#GenghizInLove: Episode 62

"Almost time for the Big Bash!" Lucy exclaimed gaily as the elevator surged up. "Is everything ready?"

"Not quite." I punched a button. The elevator ground to a halt. "I have to arrange something with Benito. I'll be up in a minute."

"Be careful!" Lucy smirked. "Benito is not a happy puppy right now."

I walked down the corridor towards Benito's room. I hesitated outside the door when I heard his anguished wails, but then shrugged and walked right in. A friend who needs is a friend indeed. Benito lay slumped on the floor in a puddle of beer and tears. I thumped him on the shoulder several times before he raised bleary red eyes towards me. "Leave me alone!" he groaned listlessly.

"What's with you?" I demanded ruthlessly.

"Delilah... left me." Fat tears rolled down Benito's tanned cheeks. "She went off with that bastard, Hachek."

"What are you talking about?"

"When Hachek and I were wrestling on the terrace..." Benito muttered between sobs. It was hard to make sense of what he was saying so I hit him hard on the head. He tried to fight back but I overpowered him easily even though he was much bigger than me. I love fighting with drunks.

"All right," I commanded after I had pinned Benito down and forced him to drink some whisky. "So Hachek knocked you down. Did he beat you up badly?"

"I beat him up," Benito sputtered indignantly. "Delilah jumped on my back and stopped me from killing him. Then she asked him if he was all right and started kissing him all over." Benito shuddered and morosely threw a beer bottle against the wall where it shattered spectacularly. "And then she stuck her tongue out at me and they left..." he concluded brokenly.

"It's okay, Benito. They're both gone now."

Benito convulsed in agony. "He took her back to Poland? Oh, my God! She'll live in some horrible prefabricated socialist apartment building and live on rotten potatoes for the rest of her life!" He buried his head in his hands.

I patted his curly head. "You don't understand. After they left, Hachek tried to kill Delilah but then I persuaded him to commit suicide instead. But Delilah is gone too. Her body has been taken over by this wandering spirit called Lucy." I coughed. "The problem is that Lucy is a little... homicidal. Her bodies tend to have short lives that come to a violent end." I smiled at Benito. "But don't worry. Lots more fish in the sea," I added comfortingly. "Go back home to Surf City. There must be millions of busty blonde babes hanging out on the beach."

Benito let out a tormented bellow. "I don't want any other busty blonde babe. I want Delilah!"

I sighed. "So take a vitamin." Benito sulkily popped a pill. "Now blow your nose and wash your face and come up to Xox's suite with me. Lucy is there right now. See if you can seduce her."

Benito lifted large olive eyes in naive appeal. "What do I have to do?"

I shrugged. "You could try overwhelming her with red roses. Fill her bathtub with vintage champagne and her mouth with liqueur chocolates. It's not original but all's fair in love and decor."

"I'll go shopping right away." Benito jumped up from the floor and wrung my hand enthusiastically. "I owe you one, man."

"Well, actually, I'll take you up on that right away. On your way down, could you just check on the arrangements for the Big Bash?"

"Sure thing. Anything else?"

"You're in charge of vitamins, aren't you? Would you just put some vitamins into the drinking water at the head table? You know, the water that the Big People will be drinking?"

Benito's eyes went wide with wonder. "You want to drug Xox and Lord Hades and Lady Snatcher and Monsieur Jacques and Herr Troll and Monsieur Rameau?"

I nodded. "Into the water jugs. Plop. Just like that."

Benito hesitated. "Should we?"

"Of course we should. You give the students vitamins all the time. They're harmless." I poked Benito in the ribs. "Come on. It'll be fun."

Benito giggled. "Maybe we could mix the vitamins into everything. The fruit punch, the salad bar, the steak tartare..."

I slapped him on the back. "There you go!"

Benito chuckled madly. "I'll do it right away."

"Good man. Make sure to put lots in. I have to make a phone call. I'll see you at the lecture."

Benito skipped off happily. I went to my office and called up Darko Darkovich, my favorite explosives expert. Darkovich had tactical battlefield nuclear weapons, and while I hoped that designer drugs would do the trick, I wanted to make absolutely sure that the Big Bash would pass off without giving me an allergy rash from all the stress. I was worried about my complexion: I hadn't been eating enough fresh fruit and vegetables in the last few days. If you can't be good, be careful.

My heart was in my throat when I finally made my way to the rarified heights of Xox's penthouse apartment. I gulped with trepidation when the door opened. A bald man in a badly cut grey suit stood at the threshold, grinning. Xox himself.

"Welcome." Xox stared intently into my left eye. "I did not get the chance to thank you properly in Budapest. I have been hearing a lot about you since."

"Nothing terrible, I hope," I murmured feebly.

"On the contrary, my dear fellow," Xox replied ambiguously. "I have just had the pleasure of meeting your exquisite friend, Anastasia." Xox winked approvingly. "Charming creature. I am so glad that she is one of us. You know our other friends of course." Putting his arm on my shoulder, Xox wheeled me around.

Lady Rudolphine and Anastasia were sitting together cozily on a couch, absorbed in an animated tete-a-tete. Lucy was curled up at their feet. They looked up and smiled at me. Otto Hell sat comfortably slumped on another long overstuffed sofa, belly placidly protruding, eyes closed as if in sleep. Besides him, long stick limbs contorted like an ungainly insect, waving his wine glass in the air as he vainly tried to engage Hell in conversation, sat Terence Killjoy-Yuck. He looked up at my entrance and went pale. I went over to him and thumped his thin shoulder in hearty greeting.

"Terence! How the hell are you, old chap?"

"You!" Terence's eyebrows were rocketing all over the place. "I thought you were..."

"Dead? Under arrest?" I guffawed.

Terence smiled weakly. "I had indeed heard, ahem..."

"Where's Rasputin, Terry? In hospital or in jail? Did Godfrey get away?"

"I really couldn't say."

"What about your other minions in beige trench coats? Where are they when you really need them, huh?"

"My dear chap." Terence smiled winsomely, exposing rotting front teeth. "Are you still upset about that little scene in Berlin?"

"Not at all." I grinned back. "I don't mind being followed and bugged and kidnapped and chased and shot at. What I do mind, however, is being used as a scapegoat."

"What on earth..."

"Why did you send me to Prague in the first place, Terence?"

Terence wriggled uncomfortably. "Do we really have to discuss this now, dear boy? Perhaps some other time would be more appropriate..."

"I don't think so." I looked up. Otto was still pretending to sleep. Xox was pouring himself a Scotch. He glanced over and smiled benignly. "I was a decoy, wasn't I?"

"Decoy?" Terence had clearly never heard the word before. He rolled it around wonderingly between pursed lips. "Decoy?"

"You wanted to spy on Xox. You knew that his security apparatus was vigilant." Lucy nodded. "You wanted me to be caught because that would draw attention away from the real spy, didn't you?"

"Real spy?" Terence shook his head in bewilderment. "My dear chap, whom are you talking about?"

"Me, obviously." Otto opened one beady eye and frowned at Terence. "Game's over, Killjoy-Yuck. Xox knows everything. I've been working for him all along."

We gaped at Hell in amazement. His move had boldly torn open a veil of secrecy, exposing the shadowy spaces in which spies revel, a murky maze of ambiguous meanings and nebulous identities, a dusky world with its own hazy allure, and those drawn into its obscure orbit soon find their eyes growing accustomed to a deceptive dimness in which values and people lose all distinctness and are soon reduced to mist and shadows... Now we sat blinking suspiciously at each other in the novel clarity produced by Hell's disclosure, like tourists newly arrived from a foggy English winter for a vacation in the tropics, and if even I, the rawest recruit among our ranks, found myself at a loss for words, how should one depict the indescribable distress Terence must have felt, stoop-shouldered spook, born to genteel bitchiness and bred to snobbish contriving, as he sat there stiffly, wincing?

But even the stiffest of upper lips soften under pressure and as he sat there under our concerted stare, Terence was soon blubbering brokenly. "Don't hold it against me," he sniffled. "I was just serving Queen and Country..."

"No, you weren't," Otto replied calmly. "You were doing your very best to sabotage the Queen all along."

Terence sat up straight. "How dare you…"

"You're not trying to deny your involvement in Princess Fi's assassination, are you?" Hell said reprovingly. "That clumsy attempt to implicate the poor Princes in the plot. Tut tut. And who set up the poor trusting young Duke with that gorgeous gold-digger transvestite? The turncoat who sucked the Princess's toes on that Caribbean beach and then sold the pictures to the tabloids wasn't one of your trench-coated flunkies? And who burned down the poor woman's castle?"

"There, there." Xox patted Terence's shoulder comfortingly. "Don't cry. We know all about your plot to discredit the royal family and eliminate the Queen."

"You do?" Terence's eyes went wide with alarm.

"Of course. And to put Lady Snatcher in her place." Terence gulped. Xox nodded reassuringly. "The Snatcher Foundation's finances are hardly a secret to me. Your money is safe in my hands."

Terence groaned. "The Royal Bank of England merger…"

"Yes, I bought the bank. But surely you knew that?"

"You own everything now, don't you?" Terence asked suspiciously. "But whose side are you on anyway?"

"I am on everyone's side." Xox beamed. "Surely you should know that by now?"

"Even the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor?" Terence made a brave attempt at resistance.

Xox chuckled. "But of course. They don't know it yet but they will."

"Your conspiracy of billionaires hasn't won yet," Terence said pugnaciously. "We will fight on the beaches and in the streets…"

"And yet the MIDAS membership keeps growing," Hell said unexpectedly. "Despite all your efforts to assassinate them."

"Funerals are good opportunities for meetings," Xox added graciously. "Were you trying to murder us in order to eliminate MIDAS or because you had lost too much money to us?" Terence let out a low moan and buried his head in his hands. "Oh, yes, we always knew that you were after us. Why else would we play bridge with you? I'm sorry, my dear fellow, but you really must improve your game a little. Here. Take a vitamin. Lemon flavor or cherry?"

"It's time to get down to the Big Bash," Lucy chirped up. "Lady Snatcher and Monsieur Jacques should be arriving any minute."

"Thank you, my dear. We must not keep our guests waiting." Xox offered his arm to Lady Rudolphine. "Shall we go? This event promises to be most entertaining."

#GenghizInLove: Episode 61

Pandemonium reigned on the terrace. We were all under the indiscriminate influence of Basic Instinct, and the mysterious drug's effects were all too visible. Benito and Hachek lay locked together on the floor, their magnificent muscles writhing as they fought. Delilah lay asprawl between them, her clothes incitingly torn, her splendid breasts heaving with the shrieks she repeatedly uttered, mechanically, like a dysfunctional doll. Immanuel's tattered purple robes fluttered like the flag of some derelict nation as he stood precariously balanced on the balustrade, earnestly exhorting the unheeding combatants to cease their strife. Jesus sat motionless like a predator owl, watching through unblinking eyes, arms crossed across barrel chest, trained assassin's body relaxed and ready. And, crawling on all fours, my heart pounding, I negotiated the perilous hazards of the glass-strewn floor, seeking escape from the mayhem.

As I entered the safety of the elevator, I was filled with an instinctive need for chocolate milk. I craved its insipid reassurance, its cloying satiation. Riding down in my closed cocoon, I coveted childishness. The elevator door opened and I went over to the reception desk. Cute little Annichka was sitting behind the counter, playing with her dolls. She looked up at me and frowned.

"Oh, it's you." Annichka looked down again into the vacuous eyes of her plaything.

"What's the matter?" I asked, hurt. "Aren't you glad to see me?"

Annichka stuck a needle into her doll's eye. I blinked. "You never play with me," she squeaked sulkily. Her lower lip was stuck out in a mutinous pout. "You always promise to bring me drugs and to play with crayons but you never do."

I winced. She was right. Months had passed since that promise and, trapped against my will in earth-shaking conspiracies, I had been faithless to this pretty chiclet. "What about right now?" I asked hopefully. "Do you have your crayons here?"

"I don't want to play with you anymore." Annichka's lower lip quivered. She viciously ripped a sleeve off her doll's dress. "You like Barbie better than me. I hate you."

"Come on, sweetie," I pleaded but to no avail. "All right. Don't talk to me. But do you have some bandages here? I'm bleeding all over the carpet."

Annichka put her little hand to her mouth and squealed in horror. She was rummaging frantically through her first aid kit, tossing gauze and iodine everywhere, when I had my brilliant idea.

"Annichka, don't you want to try a new drug?"

"Yes, but shouldn't we first bandage..."

"No. Listen. Suck some blood out of this cut on my wrist." Annichka's eyes opened wide in amazement. "My bloodstream contains a drug called Basic Instinct," I insisted urgently. Annichka looked at me trustingly. I had a moment of misgiving, seeing those big brown eyes, but I suppressed this misplaced compassion ruthlessly. I fluttered my eyelashes at her and smiled toothily. "Trust me."

"Okay." Annichka smiled sweetly. I held out my bleeding wrist to her. She put her soft lips to the cut and sucked, at first with tentative little nips, but surprisingly soon, with greater zest, tweaking and licking with quick feline flicks of her hot tongue. I shivered and closed my eyes. Snippets of memory zipped through my head, odd fragments from my brief sojourn with my lost love, Anastasia. Anastasia's green eyes flashing as she advanced towards me brandishing a butcher knife; Anastasia flashing a perfect thigh as she casually inserted a needle; Anastasia holding me to her, clawing my back, huskily howling guttural endearments; Anastasia calmly kissing her father's severed head before turning to me in that inexplicable transfer of her spirit's green flame... An eerie calm enveloped me. I was a solitary spectator in an empty theater. Then I was dangling in the void, suspended without support in an endless chasm, alone. A hot sweet presence was gone: I was bereft.

Until Annichka looked up at me and smiled. I gasped. The brown centers of her bovine eyes were flickering, transmutating: the milk chocolate brown yielding at the edges, whipped into a hazel froth, slowly succumbing to the inexorable progress of a glittering viridian wave. Annichka's adorable face underwent a parallel transformation: the cute curves melted away, accentuating the arrogant angles of the cheekbones and the long loveliness of the haughty throat. Annichka's thick dark curls tightened and shimmered with a coppery sheen, accentuating the small pink freckles gathering on her very pale heart-shaped face. "I love the taste of blood," the girl whispered huskily. "You remembered."

"Anastasia."

"My stupid love. So slow to release me."

"You didn't explain."

"You didn't think."

"I can't help it."

"Did you miss me?"

"Until I realized that you were with me all along."

Without warning Anastasia slapped me hard. "You bastard," she snarled. "How dare you sleep with that trollop Madlenova?"

I bit my lip and smiled sheepishly. "I'm sorry."

Anastasia glared at me through slitted eyes. "I had to fight her with all my power. Otherwise she would have stolen both our souls and then we would be languishing for all eternity in the belly of the beast."

"Oh, come on," I remonstrated. "She's not that bad."

"She's an old cow. I cannot believe that you wanted to release me into her body."

"Do you like this one?"

Anastasia appraised her new body dispassionately. "Not too bad. At least it's young." She wiggled her hips and stared down her front critically. "The bottom is all right and the legs are quite good but the breasts are a bit small."

"They are not," I protested hotly. "They are firm and round and high. And big enough for a hot little adolescent. What do you want, melons?"

"And why pick a receptionist?" Anastasia's upper lip curled in aristocratic dismay.

"Edit the snobbery," I replied firmly. "Annichka was easily the cutest girl around. And talented. The things she did with crayons..."

"Stop speaking in the past tense," Anastasia interrupted. "I am Annichka. I am sixteen years old and very vapid." She rolled her eyes around in her head. The copper curls turned chestnut and the clear green eyes became murky momentarily before settling into placid brown. "I like this drug!" Annichka squealed happily. "Now can we play some other game?"

"Yes, sweetie. I know a very special game I want to play with you." I firmly led her behind the reception desk into the small room where the receptionists catnapped at night. I covered her face with hot kisses as we subsided noisily onto the flimsy camp bed.

With the passion reserved for lovers reunited after a long separation, Anastasia and I ran through the stages of love, the urgencies of clumsy preliminaries and premature culmination, the relief of laughter and affection, cuddle and fondle, then the careful impassioned agonizing bliss of coming together again, the lazy languorous tendresses that follow, leading only to more urbane embraces, the sophisticated wickedness available to those with time on their side. Naughty Anastasia amused herself by corrupting innocent Annichka, suddenly switching selves during our most dissolute caresses, snickering sardonically at her simple substitute's startled squeals.

"What will happen to Anastasia now?" I asked, idly stroking my beloved's sweet long flanks.

"How the devil should I know? I don't keep in touch with my previous bodies. She will probably go to mass regularly, have four corgis which she takes for long walks by the sea, dutifully accompany her husband to decorous church gatherings, and stare blankly when acquaintances ask why she stopped making movies."

"Poor thing." I wistfully remembered lying in bed with that smaller more fragile body.

She glowered at me. "Stop that. She's just a body."

"How can you be jealous of your own previous self?"

"You're with me now."

"But what should I call you?"

"Annichka, obviously. I may need a new name when I start my acting career."

"Annichka is going to become a movie star?"

"Of course. You don't think I'm going to be a receptionist forever, do you?"

"La di da." I stiffened and turned. "Isn't that someone ringing the bell at the reception desk?" Annichka and I threw on some clothes and left our little cave.

Delilah stood at the reception desk, sobbing hysterically. Her clothes were ripped to shreds and her hair was a serious mess. "Help me!" Delilah screamed wildly. "He wants to kill me!"

"Come here." Annichka and I escorted Delilah to the back room. I pulled out my flask from my pocket and cajoled the sobbing girl into gulping down a shot. She grimaced through her tears. I sighed. It was a sad sacrifice of good single malt but chivalry required it. After a few wasted shots, Delilah was calm enough to answer questions. "Who's trying to kill you?"

"Hachek." Delilah's face contorted again. "He knocked Benito down like a doormat and then started chasing me all over the building with a knife."

"Why?"

"I don't know." Delilah began to sniffle. "He... he called me the perfect Amerikan cow. He wanted to milk me. Boo hoo hooo!" She began to wail loudly again.

The reception bell rang insistently. We looked at each other. I squared my shoulders and nodded reassuringly at the girls. "It's probably Hachek. I'll handle him." Annichka looked at me adoringly. I marched out. Hachek was was bleeding profusely and his craggy hook nose seemed even more menacing than usual against the backdrop of his bloodless face. His tiny eyes held a cunning squint and his thin lips were twisted in an evil leer. He was holding a large hunting knife.

"All right," Hachek snarled nasally. "Where is she?"

"Who?"

"My side of beef. I want a steak. Rare." Hachek jumped over the counter and rushed past me, felling me with one passing shoulder.

I eased myself up and followed him. Hachek stood against the far wall, holding Delilah in front of him. The knife was poised at Delilah's exposed throat. Annichka sat on the bed, calmly putting on her stockings. She looked at me ironically. "My man."

I stuck out my tongue at her and turned to Hachek. "Why do you want to kill her?"

"All my life I have longed to die. I just want to take her with me." Hachek giggled insanely. "Like a Pharaoh, secure in the knowledge that I will have company in the afterlife."

"Why don't you kill yourself first?" I suggested. "Then we'll slaughter her. Like a ritual heifer. Much more impressive that way."

Hachek frowned for a moment and then nodded. "Why not?" he said easily. "Do you promise to sacrifice her?" I nodded, ignoring Delilah's indignant gurgles. "Okay. Here goes." Hachek pulled the knife away from Delilah's throat and slashed it across his own. He toppled to the floor like a butchered bull. The sweet scent of blood rose sickeningly in the air.

"A ritual heifer, huh?" Delilah glowered at me. Her thick blonde eyelashes fluttered accusingly, half-obscuring her large azure eyes. "Recognize me now? Still want to sacrifice me, mister?"

"Lucy," I gasped. "Back from the dead. Again."

"Hi." Delilah/Lucy turned to Annichka/Anastasia. "We've met."

"Of course." Anastasia smiled. They shook hands. "I dreamed of you once. And then I saw you murdered in Berlin."

I rolled my eyes in my head. "Small world. What the devil are you doing here, Lucy? Why did you take over Delilah's body now?"

"I can't just wander around without a body," Lucy replied reasonably. "I smelled the blood. Why not Delilah? She's cute. And in case you've forgotten, the big bash begins in less than three hours. Xox is already here. Don't you want to meet him?"

Anastasia nodded. Her phosphorescent green eyes glittered in the darkness. "Why not?" I muttered feebly. Lucy laughed and led the way. We took the elevator up, up to the private suite of Xox, the lair of the lord of chaos himself.

#GenghizInLove: Episode 60

Jesus and I walked to the University of Truth and Justice. It was a pleasant half-hour stroll, meandering through deserted streets lined with the elaborate facades of a more prosperous age, periodically punctuated by the slender spires of forsaken churches. The cool night air held a promise of spring. We sauntered along in silence, sunk in our separate thoughts. Although my stunned eyes had seen Maya gunned down by Rasputin, I still could not comprehend that she was dead, and I found it even harder to believe that Luke had perished. Plots were colliding head-on like vast tectonic plates, crushing my best friends in their mangles.

"Someone will have to break it to Barbie," I said reluctantly.

"Is she here?" I nodded. Jesus took a deep breath. "I will do it," he said at length. "She is my responsibility now."

"I've known her since she was six." I felt oddly jealous but also relieved.

"Sleaze and I were closer than brothers. I take care of what he left behind." Jesus looked at me with heavy hooded eyes.

I shrugged, overcome by his unabashed machismo. "Whatever." I felt numb. I needed a jolt to shake me up, I needed drink and drugs and nostalgic conversation, I needed a wake. And so Jesus and I went to Marek's bar. Barbie and her entourage had disappeared and Marek was closing up. We picked up an assortment of strong spirits, found a convenient terrace with comfortable chairs, and settled in for a long night of serious drinking.

"Nice place Xox has here." Jesus downed his fourth tumbler of tequila, glancing around at the terra cotta and plate glass and track lighting all around us. He idly pinched a buttery fold of leather upholstery between his fingers. "Almost as luxurious as his New York office."

"Were you trying to raise money from Xox?" I asked curiously. "Luke told me that you had gone to New York to meet some old pal of yours who had defected from the Enlightenment and set up his own splinter group."

"I wouldn't describe Xox as an old pal exactly," Jesus replied calmly. "But I did go to New York to meet him, yes."

"Are we talking about the same guy?" I asked in bewilderment. "Grinning bald billionaire..." Jesus nodded. "Why would the richest man in the world be involved with a Marxist revolutionary movement?"

Immanuel peeked his head around the corner at that moment, still in muddy purple robes, followed by Benito, Hachek Katastrofski (as ever, nose first) and Delilah. "So that's where you are," Immanuel said happily. "Barbie and the boys have gone to bed."

"Separately, I hope."

"I can't swear to that. What a girl. Marek told us you were drinking heavily. We've been looking everywhere for you. May we join you?"

Jesus rose and bowed politely. "Jesus Guevara at your service. What's your poison?"

Immanuel beamed. "Whisky, please. Thank you." He sat down between us, knocking over a couple of empty bottles. Delilah's two suitors perched themselves on either edge of the armchair into which she had gracefully subsided. Hachek and Benito glared at each other each time they found their rival staring down into her spectacular cleavage. "This looks like a heavy discussion."

"Jesus here claims that Xox is a closet Marxist."

"Really?" Immanuel exclaimed. "Which closet? Leninist or Maoist?"

"I don't want to get into Marxist theory," Jesus began. I heaved a sigh of relief. "What do you know about the Enlightenment?"

"It's a shadowy movement in Peru trying to bring about a peasant revolution," Delilah responded, clearly a girl used to getting good grades.

"Basically, that's correct. The Enlightenment was started by a university professor who read too much Mao."

"That is how it all starts," hook-nosed Hachek interjected gloomily. "Silly ideas about the dignity of labor."

"Dangerous things, vegetable gardens," Immanuel added.

"There are more peasants than factory workers," Jesus continued. "So the revolution must come from the peasants. The poorest countries in the world are agrarian economies. So the capitalist world-economy can only be overthrown by an alliance of societies ruled by peasant communism."

"Do you actually believe all this, Jesus?" I asked. "You were the chief spokesman for the Enlightenment."

"Well, it is hard to imagine that North Korea and Albania and Cuba are going to rule the world," Jesus agreed. "But the peasants need something to believe in. It's better than believing in a virgin who wants you to have fifteen starving babies."

"What does Xox have to do with all this?"

"He's Enfer Hohdzha's cousin."

"Who?"

"Hohdzha was the chief ideologist of the Albanian communists for forty years. A ruthless megalomaniac who wanted to make Tirana the capital of the world. So he sent his acolytes out to the poorest countries in the world. Their mission was to infiltrate local communist parties and to spread the word. Proletariat bad, peasants good."

"And Xox was sent to Peru?" Immanuel asked incredulously.

"Right. He gave the university professor lots of books by Hohdzha. The cool college kids loved it. More Maoist than Mao. Wow. What a great reason to grow a beard." Jesus gulped down the rest of the tequila, coolly inhaling the worm straight from the bottle. Benito whistled in admiration.

"Did Xox grow a beard?" I asked curiously. "It's hard to imagine him with facial hair."

"He's been bald ever since I've known him," Jesus answered. "Which is almost twenty years."

"You've known him since you were a small child?"

"My parents died for the revolution." Jesus smiled remotely. "How do you think I managed to go to an expensive prep school like Bendover?"

"My mother sent me there to make rich friends," I replied, shame-faced. Yet again I realized how thoroughly I had failed my poor mother.

"Well, I had a full scholarship from the Fund for Peace and Love. Except it wasn't called that back then."

"So how did Xox make his billions?" Immanuel asked.

"And why?" I added.

"He defected."

"What?"

"He changed sides at some stage. He does not talk about it much but I suspect it was when he went to Chicago to study with Otto Hell. That was when he decided that Mao was wrong and that Hohdzha was naive. You see, Xox had to find money for the Enlightenment. Revolutions need guns, bullets, uniforms, boots. And the peasants would rather betray you to the army and collect a reward. They don't want to feed you while you fight for their freedom. Xox saw the obvious answer. Cash crops. He built symbiotic relationships with local peasants, regional cartels, compliant policemen all over Latin America, and flexible politicians everywhere. But this was hot money and these were simple people. After buying their limousines and private jets and penthouses and everything in the fashion magazines and lingerie catalogs, when the money still kept rolling in, they got frightened. Like Midas in the myth, everything they touched was turning to gold and they didn't like it. It was too conspicuous. Xox was glad to help. He was everyone's front man. He invested their money, and, lo and behold, it multiplied even beyond their dreams, safely, far away, in computer printouts and stacks of gold ingots in underground vaults. When the Enlightenment had less than a thousand guerrillas and a bank account bigger than ten billion dollars, Xox saw the irrelevance of the peasant revolution."

"So he moved to Wall Street and became a capitalist?"

"He moved to Wall Street because he was still a communist. But now he knew where Marx and Lenin and Mao and Hohdzha had all gone wrong. They tinkered with movements among the poor, the proletariat, the peasants, the peripheral. But it was the center that was crucial, Xox decided. If he was going to give capitalism a heart attack he had to become a great big lump of fat to choke the system at its core."

"A Master of the Universe," I said dreamily. Finally the connections were all coming together. I still wasn't sure I liked it.

"How do you know all this?" Benito asked.

"He told me."

"Why?"

Jesus chuckled. "I've been working for him for years. We get together once a year usually when he brings together the leaders of all the revolutionary movements he funds. The Sikhs, the Acehnese, the Tamils, the Mindanao people, the Xighurs, the Kashmiris…"

"What does he want?"

Jesus shrugged. "Truth and justice? A better world?"

"Why doesn't he buy himself some better clothes first?" I snapped peevishly. "I hate those baggy grey suits he wears. Why doesn't someone stop him?"

"How do you stop the richest man in the world from giving away all his money?"

"It's not just his money, is it?" Immanuel shrewdly pointed out. "If I understand you correctly, Xox wants to do away with money altogether."

Jesus grinned. "You're right. And lots of people are actually trying to stop him."

"Isn't Xox worried?"

"Hard to tell. He smiles constantly and gives lots of television interviews."

"He's up to something, isn't he?" I asked suspiciously. "An ultimate project. Like all the megalomaniac trillionaires in the James Bond movies."

"I don't know." Jesus smiled serenely, a pock-marked Buddha. "We'll just have to see."

Immanuel let out a resonant belch. "Xox has a dream," he declared drunkenly.

Benito nudged me. "Uh, oh. Time for another sermon."

Immanuel continued, unfazed. "Xox wants a refrigerator for every Chinese peasant and Amerikan hausfrau. He wants each species of animal and plant, fish and fowl to lie together in peace in the New Ark, in their allotted place in the Big Refrigerator filled with frozen genes, awaiting rebirth on a better planet. He wants solar energy and perpetual motion and desalination plants. He wants psychotropic drugs and endless joy." Immanuel reached for his bottle of whisky, missed by a mile, and toppled over with a deafening crash. "Long live Xox! Xox is in us all. I am Xox!"

"No, you're not," Benito replied primly. "You're just drunk."

"Better drunk than stupid," Immanuel replied sharply, resisting our attempts to help him up from the floor. "Get in touch with your instincts, damn you, and stop fussing over me."

A membrane ruptured in my memory. "Instincts!" I exclaimed, draining down my vodka and throwing the empty bottle off the balcony. "Now I remember!. Lady Rudolphine gave me a drug called Basic Instinct and said I would remember when the time was right. Jesus, does Lady Rudolphine know that her son is dead?"

Jesus nodded. "I met her in England yesterday. Xox sent me to Murti Bing's country house. I had to identify the bodies." He smiled coldly and flexed his powerful fingers. "You say these men in purple jumpsuits work for Axel von Schadenfreude? I hope to meet him one of these days. In fact, I'm going on a little manhunt."

"What a good idea." I smiled back. "Let's go scalp the Holy Roman Emperor."

"Is that who he is?" Jesus didn't seem terribly concerned about the potential impact of his regicidal plans on world history. "I'm sorry, amigo, but you can't come. I assassinate better alone. Besides, this is a private vendetta."

"Luke was my friend too," I protested. "And I have my own vendetta with Axel."

Jesus shook his head implacably. "You don't have the training."

I pouted. "Oh, all right, you old feudster. Will you at least bag a couple of purple jumpsuits for me?"

"Did I hear someone mention drugs?" Immanuel spoke up from the floor. "I feel the strong need for a pick-me-up of some sort."

"Of course," I said, reaching into my pocket for the shiny phial of Basic Instinct. "Lady Rudolphine said that it just had to be dropped into any open wound."

"That's good." Immanuel pulled out a shard of glass from his thin ankle. "I'm bleeding like a pig already."

I took the sharp sliver and scratched my wrist. "In memory of Luke Leazy," I whispered huskily, carefully dripping a drop of the silvery fluid into the bright red blood welling up in the wound. "Drug designer extraordinaire and the best of friends."

"Rest in peace." Jesus injected his dose.

"I miss him already and I didn't even know the guy," Immanuel piped up. "Can I have some too?"

"Yes, but wait till you get in touch with your instincts before you try to kill yourself again."

"Ow!" Delilah suddenly screamed. "I cut my foot!"

"Permit me to assist." "Goddamnit, just get out of the way." In their haste to assist Delilah, Hachek and Benito toppled together to the floor. The vial of Basic Instinct flew out of Immanuel's hands and broke with an ominous tinkle. I closed my eyes and covered my ears in an ineffectual attempt to block out the animal grunts of the two powerful young males angrily wrestling on the glass-strewn floor. I could feel my basic instinct coming to the fore: I looked around for escape.

#GenghizInLove: Episode 59

Interrupted in the reassuringly familiar soap-opera plot of the love triangle, I sulkily answered the phone. "Who the hell is it and what the devil do you want?"

"Hi, dear, this is Maya." My old friend from Oxford sounded amused. "That sweet receptionist of yours put me through to this phone. Are you okay? You sound a little harried."

"Maya darling!" I exclaimed sheepishly. "I never got a chance to thank you for your help in Budapest. Did they throw you in jail?"

"No, I got away safely," Maya replied. "I had a plane to catch. My three friends are still in prison though. They don't mind. Hungarian jails are so cushy compared to the Turkish dungeons they're used to and it's all research anyway for the book we're putting together. It's called the Terrorist's Guide to European Prisons."

"Are you going to cover other continents as well? I have a Peruvian friend who might be interested."

"Oh, what a good idea. We can talk about it when we meet."

"Where are you calling from?"

"Ten kilometres above sea level," Maya replied airily. "From the first class cabin of an airplane about to land in Prague. Are you still available to help?"

I remembered the commitment I had made a lifetime earlier in Berlin to aid Maya in some mysterious terrorist project. I was torn between fatigue and the gratitude I felt for Maya's help in Budapest. "Yes, of course, Maya. I'll get to the airport right away."

Barbie touched my arm as I hung up the phone. "Do you have to go?"

"It's the first time Maya has ever asked for my help, Barb." I looked at my watch. "I'd better go."

"Be careful."

"You be careful." I glowered at the drooling students clustered around my friend, like baby wolves waiting hopefully to nibble at their prey. Sweet Annichka at the reception desk summoned a taxi for me. I told the driver to drive like blazes to the airport. Then I slumped into my seat, closed my eyes, and prayed that I wouldn't be late. The first passengers were just emerging from customs when my taxi screeched up to the arrival area. I ran in and collided into someone. I began blindly to blurt out an apology when I realized that I had bumped into God himself.

"Good God! I mean, good grief! Godfrey, what the devil are you doing here?"

"Same thing as you, old chap. Anxiously awaiting loved ones."

"Whom are you waiting for?" At that moment I glimpsed Maya's slim figure wheeling a laden luggage trolley through customs. She was accompanied by a pudgy woman with grey hair. I guessed it was Nina Hamidi. Besides designing love potions for her rich and famous Berlin clientele, who included my lost love Anastasia, Hamidi was also involved in Maya's terrorist activities. Maya waved and began to wheel her trolley towards us.

"Do I see Maya?" Godfrey murmured lazily. He shook his head in mock bemusement. "What a gathering of the clans. I wonder if she spoke to Rasputin on the flight?"

My jaw dropped open. "Rasputin?"

"Yes. Rasputin. Surely you remember our old bridge partner?" God's eyes locked onto mine with heavy lidded irony.

I gulped. "I thought he was still in Berlin."

"Didn't you hear? I forgot, you only read the comic strips. Quite right too. The story dominated the English newspapers earlier in the week before Princess Fi's miraculous ascension. Meredith, Rasputin's wife, paid a large ransom to free him from some homosexual brothel in Berlin and told all the tabloids that she had done it as a moral duty to save Rasputin from temptation." Godfrey darted me a cool amused glance. "Oddly enough, Rasputin claimed you had something to do with this." Godfrey looked over my shoulder. "Ah, there he is. My, what a limp. Stick around, old chap. I'm sure Rasputin is just dying to see you." Firmly grasping my elbow, Godfrey turned me around. Rasputin and I caught sight of one another at the same moment. Five paces away from me, Maya saw the terror on my face and turned around in puzzlement.

Rasputin let out a wild roar of rage, dropped his overnight bag, wrenched a sub-machine gun away from a policeman standing around the customs exit, and fired a loose burst in my general direction. I dived for cover behind a train of unused luggage trolleys. The bullets whined and clanged off the metal and shattered the plate glass windows behind me. The confused screams of innocent passengers rose high in pain and protest, the frenzied lowing of cows in a slaughter house, punctuated by a wild bull's bellow as Rasputin ran amuck, howling hysterically as he fired off burst after burst of machine gun fire. My heart was pounding in rhythm with the gunfire as I pushed the luggage trolleys towards Rasputin. He didn't notice until it was too late. The trolleys hit his knees with a sickening crunch and he collapsed to the ground, screaming in agony.

Unfortunately, it was also too late for Maya and Nina Hamidi. The machine gun fire had ripped Hamidi apart almost in two. Maya lay in a pool of blood amidst the wreckage of her bags. I knelt besides her and felt for her pulse in a desperate gesture stolen from a bad movie. Her eyes were still closed but she smiled weakly when I brokenly called her name. "Rasputin strikes again," she breathed. "Premature as ever. Why did he have to spoil my surprise?"

"What are you talking about?" I implored.

Maya opened her eyes wide and I gasped in horror. My friend's pretty brown eyes had turned an angelic azure, half-obscured by thick blonde eyelashes. "Recognize me?" she giggled, coughing up a thin pink bubble.

"Lucy!" Horror turned to outrage as it dawned on me that it was the enigmatic Lucy Setton who had struck once again, coolly confiscating yet another body before abandoning it to the murderous instincts of her accomplice fiend, Rasputin. "How dare you?"

I told you this afternoon that I had taken the body of a friend of yours."

"Why?"

"It's like hitch-hiking. It's cheap and you get to eat interesting people."

"But why Maya?"

"She had nothing to live for anyway," the uncanny spirit murmured, reasonably enough. "She's been dead inside ever since her husband and child choked to death on Saddam's mustard gas. You can't live for revenge forever and even terrorism gets boring after a while. Why not go out in a blaze of glory?"

"Who are you to decide?"

"We'll talk about it later." Lucy laughed and Maya died.

I knelt besides the corpse of my friend, holding her limp hand. It seemed the most forlorn gesture in the world. I wiped away angry tears from my eyes and rose heavily to my feet.

Rasputin still lay on the glass-strewn floor of the airport terminal, clutching his knees, moaning, surrounded by a bunch of airport commandos, Kalashnikovs watchfully held at the ready in case the cripple tried to make a getaway. A pudgy policeman in an atrocious suit waddled hurriedly up and began to speak in stentorian tones. Lieutenant Boruvka, the incompetent policeman who had arrested me a couple of months before on suspicion of Lucy's murder, was reading Rasputin his rights. Boruvka had finally done it. He had cracked his case without even knowing it.

I smiled to myself. It was a mistake. Smiles make Czechs suspicious, especially Czech policemen. Boruvka's jaw dropped open and I could see the wires short-circuiting behind his protuberant excitable eyes. Before he could order his bewildered cohorts to arrest me, I made a dash for freedom.

Luckily, the driver of the first taxi idling outside was a Slovak with little love for Czech policemen. Flagrantly ignoring the flashing sirens and blaring horns of their dinky little Skoda police cars, the driver gunned his powerful BMW taxi around the winding hills on the outskirts of Prague, turning abruptly in the middle of a broad street where he reversed and roared straight up the special lane reserved for trams. Stopping just short of an approaching tram, the driver wedged his taxi onto a pavement and drove at manic speeds around the blind corners and twisted lanes of Prague's picturesque city center. Finally pulling up with a flourish on Wenceslas Square, the driver smiled, contentedly twisted the ends of his thick black moustache, and declined my grateful offers of large sums of hard currency. "I used to drive stunt cars in Soviet spy movies," he explained. "Reminded me of the good old days. No sweat."

After persuading the driver to accept a few hundred dollars to buy candy for his children, I darted down a narrow alley and found myself in a smaller dimly lit square. I could hear the wailing sirens of approaching police cars growing louder, but what was this other noise which was also growing louder?

Just as the first policemen came running up, the square exploded with sound. A troupe of immensely fat men dressed in purple satin tunics and wide pink trousers came goose-stepping through the square, each puffing hard on shiny brass instruments or banging lustily on rattle-drums. Marching steadily on, the band relentlessly pushed the protesting policemen back down the dark alley. I blinked but just as the first troupe had disappeared, another brass band came stomping into the square, louder than their predecessors in both volume and costume, wearing furry outfits striped in fluorescent orange and pink with stiff curly tails. I put a hand to my feverish head and blinked again in an effort to dispel the hallucinations, but to no avail: a third band of swarthy men in Peruvian ponchos now filled the square, dancing in a circle as they strummed strange-shaped guitars and played plaintively on wooden pipes.

I took my courage in both hands and went up to one of the Peruvians. "Excuse me, sir," I stammered. "But what is going on?"

"Why, it's the annual European street music competition," the Peruvian replied in perfect English tinged with an American accent. "How convenient that you showed up. I was about to come and see you." He sounded amused. I looked with incredulity at his kindly pock-marked face and fainted.

When I came to, we were alone in the square. I sat up and rubbed my eyes. "Jesus. Am I dreaming?"

"Nope. It's me, all right," Jesus Guevara, my old friend from prep school, confirmed. "Surprised?"

"I thought you were in New York."

"I was." A shadow crossed Jesus's face. "I had to come to Europe suddenly."

"Why?"

"Can you handle a bad shock?"

I breathed deeply and nodded. "I think so. I've seen an old friend machine-gunned down before my eyes, been chased by the police all over town, been saved by a stunt taxi driver, scared silly by brass bands, and run into you. Yes, I think I can handle most shocks."

"Luke is dead. Along with the other drug designers in Murti Bing's team. They were murdered in cold blood by the men in purple jumpsuits. Are you all right?"

I nodded dumbly. More dead friends and more weird plots. It never rains but it pours.

#GenghizInLove: Episode 58

I am almost always late, not because I don't value other people's time but because I invariably get caught by some old bore who wants to jabber into my ear. After fifteen minutes of insincerely reassuring Professor Masaryk that everything would be all right, really, if he just took a vitamin, I finally managed to escape, just half an hour late for my date with Barbie. Luckily, she knew my habits: I found her in Marek's bar, surrounded by a gaggle of male students. Technology really has changed the world: every red-blooded Central European male under the age of thirty has seen my starlet friend's recent work in such frat classics as The Booze Brothers and Secret Sorority Showers.

"I think my all-time favorite scene was when you crawled out of the beer keg," Fyodor was telling Barbie as I walked into the room. Alexei and Andrei, the art historian twins from Moldova, nodded in intelligent agreement, drooling down Barbie's cleavage.

"I'm so glad you liked it!" Barbie grinned luminously. "I caught an awful cold shooting that scene. That was in Firemen's Party VI. I didn't know anyone had watched that far…"

"Actually, it was in Firemen's Party VII," Fyodor corrected her. "I have seen all twelve movies in that series. At least five times each."

"You were the highlight of my teenage years," Grigori told Barbie, a far away look in his dark eyes. I snickered to myself, trying to imitate that romantic look. Grigori was the University Don Juan. He had seduced every single girl in his department, and a few married ones as well.

"Oh, that's so sweet." Barbie was close to melting. I coughed ostentatiously and joined the group. Barbie turned to me, her eyes shining. "These guys are just adorable. They've seen all my movies."

"And I've seen all their moves." I looked at Grigori severely. "Isn't Svetlana waiting up for you?"

Shame-faced, Grigori mumbled an excuse and drifted off. Barbie frowned at me. "Why are you coming over all big brother?" she said mutinously. "So what if he's married?"

"It's a Russian marriage."

"What's that?"

"You've heard of Russian roulette?"

"All the Russian students have spouses and children at home," Fyodor explained. "None of them knew each other before they came to Prague. But within two weeks of arriving here, they were neatly organised into couples. Naturally, they are all insanely jealous since they have so little time together. Grigori's wife for the year is Svetlana. He has already cheated on her with every girl he can find. If he didn't cheat, he wouldn't feel married."

Barbie was taken aback. "How peculiar."

"Yes, well, Russians are like that." Fyodor leered.at Barbie "Now Ukrainians, on the other hand…"

"Fyodor, what's the matter with you?" I asked, astonished. "Are you drunk?"

"With love!" Fyodor declaimed theatrically. "You bring us a star from Heaven and expect us not to fall in love? We have blood in our veins, not ice!"

"You've got alcohol in your veins, and Barbie is actually a starlet from Kalifornia," I replied tartly. "I've never seen you so drunk before."

"Just a few bottles of pepper vodka, my friend." Fyodor belched drunkenly. "Strictly medicine. To get over the shock…"

"What shock?"

"The shock of seeing our esteemed Professor Novak dragged away by the Czech police. Oh, the screaming and shouting, the wailing and weeping…"

"Marek, call a hospital. Poor Fyodor is having some sort of fit."

"No, he is telling the truth," Alexei said tremulously. Andrei nodded vehemently. "We were sitting in the lecture today and Professor Novak was talking about Deride's theory of meaninglessness. It was after lunch and so we were taking a nice little nap. Just then the door burst open and this fat policeman came storming in with a whole detachment…"

"At least fifty of them," Andrei confirmed.

"And they dragged poor Professor Novak away."

"On what charge?"

"The fat policeman called Professor Novak a pervert."

"Which is true enough."

"But not enough reason to arrest him."

"They called him the Park Killer," Fyodor said sententiously from the floor where he had gradually slumped. "He killed poor Lucy."

"No, he didn't…" I said, aghast at the thought of that mild-mannered aesthetic philosopher in the clutches of Lieutenant Boruvka.

"Yes, he did," Fyodor insisted. "By process of elimination they had figured out that Professor Novak was the only person who knew Lucy and who had been in Prague during the right time period. So they got a search warrant to raid Novak's apartment. And they found all these trophies from all his previous victims, skin, nipples, toenails, nose-rings. He was assembling a big mannequin."

"Oh my god." Barbie shuddered. She looked worriedly at the group of students pressing around her. "This maniac was your professor?"

"He was the head of the department of Culture," Fyodor said with slow relish. "Totally crazy. He confessed to everything. Except Lucy. He said he had nothing to do with her murder. Apparently he went crazy after Divka divorced him. That's when he started picking up prostitutes. He was desperate for human contact…"

"Philosophers get that way," I agreed. "Does Divka know?"

"Novak told them he would only confess if Divka was there. So he calmly told them about all his murders. And then at the end he turned to her and told her he still loved her."

"How romantic."

"She seems to think so. She has been there all day. Immanuel is going crazy with jealousy. I think he has gone to do something really bad. I was trying to stop him but he wouldn't listen." Fyodor tilted his head and sucked back the last of his vodka. "He will get killed and I will feel guilty. That is why I am drinking. It numbs the pain in advance."

"Oh hell." I was worried. "I just hope he won't jump from this building."

Benito came running into the bar. "I can't find her," he announced breathlessly. "Have you seen her anywhere?"

"Who?"

"Lila. If Manny has touched a hair on her head, I swear I'll scalp him," Benito said fiercely. His broad chest quivered. Barbie shivered.

"Why do you think Immanuel would do something to Delilah?" I asked.

"He's missing. She's missing. What do you think?" Benito asked jealously.

"Maybe she's with someone else."

"Oh fuck. Hachek." Benito tottered to the bar. Marek poured him a whisky. Benito tried to slug it back but it went the wrong way when Immanuel made his dramatic entrance.

Enter (stage right) IMMANUEL, his hair standing straight up in a frizzy brown halo, contentedly wiping off the mud and blood from his hands onto his purple robes.

BENITO: cough, cough

IMMANUEL (dramatically): Arise, my children, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Lucifer cavorts with the angels, the morning star is brightest at high noon. And behold, the son of man shall learn from the trees, for they neither toil nor spin, but perpetually move in the wind. The sun pours down its gold and the leaves stay forever green. The mysteries shall now unravel, and the stranger in your midst shall save ye. Arise, my children, for the day of revelations is close at hand.

BENITO: cough, cough

FYODOR (sotto voce): That's the kind of lecture Immanuel has been giving us recently in his Philosophy of Revelation class.

ME (cautiously): Immanuel, where did you get those robes?

IMMANUEL (contentedly): From a bishop.

ME: Did the bishop just give you his robes?

IMMANUEL: Yes. At gunpoint. I was wandering about in the park by the train station when I saw the bishop and knew I had to have his robes. I asked him nicely but he wouldn't obey so I pulled out my gun. (Immanuel holds out his gun. It is a water pistol.) I took him to a nice quiet phone booth and told him to strip. Then I put on the robes and squirted him with the gun and skipped away.

ME: You left the poor bishop in a phone booth?

IMMANUEL: It seemed like the safest place to leave a naked bishop.

BENITO: cough, cough.

Enter (stage left) DELILAH, followed by HACHEK KATASTROFSKI. BENITO springs to his feet in an agony of jealousy.

BENITO: Lila! Where have you been?

DELILAH (surprised): Hachek took me to a movie.

BENITO: You went with him?

DELILAH: What's your problem?

BENITO: I love you.

DELILAH (scornfully): You don't even know me.

BENITO: But I love you.

DELILAH: I heard you the first time round. I love you too but I'm not in love with you.

BENITO (screaming): Aaaaaghhh!!!

DELILAH: Benito, you're like the boy next door. Hachek is different. (HACHEK smirks.) He has this aura of evil. The way he looks at me makes me shudder. He's every mother's worst fear… (BENITO gags. He waves his fist at HACHEK who cocks a snoot back. DELILAH catches her two suitors making horrible faces at each other.) Oh, take a vitamin, you two!

BARBIE (puzzled): Is it always like this around here?

ME: Often.

Just then the phone rings. MAREK picks it up and hands it to me. "It's for you."

#GenghizInLove: Episode 57

I followed Hell to the boardroom. Hell threw himself into his usual canvas camp chair, which he perversely insisted was infinitely more comfortable than the butter-soft leather armchairs that lined the gleaming conference table. I timidly moved towards a corner of the room, but Hell waved me over to his side. I was nervously aware of Professor Masaryk's disapproving glower, but then cheered up when I saw Lady Monica Bigglesworth-Fume scrunch up her eyes and lips in what looked like a smile. Lady Monica was sitting next to Terence Killjoy-Yuck. I shuddered, appalled at the sight of my old Oxford tutor. Instrumental in sending me to Prague in the first place as the fall guy in his covert plots against Xox, what brought this suave vulture to Prague again, lazily flapping in to gorge on fresh bleeding kill? Next to him was a stocky red-haired man with a perpetually pugnacious expression on his bulldog face. I instantly recognized Blodgett Scrotum, England's most notorious conservative philosopher. Scrotum was engaged in conversation with a short balding man with a thick neck and barrel chest, famous Polish dissident turned pornographic journalist, Cain Piknik. The only person at the table I didn't know by sight was a trim man with a shock of white hair and a black suit whose perfect cut made my mouth water. I regretfully recalled that I still hadn't called my mother to beg for money. I needed new clothes badly.

"Right. Let's get started." Hell silenced the quiet chatter as usual with a noisy thump of his walking stick on the conference table. "Got lots to discuss."

"Are we not missing some people, Otto?" Professor Masaryk quavered. "Also I do not recognise the gentleman in black…"

"Gunter Otto Troll," Hell replied. Gott uncrossed his folded arms and waved a hand. I nodded approvingly at his daring pink tie. "He has taken over the European Studies department."

"But where is our colleague Attila Ugh? I do not like him but surely he should be here for a meeting of the University's trustees."

"Ugh has resigned." A quiet wave of shock rocked the room. "As some of you may know, Xox was held captive in the Budapest College last week until my special assistant here freed him, using some rather unorthodox means."

"Always this boy causes trouble!" Professor Masaryk shook his fist at me.

"This intervention has somewhat precipitated matters," Hell continued. "Ugh and his cronies have come out in their true colours. The Budapest College has seceded from the University of Truth and Justice." Hell raised an embossed parchment. "They have formed their own University of Ruthless Justice and declared war on us."

"The Warsaw College has received an invitation to join this new university," Piknik confirmed. "Budapest has offered us West Slovakia and Northern Bohemia if we join them. I am here to hear your counter-offer."

"Two billion dollars for the Warsaw College and the majority share in Playtoy magazine for you," Hell replied briefly. "Take it or leave it."

"Done," Piknik replied, settling back comfortably in his chair. His small eyes glinted with satisfaction. "Real estate is the most over-rated investment."

"I always said Ugh was a megalomaniac," Masaryk declared with satisfaction. "He was never content with being merely the Director of the Budapest College. He always wanted to be university rector…"

"Actually, they have appointed a new rector. Albert Lumpkin."

"Bert Lumpkin?" Troll asked incredulously. "I thought he was in Paraguay with all the other Nazis."

"Apparently not." Hell sighed and rubbed his eyes. In that moment, he looked old and vulnerable. "I take this personally," he explained. "Lumpkin was a student of mine at Chicago. Took my game theory course along with Troll here and Xox. But Lumpkin always played dirty. Failed him for cheating. He became a strategist for the U.S. Defense Department during the Vietnam war. Worked for Kissinger for a while, then headed down to South America and became cozy with all the dictators. Military advisor to the most repressive military regimes on the continent. Excellent strategist. Eminence grise behind Somoza, Stroessner, Tourniquet…

"Tourniquet!" Blodgett Scrotum said indignantly. "Lord Hades, I must protest your description of that noble man. The Generalissimo is a hero in the cause of freedom."

"Lady Snatcher has just awarded Generalissimo Tourniquet the very first Gold Medal of the Snatcher Foundation," Terence confirmed.

"If Ugh is allied to Lumpkin who used to work for Tourniquet, then my allegiances are clear," Scrotum declared confusingly. "I have no choice but to secede as well. Monica, come!"

"Sorry, Blodgett," Lady Monica replied regretfully. "Free enterprise is all very well but I draw the line at torture."

"But Monica, my dear, ordinary people do not always know what is in their own best interest," Scrotum spluttered. "The masses must be taught to be free. Torture is just another form of education. Think of it as corporal punishment. Firmness is necessary. I was most impressed with the effectiveness of capital punishment during my recent exile in Texas."

"Oh, do stop being so tiresome, Blodgett!" Lady Monica said with asperity. "Texas has changed you. You sound positively Stalinist!"

Scrotum drew himself up to his full height, preparing to respond, but was obviously unable to come up with a sufficiently crushing retort. He turned on his heel and stomped out of the room, ostentatiously ignoring Lady Rudolphine who entered as he left.

"What's he upset about now?" Lady Rudolphine asked lightly.

"Oh, Aunt!" Lady Monica burst into tears. "I've lost the man of my dreams…" she sobbed.

"Nightmare, really," Lady Rudolphine responded unsympathetically. "Pull yourself together, Monica. I've had quite enough weepiness to deal with this week."

"Were you with her Majesty?" Terence asked curiously. "How is she taking Princess Fi's unexpected demise?"

"Badly." Lady Rudolphine sighed. "The poor thing was never taught how to drink. So she glugs champagne straight from the bottle and the bubbles go to her head causing wild exhilaration for fifteen minutes before she's down in the dumps again, whining about how her subjects don't love her anymore. And the Princes are of no use at all since it is shooting season in Scotland and they are all out with the guns. She was nearly apoplectic this morning when she heard the Pope's announcement."

"I thought the Pope was in a coma," Piknik said.

"On life support, I believe. The one in Vienna made the announcement."

"The Pope in Vienna?" Even Hell looked mystified.

"You haven't heard?" Lady Rudolphine chuckled. "Our old friend the Cardinal declared himself Pope this morning after the Vatikan doctors refused to turn off the old Pope's life support machine. His first act as Pope was to sanctify Princess Fi."

"Clever move." Hell sounded impressed. "Wins popular support"

"Right. Now they just have to get rid of everyone who knew Saint Fi personally."

"Is that what upset Her Majesty this morning?" I wondered why Terence looked quite so happy.

"She's always been terrified of assassination." Lady Rudolphine nodded. "I barely managed to keep her from abdicating this morning."

"What a blow that would be to our royal family." Terence surreptitiously rubbed his hands together.

"Be a dear and check the latest news," Lady Rudolphine urged me.

I was back two minutes later. "No news about the Queen. But the new Pope, His Holiness Maximilian the First has crowned His Excellency Axel von Schadenfreude as the new Holy Roman Emperor," I announced gravely, reading out the news release I had picked up on the internet. "The coronation took place in Bratislava about an hour ago."

"Why Bratislava?" Masaryk asked, Czech chauvinist to the core. "It is just a small provincial Slovak city."

"Bratislava was chosen because of its historic past as the coronation city of the Holy Roman Emperors," I continued reading. "The historic name of Pressburg has once again been restored to the city."

"Bratislava is an hour's drive from Vienna," Hell said soberly. "And halfway between Budapest and Prague."

"You mean…" Masaryk looked terrified.

Hell nodded and raised the parchment he had received from Budapest. "We need to take this declaration of war very seriously."

#GenghizInLove: Episode 56

"Get to work!" Otto Hell ordered the next afternoon when I finally showed up after many aspirins and pots of strong espresso. "Set up the big bash for this weekend. I've called a meeting of the board of trustees this evening. Confirm Xox's attendance. And what about that historical research on the Schadenfreude family? We need some hard evidence."

My hangover grew worse instantly. I pouted. "What are you going to do?"

My boss put his hairy arm around Pipi's slender waist and smirked. "It's a nice afternoon. We're going fishing." Hell looked at my bleary face for a moment. "You been taking street drugs again? Take a vitamin, damn it. You look dreadful."

I popped a pill and then another. The dark clouds lifted almost instantly. I felt speedy, even belligerent. After some hard bargaining with various caterers and fireworks experts, I walked into my temporary office, placed my feet, cigarettes, and hip flask on the desk, and pulled the ashtray and telephone toward me. I was ready for combat. It was time to call New York. I punched in one of the numbers listed under Exponential Investments in the slim university phone book. "X-O-X Foundation," a cracked voice whined. "Koroviev speaking."

Koroviev. With incredible speed and precision, my memory recalled that Koroviev had cleaned up after Lucy's death. He had also contacted Luke on behalf of the X-O-X Foundation. How did I remember this? Normally I couldn't even remember the names of people I had met an hour before. Clearly the vitamins were affecting my memory. I frowned. A bad memory was so convenient. My closest relatives and best friends had long since reconciled themselves to never receiving birthday cards. Strangers came up and threw their arms around me and I bore their effusions with equanimity, knowing that I would forget their faces again within the minute. A good memory imposes responsibility and the quality I like most about myself is my utter incapacity to be responsible about anything. If I was going to remember things I would have to act like an altogether different person. I shrugged. I had an interesting lead on the line and there was no time for existential questions.

"Monsieur Koroviev," I said warmly. "How are you?"

"Fine, thank you," the whiny voice replied hesitantly. "Who is this?"

"Come on, big guy. I work for Lord Hades. I'm his special assistant."

"Nero Insanetti?"

"Of course not," I said cheerily. "Nero is gone. Didn't you know?"

"Of course..." Koroviev whined. "What can I do for you?"

"Would you happen to know how I can reach my friend Luke Leazy?" I asked easily. "We just don't seem to have Murti Bing's place listed in our confidential phone directory. I thought you might know..."

There was a sharp intake of breath. "You don't know?"

"What don't I know?"

"Please speak to Mister Xox himself about this," Koroviev replied formally and then he hung up.

I shrugged, mystified. I had to invite Xox to the Europe conference anyway. After the usual hassles with various clerical intermediaries, an obstacle course which I hurdled with ease, dropping Otto Hell's name whenever I felt like it, I was put through to a mobile phone number in London, a special line to the great man's special assistant herself.

"This is Lord Hades' special assistant at the University of Truth and Justice in Prague," I recited for the hundredth time. "May I speak to Mister Xox please?"

" So you finally learned how to say his name." The voice sounded pleased.. "Thanks for saving his butt in Budapest the other day. I couldn't get there in time. Couldn't find a spare body. In New York City, can you imagine?"

"Excuse me?"

"You used to call him Mister X. You even called him Socks once. I bet you learned it from your friend at the Amerikan Embassy. What was his name, Steele?" The voice giggled. "He was cute."

"Steele was transferred to Tirana. He's still there as far as I know," I replied faintly.

"Tirana, huh? Think Steele managed to find out anything in Albania about Our Master? Or was my mysterious death just a red herring to distract attention?"

"Who is this?"

"It's Lucy, silly." I could almost hear her skip for joy.

"That was you in Berlin, wasn't it? The torch singer with Old Nick and the Fallen Angels? In that dreadful nightclub, Holle?"

"Lucie Settonova," the voice confirmed. "That was fun. I've never been a torch singer before and it was such a relief after being a boring Mormon."

"Did you kill her?"

"Who, me? I was the victim. Ask the Berlin police. About the brutal murder of a young Czech au pair with a husky voice and a fondness for nose rings. Actually, I wouldn't advise asking the police. They would probably arrest you again. And that's no fun, is it?" The voice giggled again. "You might ask Rasputin. When you see him again."

"Who the hell are you?"

"Lucy. Mister Xox's valued special assistant."

"Whose body do you inhabit right now?"

"You know her. In fact, she's a good friend of yours."

"Oh shit. Who is it?"

"I'm not telling..." Lucy teased.

I took a deep breath. "Do you snatch bodies often?"

"Whenever I get bored. Which happens quite frequently."

"So I see. Will you tell Xox that Hell is arranging a conference this weekend?"

"He knows. He'll be there. I'll show up too. When you least expect it."

"Don't change bodies before then. I mean, please don't murder any more of my friends, okay?"

"I can't promise that, silly. You're in for a shock, though..."

"I can't wait." I hung up the phone and grabbed my head. It was still there. My increasingly frequent encounters with the supernatural were imbuing me with a profound appreciation of the simple pleasures of life. Like the fact that I had a head. Safely attached to my body, albeit with a scrawny neck. One couldn't have everything. Or could one? With a little help from one's special friends? Whom did Lucy call when she wanted to dispose of her current body and Rasputin wasn't around? Was Rasputin back in action after all? I was suddenly very afraid. How would Rasputin have felt about me when he woke up from his coma and found himself sold to a Berlin brothel for hardened homosexuals by his erstwhile best friend? Would he still like me? More to the point, would he want to kill me?

I pulled myself together. My personal feelings had nothing to do with it. I had a job to do and I was, after all, a special assistant. Like Lucy. I remembered Nero Insanetti, who too had been fond of boasting about his special status. And look what had happened to him. I didn't want to start frothing at the mouth and sobbing at meetings and threatening to kill inoffensive strangers just because they resembled the Antichrist. I resolved to take better care of myself. I would take more drugs and indulge my personal feelings shamelessly.

I stared out of the large plate glass window. The view was spectacular, a panoramic picture of Prague, faded red rooftops and a thousand spires stretched out beneath me, a broken medieval mosaic, or a complex jigsaw puzzle, or an intricate web. The maze stretched out beyond my sight but I knew that the horizon was no limit, that beyond its horizontal, billions of people were eating, sleeping, working, plotting, rushing to and fro, teeming, struggling to escape the long confines of their particular place in the puzzle, hoping to reach some still center. It seemed to me that all the lines of the labyrinth were leading now to this building where I sat, small, motionless. In that silent instant, I became suddenly aware of the movement of the earth, the unending rotation of the planet, the wild whirl of the world, a greater game than all the plots of power in which I was now embroiled, and I rejoiced.

But then I sighed and stared morosely at the fat studbook in front of me. The music of the spheres was fun enough to listen to but I would face an altogether different music if I didn't do my long overdue historical research. I had no intention of getting a tongue-lashing from Hell: I began dutifully to pore over the tiny print, tracing the intricate pattern of marriages which wove the Schadenfreude family inextricably together with the more obscure offshoots of the Gapsburg dynasty, a narrowing trail of drooping lower lips and hooded eyes and an appetite for mad violence which finally led to the abominable Axel von Schadenfreude, and I was so engrossed in this maze of intrigue and intermarriage that I did not notice Hell standing behind me until he tapped me on the shoulder.

"Enough work for now," Hell said almost kindly. "Come along and have some wine. Most of the trustees are here for the meeting."

"Who's here?"

"Some old friends." Hell grinned. "And one or two you haven't yet met."

"You're not planning to kill anyone tonight, are you?" I asked in alarm.

"Asking questions again," Hell reproved. "Just sit in a corner and take notes. The big stuff will take care of itself. Just sweat the small stuff."

#GenghizInLove: Episode 55

Ce..le…brate

All night long!

Come on!!



It's a ce… le… bra…shun!!!



Dance music blared triumphantly through giant loudspeakers on all four sides of the enormous room. Strobe lights pulsed in hypnotic rhythm, bouncing spangled reflections off the kaleidoscopic mirror-ball hanging from the ceiling. We shoved our way towards the bar. The Moxie was Prague's hottest nightclub, a converted movie palace in the heart of Prague's art deco Old Town district. The seats had all been ripped out and the big screen resembled an abstract expressionist work-in-progress on which the kids practised their graffiti skills. The place was packed with Prague's hippest: little teeny-boppers in tied-dye rags and piercings on every conceivable body part, cool party-girls with spiked white hair and black band-aid skirts barely covering their shapely hips, battered old hippies with long ponytails and vacant looks in their rheumy bloodshot eyes. The air was thick with tobacco smoke and incense and the pungent odor of home-grown pot. The drug-dealers and prostitutes plied their wares surreptitiously in corners under the benevolent eye of the blatantly plain-clothed and easily bribed policemen, and yet an odd innocence prevailed: this was, after all, the capital of Bohemia.

Lulu, Stash, Barbie and I lolled against the bar and let the world flow by. "Psst, want some X?" The bartender whispered, taking us in with a practised eye.

"Not for me, thanks." Having inadvertently eaten a Truth sandwich on the way back from Budapest, I felt all drugged out. "Just another beer…"

"Ecstasy? I'd like a hit," Barbie said brightly. I tut-tutted at my little friend. She stuck her pointy tongue at me and grimaced horribly. "Want some, Lulu?"

"Of course, darling," Lulu replied. "Stash will have some too."

"Will it wake me up?" Stash asked dubiously. "I'm not sure I want that."

"Oh, don't be so grumpy. You two grouches can just hang out here and get smashed. Barbie and I are going to have some fun." The two girls popped their pills and pranced off to cavort on the dance floor, instantly drawing a circle of drooling men around them, like iron filings to a pair of magnets. Stash and I took our beers to a table and slumped into companionable silence, grunting occasionally, asking for a match, the occasional appreciative head jerk indicating an exceptionally cute chick, a casual sexist slur here, a bigoted remark there… Male bonding is so undemanding.

"Pretty girl, Barbie," Stash said. "She good in bed?"

"We've never slept together." Stash raised an interrogative eyebrow. I shrugged. "I've known her since she was six."

"Never stopped me. I had slept with every girl in my neighbourhood by the time I was fourteen."

"Yeah but that was in Katholic Poland. You had repressions to overcome."

"And you didn't in laid-back Kalifornia?"

I shuddered. The Truth drug was wearing off but I still felt an insane compulsion to confess everything. Just then a deafening drum roll induced a momentary hush. All the lights went out and we were enshrouded in inky darkness. "Ladies and gentlemen!" an excited voice boomed. "We have the pleasure to present this evening an extraordinary entertainment… A surprise performance by the one and only… Artist Who Dares Not Speak His Name!" After an instant of stunned silence, loud cheers and shrill whistles resounded through the night club. I stuck my fingers in my ears and watched the graffiti-laden big screen lift up, revealing a makeshift stage. Dry ice billowed everywhere and amp;$%*=$ leaped onto the stage and struck up a fast and furious rendition of his notorious classic "Black Wedding":



Baby I don't care what you feel

As long as you do what I tell you

You can dress up in rags

Or just crawl in a sack

Nobody will come to save you



Don't ask for a bedtime story

'Cause it’s a

Black wedding



Always wanting to be bad

Go straight down to hell

You can rip off your shirt

And wax the hair on your breasts

And play rebel-rebel



Don't ask for a fairy tale ending

'Cause it's a

Black wedding



amp;$%*=s managers were quick to deny reports of the reclusive artist's surprise performance in Prague when reports spread like wildfire on the internet the next day. "It must have been an imposter," one spokeswoman insisted. "amp;$%*=$ would never travel without his pet chimpanzee!" However, I remain convinced that the Artist I saw that night at Moxie was the real thing: the patented MarswalkTM had the authentic dragging lethargy and the slow wiggle of the hips at each refrain bore undeniable testimony to the Artist's distinguished history as a topless go-go dancer. I sat in my chair, goggle-eyed, and when the whole thing was over and amp;$%*=$ had vanished as unexpectedly as he had appeared, I was barely able to walk weakly to the bar and beg the bartender for a bit of X.

"Did you see that?" Barbie demanded, wide-eyed. "That was…"

"amp;$%*=$. Yes, I know, Barb. I took you to see him in concert on your thirteenth birthday, remember?"

"I saw him just last week at your mom's place. He was serenading her."

"Oh fuck." I winced. "Did I miss her birthday again?"

"You're in big-time trouble, boy. She'll leave me all her money if you don't watch out."

"Were you sucking up to her again?"

"I just happened to be visiting my parents in Caramel-by-the-Sea," Barbie replied innocently. "And my mom was having her nails done…"

"At Nails-by-the-Sea…"

"Which happens to be next to Salon-by-the-Sea where your mom was having her hair done before her birthday party."

I shuddered. "Was it big?"

"Not really. Just a couple of thousand people."

"And the Artist sang Happy Birthday. What devotion."

"It was all over the newspapers that week."

"The tabloids, you mean."

"Yeah, whatever." Barbie only read the National Busybody and Tittle Tattle. "Anyway, your mom misses you. She told me so. And I saw the tears in her eyes."

"She can turn them on and off like a tap," I replied indifferently. "They taught her how to do that in the days of the silent movies."

"You're so mean."

"I'm her son. You want to dance?"

Barbie and I went out under the lights and swayed our limbs in wild abandon, letting the staccato rhythm of the rave sweep through our bones. Time ceased in that ecstatic moment and I was free, anonymous, without attachment or history or famous mother as the sweat dripped down my nameless face and my heart pounded to the beat of the music. Lulu had persuaded Stash to join in, and the four of us danced through the night, an orgy of movement punctuated only by frequent visits to the bar and toilet. I guzzled bottle after bottle of mineral water, savouring its bitter saltiness. My thirst was as endless as the night.

But all good things come to an end, just as they should, and my friends and I walked out of the night club into a cold blue dawn. We walked down a long deserted boulevard, past a solitary tram making its stately progress, its lights pale gold against the lightening sky. The pale blue was taking on a rosy flush by the time we crossed the Vltava at Charles Bridge, taking deep breaths of the frosty smoke-scented morning air, expelling the night's detritus from our lungs.

"So you guys won't stay here for a few days?"

Lulu shook her head. "It's been lovely to spend time with you, sweetheart, but we must get back to Berlin today. I've got to finish my manuscript. The publishers are waiting with bated breath and they've been so patient, poor darlings. And Stash has to work on his movie…"

"Will he find someone to replace Anastasia?"

"It shouldn't be too hard. Lots of ambitious actresses out there. Will you be able to replace her as easily, my poor baby?"

I sighed. "I don't know, Lu. I have to find the right girl."

"Lots of pretty airheads out there," Lulu said reassuringly. "Just keep hanging out at night clubs and taking drugs. Things will work out." She cast a sidelong glance at Barbie, striding along beside Stash, chattering away happily. "I like Barbie. What about her?"

"I can't do that," I said, shocked. I looked back surreptitiously at Barbie's bright face and opulent curves. "She's my friend."

"You are allowed to fall in love with your friends, you know," Lulu chided.

"Yeah, but Barbie is going out with my friend Luke," I replied weakly.

"What's that got to do with it? You've known her longer than he has."

I played my trump card. "My mother likes her."

"That does make it difficult. Are you sure you can't overcome this obsession you have with annoying your mother, angel?"

"No," I said rebelliously. "It's my one principle."

"Ah well," Lulu observed philosophically. "I prefer not to have any principles at all. But then I am a married woman so I can afford it."

"But I am running short of money so I will call my mother and wish her happy birthday."

"Darling, how reasonable of you. Let's go find a pub somewhere and have sausages and beer. This calls for a celebration!"

#GenghizInLove: Episode 54

The scene has become a visual cliché now, after Stash's notorious depiction in Escape from the Temple, the blockbuster mega-hit which finally earned him Hollywood dollars in addition to the usual critical acclaim; even beer ads on television now parody that famous moment when a troop of nuns scrambled six flights of stairs down a fire escape, hitched up their skirts and ran through the traffic snarled up as usual on Budapest's busiest boulevard, chased by a horde of husky men in tight purple jumpsuits. One devout old lady suffered a minor stroke when the wimple flew off Xox's beaming bald head as he ran past her car, causing irate motorists for several blocks behind to impatiently honk their horns, in turn causing the Prime Minister, engaged in a fiery parliamentary debate, to briefly consider resigning. A survey commissioned by the Archdiocese some weeks later confirmed the Archbishop's worst fears: nuns had plummeted in public opinion to a status barely higher than policemen although still substantially above lawyers and journalists.

"Phew!" Lulu said breathlessly, as we found shelter in a dark alcove behind a fast food stand on the Danube embankment. "Are we safe yet?"

Stash stuck his head out for a peek. "For now," he replied cautiously.

"Oh good." Lulu pulled off her habit and straightened her hair.

"Good idea." Barbie followed Lulu's example. "I'm hungry."

"I could use a coffee." The two girls ordered refreshments from the fast food vendor, a dissatisfied middle-aged man who couldn't take his eyes off his gorgeous customers. Stash, Xox and I also disrobed but we didn't get nearly the same level of service. We sat calmly around a table, sipping cappuccinos and soaking up the pale winter sunlight, transformed in that moment into lazy tourists enjoying a well-deserved vacation from mayhem and chaos.

"So what did you find out?" I asked Lulu.

"So much resistance to telling the truth. Got some juicy stuff though." Lulu peeked sideways at Xox. The great man's head was thrown back and his mouth was slightly open. An incipient snore gurgled forth. Lulu and Barbie giggled.

"With whom did you get into a fight?" I asked Stash, who was applying a cube of ice to his black eye.

"Nectarini."

"My hero," Lulu trilled, solicitously taking the ice cube from her husband and deftly dropping it down his neck. "My big strong man got into a fight to defend my honour, didn't he?"

"Nobody is going to call you names in my presence," Stash said firmly. "Except me."

"I must say I would never have got engaged to Nectarino if I had known his true opinion of women," Lulu said. "Italian men... I didn't know Nectarino could even speak but there he was, yelling away, calling me a two-timing unfaithful bitch. And Luciano was nodding away too, even though I only slept with him once when we were at Oxford."

"What did Godfrey have to say about it?"

"Ah God. He just sat there watching calmly. We went around the table, you know, confession time, and when it was God's turn he just admitted that he totally bored with everything."

"Which makes him a very dangerous person," Stash commented soberly.

"Was he representing Terence at this meeting?"

Lulu nodded. "Terence couldn't make it because he was at some ceremony in London deifying Lady Snatcher. So he sent Godfrey."

"Did Godfrey explain the connection between the British secret service and these crazy Euro-plotters?"

"No, but he did confess that he had told Axel that Anastasia and you were at her father's castle."

I nodded. "That's what I thought. Any revelations out of the rest of them?"

Lulu shrugged. "Just your usual tangled mess of conspiracies. This pompous little man Pickie was from the Zurich Club..."

"He's Navel's father," I explained.

"The one who institutionalised Navel?" Lulu asked, interested.

"Navel's only got one father as far as I know. Why was Pickie at this meeting?"

"He was representing the Sultan of Arabia. Apparently the Sultan owns this bank…"

"Bank Ripoff."

"Yes." Lulu seemed affronted. "Do you know everything or do you want to shut up and listen?"

"Oh, okay," I said meekly. "So Pickie was here to put through this merger of Bank Ripoff and Hotbank?"

"Exactly. He had to negotiate with Nectarino, since the Nectarini family basically runs the Vatikan's finances. But Pickie was also buying something from Nero Insanetti…"

"Secret documents," Xox said unexpectedly. We turned to look at him. He seemed wide awake and completely lucid. "Nero took them from me this morning when they put me into captivity."

"What happened, exactly?"

Xox shrugged. "Nothing special. I was on my way back from a MIDAS meeting…"

"MIDAS?"

"Have you heard of it?" Xox beamed. "It is a billionaire's club. Fine fellows. We play bridge together sometimes. Yesterday we met at the funeral of Christian Covett."

"Covett's dead? What happened to him?"

"His private jet lost cabin pressure and he suffocated to death along with all the crew. The plane flew half-way across the Pacific Ocean before landing on auto pilot in Hawaii where he was due to play in a bridge tournament. A sad loss. He was a good player. Anyway I was on the way back from his funeral so I thought I would drop in and see how things were going here in the Budapest college."

"And they just locked you up?"

"There was some talk of ransom," Xox said mildly. "Our European friends have not been particularly happy with me since I picked their pockets. Also the Sultan of Arabia was particularly anxious to get these documents. My colleagues and I have been funding some research which might affect the Sultan's interests."

"What kind of research?"

"Solar energy. A new artificial photosynthesis process…"

"Oh my god," Lulu said, appalled. "Why didn't we take those papers away from that pudgy little man…"

"Oh, it really doesn't matter," Xox replied calmly. "The documents were just camouflage. I always have my documents stamped "Top Secret". It diverts people. Everything in those papers is readily available on the internet."

"So where are the real secrets?" Stash asked slowly.

Xox smiled and tapped his forehead.

Just then a shot rang out. A hunk of plaster crashed down from the wall behind Xox, narrowly missing his skull. I turned and groaned. I had barely drunk half of my cappuccino and there they were again, the men in purple jumpsuits running towards us, tireless, indefatigable, always on our trail.

"Quick. Let's go." We jumped into a small motor boat moored to the embankment. The boat's owner, a hefty middle-aged woman with bright yellow hair, drinking coffee with her friends at a nearby table, screeched angrily at first, but then waved permission after we threw her a fistful of dollars. Stash revved the engine and let her go. Rifle shots rang out as we careened wildly into the middle of the Danube, bouncing through a freighter's wake, nearly colliding into a tour boat laden with middle-aged tourists. Jaws dropped and cameras snapped as Stash expertly whipped our vessel around the big boat, eluding our pursuers' sniper fire. We made as if to follow the tour boat to the other side of the Danube before turning back in our tracks and docking at the embankment right below the Grand Hotel.

"What fun." Xox beamed as we pulled him out. "Thank you for the rescue. Excellent timing. I have a meeting in New York in ten hours. My Learjet is parked at the airport. Taxi!"

We waved goodbye and then went up to the hotel. Stash and Lulu packed and paid up, after which we caught a taxi to the university building where Stash's Mercedes was parked. Stash sneered at the parking tickets on the windshield and threw them away like so much confetti.

"You know what I still don't get?" I asked as we left Budapest behind us, driving into the sunset. Stash had his hands on the wheel and his eyes on the road. Barbie was curled up comfortably against me, her head in my lap. I stroked her hair idly as I spoke. "Why did Axel bring Anastasia with him to Budapest?"

"Oh, we asked about that, angel," Lulu replied, looking over her shoulder. "I didn't finish telling you about the interrogation. Apparently, Anastasia's father left her the bulk of his fortune and so Axel can do what he wants with it now since Anastasia just signs everything. He wants her to make over the shares she owns in this Tamato robot company to Nectarino. In return, the Nectarini family will help Axel buy up lots of seats in the European assembly."

"What for?"

"The Cardinal wants Anastasia's son, Ulrich, to eventually become the Holy Roman Emperor. They want to make the European bureaucracy really powerful and to have young Ulrich rise through the ranks till he becomes President. The idea is that once he's President he would declare himself Emperor and nobody could do anything about it."

"Like Napoleon."

"Exactly, sugar. But Axel doesn't want to wait till Ulrich grows up. Axel wants to become Holy Roman Emperor himself. So he wants to pack the European assembly and then stage a coup. It was all working out fine until Xox threw a spanner into the works."

"What did Xox do?"

"He took billions off the European bank, didn't he? So now they've lost all this credibility. Nobody trusts Eurocrats any longer."

"That's why Hohenstaufen wanted to kill himself." A thought struck me. "Why do the Nectarini want to buy Tamato robots?"

"Luciano said something about perpetual motion. I didn't get it," Lulu confessed. "I was always terrible at science in school."

"So Luciano has been working for the Nectarini all along?"

"Tamato hired him on his own merits but he sold out to the Nectarini." Lulu shuddered. "I always knew he was twisted."

"He's Sicilian," I said, defending our old Oxford acquaintance. "What do you expect?"

"Whatever. Did Xox tell us something we didn't already know about MIDAS?"

"He made it sound so simple," I replied. "A billionaire's club. They play bridge together and go to each other's funerals. Lots of those lately. And they also fund research on solar energy that makes the Sultan of Arabia nervous. Nervous enough to kill? I have no idea if Xox was telling the truth or not."

"Why not? Didn't he eat the Truth sandwich?"

"You saw him gobble it up. It didn't seem to affect him though."

"You're right. It was a wrenching experience for all the others. Maybe Xox tells the truth all the time."

"Maybe. But he can also keep a secret. I just wonder what's behind the smile on that big bald head."