zappa. Now what was that address again?
- Fourteen, one-four, Acacia Avenue, Langsley. They didn't even have a socialist candidate here at the last election. It's so solidly middle class and Tory.
- That's the kind of thing that they teach you at Police Academy these days, is it? Which one did you do ?
- Police Academy 7. It was only the incidental music. I had an IRS bill the size of Miami man.
- So, what exactly do you mean by socialist candidate? According to you, haven't such things been consigned to the dustbin of history?
- RESPECT man. The middle-class Socialist Lite/Anti-War Muslim alliance. George Galloway.
- Lord help us.
- Actually, with the purchase of 25 million shares in the UK's second biggest arms producer, your Lord - in the form of The Church Of England - is sort of helping the other side right now.
- It was a turn of phrase, you Marxist nut.
- True, nonetheless.
- Since we're trading soundbites, Sgt Zappa, in common with 26% of the population, I have allergic rhinitis. Please keep that window shut, if you wouldn't mind. I will not succumb to the tyranny of the sunny majority.
-They got more important things to worry about in Bagdad right now Inspector.
- Mmm. Body count not pollen count.
- Exactly. Hey your climate's ok. It's just the weather that's lousy, Inspector.
- You can keep your California sunshine. Despite the fact its pollen irritates me immensely, I would not miss that green grass for the world Sgt Zappa. Take a look.
- It's not the only kind of grass England is now famous for.
Just as the Jag was about to turn left into Acacia, Sgt Zappa pointed to the airstrip on the left where a USAF military cargo plane was coming in to land.
* * *
It was idle speculation on Sgt Zappa's part, but Terse was up for it. He had fancied that the charge of corporate manslaughter was going to be difficult to build a case around, to say the least. That sort of thing might have been feasible on Channel 9 or whatever, but this was Cambridge not reality TV. There were certain conventions after all. You couldn't go around picking up CEO's and charging them with making money and accidentally killing people; any more than the Animal Liberation Front could name & shame the shareholders of pharmaceutical companies, however morally dubious their business practices; any more than George Galloway could advocate the hypothetical assassination of Tony Blair.
It just wasn't cricket. Terse felt a twinge : the clash of classical liberal ethics - I don't like what you say, but I shall defend your right to say it - vs the neo-liberal consensus, I quite like George's kill Tony idea, but you can't say things like that in a democracy - was making him queasy.
Sgt Zappa was shocked by Terse's sudden verve, but chasing a couple of drug-trafficking GIs across the English countryside had its hidden attractions: they served a great pint of real ale in a pub just off the base. He should have to take counsel from his matriarch and cleaner, Mrs Bouquet later. For the time being, however, he was going to drown his moral quagmire in malted hops and yeast.
- Mine's a Summer Lightning, said Terse to the young Polish barmaid, who'd just been on the phone, chatting to her mother about the difficulty of getting hold of a skilled tradesman in Krakow these days.
- What'll it be Sgt. Zappa. A Purple Haze?
-Why not.
Served and seated in the corner, Sgt Zappa gazed at the names of WW2 airmen which had been burnt into the ceiling by Zippos from the Golden Gate to Brooklyn Bridge. It always captured the imaginations of new visitors on account of the light pine corporate homogeneity of the rest of the pub. Terse hated the decor as much as he loved the ale.
- This is a folk museum to common history, mused Sgt Zappa.
- This is the history of the common folk, he replied nodding towards his pint. Don't go bringing museums into it. Now brief me about the drugs and the military connection, requested Terse, mouthing rather than speaking the last few words, seeing as the Chief of base security was about to rack off at pool with several military personnel in attendance.
The Chief looked like a mock dogfight gone wrong.
Sgt Zappa's appearance had caused a few nerve impulses to flutter for a coupla three minutes, before the uniforms returned to their game, their beer and the odd grunted conversation. Thanks to the lousy climate, the even worse diet and being officially dead, he was now only strangely familiar to all but the most ardent of progessive music fans .
- Relax Sergeant. They look like Country & Western fans to me. Tell me about your suspicions, Zappa.
- You remember what I was telling you about South Compton, Los Angeles and the Company's covert ops?
- You mean the conspiracy theory that the CIA got the black population addicted to crack cocaine so Ronald Reagan could get re-elected.
- You've cut a few corners there, Inspector, but that ain't no conspiracy theory man. Broadly speaking, that was pretty much what happened. When you consider that over 60 percent of the crack cocaine was brung into this almost exclusively African-American neighbourhood by just one CIA asset. It kinda figures. Feds knew he was a company man. Only busted after six years. Part of covert narco-ops in Latin America.
- Never mind the bigger political picture, Zappa. We have to have a good reason to go snooping around an American military base. Did you know American sovereignty extends to everything that can be seen from the base?
- How so?
- Apparently. According to a judge's summation I read in The Telegraph. Some protestors defaced the Stars & Stripes flag with anti-war slogans in the sight of the base grunts which constituted an infringement of their human rights, or some such rot. The defence's case, that their side of the fence was actually East Anglia and not Washington, was defeated.
- Where's UKIP when you need them eh?
- Precisely sgt. Precisely.
- What time's our man arriving Terse?
- He's already here, said a red-haired man in a thick overcoat and an even thicker public school accent. Stanley Spencer, British military intelligence. I used to go to university with Judge Lovejoy. Steady chap. He knows the law must bend to the will of the security state on occasion.
- So much for the lofty ideals of fairplay and justice eh? interjected Zappa.
- They are courts of law not justice. If that is what you are after, I suggest Judge Dredd comics.
The Inspector cut short their banter with diversionary introductions.
- Inspector Terse, Cambridgeshire Constabulary and...
- Sergeant Zappa of the SFPD. On post-mortem secondment.
- To cut to the chase, gentlemen, I am here to warn you two off my patch. There is a military intelligence operation here.
- What kind of op? quizzed Zappa.
- That's all I can really tell you I am afraid.
- Does it involve GM superskunk grown hydroponically and made available widely across the UK suddenly? continued Zappa.
- What?
- ...promoting lethargy, apathy and addictive lifestyles. Seen as a better option than crack and guns. It comes from the progressive wing of the intelligence community. These days you can win UK council by-elections with fewer votes than friends.
- What have you been drinking Sergeant?
- Purple Haze, I think.
- Never mind him Spencer. The point is this is off-limits.You would like us to go back to trying to get a Corporate manslaughter charge to stick to an upper middle class gent from Grantchester who writes dodgy fiction and promotes moral cancer.
- Yes.
- Very well. Sup up Sergeant.
Made to down it in one by the bombastic Terse, who thankfully was driving, Sgt. Zappa turned the same colour as his drink.
- Inspector. If you were thinking of drinking and driving.....
-Yes?
-...then don't forget your car Inspector.
- Don't worry, Spencer. I shan't.
Terse's Jag tore away from the pub car park ripping up the gravel like a tiger in a litter tray. Military punters noticed and looked out of the window.
- This isn't the way to the station. Inspector?
The Jag went churning across the field towards the outline of a USAF military cargo plane, just becoming visible in the twilight. Sgt Zappa clung onto the side of the passenger seat for dear life. He looked at the gritted determination on Terse's face. It didn't look like he was going to stop for any wire perimeter fence or armed patrolmen.
- Holy Shit! cried Sgt Zappa.
* * *
Jeffery thought he was a peacock, m'lud. Where am I? It makes it worse thinking about it. It really looked hot. Terse. Why did he do it? It's bloody well illegal. Not sure. It's a no brainer on acid. Surrealistic Pillow on again and again. I can smell hospital bleach. She had a thing for me. The egg came first. Could see the heat from the gas down the side of her face. Goddam hippy put it in the cider.They call two thousand pounds An Archer down the East End. Apparently peacocks go looney tunes when they see their own reflection in the mirror. I never did touch though. The car? Mary was upset by that more than anything else. My pal had to tell me. Do all hospitals get their bleach from the same place? The chicken's not happy about it.I have integrity.There was a very narrow space down the side of the armchair. Misuse of Drugs Act wasn't until 71. Grantchester knows I'm no rogue. Tried to sit there.Heard him scream. Of course that freaked me out man. Don't turn the fucking light off Frank. Lied about having my history degree to get my first in in teaching. Zappa knows but can't prove shit.She knew I was lying, she watched my mouth. I was tripping out man. Dug me in the ribs.MI5 had me do it for years before that. Made me paranoid. Machiavelli had moral value.Terse knows shit but he's dangerous. Where am I?
- Sgt Zappa. Sgt Zappa.
The nurse on the purple wing gently shook him to. He'd been concussed in the accident. This had brought on an attack of Jeffery Archer. Inspector Terse had broken a fibia and a tibia, but was otherwise OK. In fact they already had him up walking around. They were keen to rotate beds. You really didn't want to get a hot bed and contract MRSA, now did you Sgt Zappa? This verbal cattle prodding got Zappa out of bed in double quick time. Terse had spent a brief time in intensive care; he'd had breathing difficulties on arrival. But it turned out he'd attack of asthma brought on by his allergic rhinitis - a reaction to the grass pollen due to being in the middle of an open field, no doubt.
- Piffle Zappa. It's May man. I never get it so early in the season.Global warming Inspector.
- Nonsense. I will not be party to any liberal conspiracy. My guess is your hay fever attack was down to the huge consignment of skunk cannabis you'd just driven us into. Just then Terse sneezed.
- Good god man. Get that out of my face. My theory checks out Inspector, confirmed Sgt Zappa slipping his bud back his shirt pocket. What a bummer man! Being allergic to grass.
- Let's have another couple of pints of antidote. It's about time you learnt how to handle the local currency. You're not allergic to the pound are you Seargent?
- This Purple Haze is CiA stash for sure dude.
- Possibly. This is East Anglia after all.
- That's American English for Aircraft Carrier.
- Mine's An Acapulco Gold Old Spot Port, Zappa.
-Dude?
EPISODE #4
Sergeant Frank Zappa, on posthumous secondment from the SFPD still, couldn't get a word out of his new commanding officer, who had replaced Hornblower Bacardi Terse at the Criminally Investigative Department, where mavericks were sent out to pasture in the Fens in the hope that they’d meet an untimely end driving down the white line in the middle of the road, politically.
Officially, the controversial replacement was in no wise connected with Terse's unwillingness to take preventative steps to halt the spread of Jeffery Archer. Others believed he’d been forced out.
Much like Terse, only more so, Detective Inspector Terser drove a Land Rover. Not quite as classic as a Jaguar. Still it avoided the dating of a rehabilitated Skoda or Renault Scenic. In an attempt to make Terser greener, cycling was mooted at one point. He would have none of it however.
If anything, Detective Inspector Evan Terser was even more of an opinionated curmudgeon than Terse.
Terser’s first new case: the miniaturisation of the local railway network despite the quadrupling of its state subsidy.
In the event, it is a purely fictional branch line, serving a small community somewhere in the Fens with Californian overtones, and set around the early part of the Second World War long before Fox News blackouts became the norm. The village is a busy place with traffic both over and under the bridge, but it seems the place for gossip is outside the local shop.
Local industry has turned from engineering to helping the American war effort. Dissent is widespread but contained, and passenger services are sparse. A mixed economy train runs to and from the Blitz and nationalisation. There is now no sign that a railway existed in this part of the Fens.
There are several cameos set around the perimeter of Great Shelford Memorial Hall, (e.g. the ARP telling Mrs Lower Class to “Put that Daily Worker out”, the verger warming his backside, the van being loaded with nylons, chewing gum and Benny Goodman, the Home Guard being taken over by the comrades of the International Brigade, just back from Catalunya, much to the chagrin of Lord Halifax, Churchill, Mrs Simpson and other enemies of democracy).
But, in the event, the detectives themselves are the central attraction at Cambridge 31A Model Railway Club Exhibition. Inspector Terser had expected something altogether a lot grander for the money.
(Sgt Zappa had paid.)
- Monty, being the engineer he is even makes his own bolts.
The two model railwayers were interrupted by an officious Terser. He wanted to now if they had seen anything unusual or suspicious since the last episode. Sgt Zappa was distracted by the little figures on display. The half-inch man who operated the replica car ferry reminded him of someone.
- Lord Archer, is that you? Mouthed Zappa .
To his surprise, the half-inch man replied.
- Of course not, you damned hippy, you're ripped again, said the Inspector.
- If you think I’m going to put up with these Class-B antics much longer, you‘ve got another thing coming. Put that third-rate yarn-spinner down, man, you don’t know where he’s been. Where does one get a decent real ale around here Zappa?
- Oxford? Quipped the sergeant.
Evan Terser, even more than Terse, loathed anything which came from Oxford, especially its inferior real ales, its football club, its varsity sports teams, and its -ise spelling .
- Goddam British pedants. Worse than Terse, moaned Zappa.
- ize has been in use since the 16th century and is no more American than East Anglia, Terser droned.
- My comrades in Lakenheath Action Group might like to take issue with you there Inspector, politicked Zappa. They say this region's a US storage facility for nukes, surface-to-air missils.
There was nothing on earth more likely to push Terser's buttons than American (mis)pronunciations.
- Missiles! Terser corrected. Terse warned me about you. Nuclear weapons, CIA interference and a massive military presence we can just about accommodate. Cultural imperialism, sloppy spelling and phonetically modified vocabulary, on the other hand, no Englishman could ever countenance, Sergeant.
Language problems notwithstanding, their special relationship was set to continue well into the 21st century.
Dude.
Jeffery thought he was a peacock, m'lud. Where am I? It makes it worse thinking about it. It really looked hot. Terse. Why did he do it? It's bloody well illegal. Not sure. It's a no brainer on acid. Surrealistic Pillow on again and again. I can smell hospital bleach. She had a thing for me. The egg came first. Could see the heat from the gas down the side of her face. Goddam hippy put it in the cider.They call two thousand pounds An Archer down the East End. Apparently peacocks go looney tunes when they see their own reflection in the mirror. I never did touch though. The car? Mary was upset by that more than anything else. My pal had to tell me. Do all hospitals get their bleach from the same place? The chicken's not happy about it.I have integrity.There was a very narrow space down the side of the armchair. Misuse of Drugs Act wasn't until 71. Grantchester knows I'm no rogue. Tried to sit there.Heard him scream. Of course that freaked me out man. Don't turn the fucking light off Frank. Lied about having my history degree to get my first in in teaching. Zappa knows but can't prove shit.She knew I was lying, she watched my mouth. I was tripping out man. Dug me in the ribs.MI5 had me do it for years before that. Made me paranoid. Machiavelli had moral value.Terse knows shit but he's dangerous. Where am I?
- Sgt Zappa. Sgt Zappa.
The nurse on the purple wing gently shook him to. He'd been concussed in the accident. This had brought on an attack of Jeffery Archer. Inspector Terse had broken a fibia and a tibia, but was otherwise OK. In fact they already had him up walking around. They were keen to rotate beds. You really didn't want to get a hot bed and contract MRSA, now did you Sgt Zappa? This verbal cattle prodding got Zappa out of bed in double quick time. Terse had spent a brief time in intensive care; he'd had breathing difficulties on arrival. But it turned out he'd attack of asthma brought on by his allergic rhinitis - a reaction to the grass pollen due to being in the middle of an open field, no doubt.
- Piffle Zappa. It's May man. I never get it so early in the season.Global warming Inspector.
- Nonsense. I will not be party to any liberal conspiracy. My guess is your hay fever attack was down to the huge consignment of skunk cannabis you'd just driven us into. Just then Terse sneezed.
- Good god man. Get that out of my face. My theory checks out Inspector, confirmed Sgt Zappa slipping his bud back his shirt pocket. What a bummer man! Being allergic to grass.
- Let's have another couple of pints of antidote. It's about time you learnt how to handle the local currency. You're not allergic to the pound are you Seargent?
- This Purple Haze is CiA stash for sure dude.
- Possibly. This is East Anglia after all.
- That's American English for Aircraft Carrier.
- Mine's An Acapulco Gold Old Spot Port, Zappa.
-Dude?
EPISODE #4
Sergeant Frank Zappa, on posthumous secondment from the SFPD still, couldn't get a word out of his new commanding officer, who had replaced Hornblower Bacardi Terse at the Criminally Investigative Department, where mavericks were sent out to pasture in the Fens in the hope that they’d meet an untimely end driving down the white line in the middle of the road, politically.
Officially, the controversial replacement was in no wise connected with Terse's unwillingness to take preventative steps to halt the spread of Jeffery Archer. Others believed he’d been forced out.
Much like Terse, only more so, Detective Inspector Terser drove a Land Rover. Not quite as classic as a Jaguar. Still it avoided the dating of a rehabilitated Skoda or Renault Scenic. In an attempt to make Terser greener, cycling was mooted at one point. He would have none of it however.
If anything, Detective Inspector Evan Terser was even more of an opinionated curmudgeon than Terse.
Terser’s first new case: the miniaturisation of the local railway network despite the quadrupling of its state subsidy.
In the event, it is a purely fictional branch line, serving a small community somewhere in the Fens with Californian overtones, and set around the early part of the Second World War long before Fox News blackouts became the norm. The village is a busy place with traffic both over and under the bridge, but it seems the place for gossip is outside the local shop.
Local industry has turned from engineering to helping the American war effort. Dissent is widespread but contained, and passenger services are sparse. A mixed economy train runs to and from the Blitz and nationalisation. There is now no sign that a railway existed in this part of the Fens.
There are several cameos set around the perimeter of Great Shelford Memorial Hall, (e.g. the ARP telling Mrs Lower Class to “Put that Daily Worker out”, the verger warming his backside, the van being loaded with nylons, chewing gum and Benny Goodman, the Home Guard being taken over by the comrades of the International Brigade, just back from Catalunya, much to the chagrin of Lord Halifax, Churchill, Mrs Simpson and other enemies of democracy).
But, in the event, the detectives themselves are the central attraction at Cambridge 31A Model Railway Club Exhibition. Inspector Terser had expected something altogether a lot grander for the money.
(Sgt Zappa had paid.)
- Monty, being the engineer he is even makes his own bolts.
The two model railwayers were interrupted by an officious Terser. He wanted to now if they had seen anything unusual or suspicious since the last episode. Sgt Zappa was distracted by the little figures on display. The half-inch man who operated the replica car ferry reminded him of someone.
- Lord Archer, is that you? Mouthed Zappa .
To his surprise, the half-inch man replied.
- Of course not, you damned hippy, you're ripped again, said the Inspector.
- If you think I’m going to put up with these Class-B antics much longer, you‘ve got another thing coming. Put that third-rate yarn-spinner down, man, you don’t know where he’s been. Where does one get a decent real ale around here Zappa?
- Oxford? Quipped the sergeant.
Evan Terser, even more than Terse, loathed anything which came from Oxford, especially its inferior real ales, its football club, its varsity sports teams, and its -ise spelling .
- Goddam British pedants. Worse than Terse, moaned Zappa.
- ize has been in use since the 16th century and is no more American than East Anglia, Terser droned.
- My comrades in Lakenheath Action Group might like to take issue with you there Inspector, politicked Zappa. They say this region's a US storage facility for nukes, surface-to-air missils.
There was nothing on earth more likely to push Terser's buttons than American (mis)pronunciations.
- Missiles! Terser corrected. Terse warned me about you. Nuclear weapons, CIA interference and a massive military presence we can just about accommodate. Cultural imperialism, sloppy spelling and phonetically modified vocabulary, on the other hand, no Englishman could ever countenance, Sergeant.
Language problems notwithstanding, their special relationship was set to continue well into the 21st century.
Dude.
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