Sir Reginald in Bournemouth

Clump whirr.  Clump whirr.  Clump whirr.

That is the sound of Sir Reginald being pushed in his bath chair around the West Cliff Gardens by his one legged manservant Phillips.

The sound of their peregrination is interspersed by the cry of gulls and the distant peals of laughter carried on the breeze up from the sands below.  Sir Reginald grimaces.  He dislikes gulls.  He abhors laughter.  He is vexed by the breeze and most of all he detests the cliff top gardens and the sea and the whole existence of the town of Bournemouth.  Why he has allowed himself to be imprisoned here he cannot imagine.  He only knows that Bournemouth is the most excruciatingly awful place he has ever had the bad luck to be in.  And he has walked the foetid alleyways of Calcutta and the less that salubrious slums of Naples and San Francisco.  “Damn Bournemouth.  Damn it all.” He mutters aloud.  “Yes Sir” intones Phillips and pushes his master on through the resinous groves of Corsican pine that dot the greensward.

A young female leans on the rail at the clifftop and surveys the bay below.  Sir Reginald waves his stick.  A handcarved affair denoting a serpent twining around the shaft with its tail in its mouth.  “Sloven!” hisses Sir Reginald “Nincompoop. Damn Socialist. I don’t pay my taxes so that young persons may idle about when they should be gainfully employed.”  And at least one part of that sentiment is true for Sir Reginald considers taxes to be something that only the so-called working classes should be subjected to.  Not people like him, servants of the Empire and prisoners of Grand Marine Court. Indeed, if any member of The Club had suggested that he had stooped so low as to pay a penny in tax at any time in his life he would have been mortally offended and would have called him out.  Or at least, enjoined Phillips to beat the rascal soundly with his wooden leg.

And so the daily journey continues.  Round and round the asphalt paths beneath the pines and across the grass.  Clump whirr.  Clump whirr.  Clump whirr.  And as each lap is completed Sir Reginald finds something new to rail against.  Some other cause for fulmination.  A discarded toffee paper causes a two prong outpouring of bile.  One against the miscreant who dropped it in the first place. “Damn communist.  Expecting me to pick up his litter. Part of his so-called Socialist so-called paradise” He rages. “He can only have been a visitor” Sir Reginald has no time for visitors.   But the main recipient for his spleen is the otherwise fastidious servant of the Borough Council who has failed dismally to spot the wrapper and retrieve it. “Damn lefties at the council. All those rates we have to pay.” (See note above concerning taxes) “And they expect me to do all their work for them.”  However, we get the impression that Sir Reginald probably wouldn’t have picked the wrapper up himself as his contribution to the common good.

And as Phillips directs the machine towards Grand Marine Court the vexed subject of luncheon is raised.  “As it is Monday, I believe the menu features cottage pie.” Clump whirr.  “Damn swill. Cottage pie is for socialists.  Not for people like me. Those nincompoops in the kitchen. “Clump whirr.  And the sound of Sir Reginald’s bath chair and Sir Reginald’s vituperations fade into the distance leaving just the sound of the breeze in the pines and a very small sound which may have been the smallest of sighs escaping the pursed lips of Phillips the one legged manservant.

Hello?

From Cafe Conversations by Peter John Cooper

The woman sitting at the table in the corner calls on her mobile

Hello! Hello?

Hello....  Oh hello Andy.  I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday darling.  You’re not in at home so I’ll try you at the office.   Happy Birthday  mwaa mwaa.

She drinks her coffee and tries the phone again

Hello.  Hello.  Oh yes, I wanted to speak to Andy Stapleton.  He’s not at home and I can’t get him on his mobile so could you put me through to his office.   No, I don’t know his direct number.  That’s why I’m coming through the switchboard.  Well, I haven’t got it.  It’s Jane his wife, I’m away for a few days.  I haven’t got my address book.  You must be new.  Yes, Jane....  No?  Never mind, I’ll try again in a few minutes.

A few minutes pass.  She tries again

Hello, yes, it’s Jane Stapleton.  That’s right... Andy.  Could you try him again for me.  No?  Well, would you give me his direct number then I won’t have to bother you again.   No.... I’ve got his mobile.  I’ve already left a message....  I know it’s not company policy to give out personal numbers.  Of course I know his home number.   I live there.  I’m his wife.   No, don’t get him to call me at home because I’m not there.  If you remember, I said I’m on holiday.  I just wanted to talk to him.  It’s his birthday.  Never mind. Just put me through to his office.  It’s marketing somewhere.  No?  Not answering?  I expect they’re in the morning meeting.  They do drag on a bit.  I’ll try again.

She drinks another cup of coffee

Hello?  Jane Stapleton.   Yes, Andy Stapleton’s office please.  No?  They’re usually finished by now.  Do you know whether he’s still in the building?  Yes, yes, I know.  Well, do you know where he’s gone?  I mean he’s not picking up his mobile...  Well it is quite.  Not earth shattering.  No emergency.  I just wanted to wish him Happy Birthday.  Why?  Because it’s his...  So that he’ll know I’m thinking of him.  He’ll think I’ve forgotten...  No, I can’t.  I’m on holiday.  I’m away for a few days and I wanted to wish him happy Birthday.  Look, I’ll try again in a few minutes.  If you could find out where he is in the building..  Yes, I think you said he was still there.

Another cup of coffee

Hello?  Andy.  Oh Andy... I’ve been leaving messages all over. Happy...  I’m sorry...yes, I know you don’t but I just wanted to say Happy Birthday darling... I mean it is your birthday... even the office...  Yes, I know the pressure you’re under.  I understand...  I know.  I just wanted you to know...  Look, please don’t take it out on me...  Please... Not now...   You what?  Pardon?  I didn’t catch that..  You...  I don’t understand...  Andy... are you sure. I mean, but when?  You can’t today....  Why not?  It’s your birthday.  When I get back... What do you mean you don’t .....?  You can’t.... Nonsense. It’s my home as well.  Not like this.   Andy, not like this.  It’s that new girl, isn’t it?  You know the one I mean.  The one on the switch board.  All hoity toity and “it’s not company policy.”  Andy, I know you wouldn’t, couldn’t, have thought of this on your own.  She’s just after your money.  She’s too young.  Andy....  How dare you.   How dare you.  I’ve never...   Of course, I’m losing my temper.  I’m upset.  I’m hurt.  And I don’t care who hears.  It doesn’t happen like this.  Not after this time.  I know it happens to other people but we aren’t other people.  We’re...  you and me.  Andy and Jane.  That’s who we are.  How am I meant to tell people?  People that I meet.  My friends.  How do I explain it?...  On the phone... It’s not...  It’s crazy... It doesn’t happen like this. Let’s sort this out properly.  Wait till I’ve got home.  I’ll come now.  Straight away.  We’ll talk about it.  Properly. It doesn’t matter about the rest of... We’ll talk about it.  We’ll sort it out.  Andy, don’t you dare ring off...  

But she has been talking to herself for some time

Andy...  Andy....

She turns to everyone else in the cafe who is now listening

  

I just wanted to say Happy Birthday.  

She picks up her shoulder bag and goes out of the cafe.  Her eyes are red and puffy.

Shooting Archeopteryx Again

I can hear the sound of guns and the great squalls of noise from the flying creatures.  It is Glen Applebee and his men shooting archeopteryx again.

They’ve had the place to themselves for long enough. It was only a generation or two ago that we realised that the archeopteryx were dinosaurs and that they’d been on this earth for a hundred and fifty million years.  It’s time for mankind to make a stand.  We’re the up and coming species let them move aside.  That’s what Glen Applebee says, anyway.

The taking of the child earlier this year was the catalyst.  We took them for granted.  They lived on the cliffs and on the foreshore feeding off pleisiosaurs and ichtyosaurs from the deep.  Let them, we thought.  They do no harm to us.  But they took up a huge amount of real estate.  As do all dinos.  They’re all big.  Big and lumbering.  So Glen Applebee and people like him have cleared most of the countryside of the big thumping brutes and we can live without the fear of being stamped on.  Not that they ever did stamp on us.  Well, except for that time a herd of alosaurs ran wild one night and crushed those old folk in their beds.  Somewhere.  Not near here.  Somewhere Glen Applebee heard about, though. That was enough.  It had to stop.  I mean you can’t live like that.  Can’t make a living. So Glen Applebee and his men got to work and we have a better life all round.  It was funny how quiet it all became.  Without their singing.

And then there was the child.  I mean, I might not have bothered about the archeopteryx had it not been for that baby.  That shouldn’t happen.

It shouldn’t take Glen Applebee and his men long to clear the cliffs and when it’s done he’s promised he’ll build some fancy houses and apartments up there.  The sort that’ll raise the profile of the place.  Make us all feel proud.  Proud that somebody wants to come and live here at last without being disturbed by that constant, hideous noise.

It’s funny I do sometimes miss that high whinnying sound the big dinos made.  I always though it was a kind of singing.  Sweet and melodious.  I used to walk out into the forest and just sit and listen to that sound coming in on the evening air.   Now they’re all gone and i’ll never hear them again.

I wonder if I’ll ever miss the archeopteryx sound, that mournful wail that echoes round the cliffs every morning and evening with a sort of melancholy as if they were being nostalgic for all those millions of years that have passed by whilst they’ve been sitting there on all this prime real estate.  They were wailing for the lost youth of the species.  An old, old family who knows its time is over.

Anyway, I can hear the guns and it’ll be nice and quiet.  And then Glen Applebee says he’s got a plan to get rid of those ichtyosaurs and pleisiosaurs that roll quietly in the waves of the bay before they plunge down into that blue deep, unknown sea.  And those people in the cliff apartments will be able to swim undisturbed.

Chance

 The maroon thumps the sky and we pause to see if there will be a second.  There is.  I put down my knife and fork, wipe my lips and stumble up into the observatory to watch the launch.  Two minutes and forty seconds after the detonation the doors spread open and the lifeboat is eased out onto the top of the slipway. Two figures in fluorescent overalls busy themselves at the stern raising the aerials and clipping the stays but I can’t see their faces.  Some of the crew must already be aboard. Another pair arrives with jackets on and scramble aboard.  The step ladder is taken away and after a few more seconds the boat moves slowly down the slip and buries its bow in the oncoming sea.  With no more spectacle than a number 72 bus pulling out of the depot the lifeboat makes its way out of the bay and plunges into the big rolling seas off the Point.  For another minute or so I can see it through the glasses lifting and dropping over the white caps; then the weather closes in and four minutes and thirty seconds after the second maroon there is nothing to see.

My routine is to wait in the observatory till the boat returns but I hear laughter coming up from below so I shuffle back down and try to pick up the atmosphere.  But they know me and within twenty minutes they have excused themselves and are gone.  There was a time when we would have gone on into the night drinking a little more malt whisky than was good for us.  But they don’t like to come so much now and I don’t like them coming. I worry them, I think. And I worry for them.  They were my friends once, after all.

Back in the observatory I turn to the local radio station in case there is any news.  I could listen in on the marine band emergency channel but David forbids it.  He says it’s unlucky.  I know that’s not true.  He’s not given to that way of thinking.  It’s more likely something to do with not wanting to be self-conscious when working.  Either way, I have to respect his wishes.

I put on the ring to warm some cocoa.  In the High Street below my window it’s an unremarkable sort of evening.  Young men are gathered near the door of the Red Lion.  Car doors slam and girls shriek as the chill wind blows their skirts out before them.  The young men laugh at the girls’ discomfort and they all mill into the pub together leaving the coloured lights from the arcade opposite flashing soundlessly onto the wet pavement.  It’s strange that even in this town almost oblivious to the sea hissing beyond the promenade, people still pause for a minute when they hear one maroon to see if there will be a second.  Two maroons mean the lifeboat will be launched and there is still some moment in that.  Here, young men still walk with a swagger when they wear an R.N.L.I. pager at their belt.  Most local drivers know which cars and vans to let past when they swing out suddenly into Station Road with their headlights blazing on the way to the Lifeboat House.  And if they’re out for a constitutional after dinner most people will stand and watch on the prom for a couple of minutes until the excitement is over.  Not that there is any excitement.  It’s always very calm, very ordinary.

And there’s no danger, not now; not these days of modern high-tech equipment and satellite navigation.  A yacht has lost engine power and needs a tow, perhaps.  Or a crew member with appendicitis needs taking of a Polish freighter passing up channel.  The injuries are small and commonplace:  a grazed forehead when a boom swings unexpectedly across the deck, rope burns, a grazed hand.  But there is one element that puts the lifeboat and her crew beyond being merely a floating breakdown truck or a marine ambulance.  It is the sea.  The sea causes trouble; and having caused it, it entices out the men in the Lifeboat to play games with it.  If your luck holds, you’re O.K. If not, watch out.

I finish my cocoa and turn to the log.  It falls open on September the ninth 1989 because that page is so thumbed.  Only a simple entry:  “Launch 21.09 to aid motor cruiser Albion off Kimmeridge ledges.”  And, as an afterword:  “R.B. Fellowes tangled in line he was trying to get to Albion and pulled into water. Drowned.”  It was a million to one chance.  There was nothing that wasn’t done properly.  He was in full survival gear with life jacket and bump cap but the line held him under and by the time they got a boat hook to him and cut him free it was too late.  People were very kind to me.  They understood, they said; and me having lost Miriam only a year before.  There was a memorial service in St. Mary’s but I never spoke about it.  They thought I was numb with grief but that wasn’t true.  I’d been expecting it.  You see, I knew my luck had run out.  And once that happens all you can do is sit quietly and wait for the blows to fall.

There is a line in the Bible about planting and watering and God giving the increase.  Well, I did plant well.  When we came here, Miriam and I, we had a good business and this was a good place to let it grow.  Plenty of holidaymakers in the summer and, for the rest of the year, a quiet place from which to send out orders.  By the time Bob was born we had already moved house once.  A nice bungalow out on the Valley Road and then, with the arrival of David, we moved here. Bought it too. Paid cash outright.  A growing business, our own house, a family and a beautiful wife.  I even joined the Yacht Club.  Just for the bar, really.  Somebody took me out in a dinghy one Saturday but I didn’t like it.  But apart from that I had everything a man could want.  And the whole thing was built on Chance.

Chance, you see, was the name of the business.  It was the board game I invented whilst I was kicking my heels and waiting for demob.  It was a simple idea:  you moved counters round a board following a number of alternative paths.  The first one to the end won.  The trick, though, was the risk factor.  After every move you shook the dice to calculate the risk on what you had done.  The greater the risk, the greater the reward and you could go galloping round the board, taking pieces, destroying other players,  making money.   But the greater the risk, the closer to disaster you had to steer and if the dice said the wrong thing you were wiped out.  I’ve seen grown men, hard bitten fighters who’d resisted Rommel step by step through the North African desert reduced to tears by Chance.   But in the gloomy days of post-war Britain people loved it.  When everything else is rationed there are only two things to occupy your mind and most people found Chance more exciting than the other.  What’s more it was cheap and easy to make, a cardboard playing surface, a few trinkets for counters and a pair of dice.

For the first few years I was on the road every single minute of every day, selling, selling, selling.  Shopkeepers couldn’t get enough of them.  I got a small printing firm to make the sets and, later, employed a couple of blokes to do the selling for me.  All I had to do was to run the shop front and take the profits.  Then, when I married Miriam, we decided the seaside would be as good a place as any to have the office and, besides, it was a better place to bring up kids.  By then there were a number of variations on the game, too.  International Chance, Junior Chance.  But this place inspired the most successful so far - Sea Chance.

The ironical thing was that I could never play the game myself.  I couldn’t face losing and with the risks involved that was pretty much a certainty as far as I could see.  I knew you could only count on the roll of the dice for so long.  I saw it every time the game was played; the further round the board you got, the longer your luck held, the more you had to lose.  I came to recognise the look of horror that haunted players' eyes when a long run crashed and they lost the lot.  But it was only a game and people love to be frightened.  I suppose you could say that my game was a primitive version of a modern white knuckle ride.

The radio is churning our idiotic, harmless, night-time music.  No dramatic news flashes or anything like that, so I suppose there’s nothing much to worry about.   The waiting I find difficult.  Waiting and waiting.  Two years ago there was a massive appeal and they raised enough money for a new lifeboat.  Huge sums of money were raised which is pretty mind-boggling because it’s only a small town.  But people do believe in the Life boat.  Even if they get no nearer the sea than the chip shop on the promenade they know they are lucky to have a lifeboat.  And having one is like a lucky charm for the whole town.  I mean, it’s not something any of us are ever going to make use of but we’re proud to have it.  They used Bob’s photograph on some of the posters for the appeal.  It didn’t make any difference to me; if it brought in a few more pounds, good luck to them.  But then somebody had second thoughts.  A bit tacky I think they reckoned so he disappeared from the appeal just as he’d disappeared into the ocean.  Within a year I’d lost wife and son and then the recession bit and the company, Sea-Chance and all, disappeared with them..

I still have a house and I’ve still got David. He’s happy enough.  He gets jobs around the place, delivering newspapers, cleaning windows, a bit of farm work.  He has a room along Institute Road and he has friends, I think, but most of his life revolves round the Lifeboat.  Training, drills, courses, that sort of thing.  Sometimes he comes round for dinner but he hasn’t been here for a month or two.  I don’t like him coming here.  I’m afraid for him.  He laughs at me.

“It’s no use cutting yourself off, Dad.”  He says.  But there is.  I don’t want any of my bad luck rubbing off on him.

The thing about luck is not the absence of it.  I saw poor people in Egypt and Libya struggling against appalling poverty and difficulties and still keeping going.  “Insh’allah.”  They would say.  “Allah is good.  As Allah wills it.”

No, it’s when luck suddenly turns against you that it becomes dangerous.  It’s like a big dog that lollops amiably at your heels until, one day, it goes mad and tries to tear your throat out.

I’ve often meant to trace it back; to find the turning point.  What was the precise moment when luck ceased working for me and started working against me?  Probably there wasn’t one single moment, more a culmination of small things building up until the scales tipped away from me.  For some years we must have been living on a credit of luck and then, when it was all gone, life ripped apart like an airliner with metal fatigue.

But if there is one tiny thing that did tip the balance then it must have been the day when I stopped actually believing.  I had been scrambling on the rocks up near the Point, picking up pebbles and skipping them out over the waves.  Two, three, four skips each.  I knew how far each one was going to go before I flung it.  And I could make them go further and further.  As far as I chose.  I shouted out my forecasts:  “The next one three skips.”  It skipped three times.  “The next one four skips.”  It skipped.  “The next one five skips.  If it skips five times I will be happy ever after.”  and I bent and picked up the stone.   It was smooth and flat and just the perfect shape.  No trouble with five skips, it could do six or seven if I wanted.  It also had a hole right through the middle.  Round here they’re called lucky stones.  In the old days you hung them from a ribbon round your horse’s neck to stop it being hag-ridden at night.  And the one thing you must not do with a lucky stone is throw it away.  That’s throwing your luck away, they say.  Now, what was I to do?  Make it skip five times and live happily ever after or keep it for luck?  It was only a brief moment of indecision before I slanted it our over the water but the hesitation must have been long enough to affect my aim.  Two, three, four skips and it sank beneath the waves.  It was like being a character in one of those old cartoons who doesn’t realise he’s hanging in mid air until he looks down and realises he’s run right out over the cliff.  Suddenly, something made me feel vulnerable, human.  And feeling it, I was.

Misfortune is not like an illness.  You can’t catch it.  But the reason I keep old friends away from me is because I don’t want them to look down into the abyss the way I did..  One of them might ask me what happened to my good fortune, and I might just tell him and that will set him wondering and then....  Perhaps there is one parallel with disease;  the fact that it’s incurable.  Once you’ve got it, it just keeps piling into you again and again.  Until you can only wish that you had nothing else to be taken away from you.

I make some cocoa and scan the horizon again with the binoculars. The night is never dead black when you look at it in detail.  Even with a fog and a lowering cloud there is broken light in scratches and splashes but they don’t take any particular form and nothing resolves itself into a story.  Whatever game is afoot out there I can have no part of it.  I just wait to see the winner and loser.  To wait and wait is almost beyond bearing.  This is the last throw of my game.  I have nothing left to play for.  I twist the dial of the radio along the wavelengths waiting for some word.  My back and legs are stiff and I pace unevenly back and forth.  At last I turn back to the radio and push the button marked Marine Band.  Now the waiting will be over and I will know the outcome out there in the channel.

The Grief Cannon - another story of the Boy from the Year 2000

“Good grief!  Good grief!”

Jimmy sat on the bottom step of the stairs sobbing as if he was about to burst with the effort.

“Jimmy!  Jimmy Darling! What is the matter?”  His Mother sat awkwardly beside him.   Jimmy tried to speak but all he could manage was great gulps of air.  The tears continued to roll down his cheeks.

“I’m so sad.”

“What’s all this?”  Jimmy’s Father breezed through the front door and stopped in shock.  “Crying!  You shouldn’t be crying, Jimmy, you’re nearly a grown man.  You’re thirteen years old.”

But Jimmy still could not manage to control the enormous emotion that was ripping through him.

“For goodness sakes, stop the boy blubbing.  You can hear him all down the street.”  Said Jimmy’s father,  ignoring the fact that he had not heard anything but birdsong as he made his way up the path.

“I can’t stop him.” said his Mother, a worried expression on her face.

“This is what comes of spending too much time with his Mother. “Jimmy’s Father’s voice was rising in pitch.  “Now listen, son.  You stop that.  Control yourself, do you hear?”

“I caaaaaan’t” wailed Jimmy. 

“Yes, you can.  Men don’t cry.”  Jimmy’s Father glowered at Jimmy’s Mother.

“All right,” she said.  “I’ll try another way.  Jimmy....   Jimmy... Can you hear me?”

Jimmy nodded between his wracking sobs.

“What has happened?   What were you doing?”

“We...  we... we were playing in the Smith’s garden”.  Jimmy fought hard to get the words out.

“Yes.  Who with?”

“Tommy Smith.”

“Good, go on...  Did he do something to you? Did he call you names?  You know names cannot hurt you.”

“Did he hit you, son?”  Interjected Jimmy’s Father.  “If he did you should’ve hit him back.  Hard.  Right on the end of his snitch.”

“No.  No.  No.”  Wailed Jimmy.

“You should’ve kicked him on the shins, given him a Chinese burn.  I knew that lad was no good.   I worry about his parents.  I’m not sure they’re the right type for this neighbourhood.”

Jimmy’s Mother snorted.   Tommy Smith’s father was some sort of government scientist and was always driving about in some new fangled hover car or other.  Jimmy’s father had always appeared to be in awe of him and he hung over the fence on summer evenings listening to his descriptions of the great inventions the other man was working on.   New holographic viewscreens, faster space transporters, personal rocket belts and so on.

But neither of them could get anything more out of Jimmy who just continued to wail uncontrollably.

“Right.”  Said Jimmy’s father.  “This has gone on long enough.  I’m going to get to the bottom of this.  Come along Jimmy”  and father and son were gone out of the front door before you could say “Impulsedrive scooter”.

“Just be careful.”  Called Jimmy’s Mother but what it was that Jimmy’s Father was meant to be careful of, he didn’t pause to ask.

The Smith’s door was opened by Mrs. Smith.  Jimmy’s father had always found the presence of Mrs. Smith deeply troubling.   Although everybody had been issued with the same silver suits at New Year 2000, there was something about the way Mrs Smith fitted into hers that was different from most of the other women in the street.  Mrs. Smith’s suit went in and came out where other women’s went straight down or bulged like large Christmas turkeys wrapped in foil.  And what’s more, Mrs. Smith’s silver suit seemed to cling to her so tightly that you could actually see parts of her breathing.

After several minutes of standing there examing Mrs Smith’s suit, Jimmy’s father managed to stutter “Is Tommy’s Father in?” 

“Of course,” breathed Tommyy’s Mother with a big smile that showed two rows of perfect pearly teeth.  “He’s just come in from the shed where he’s been tinkering with some invention or other.  He spends so much time in the shed that I feel quite lonely sometimes.”

Jimmy’s father could feel beads of perspiration forming on his upper lip.  He pushed past almost rudely.

“He’s in the front room.  Why don’t you come in?”

But Jimmy’s father was already in and confronting Mr. Smith.

Tommy’s father was lounging in a deep armchair.  His silver suit was unbuttoned at the neck and hung on him casually almost as it were the type of cardigan with leather arm patches that scientists wore before the year 2000.  “Ah, my dear chap,” he said pipe clenched between his teeth,  “Come in, come in..  Here sit down on the sofa.”    Jimmy’s father was about to say that he would rather stand over here in the doorway when he sensed Mrs. Smith’s sweet smelling breath on his neck.  He seized Jimmy’s hand and sat on the sofa opposite Mr. Smith.  “Now what’s it all about?” continued the other man, “You don’t often drop in for a chat.”

“It’s Jimmy.”  He gestured to his son.  “He seems to be.... upset, rather.” And to demonstrate, Jimmy let out a series of loud sobs.  “Jimmy’s thirteen, he doesn’t cry any more.  This is not normal behaviour. It all started when he was playing with your Tommy in your garden.  Now, I’m not blaming Tommy....

“Aha” said Mr. Smith leaning forward to knock his pipe out in an ash-o-matic standing in the fire place.  “I don’t think you need to blame Tommy.  You see, Tommy was in much the same state himself when he came in for tea this afternoon.”

“Poor lamb.”  Breathed Mrs. Smith sweetly.  “He couldn’t swallow his pills.  Not even the purple ones that I’d got specially as a treat.”

“I hope you’re not implying that Jimmy here had anything to do with that?”

Mr. Smith held up his hand.  “Not at all, not at all.”  He began filling his pipe from a well used plasti-cloth pouch and stood up “Come with me into the garden.”

Jimmy and his father followed out through the kitchen.  Jimmy hardly noticed that his father had his arm round his shoulders. 

On thepocket handkerchief  lawn, Jimmy’s father observed enviously the brand new Auto-mow fitted with all the sort of advanced features like grass vapouriser that he could only dream about.  But he had no time to marvel as Mr. Smith was unlocking the padlock on the little wooden shed swathed in a strange orange passion-flower. 

“I think this is what you’ve come to see.”  He said and stood aside to let Jimmy and his father peer inside.  On the bench was a strange looking device made up of coils and valves and oddly coloured sheets of perspex.  At one end was a sort of coppery nozzle pointing out the window.

“I’m not sure..... what...”  stammered Jimmy’s father.

“Come, come.  I’m sure someone of your technical ability can recognise a ring-field-oscillation bridge.”

“Oh yes, of course... it’s just that...”

“Quite, quite.”  Tommy’s father was using the stem of his pipe to point to features of the machine.  “What you won’t recognise is the way I’ve configured this thermionic snapple  gate.  Or this condenser valve rack.”   He depressed a few switches and the machine began to whirr and hum.  Rows of light began to twinkle.

“Er. What exactly....?”

“The government has asked me to come up with some new devices to help us combat some dissident forces that are at work.”

“I didn’t think there were any dissident forces.  Not since 2000 and the universal peace and harmony treaty.”

“Well, no.  You’re right.  Not dissident forces, as such.  I’m using old language.  Can’t help it sometimes.  I meant of course, that there are one or two unhappy individuals...  Yes, unhappy, that’s the word...  Who could be helped... with a machine like this.”

“Helped?  In what way?”

“To become less unhappy.   Yes, to become happier altogether.”  Tommy’s father was trying to light his pipe from a bunsen burner.  “like the rest of us.”

“And how does this machine do that?”

“It affects the emotional centres of the brain.  I’ve had some spectacular results.  Of course we wouldn’t want to harm anybody. I was callibrating it this afternoon.  It uses rays.”

“What sort of rays?

“Green ones.”

“Ah yes, green rays.   I can see how that would work.”  And in a flash of inspiration: “And Jimmy and Tommy....”

“Were playing just outside the shed .”

“You were experimenting on our children?”

“Not at all.  Not at all.   I had the window open to let my pipesmoke out.  But you must admit that it works. I just had the field polarity reversed so that instead of making them happy, it made them terribly terrible sad.”

“More to the point, is there any way the effects can be reversed?”

“Of course.  If Jimmy just stands over here, I can give him a good dose of the green rays now that they are properly sequenced.  It’s quite safe now – I tested it on Tommy a little while ago.”

“He’s in bed recovering.”  Breathed Mrs Smith right into Jimmy’s father’s ear.

And in a little while they were all back in the house shaking hands.  Jimmy was beaming  broadly again.

“Of course, you’ll keep this all to yourself, won’t you, Old man?  Until the government announces the good news.”

“Yes of course.  I’m just glad to have Jimmy back to normal.”

“I’m hoping that the government will release it for general use.”  Mrs Smith was speaking in that breathless way of hers that so unnerved Jimmy’s father.  “There are still so many emotional hangups that could be cured.   Even after 2000.”

“Are there?  I doubt it.”  Said Jimmy’s father running his finger round his collar.  “At least, not in a street like ours.” as he sidled to the door.   And they all laughed for some reason.

Cyber Attack

“There’s something big building just across the channel”
Shall I call out the crews?
“No, not yet. Let’s see if we can guess what they’re going for. Where we should deploy to best effect.” The Wing Commander strains to understand what she is seeing on the screens.
“What do you think? Power stations? Railway network? Water?” The young Flight Lieutenant’s voice quavers in anticipation.
“Oh my God.” The Wing Commander’s fingers tighten on the console edge.
“What? “
“This is big. Could be the whole damn lot. Yes. Scramble all units. Get them all on line now.”
The Flight Lieutenant picks up the phone. “All units. All units scramble.”
One by one screens flicker and faces appear.
“Another one? Already” “ I’d barely dropped off” “How long can they keep this up?” Theweariness in the girls’ voices comes across the speakers.
“This looks big. Better get on station.” The Wing Commander’s voice is firm. Reassuring.
The girls are shrugging off dressing gowns, yawning. Rubbing sleep from their eyes. But already they’re running their fingers across their fighting screens. Calling up defences, setting target sights. Settling down for the long haul

“Here it comes. First wave. Stand by”
Now the girls are working their screens. In their individual command stations situated in bunkers deep underground in strategic points across the country. Fingers crawling here, now there. Stabbing and flicking. Hands brushing off the invaders like flies. Shooing away the danger.
“Look out Monica. Coming at you”
“Behind you, Sandra.”
“Theresa. Snap to it or you’ll be out of it in two minutes.”
Lips are bitten. Cheeks chewed.
Digital tracer streams off into the ether. The staccato burts of code chatter with increasing intensity. And the voices of the girls die away as deep concentration takes over.
The hands on the screens work more urgently. This attack is not going away.
“Another wave coming in, Girls” mutters the Wing Commander under her breath. There’s no time or need for instructions or warnings from her. This is where training and experience count. And not a little luck.
“This is worse than anything we’ve seen so far” whispers the Flight Lieutenant. “How many have we got in reserve?”
“None. They’re all on line. All engaging with the enemy.”
“I’m having trouble here” says Monica in an undertone.
Their voices are all subdued. Barely rising above whispers but there is real tension and sweat begins to form on upper lips.
It is Monica’s voice that rises above the rest.
“I can’t....”
“Sorry Monica, I’m shutting you down. You’re hit.”
“I’m baling out.”
“Too late. You’ve left it too late. It’s a complete shut down.”
Monica’s eyes register a brief moment of horror before her screen goes dead.
The Wing Commander’s fingers rest unsteadily on the button
The Flight Lieutenant turns: “Did you have to,,,?”
For a second, the Flight Lieutenant gazes into the deep well of loneliness that surrounds the business of being an officer in wartime and turns smartly back to her job.
“OK crews. It’s clearing now. You’ve seen them off. You may shut down.”
One by one the girls rise from their screens, wrap their dressing gowns round them and click terminals to standby.
The Flight Lieutenant turns back. “Pilot Officer Monica.... what will happen to her?”
“You’re green, aren’t you?”
“I know I’m Straight out of training college but did you have to...”.
“Of course i did and I’ll do it to anyone else too, And so must you too if you’re in my position.”
The Flight Lieutenant gulps.
“And the training manual will have told you. Complete isolation in her bunker. “
“I know what the book says but what does it actually mean? Complete electromagnetic shielding?”
“It means that there must be absolutely no chance of the worm getting out by inadvertant radio or other transmission. The bunker is sealed. Complete lock down. Absolutely no human contact for the same reason. Continual sweeping for a fortnight. Of course, the best remedy is time. Leave it long anough and any worm will cease to have impact. It should be six months....”
“Six months... in solitary confinement?”
“In effect, yes. But this is war. We are under continual daily attack so we can’t allow anything like that length of time. Weeks perhaps but not months.”
“Even so.... She could go mad. Isolated for that length of time. And won’t she starve?”
We ask them to do a hell of a job. To take big risks and, for some, they have to pay a big price. But the crews are all selected because they’re resourceful and quick thinking. That’s why we only use women on the front line. She should have made sure she stocked up with food and drink. It’s the aircrews own responsibility. And If she hasn’t, if she forgot, it’s too late now.”
There is a long silence in the ops room.
“But If we do our job properly. All of us. Nonone will know what we have done and probably not care either. If we can get through this without the national grid going off line, without all the machinery in the national health service going off line. If we can keep water and sewerage pumping and food arriving at the supermarkets, then that will be a reward in itself. And the odd casualty will go unnoticed.”