Dispatch From Our Time-Travelling Correspondent, Hugo Makewar:
Tit-Bits, long thought to be a sort of Holy Grail of Victorian Erotica, a Legendary City to Collectors of Curiosa the World Round, Does Not Actually Produce Pornography.
I was surprised and disappointed to find that it was a mere Comick Rag, and not the “Voluminous Vendors of Voluptuous Victorians” (as it was called by Hervin Finkstylesheet-Blavin, one of the Leading Lights in Eroto-Historic Arts, in his famous speech to The Society for the Preservation of Pictures of Naked People) that we fancied it was.
I traveled back to 1900 to get this Scoop — all in a day’s work for me, no need for this massive public adultation, though I should add that all Fan Mail is lovingly sorted by a coterie of monks in an isolated 13th century monastery and rigorously decorated with Marginalia before being returned to me for hanging on my cubicle wall.
I am sure that 1900 was interesting and colorful; there may have been fog; the streets may have been lit by gas, or then again, some other condition may have obtained. I Did Not Notice.
I was a Man on a Mission.
I was a Man on a Mission. I strode purposefully into Tit-Bits’ headquarters.
“Shop!” I bellowed, pounding upon a desk. When this produced no response, I grabbed up the nearest lackey by the collar, hoist him into the air, glared into his eyes, and demanded to speak to the Editor-in-Chief. He seemed dazed, so I shook him a little.
“Put Jenkins down!” Barked A Voice. “However many of your womenfolk he has wronged, he doesn’t deserve to die like this!” The Voice turned out to belong to the Editor-in-Chief, so I released Jenkins back into his natural habitat and followed The Voice into his office.
“Porn. Women. Dirty pictures. Give,” I said, towering over him as he sat at his massive oak desk.
His face did something curious at this point. I have seen other faces do it. He was trying to decide whether he understood me or not. That is, he knew exactly what I meant, but he thought that a real gentleman would not know.
“I,” I added, “am from The Future.” Because I am a Straight-Forward man, and I refuse to indulge in cowardly evasion on the feeble excuse that telling the truth might warp or radically alter the present (which is, as we all know, 2213).
The man nodded sagely. “How can I help you?” He asked. And if I’d known what he was doing with his hands under the desk, I would have had a different answer, but I did not, so I said, “The future is full of horny, nostalgic, rich people. They want porn, and they want it Now. They want Duchesses wearing diamonds and a smile, they want shop-girls up on ladders with no-”
The man made a noise like Hrrrrrrnnnnnuuuuuuppphphh, and I cut to the chase.
“Atherton’s Magic Vapour is a fine Blaugh and News-Vendor, one of the oldest and most respectable in circulation. We have Powerful Backers. The Powerful Backers are generally perverts. Occasionally, one of the Backers gets Cold Feet, and I go on a Treasure Hunt, to find knick-knacks that will appease said Backer. This particular Backer wants a large quantity of Victorian Porn, and so she must have it.”
“Tit-Bits would not happen to be still in circulation in your time, would it?” He sounded wistful. His hands were still doing something under the desk.
I laughed heartily at this conception. “Oh my, no!” I told him, as the tears slid down my cheek. “Now, the porn.”
“We are not that kind of paper. Really, the idea! Sir! You appall me, you really do.”
I was, however, no longer listening. I spotted a name on a submission for publication on his desk.
The name was P.G. Wodehouse.
Which meant that I was looking at something even more valuable than all but the highest-quality Victorian porn.
I grabbed it and made for the door.
The Editor-in-Chief pulled out his gun and shot me several times before I reached it. This triggered Retrieval, and I was brought back dead (for some reason, this seems to happen every time I travel), but this was quickly remedied, and soon I found myself alive once more in the present day, with a priceless manuscript in my jacket pocket and a First-Rate Scoop in my head.
Quite clever and intriguing
thanks!