Seven

 

Why Won’t These Mer-People Just Leave Me Alone?

 

 

Paris in those days also had its fair share of cholera-ridden hags and infant death and mud, but the cholera-ridden hags coughed with slightly more continental élan, and the infant death only seemed to strike the uglier babies. The mud was pretty much the same. Even though the pirates didn’t have any real reason to be disguised, several of them had cut their hair into chic bobs and bought themselves tiny dogs to carry about. The pirate in red pointed out how useful the Pirate Captain’s French language skills would prove to be now they were actually in France, but the Pirate Captain said that he spoke such a complex dialect the Parisians probably wouldn’t be able to understand him, so in fact he would be sticking to English for the duration of their visit, and anybody who was minded to bring the subject up again would be advised to keep quiet.

 

‘I suppose,’ said the Pirate Captain to Marx, as they strolled down a leafy boulevard, with Engels and the pirate with a scarf hefting their luggage a little way behind, ‘that there’s some clever way we get in touch with these Paris communists? Something to do with code words inserted into the Le Monde crossword? “Three across – the swallow flies east tonight”. “Shadowy meetings in the park”. That kind of thing?’

‘No, Pirate Captain,’ replied Marx. ‘We’re on the more enlightened continent now, where we communists are not vilified like in London. In fact, a group of my followers have set up the Paris Commune, as a sort of utopian model of how society should be, lived according to my philosophical principles.’21

‘A utopian society!’ said the albino pirate excitedly.

‘With lady models! And as much meat as you can eat!’

‘And furniture made from that Spanish ham that tastes of fruit!’

‘And intelligent, talking dogs that brush your teeth for you!’

The pirates all got so carried away with imagining what a perfect utopian society would be like that they didn’t even notice that they’d already arrived at the Commune. It was a bit of a let-down. But the pirates tried their best to hide their disappointment.22

‘Funny sort of utopia,’ muttered the Pirate Captain, pulling away some of the peeling paint from the door. A hand-written sign said ‘No door-to-door salesmen, no circulars and no bourgeois oppression’. Marx rang the bell, and before long a baleful-looking eye appeared at the peephole and peered out at them. Then there was the sound of several bolts being drawn back, and the door creaked open to reveal a French communist in a beret.

‘Comrades!’ boomed Marx, ushering the pirates into the hallway. ‘These are my new friends. This is the Pirate Captain, and these are his aquatic crew. I know they look like questionable types, but the Pirate Captain here is a fellow philosopher.’

‘Hello, pirates,’ said the communists.

‘Hello, communists,’ said the pirates.

After that, the conversation lapsed a bit. Normally, the Pirate Captain would put this down to how bad his crew were at mingling with non-work people, but in this instance he had to partly blame the communists. They seemed glum, especially for a group of people living in a utopia. Nobody was singing, or laughing, or even reading out stirring political poetry. Mostly the French communists looked like somebody had just that second told them the truth about Santa.

‘Things haven’t been going well in London,’ said Marx. ‘We’ve had to flee because someone is trying to ruin our reputation.’

‘Oh, dear me. It’s the same here,’ said one of the communists miserably. ‘All sorts of terrible things have been happening, and we seem to get the blame for everything.’

By way of explanation the communist indicated a stack of old newspapers piled up on the coffee table. Marx’s eyes flicked across the headlines.

 

 

‘It goes on in the same vein. Just last week we were accused of stealing nine bears from the Paris zoo. What would we do with nine bears?’ said the communist, sounding a little exasperated.

‘You could get them to form one of those human pyramid things, except with bears, instead of humans,’ suggested the Pirate Captain. ‘Actually, you’d only need six bears to make a pyramid, but the other three could be spares.’

‘We didn’t steal any bears.’

‘That’s a pity. I’d have liked to have seen a bear pyramid.’

‘This is bleak,’ said Marx, shaking his bushy beard. ‘My reputation back in England is in tatters, and now I find out that our troubles seem to have followed us here to France.’

‘Would you like to hear my considered philosophical opinion, Marx?’ said the Pirate Captain, trying to lighten the mood.

‘By all means, Captain.’

‘I think of it like this – there are only two certainties in life. One is the inevitability of death, and the other is uncertainty itself. So when everything seems to be going badly, it’s probably meant to be. Or perhaps it’s fate. Either way, it’s something we’ll never really know, and it doesn’t pay to waste too much time thinking about it. Eat a chop instead.’

‘Dr Marx,’ said Jennifer. ‘it’s obvious you and your communists have a lot to discuss, and we were thinking that it might be nice for us pirates to see a few sights.’

‘Yes, good idea,’ said the Pirate Captain. ‘A lot of people follow our adventures with a view to getting travel tips and ideas, because we go to so many exotic climes. So I think it’s only right that whilst we’re here in Paris we check out the local attractions.’

‘While your pirates do that, perhaps you would accompany me to the salon?’ said Marx to the Pirate Captain.

The Pirate Captain looked a bit dubious at this suggestion. ‘Is that a salon like we have in England, where you go to get a fancy new haircut? It’s just that I never let anybody but the pirate with a scarf cut my hair. Between you, me and the gatepost, I have a slightly funny-shaped head, and if I’m not careful I end up looking like that Nefertiti bust. He does these clever feathery bits, hides it very well.’

‘Yes, I see. But you needn’t worry. It’s not like one of those salons, but rather a place where the Parisian élite go to discuss intellectual matters of the day. It will be a fantastic introduction of your philosophies to the wider world.’ Marx clapped the Captain on the back. ‘And I must confess to a selfish interest, because I have a feeling that by bringing you along, I may be able to restore my popularity.’

‘Oh, well, that’s different. It sounds right up my street,’ said the Pirate Captain. ‘I love intellectual matters of the day.’

The pirate with a scarf held up his hand, looking a little anxious. ‘Pirate Captain, do you think sitting about in a Paris salon talking about stuff counts as an adventure any more than sitting about in London did?’

The Captain clicked his tongue thoughtfully. ‘Hmmm . . . I suppose not. What does the small print on the Perkins contract say?’

The pirate with a scarf pulled the contract from his pocket. ‘It says that the . . . ah . . . blah, blah . . . “aforementioned adventure of which the full part is to be sponsored by the party of the first part must involve running through, deathly peril, a racy encounter, at least one chase, numerous incidents of bloodthirstiness, a few shanties and a comic bit with some creatures”.’

‘Nothing about pontificating on the meaning of life?’

‘No, sir.’

‘And I don’t suppose that a metaphorical running through of a poorly constructed argument is going to do the trick, is it?’

‘It explicitly says in Clause 45b that metaphorical running through will not suffice.’

‘Well, not to worry,’ said the Captain, with a grin. ‘You know what we’re like. We’re bound to run into trouble.’

 

 

 

The pirates couldn’t agree which was the best thing to see in Paris, so they split into groups. One group decided to go to Madame Tussauds to see the waxworks. Another group decided to go to the Louvre to see the paintings. And the third group decided to go to the Folies Bergère to see the ladies who left nothing to the imagination. The Pirate Captain took the precaution of making sure each group took a packed lunch with them and learnt from the communists how to ask a policeman for help in case they got into any trouble.

 

 

The pirates who went to the Louvre were a bit disappointed to find that the gallery didn’t seem to have a single one of those pictures of the girl with green skin, or of unicorns standing on a giant chessboard in space.

‘Why do you suppose they painted so many bowls of fruit in the olden days?’ said the pirate who liked kittens and sunsets, stifling a yawn. ‘Why not bowls of ham?’

‘Yes. It doesn’t exactly encourage healthy eating habits,’ agreed the pirate with gout.

‘These Pre-Raphaelite girls certainly look like they could do with a bit more red meat in their diet. Look how pasty they are,’ said the pirate with a nut allergy.

‘Oooh! This next room contains the Mona Lisa,’ said the pirate with a scarf, looking at his guide. ‘Who, according to this, is “one of the most enigmatic ladies ever painted”.’23

‘Does enigmatic mean not wearing a thing?’

‘No. You know when the Pirate Captain says something like, “I may lead a secret double life as a spy? Or maybe I don’t. Who’s to say?” and then he arches an eyebrow? That’s enigmatic.’

‘Ah. I always thought that was just annoying.’

 

There was quite a crowd in front of the Mona Lisa, and it took the pirates a little while to fight their way through. They all looked up excitedly, and this is what they saw:

 

 

‘Well, I suppose it’s OK. Though I’m not sure I can really see what all the fuss is about,’ said the pirate with long legs.

‘It lacks a certain something,’ said the pirate with gout.

‘This Leonardo da Vinci,’ said the pirate with a scarf. ‘He was supposed to be a genius, was he?’

‘Someone’s stolen the Mona Lisa!’ shouted an adorable French child.

‘Another outrage by those filthy communists,’ said a gigantic statuesque blonde. ‘They won’t stop until they have brought civilisation crashing to the ground.’

‘When is someone going to come along and sort them out once and for all?’ said another statuesque woman with blonde pigtails, a bit stiltedly, almost like she was reading from something. ‘How much longer must we live in fear?’

The Parisians around the painting grumbled in agreement.

‘This is bad,’ said the pirate with a scarf.

 

 

 

The second group of pirates were having a much better time in Madame Tussauds. Over the course of their adventures they had met a great many famous people in the flesh, but they all agreed that meeting famous people in the flesh wasn’t all it was cracked up to be, as they tended to be much more boring than you’d hoped, and also shorter. Whereas meeting them in wax form was brilliant, because you could stare at their faces as much as you liked but they couldn’t let you down and you could pretend to have a conversation with them in your head where they were witty and erudite.

The pirates stopped in front of a High Seas display. There was Napoleon and Lord Nelson having an arm wrestle, and Jason and the Argonauts waving from the deck of the Argo, and next to that an exciting diorama of Black Bellamy riding atop a big wax squid.

‘They’ve done Black Bellamy very well, haven’t they? They’ve really captured that mischievous gleam in his eye,’ said Jennifer.24

‘But why is it that Black Bellamy has a waxwork when the Pirate Captain doesn’t? Is Black Bellamy a more famous pirate?’ asked the albino pirate.

‘Of course not,’ said the pirate in green defensively. ‘I’m sure the Captain has been asked to pose, but he probably didn’t think wax technology is at a sufficiently high standard to do justice to his air of resolute authority.’

‘Do you suppose they have nipples?’ the pirate with a peg-leg wondered out loud, trying to peer down Nell Gwyn’s top.

‘I wonder if they’re wax all the way through?’

‘Oh, no. They build a frame out of wire, or newspaper, or whatever they have to hand, and then they spray it with a special bee pheromone. That makes all the bees for miles around turn up and cover the frame with wax,’ said the pirate who had once been a mailman.

‘Really? I didn’t know that,’ said the albino pirate.

‘You see, wax is basically bee sick.’

‘What if there aren’t any bees about? Bees get all sleepy in winter,’ said the pirate who knew a bit about nature.

‘Yes, well, in winter they probably use earwax from street urchins instead.’

‘Look at me! I’m kissing Charles Babbage!’

‘And I’m getting a piggyback from Oliver Cromwell!’

‘Ha ha! Marie Antoinette is doing something unspeakable with the Pope!’

 

They wandered through to the Hall of Crowned Heads, which was supposed to be full of waxworks from all the royal families in Europe, although most of them seemed to be temporarily removed for repairs. The sassy pirate got a match and set about melting the nose of a crowned head who had once tried to trap the pirates down a well.

‘Look, here’s a waxwork of a dead waxwork-museum curator with a spear coming out of his back,’ said the pirate in green. ‘They’ve even done a little pool of wax blood! That’s very clever, isn’t it?’

The pirates looked at the dead waxwork-museum curator waxwork sprawled across the floor. Jennifer bent down and prodded it.

‘I think,’ she said, wrinkling her nose, ‘that this is an actual dead body.’ Even though she was a Victorian lady, she had seen a number of dead bodies since becoming a pirate, and was getting to be quite an expert on the subject, though she had not let this affect her breezy outlook.

‘Was it old age?’ said the albino pirate hopefully.

‘I don’t think spears in the back are often a symptom of old age, no.’

‘Oh dear.’

‘Moider!’ said the pirate from the Bronx.

All the pirates jumped with a start as the sound of heavy footsteps echoed down the hallway.

‘Somebody’s coming!’ said the pirate in green.

‘Oh! It’s bound to be the murderer. They always return to the scene of the crime. And what if they’re not done murdering?’

‘Quick, we’ll pretend to be a piratical diorama.’

‘What should we do?’ said the albino pirate in a panic. ‘What goes on in a piratical diorama?’

‘Pirate stuff. You two, pretend to be having a duel,’ said Jennifer.

‘What about me?’ said the pirate in green.

‘Pretend to be in the middle of ravishing me.’

‘I don’t really know what that means,’ said the pirate in green, turning crimson. ‘We tend to stick to the pillage and plundering part of piracy.’

‘Here, grab my dress like this.’

The pirates had just frozen into an exciting diorama when two gigantic statuesque blonde ladies with long blonde pigtails marched into the room.

‘Jennifer,’ whispered the pirate in green.

‘Sssh,’ hissed Jennifer.

‘What if one of the bees comes and lands on my nose?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘The bees that make the wax.’

‘Please be quiet.’

‘It’s just I’m allergic to bees.’

‘Shut. Up.’

‘Did those pirates in that piratical diorama say something?’ said one of the statuesque blonde ladies, peering at Jennifer suspiciously.

The other statuesque blonde lady came across and looked the albino pirate up and down.

‘Don’t be stupid, Helga,’ she said. ‘They are wax. Look, this one isn’t even particularly realistic.’

The first statuesque blonde lady shrugged, and grabbed a couple of the remaining crowned heads under each arm.

‘Oh, this one’s heavy.’

‘I think that’s Poland. It’s all the meat in their diet.’

‘Is this the last of them?’

‘Yes. Let’s get them loaded up and be on our way.’

 

 

 

The third group of pirates were sat in the audience of the Folies Bergère. Whilst they weren’t having as good a time as the pirates at Madame Tussauds, they were having a better time than the pirates at the Louvre, although they were having to sit through a lot of boring acts that the programme assured them contained biting satire whilst they waited for the dancing girls.

‘I heard that when they dance they blow kisses at the men in the audience,’ said the pirate with a hook for a hand.

‘I heard that they don’t wear any knickers when they do the cancan!’ said the pirate with rickets.

‘I heard that you can see their bare tummies.’

‘I heard that they don’t wear any knickers when they do the cancan!’ said the pirate with rickets.

In the row in front of them sat a small group of Parisian gents, knocking back absinthe and smoking cigars. They were talking about how the Folies Bergère wasn’t as popular as it usually was.

‘Excuse me,’ said the pirate in red, leaning forward, ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking, but why do you think that is?’

‘Peuh!’ said one of the Parisians with a Gallic shrug. ‘Who can say? Perhaps it is the Ring Cycle opera of Monsieur Wagner? It’s the talk of the town.’

‘But that’s on in London,’ said the pirate with a hook for a hand.

‘Oh, no,’ said the Parisian, ‘it’s on a tour of Europe. It doesn’t stay in one place for very long.’

‘Like a tramp!’ said the pirate with long legs.

‘Do tramps sing?’

‘Do you remember that adventure when the Pirate Captain decided that he should do something about the homeless and he adopted that tramp? He sang quite a lot if I recall.’

‘Especially when he drank all the Captain’s grog.’

‘Yes. Poor Trampy. I wonder how he’s getting on in Antarctica. He looked quite cold when we left him.’

‘I heard that they don’t wear any knickers when they do the cancan!’ said the pirate with rickets.

 

The pirates waited while yet another comedian went through a routine about relationships. While they had always wondered about what was up with women stealing the duvet, they were getting very impatient. Fortunately, the comedian was followed by the cancan dancers, who high-kicked their way on to the stage. The music speeded up. The dancers kicked higher and higher. The pirates craned forward for a better look, in the anticipation of having absolutely nothing left to their imagination.25

‘Oh,’ said the pirate with rickets.

‘Oh dear,’ said the pirate with long legs.

‘That’s not what I was expecting at all.’

 

21 The Soviet space flight Voskhod 1 took a fragment of a banner from the Paris Commune into space. A fragment of the Jolly Roger has yet to go into space, presumably because the pirate space programme is not very advanced.

22 Thomas More coined the term ‘Utopia’ in his book Libellus vere aureus, nec minus salutaris quam festivas, de optimo reipublicae statu deque nova insula Utopia of 1516. Though of course his version is flawed, because it was written over four hundred years before the young Julie Christie and tubs of Haagen-Dazs even existed.

23 A recent analysis of the Mona Lisa using emotionalrecognition software showed her to be eighty-three per cent happy, six per cent fearful, two per cent angry and nine per cent disgusted.

24 There is a waxwork museum in Prague that has possibly the least convincing Michael Jackson you could ever hope to see. But it makes up for this with several quite scary golems. Recently, Madame Tussauds in London had to cover up Kylie with a longer skirt because so many visitors were patting her bum it was starting to wear away.

25 The ‘cancan’ literally translates as ‘scandal’ or ‘tittle-tattle’ and fi rst appeared in Paris in 1830.