"The most hilarious take on the French Revolution since Start the Revolution Without Me."
Not that Dexter has time to worry about that now, he has his hands full trying to track down the Roman emperor Commodus, who's on the run in revolutionary France.
Sound complicated? That's just the start! Throw in a nasty, Beatles-loving imp; an incompetent highwayman; plotting courtiers and a merciless Gestapo officer and you have a recipe for disaster.
Then there's Marie Antoinette who is in love with Dexter, Maximillien Robespierre who wants him sent to the guillotine and Charlotte Corday, who needs him to help her assassinate Jean-Paul Marat.
Plus of course, Jitterbug, Dexter's imp sidekick, who as usual causes as many problems as he solves.
Click the "Read More" link below to read an excerpt from
C'est La Vie, Johnny Black
Prologue
Those of you who
have followed my adventures up till now will know that I am Dexter Blackwell, a
clerk in the Accounts Receivable department at the Hades Corrections
Corporation.
You’ll also know that by some weird twists of fate, I got to work a
couple of cases for the SPAA, the Soul Pursuit and Apprehension Agency, using
the alias, Johnny Black. On my first mission, I apprehended Freddie ‘Fingers’
Finnegan, a two-bit hood from 1920’s Chicago, on the second, I tracked down
General Tulius Bacchus, a hedonistic Roman general from 44 minus (that’s B.C. to
you folks still amongst the living).
The success of my second mission, however, came at a cost. Commodus,
Roman emperor from the year 180 plus, gave me the slip. He’d been brought along
on the job (illegally, I might add) by Jitterbug, a red-faced imp who sometimes
assists me.
Now, Commodus was a soul on the run, escaped down a portal to a time
and place unknown, and I had the task of tracking him down, this time without
my able assistant.
Oh, and did I mention that on this mission I’d have to find my own
host (a dead body to occupy), and that Mr. Abaddon, the second most senior
demon in hell, and head of the SPAA, was after my blood?
I know this must all sound quite complicated, but we lead pretty
twisted lives here in hell. Read on and all will be explained. You join me, as
I’m about to set off on my next mission.
un
I stepped into the
pool of yellow-brown water and immediately felt myself falling without
resistance. Jitterbug had said that the sub-shaft was halfway down, but it
would have been pointless to try and stop myself on the descent. Instead, I let
myself fall all the way down, through the reversal and the upward surge that
deposited me back in the tepid waters of the Tiber. Then I simply turned around
and swam back into the portal.
The ascent was much easier to control, I allowed myself to rise
using my outstretched arms to control my upward movement. About halfway up, I
found the shaft that Commodus had escaped through. It was on the left, not the
right as Jitterbug had insisted, but everything else about his description was spot
on, the water was indeed green and cold and slimy. Nonetheless, I entered the
shaft and was instantly pulled along in a surge of bubbles, as though someone
had suddenly strapped a jetpack to my back.
I accelerated through the tunnel, which made a series of violent dips
and twists, before depositing me into the cold, murky waters of a river. I had
no idea where I was and I looked frantically around, half expecting some
ravenous aquatic beast to rise from the depths and swallow me. When none
appeared I drifted to the surface to get a look at my surroundings.
Wherever I was, whenever I
was, I was most certainly not in pre-history. There were people on the
riverbank, buildings and market stalls. The smoke from a thousand fires smudged
the blue sky and there were shouts and curses and laughter and the rumble of
hooves and steel wheels on cobbled streets.
“Put him in the drink and be done with it!” I heard someone shout followed
by a cheer from many voices. In the next moment a cart pulled up to the bank,
and a crowd quickly surrounded it. Four men jumped into the bed of the cart and
hoisted something aloft - a body.
The men grabbed the corpse by its arms and legs and carried it to
the river’s edge. Once there, they started to swing the cadaver back and fore,
no doubt hoping to get some distance on their throw.
“Un, deux, trois, quatre,” the crowd counted and then cheered as the
body was tossed in. It hit the water with a flat slap and immediately started
to sink, probably weighed down in some way. I dived and followed it down,
hardly able to believe my good fortune at finding a host so quickly. As I
approached the corpse though, I quickly realized that it wouldn’t do. This man
was missing his head, and although it would probably have been quite possible
for me to walk around headless, I had a hunch that it might cause some distress
amongst the local populace.
In the next moment, the unfortunate man’s head drifted slowly down
and came to rest on the muddy river bottom. Whoever had killed him, had removed
the head with a single clean cut. But that wasn’t my concern now, my concern
was to find a host, preferable one with a body that was still intact.
The pull of the river was quite gentle, so I allowed myself to drift
slowly downstream, floating near the surface to try and get a fix on where, and
when, I was. The surrounding buildings looked old, urban, and European, and
based on the snatches of conversation I heard, I soon came to the conclusion
that I was in a French city, possibly Paris, sometime during the seventeen or
eighteen hundreds.
It was quite pleasant drifting along on the current, especially as
the buildings along the riverbank began to give way to trees and the polluted
water of the Seine (if I was right about Paris, it had to be the Seine) gave
way to cleaner, clearer waters. I felt myself being lulled into sleep and
suddenly realized how much my recent Roman adventure had taken out of me.
My rest was short-lived, though. As I drifted around a clump of
reeds, I came face to face with a large fish, lying in ambush. The predator swiftly
separated itself from the shadows and darted towards me, jagged mouth gaping. I
abruptly remembered that, in my current state, the fish wouldn’t see a man
floating in the water at all. What he’d see was my soul, which to a fish would
resemble a nice, juicy firefly. I wasn’t sure what would happen if he swallowed
my soul, but I wasn’t about to find out. I headed quickly back into the reeds
and hid there, while the fish made a couple of passes, before losing interest
and swimming off.
This latest incident dislodged any lingering complacency from my head.
I had to find a host fast, and as I was more likely to find one in Paris than
in the countryside, I flipped over on to my back and started swimming upstream
in my favored backstroke.
I’d covered a few hundred feet when I came upon a small island in
the middle of the river, and a rowboat bobbing gently with the current. I swam
towards the boat and saw that it was tied to a tree. It was then that I heard
voices and through a break in the undergrowth, I saw four men standing in a
field. Two of the men wore cloaks and hats, while the other two were stripped
to their shirtsleeves. These two each held a weapon, a thin sword, tapering to
a needle point.
I’d seen enough movies, and read enough books, to know that these
men were about to fight a duel. This, of course, was good news for me. One of
them was shortly going to have no further use for his earthly body, which meant
that I’d soon have my host. I know that sounds harsh and self-serving, but
don’t judge me, okay. I am from hell after all.
deux
The duelists approached
each other on the green and I heard the clink of steel as they touched
swords.
“Agree to never see Marietta again, and I’ll let you live, Le Noir,”
one of the men said. He was dark-haired and impressively built, while the other
man, Le Noir, was fair, and slim.
“Never!” Le Noir said, “Marietta loves me. You were merely an
infatuation to her, de Mariny. You’re just too pig-headed to admit it.”
“As you wish,” the dark man said. “Prepare to die then.” He placed
his left hand on his hip, took a step back and pointed his sword at Le Noir,
who did likewise, although with considerably less grace than his opponent.
“En garde!” de Mariny said and thrust forward. Le Noir raised his
sword to parry, losing his balance in the process and only just managing to
keep his footing. He took a wild swipe, which de Mariny avoided quite easily
before stepping forward elegantly and drawing his sword across Le Noir’s
abdomen.
“Ow!” Le Noir screeched, as his white shirt was quickly stained red.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” de Mariny said. “You ready to submit, yet?”
“Never!” Le Noir shouted, and rushed forward. This time de Mariny
let him come, then at the last moment moved aside and hung out a foot. Le Noir
tripped and went crashing to the ground. He came up with his face and shirt
muddied.
“Mud sits well on you, bumpkin!” de Mariny laughed. “Why not head on
back to your farm in Provence and leave city life to those more accustomed to
it.”
Le Noir staggered forward waving his blade. “I’ll show you bumpkin,”
he muttered and attempted another charge. This time his feet failed to gain any
traction in the mud and he slipped and went down on one knee.
“Now there’s something you won’t find in any manual,” de Mariny laughed.
He feigned a yawn and looked over at the seconds.
While de Mariny was distracted, Le Noir seized his opportunity, he
suddenly let out a primal scream and charged forward, catching the bigger man totally
off guard. He barreled into de Mariny,
who lost his footing and landed flat on his back. Le Noir quickly moved in and
placed the point of his rapier to de Mariny’s throat. “You concede?” he said.
“That’s not fair!” de Mariny shouted.
“Fair or not, I have you at a disadvantage, Duke. Concede or I’ll have
to finish you off, distasteful though that would be.”
“Alright, alright, I concede,” de Mariny grumbled.
“Seconds?”
“Noted,” the seconds said in unison.
“Right, then,” Le Noir said, removing his rapier from de Mariny’s
jugular. “You will no longer visit or speak to Marietta. In fact, you’ll no
longer look upon her at all. Do this and we’ll put this whole business behind
us. Let’s say no more about it.”
Behind him de Mariny got slowly to his feet. “I agree no more should
be said about it,” he said, “particularly by you.” He thrust his sword into Le
Noir’s back holding it there until the smaller man collapsed to the ground.
“I say, that’s rather unsporting,” Le Noir’s second said.
de Mariny spun towards him still holding the bloody sword. “Perhaps
you’d like to join your friend, the Count, then? In the name of sportsmanship,
of course.”
“Not at all Le Duc,” the man said, almost immediately. “You won fair
and square. We both saw it.”
“Good, then drop Le Noir in the river and let’s get out of here.”
The two seconds carried the body of Count Le Noir and placed him in
the water, while de Mariny washed off his blade, then dressed in his coat and
hat. The three of them then set off across the river in the rowboat.
I waited until they’d reached the riverbank before I pushed away from
the shelter of the island. To the front I could see a blond head gently bobbing
along with the current, and I headed in that direction.
trois
On the previous
two missions I’d done, I had at least some sketchy details about my host, or intended
host. In this case, I had next to nothing. I knew that he was a count, that he
was from Provence, and that he was in love with a woman by the name of
Marietta. Other than that I had a big fat blank, and all that I got when I
merged with Le Noir was a brief flash of a beautiful, blonde woman with
piercing blue eyes.
I made my way to the riverbank and crawled out. It had clouded over
and as I set off along the road towards Paris I heard thunder rumbling in the
distance. Shortly after, it began to rain. By the time I’d covered less than a
mile I was soaked to the skin and the buckled shoes I was wearing were chaffing
at my heels and blistering my toes. I wasn’t going to make it to Paris walking
in those shoes, so it sat down on a milestone to remove them.
After a while the rain let up, and I was just about to get to my
feet when I heard the sound of approaching hooves. Before I’d had a chance to
get off the road, a rider appeared. He was dressed in black, with an elaborate
frilly shirt under his topcoat, and a three-cornered hat on his head. He also
wore a crude mask, with unevenly cut eyeholes.
“Whoa, Satan!” he called and brought his black steed to a skidding
halt in front of me.
The man looked me up and down, and then said, “Greetings friend,
nice day for a walk.”
“Greetings,” I said. “I’m afraid, my horse took off, I …”
“You haven’t been riding,” he said. “Not in those britches…”
“I assure you, I have.”
“What’s your game, stranger? You’re not one of the king’s dragoons,
are you.”
“No, not at all, I’m just a citizen out for a walk.”
“Ah ha!” the man said.
“Ah ha, what?”
“Earlier on you said you were out riding.”
“And you said I couldn’t possibly be out riding in these britches,
so I guess I must have been out walking.”
“I see your point,” he said rubbing his chin. He seemed confused.
“Tell me, friend,” he said, suddenly breaking into a smile. “What are they
saying about me in Paris? I bet they’re quaking in their boots, hey?”
“Who are you again?”
The smile faded quickly from his face, “Don’t tell me you’ve never
heard of me.”
“I confess, I haven’t.”
“What! Have you been living under a stone, man? I am Claude Duval,
scourge of the Paris-Reims line, terror of the provinces, blight of the
forty-fifth arrondissement.”
“No, can’t say that rings a bell.”
“The French Dick Turpin?”
“Ah, now him, I have heard of!”
“Pah!” Duval said, “I break wind in the approximate vicinity of
Monsieur Turpin.”
“While you’re doing so,” I said, “You may want to get off the road.
I think I hear a coach approaching.” An ornate coach pulled by four horses
rounded a bend in the road. Duval spun his horse around, almost falling off in
the process. He drew a pistol and fired a shot in the air and the coach came
sliding to a halt.
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