Max surveyed the scenery around him through dark Italian sunglasses. He paused in thought. What he knew in his head was enough to topple champion foosball players from glory to ignominy in an instant, or cause Jesus to cry. Max is a chauffeur who has acquired precious knowledge of his boss's diabolical intentions to conquer the world. The powerful Herr McCoffee of Eglicata will squash anyone in his path and has surrounded himself with a colorful staff that includes Sylvia Smitharomance who has slept her way straight into his cabinet, Manual McGetitdone who has ridden McCoffee's coattails to prominence and is not to be crossed, and Norbert Nodahead a "yes" man worthy of distrust and scrutiny. When McCoffee learns about a disadvantageous plant growing like a noxious weed on the distant island of Dalilennon that has the ability to keep his beautiful fowlawarfare alive, nothing will stop him from harvesting the crop. As McCoffee attempts to create his own defiant brand of world peace, he and his cabinet clash with the likes of Roger Rightjet, Priest Precious, Julian Knotsofoolista, and King Nocturnal in a humorous, allegorical journey where good-as it must-wins in the end.
An Isle of Fancy
Where Good Trumps EvilBy Rocky WilsoniUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2010 Rocky Wilson
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4502-1419-3Contents
Inside the Palace..........................................9Blokehead's Gambit.........................................17The Nose Pickers...........................................21A Tetherball Pole Subdues Julian K.........................26Ms Prissy the Midwife......................................37Invasion by Night..........................................41Love, and Blokehead's Gambit, Part 2.......................45Dalilennonian Motorcade and a Hot Fan......................49A Disadvantageous Night....................................59Roger Tries To Retreat.....................................68Dreams.....................................................76Broken Protocol............................................78Roger K's Reminisce........................................92Queens on the Mend.........................................102JK's Near Demise...........................................119Strolling and Pacing.......................................128A Grisly Nighttime Harvest Goes To Sea.....................131Hotline to Heaven..........................................142A Coming-Home Party........................................146Sextants and Baggy Britches................................149Drafting a Priest..........................................164Officer Ogilvie Stops a Grapefruit.........................167Julian's Biography.........................................173Time Passes the SlipSparrow................................180McTea to the Caves.........................................188Instant Prison.............................................192Expedience Sloshes On......................................205Turning In a Villain.......................................215"Why You Old Witch!".......................................222"Galatians 6:18"...........................................230
Chapter One
Inside the Palace
After advisors Smitharomance and McGetitdone were dispatched to interrogate McView at his seaside cottage, Herr McCoffee turned to watch the door close behind them, then paused in thought. Another step was being taken to realize his plan for world supremacy; world supremacy for Herr McCoffee, not for Eglicata.
He glanced over his left shoulder to his own five-foot-high portrait, pompously placed above the finely carved acacia wood table near where he stood. The scowling personage in the portrait, with penetrating eyes, peered over McCoffee whenever Eglicata's finest minds gathered to meet at his decree. Members of McCoffee's cabinet, such as fisheries experts, the nation's economic brain trust, defense specialists, and national chess players not only were conditioned, but programmed to see a second Herr McCoffee, one larger-than-life, peering down at them during every minute of every meeting.
A few feet stage-right of the Herr's virtual throne under the portrait was a closed door that led to the ruler's private study. That door afforded the international leader an opportunity to remove himself from the outside world, gave him license to cry for more personal wealth, pray for more power to achieve his carefully detailed goals or, most commonly, lust after the black widow of his cabinet who wouldn't consent to marriage ... or even any more sex.
Long ago, practically at the eve of his vault into power and fame, Herr McCoffee had stolen at night to her quarters, made passionate love mindless of the lady's own marriage intent, and proposed a marriage union of their own.
She'd laughed.
"Do you think you could satisfy me and millions of Eglicatans as well?" she'd cajoled mincingly. McCoffee, in disbelief, had groped for more physical pleasure that night, only to have the woman titter his intent away.
"But I love you," he'd gasped well into the night, and she'd laughed seductively from the back of her throat. She knew the powers he had to conquer the world were useless in her bed.
"I will be on your cabinet and very valuable to you," she'd concluded near daylight the following morning as she'd buttoned up his silk Hawaiian shirt. "We must always treat each other respectfully with the best interests of Eglicata in our hearts." She'd offered the final statement with a smile, a gentle slap on his weary butt, and nudged him toward the door.
True to her word, Ms. Sylvia Smitharomance was in Herr McCoffee's cabinet when next they'd met-in the same room McCoffee now occupied. And their compact, at her insistence, never had been violated. She was, indeed, a "very valuable asset" to a young government.
But that compact had been made nine years earlier when McCoffee's Eglicata had been tottering on stilts, threatening at any moment to stumble and crash into oblivion with another ruler or two scrambling to replace McCoffee's government with one of their own. Ms. Sylvia Smitharomance had been as valuable an ally in the early days as now.
But not, much to Herr McCoffee's chagrin, sexually.
A man of wisdom himself, the Herr repeatedly had denied personal desires to try and augment their professional relationship. He ached inside when McGetitdone, Norbert Nodahead, and other key advisors looked at her lustfully. He ached even more when he'd see her look back at them, smile seductively, and wink.
Much had changed in those nine years. A fledgling government-blessed with vast resources, agreeable people, and a unifying leader-practically had bolted into the world's consciousness. Almost any school child anywhere now could approach a world map with a push pin and tag Eglicata's location with confidence.
But, as the world and the Eglicatanese people had begun to think of Eglicata as a progressive nation, Herr McCoffee, behind symbolic waves and smiles, began harboring that vile ambition that felled both Alexander and Hitler ... total conquest.
And he was close.
Still alone, Herr McCoffee ventured through the arched doorway stage-right of his throne and into his private study. His eyes raced to the photo and charts along the nonwindowed interior wall to the right of that inner door.
"The leaders of Darius would love to see this," he articulated for only his ears to hear.
"My beautiful fowlawarfare," he said soothingly, like a televised game-show host talking to children, "you will take me to paradise."
McCoffee's eyes, filled with adoration, focused on the wall-sized photograph of a bigger, much bigger than life bird.
"Sweet fowlawarfare," he said, "you must stay alive until Darius is mine. You must be the one that carries out my plan, the attack that will end all wars."
The photo on the wall depicted a gigantic cassowary, or ostrich-looking creature with serviceable wings, rippling sinewy muscles, and a leathery coat of armor that, theoretically, could withstand and accurately, like a boomerang, slingshot back at sources any firepower generated from conventional or unconventional weapons.
"I don't know precisely why your mate chose to die," said the Herr with a level of compassion in his voice normally reserved for emotional, public speeches made during halftimes of soccer matches when scheduled women's mud-wrestling matches, replete with giant-screen televisions equally spaced around the national stadium, were cancelled because of low-hanging fog. It was the same type of compassion McCoffee sometimes voiced when unexpected lulls arose during thrilling chess competitions.
"But I do know, as do you, that you are the end of a line of nine years of selective inbreeding. You are the ultimate weapon for peace, and you soon must fly to conquer Darius."
Still, Herr McCoffee wasn't pleased with his minisoliloquy.
"Why did she die?" he demanded of the giant flying bird's photo, the house-sized flying bird held in place, as depicted on his wall, by sizeable anchor chains. "Why did she die?"
A knock was heard on the door to his study.
"Come in," barked Eglicata's most powerful figure, now in a grumpy mood.
A short White man walked into the study briskly, bowed to his ruler, then waited for permission to proceed.
"Mr. McDove, I think," said McCoffee with instant interest. "I believe you've been working on the death of the fowlawarfare's mate. Speak up."
"By our calculations," began Mr. McDove, "the Mrs. Fowlawarfare died of indigestion. She simply was unable to digest her food intake as quickly as it was consumed. We feel the fowlawarfare himself may be endangered by the same ailment. He, too, eats a lot of sheep."
"I know he eats a lot of sheep, McDove, and I know he's vulnerable to the same illness that struck the Mrs. Fowlawarfare."
Herr McCoffee spoke these words in the repetitive singsong dialect of a patient, understanding, yet cunning politician. Then his voice changed inflection like Nathan addressing David after David's anger was kindled about a rich man having the audacity to take a poor man's only lamb instead of one from his own humongous flock, (although the analogy ends there.)
McCoffee's voice went cold. "What I need to know is what the antidote is."
"We thought you'd want to know that," quietly responded the short White scientist who was confident in his position and in no way unnerved by being in the presence of such a renowned world leader.
"And?"
"And we found one called disadvantageous. It works by breaking down mutton fiber ... "
"I don't care HOW it works," exploded the highest of diplomats suffering under a world filled with strain and stress. "I want to know where to get it!"
"Our computers currently are working at full speed to find that out," said McDove. "Apparently, disadvantageous used to be plentiful, in fact a noxious weed in many places on the planet. But man, for decades, has deemed the plant worthless and made a concerted effort to make it extinct."
"Does it still exist?" asked the ruler, now a bit more composed.
"We think so, Your Excellency. The computers at this very moment are trying to pinpoint a location where it still grows."
"Very well," said Herr McCoffee. "Inform me immediately when you have additional news to share."
After opening the door and preparing to leave, McDove hesitated in the arched entrance to the study, turned, and spoke boldly. "I'd like to say it does me great honor to work with the Eglicatan government in this quest for world peace."
A cold stare from Herr McCoffee sent him packing.
Slightly less than two hours later, Ms. Smitharomance and Mr. McGetitdone knocked on the Herr's study door, seeking admittance. Herr McCoffee recognized McGetitdone's staccato pecks on the door, grunted assent to their entrance, then busied himself with pen-uponpaper activities upon his roller-top oak desk to accentuate his personal importance.
The near silence after the two entered the study was deafening. Only sounds from a muted pendulum clock on the wall by the door and pen scratches were audible.
McGetitdone felt uncomfortable in a reverent sort of way, and Ms. Sylvia plopped down in a stuffed maroon chair.
The ruler of Eglicata, aware he was being watched, hurried his pace to finish mundane, yet consequential tasks.
"I heard news of Viola," said the Herr while looking up from white mounds of paper.
McGetitdone immediately glanced to the wall photo of Viola's mate before Herr McCoffee could continue.
"Apparently, she died of indigestion ... "
"Small wonder," quipped Ms. Sylvia Smitharomance.
Herr McCoffee no longer thought to reprimand Ms. Sylvia in small groups. She nearly was his master.
"Vic could be endangered as well unless we locate the proper antidote quickly," said the Herr. "Apparently, there's a plant named disadvantageous that will break down mutton fiber at a fast rate. The problem is locating a source of the plant and getting it to Vic in time. We can't do anything until a source of disadvantageous is found."
Sylvia Smitharomance leisurely gazed around the study, noting the bright streams of sunlight peeking through latch-string blinds above and behind McCoffee. The broken rays of light striped his own desk like a studious zebra. Ms. Sylvia held no reverence for their leader, a point Herr McCoffee painfully was aware of. And the witch hunt she and Manual had just returned from had done nothing to alter her view. The old man, as she'd expected, had told them nothing about Roger K. Rightjet.
For nearly nine years, the Herr relentlessly had pursued and eliminated those who'd contested his rise to power, and the list was getting short.
But Rightjet was a special problem. An influential young lawyer who'd worked with the previous government, Rightjet had fled Eglicata for distant lands. On two occasions, McCoffee's agents nearly had tracked the lawyer down, only to have him flee again to another land. It had been seven years since Rightjet had last been seen, but sources said the old lawyer knew his whereabouts.
"He told us nothing," Ms. Sylvia said to the ruler still writing on papers at the oak desk. "We beat up the old bastard and he told us nothing. He asked us to thank you for the honor of your visit."
"The old man's still alive, Your Excellency, and he knows where Roger K. Rightjet is hiding," interjected McGetitdone loyally.
"Hiding, huh!" snorted the well-toned lady with youthful, shapely features ranging from fluid calves to soft-curved buttocks to her lightly painted, alluring face. "He'd probably call it living by now."
"Enemies of the state of Eglicata must be sought out and destroyed," barked Manual McGetitdone, much like a Marine drill instructor in an introductory speech to new recruits.
Another knock on the door, and Norbert Nodahead, a third close advisor to the Herr, was granted admittance into the study dwarfed by the presence of a wall-size photograph of a giant bird. Like the other two, Nodahead had been with the McCoffee administration from its inception. He, Ms. Sylvia, and Manual McGetitdone (all present and accounted for in the Herr`s study as we speak,) were the only original cabinet members still around. The most recent to leave, one Poncho McTea, had dipped from prominence a few years back.
No one looked to the most recent arrival in the room for news. He was more of a `yes' man, capable of achieving uncanny goals by listening, offering subtle direction, and, with multiple nods of affirmation, efficiently doing the Herr's bidding. Pudgy in stature, Norbert sported a thin, black mustache that adorned a pale, ill-looking face. Norbert was worthy of distrust and scrutiny from his fellow cabinet members, especially the newer ones whose grasp toward power, as of yet, largely was unsubstantiated. Like an unscrupulous, lithe, buoyant swimmer in a pool, Norbert Nodahead had no misgivings about pushing off the skull caps of others to attain a better vantage for him. He felt those unable to defend themselves shouldn't even be in the pool-period.
It thrilled Norbert whenever his small, plump, unassuming body no longer was a liability.
Norbert only had begun to nod over the latest fowlawarfare news when another knock was heard through the stout teak door. McDove next was ushered into the study so recently bodied only by him and the nation's leader, Herr McCoffee. He'd done his packing.
"We've found it, Your Excellency," stated McDove with pride. "The disadvantageous plant only grows on the distant isle of Dalilennon. It grows rampantly there like a noxious weed. You also must know," continued the peace-loving, White scientist/botanist, "that the weed's chemistry for digestive purposes is very sensitive. To obtain a useable crop to treat the fowlawarfare, it must be planted on a given day, harvested fourteen- and-a-half days later, and transported in wet gunny sacks."
McCoffee was perking with enthusiasm.
"Thank you, Mr. McDove," he said. "Your efforts for peace won't go unrewarded."
McDove exited, closing the big door behind him, and the nation's leader laughed loudly, mercilessly.
"Do you know who's on Dalilennon at this very moment waiting to aid our mission?"
Too hyped to slow the news and maximize the power he held over all, Herr McCoffee proceeded speaking with dashes of overt animation.
"... none other than my wonderful cousin and former cabinet member, Poncho McTea. From prominence to banishment, and maybe now back to prominence. So wise and forward-thinking of your Herr to ship Mr. McTea to the very island we'd need to deal with at a key future date."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from An Isle of Fancyby Rocky Wilson Copyright © 2010 by Rocky Wilson. Excerpted by permission.
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