Extract from Chapter 27 of mystery-comedy novel, 'The Investigations of the Para-Usual':
Off they trundled in silence, O’Singh absorbing everything – the aircraft taxiing outside, the aspirational wall posters, the grooves between the metal slats of the escalator. One moving walkway after another they continued like this until at last, O’Singh spoke again.
‘Think,’ he said, turning to the doctor, ‘how did we board aeroplanes before we had these giant sausage tunnel things we have now with a kink in them?’
‘We climbed steps?’ offered Dr Pratt, pumping his legs with a high knee action, rather as one might in a human dressage.
‘Exactly so, Dr Pratt. Do you recall the vehicles that transported the steps?’
‘Yes, you mean the vans with a staircase on the back?’
‘Ab-abso-absa-absolutely. Think now, para-usually about those stair vans.’
‘I can’t begin to think. What’s your inkling?’
‘Here is a thing. There is an employee of the airport whose job it is to drive his stair van up to aeroplanes ready for boarding. Now, imagine him driving back home of an evening after work, parking it up in front of his council tenement block.’
‘Assuming that he lives in a council flat.’
‘Let us say for sake of argument. He is in his flat, several stories high, his airline jacket flung across an armchair. He has slackened his tie. His missus, the wife, the trouble and strife, is cooking his tea.’
O’Singh guided Dr Pratt off of the escalator they were on, away from the stream of travellers and over to a bank of bucket seats set against the wall of the causeway. There, O’Singh closed his eyes, took a deep breath and transformed himself into the stair van man’s wife, employing a pumping motion of his right arm as if frying a sausage or perhaps some bacon, depending on the hard-of-understanding interpretation; his other hand simultaneously chugging at an imaginary cigarette.
“’Ere, ‘ow many bangers d’you want, love?” (It was clear now that O’Singh was improvising the wife frying sausages and not bacon.)
O’Singh plonked himself down on a seat and took on the role of the stair van man sat at a table reading his newspaper.
‘“Couple. No make it three”,’ replied O’Singh’s ravenous stair van man.
“Oh right, I’ll ‘ave to get you another one out the fridge”,’ said O’Singh, jumping up out of his seat to pose as his wife.
The professor flounced across to a glass pane looking out over a docking bay, where he mimed sweeping aside what Dr Pratt deduced were curtains of the kitchen window. O’Singh made a pantomime of shielding his eyes and peering down to something far below.
‘“What’s that din?”’ said O’Singh’s housewife, craning her neck. ‘“Ooh! The little bugbears”.’
‘“What?”’ replied the stair van man, as soon as O’Singh could fling himself back again into the bucket seat.
‘“Them kids…”’ puffed the professor, hauling himself up to the window once more. ‘“Them kids are up your stairs thinkin’ their Sammy Davis Junior again.”’
‘Sammy Davis Junior, the cabaret singer? The old-time American stage entertainer?’ asked Dr Pratt.
Extract from Chapter 27 of mystery-comedy novel, 'The Investigations of the Para-Usual':
O’Singh bowed his head and threw a guiding paw round the shoulder of Dr Pratt back towards the escalator walkway.
‘This is the para-usual thing… we humans are praised all the better if we are positioned slightly higher than everyone else.’
‘You mean in status?’ asked Dr Pratt.
‘No, I mean we hold people aloft when they have achieved something. In the sports arena. The boxer, for instance. You see now this is further to my connection with our boxer and the alternative investment scheme?’
The operatives stepped onto the walkway taking them back to the departure hall.
‘Right. So, boxers are lifted onto shoulders when they triumph,’ said Dr Pratt, slowly catching on.
‘And sports people climb stairs to claim their prize. We have the Football Association Cup winners mounting the steps to receive the trophy at Wembley football stadium; the medal-winning Olympic athletes stepping up onto the dais.’
‘There are three levels aren’t there? The highest step for the winner of the more precious metal, gold, used in the finest jewellery; another slightly lower step for the lesser desired decorative metal, silver; and the lowest for bronze, something you make door knockers out of.’
‘Very important – if you are the winner – you are going to want to take the biggest step upstairs,’ said O’Singh, knowledgeably. ‘And here is a thought… when we have seen our sports team lose to another in a game in which we felt ours was the better side...’
‘Allow me to make a suggestion, O’Singh,’ chimed Dr Pratt. ‘If you’re in the crowd, you could quite as easily chant at the players of the undeserving opposing team going up to receive the cup, something like – and I am going to sing to the tune of “Go West” by the Pet Shop Boys …’
‘Oh yes, is that not indeed a tune oft covered by the a capella chanters in football crowds?’ asked O’Singh.
‘Yes, yes. Here we go,’ said Dr Pratt, clearing his throat before bursting into song:
‘“Stop going upstairs! Come down! You should be going downstairs really, or at the very least along a level!”’
Dr Pratt faltered trying to shoehorn the lyrics as best he could into the Go West tune.
‘That is quite a lot to chant,’ said O’Singh carefully, respectful to the feelings of Dr Pratt he felt he might offend by directly challenging his remark. ‘I have found it does help when you chant, to keep it to a few choice words.’