

Three Cheers For Base

By

Theodore Halliday

SMASHWORDS EDITION

PUBLISHED BY:

Anybook Ltd on Smashwords

Three Cheers For Base

Copyright © 2012 by Anybook Ltd

This is I'm sure, as good a place as any to thank my sister Melanie for her cheerful cover design, to thank Simon for arranging it just so, and to give Peter three cheers for doing a sterling job in the editing and proofing department.
Duck's Bill

Though somewhat blurry, the shape of a duck's bill could easily be made out, gleaming through the hazy morning sunlight.

He stared at it for a moment, and then let his gaze shift up to its eyes.

They stared back coldly.

Drade squinted as he beheld bill and eyes on the handle of the Victorian backscratcher hanging on the wall in his bedroom.

"Why the grin?" he mused.

Of course, as an educated man, Drade didn't need to be told that the 'grin' had more to do with the inflexible and broadly ossified nature of the duck's bill than with any mirth the bird might be feeling or, for that matter, any quiet confidence he might have been expressing whilst facing down a hunter armed with an eagerly triggered twelve bore. But therein lay the whimsical and sometimes fiendish beauty of the limitless mind of Hamish de Buckton Drade; for whilst he knew of all of this, and much more besides, it would certainly appear to the casual observer, made acquainted with Drade's train of thought, that he knew precisely none of this, and that the extent of these besides be open to doubt or at the very least be unhelpful in the general course of affairs.

Drade continued to study duck. He had not got to where he was by simply asking the right questions. Far from it. As far as he was concerned the very mark of a man was to have that rare ability to ask the right questions and then to answer them. Thus - though it might take an age to do it – find the answer to this puzzler he would. And he would approach the matter logically, which was the other mark of a man. No point getting emotional. One had to be judicious, but not - repeat not - judgemental. So in this case:

'Why the grin? Well, clearly that was some kind of a bonal disorder with which all ducks were afflicted. Simple,' reflected Drade, 'no great challenge. Case closed. And,' he thought, briefly reopening the case, 'If one wanted proof, careful observation of one duck squabbling with another over, say, the rights to a third, would reveal that, whilst the language used was invariably heated (obvious even if one didn't know duck) and might have been accompanied by some jostling, nonetheless the lines of the participants' bills changed not a jot. QED.'

Drade twisted around in his bed to face the source of his considerations more fully. His silent partner continued to stare back, blissfully unaware that he had taken part in a joust which, though he may not have lost, the other party had certainly won. Drade, for his part, luxuriated in the knowledge that, whilst he had certainly won, the other party had most assuredly lost, and as he was in the throes of rewarding himself with a few minutes snoozing, another question crept into his inquisitive mind:

'Why the duck? Why, of all things was the handle of the backscratcher shaped like a duck?' A duck would have been the last animal he would have drafted in to sort out an inaccessible itch, and with its soft plumes and pallet-like bill there was a distinct danger that its intervention might actually make the situation worse. A woodpecker would have been better, or perhaps a rat, or burrowing-scratching animal of some kind...

Drade's inestimable intellect toyed with the matter for some moments more, but he decided at length that this was one question too many; one should not, as it were, overcook the duck. For Drade was a just man, as well as clever, and in the Creator's choice of handle-dressing he sensed the Artist's desire to perplex and to riddle. A puzzler this was meant to be, and a puzzler it should thus remain.

In any case, Drade was just waking and found himself enveloped by a light fug. At that most gentle and considerate of time of day such nuts, if indeed they needed to be cracked, needed not to be cracked then.

'Gaol-time was there for these problems,' he reflected.

By Gaol-time, Drade did not mean time spent in a dungeon, full of regret, with hairy arms clutching at bars and stubbly face glowering down upon the free world. Indeed not. For Drade Gaol meant those times which seemed to last forever, when one is caught in conversation, pinned down by someone enormously dull yet oddly difficult to detach oneself from. And although Drade was sympathetic to the warders' right to be heard, he was a clever man as well as just, and try as he might to focus even for a moment on whatever they were saying, he invariably found his mind wandering hither and thither amongst musings more interesting.

The warders did have one saving grace, however, which was that they did not seem to care whether or not one agreed or disagreed with them or even whether they were fully understood; what was important was that someone be there to receive their outpourings. Usually they were appeased with the occasional yes or no or perhaps a really?, or for those extreme cases, when one's mind wandered so far from the other's meandering trail that to find one's way back would have taken a legion of beagles and beaters enough to wake the dead, Drade found that a coordinated head and shoulder movement coupled with a sympathetic sigh hit the mark and educed a knowing look or a slight pause from his keeper.

Even though he had become an expert in dealing with the soliloquist rampant, still a sure method of avoiding entanglement in the first place eluded him. Often, as he made his escapes, he wondered whether there might be some tiny clue, some inkling, a pointer which ought to have alerted him to give that type of fellow a wide berth in the first place: a hopeful glint in their eyes towards people who appeared to be running low on conversation, the whisper of a smile in one's direction for no reason, a tripping on a shoelace or a small spilling of a drink, followed by an enormous (though unmerited) gwafour serving as an icebreaker of such naïve innocence that it were impossible to turn away. '...and suddenly boom!, you were impaled by someone who was so sincere about ...Oh something, whatever, who cares...'

Drade rested his great mind a few moments more before opening his eyes again.

Being a Tuesday morning of no special importance, this ability simply to wake up later was a luxury afforded to few. But Drade's circumstances were such that he had really never had need to muck in with the common herd, till the fields, or even toe the line. He had always felt that this had given him great independence of thought: the rare ability to see things another - and usually a better - way. Of course, being part of the leisured classes, he had never been called upon to put his ability to work; but, as he frequently assured himself, if ever he were, he would shine like a new pair of shoes. In the matters of the common herd and the tilling of the fields he would immediately have suggested acquiring some sort of tractor or mechanised device; and as for toeing the line, might he suggest towing it?

The sun had moved a little round his room and its piercing shards were beginning to cut into the darkness of the headboard. Drade knew the moment to arise was approaching and began to martial his thoughts that he might dispose of the day's challenges.

This was a trick he had picked up at school, and it had served him well. His geography master, an old trooper himself, lived by the golden rule of three: Evaluate, Revaluate and Pounce. Thus, one would Evaluate a day, considering all that it might bring; one would Revaluate it, to make sure that nothing had been omitted; and then one would jump out of bed and, as it were, Pounce upon it.

'So simple,' reflected Drade as he strode into the bathroom and flicked the shower tap to full. The cold water shot out of the shower-head and into the enamel bathtub below.

'If only there was a way of passing on these gems of wisdom to the general populous without seeming overbearing.'

He sighed and tested the water with his hand. It was cold – very cold. He coaxed the lever some way into the red, hung his dressing gown upon its hook and, sensing that the boiler had not yet got up to speed, and turned towards the mirror.

'Not billy bad,' he murmured, eyeing himself up. Good hairline, well proportioned ears, nicely pointed eyebrows over piercing blue eyes, balanced by generous lips and determined jaw. A trustworthy face, he decided, handsome but with just enough harshness in it to put off undesirable advances:

'Not bad at all!'

The only complaint he might have had was that he looked rather similar the day before, and whilst that in itself was not a problem, Drade liked the element of surprise.

'Surprise is to Hamish, as a good water repellent coat is to a submarine,' Drade had said once to one of his young cousins. 'Very important,' he had added, lest there be any doubt.

He remembered how surprised he had been to learn that the Chelsea Physic Garden was simply a herb garden and not some kind of gymnasium; or that the British Legion was utterly different to the Foreign Legion. In common with the best sorts of people, he preferred surprises which surprised pleasantly, like discovering that there was an extra pint of milk in the fridge rather than discovering that Father Christmas did not in fact exist (which, at the time, had been a bit of a blow).

He stood under the shower and had just begun to apply his favourite eau-de-cologne-scented soap when the telephone rang. He ignored it. He knew this trap: he would stagger out of the bathroom, drenching the floor and towel with a soapy mixture only for the ringing to stop the moment he reached the.

'If it's important, they'll ring back,' he thought and continued to lather himself.

The telephone did continue its ringing, but though Drade paused momentarily, he did not rise to the bait. In fact, the more the telephone rang, the more deliberate the ease became with which Drade went about his business, until, that is, he could bear it no longer, and, swaddled in a soggy towel he stumbled out of the bathroom and lunged at the source of his distress.

It stopped chirruping the instant he laid a hand upon it.

'Bugger,' thought Drade, who turned and began to waddle back towards the bathroom.

The telephone rang again and Drade grabbed it. It was Belter calling a meeting at Base for late lunch and possible early supper.

Drade had known Belter almost all his life, having been deposited at the same out-of-town school at the tender age of four by parents stuck out in some ex-colony or other. On his first day, when Drade had closed his newly occupied locker, Belter had appeared, standing on the other side. Belter had been observing the newbie for some moments, trying to work out if he be friend or foe. Drade had jumped back at the sight of Belter's physical proximity, ruddy face and podgy features; immediately Belter had known this one to be a friend. Drade had, on the other hand, not been so speedily convinced and, in fact, it took three rescues from the most perilous situations and a great deal of help with his prep finally to win him over. Then, until the age of nineteen, the two were almost inseparable. After school they had parted ways, with Belter going to the Reading to study Law and Drade going to Durham to read history. They had kept in touch of course, and had many mutual friends and the like, but almost ten years had passed until they saw one another.

'Oh, but he was a smart one, that Belter,' thought Drade, with a rueful smile, as if he had somehow been cheated out of the smartness gene by a bad hand of cards.

'First, he gets himself a law degree and then gets nicely ensconced with a good firm of lawyers.'

Unluckily for Belter, at that point his stepfather – to whom he had been much attached - died of a heart attack. The man had made the same series of mistakes as Belter's real father had, in first marrying his mother and then turning to drink in order to cope with her. He too had died young of a broken heart. And for the second time in a generation Belter had inherited a huge pile of money, decided to give up the lawyer's life and instead to lead the life of general bon viveur, with a little armchair investing on the side.

Swaddled in towelling, his bare feet caressed by the course strands of an Afghan, Drade gazed thoughtfully out of the sitting room window of his Cadogan apartment. Living on the seventh floor, he could just peak over the roofs of the buildings opposite and in the distance make out Victoria Station, Big Ben and the London Eye. The apartment itself was on a corner of a much larger mansion, so if he chose to look out of the other window, he would have been able to make out The Albert Memorial, The Trellick Tower and the new Wembley Stadium up there on the hills overlooking London. Drade rarely choose to do this, however, the path to the other window being almost always blocked by boxes of books and papers left to him by his maternal grandfather – a professor of Biology at a college just down the road – which for the last ten years, at least, Drade had been telling himself he was 'going through'.

Unfortunately, 'going through' had generally consisted of his picking out the first item that was to hand and whisking through it. If it did not interest him – and it usually did not – it would be put to one side until a final determination as to its future might be made at some point. If it did, he might read a few lines or paragraphs, before he drifting away away into something perhaps vaguely connected, but, in fact, not really connected at all. A few days earlier, for example, he had come across an article his grandfather had found interesting about the stagnation of the Thames at Henley due to pollution. Drade had got as far as page two when he had started to imagine how bizarre it would be to hold The Regatta in stagnant waters; he had pictured two stranded boats filled with rowers, scooping great oar-fulls of sludge in their wake, which was only a notional wake of course, as they were not actually moving. Very quickly his rowers would find themselves perched upon oar-high pillars of mud in the middle of the Henley Marsh and they would need stilts to get to terra firma. So the boat race would become the stilt race and the rowers would no longer need to be tall, muscular types with square jaws, but instead small, lithe fellows who were good at balancing. Which would mean that Oxford and Cambridge would no longer be filled with lanky, romantic intellectuals, but small, cunning circus-types, who would then go on to work for the BBC to schedule programmes about fighting dirty and trampish survival skills, instead of documentaries about obscure Ottoman artists or nasty popes. So the peoples of Britain would become versed in devious tricks rather than the higher things in life. And that would surely never happen and so it was that the books never moved and Drade rarely got to see the view out of the other window.

Having found himself a new dry towel, Drade patted himself down, warpped the towel around his waist, and strolled into his bedroom closet. He had not had a chance to assess the weather, but he did recall an impression of sunlight earlier on. On the other hand, with it being spring and the weather so changeable...

'Better not risk it,' he thought, as he picked up a simple pair of chinos and a tattersall shirt and turned his great mind to more practical matters.

Being leisured, Drade did not divide time into weeks, months or years, but rather into seasons, and he did not therefore keep a calendar as such but rather organised his life around three lists. The first list contained his formals, so called on account of the good form shown by one's attendance. They were usually annual or seasonal family gatherings held in different parts of the country to celebrate some achievement or to commemorate an anniversary or some such. This summer, for example, cousin Claire would be celebrating her graduation and this was a formal as indicated by its being held in the family home just outside Bristol, so Drade would attend. He himself had no siblings, probably because both his parents – themselves first cousins – had had an extraordinary number of them, and thus did he have abundance of relatives of all persuasions. Added to which, through the sanity of intermarriage, there were some of more than one persuasion. And not to mention, through the fallibility of human nature, a few of no persuasion at all. Uncles and Aunts, as cannons of the clan, held this loose confederation together and tendered the forked whip of guilt and fear liberally upon anyone impertinent enough to forget a formal, or worse still disrespect it by offering a poor excuse for non-attendance. That being said, it was generally reckoned that one could miss a formal on account of something unexpected, which in Drade's case was the name of his second list.

Events on his unexpecteds list were, as its name suggested, events which could not reasonably be foreseen: untimely deaths, sudden marriages, windfalls, bankruptcies, and the like. A precision was applied to the interpretation of the word unexpected which would have surprised one not familiar with Drade's social circle. For an event to be unexpected it needed to be a bolt from an at least bluish sky. The death of aunt Helena at a 103, after a long illness, could not by any stretch of the imagination be described as unexpected. However, excluding her son from her will was unexpected, and thus the marriage of her grandson had to be unexpectedly called off, which meant that he got a pass from going to an autumn formal held by his uncle Harry, ostensibly to kick off the hunting season, but really to celebrate his nephew's wedding.

'Unexpecteds really are the spice of life,' mused Drade, smoothing down the placket around his shirt's top button, 'a bit like surprises.' In fact, now that he came to think about it, he could not really imagine a surprise not being unexpected, or for that matter, something unexpected not being a surprise. Perhaps he should change the name of his unexpecteds list to his surprises list. Certainly something to dwell upon, or at least to put to the top of his mundanes list.

On the mundanes list were all those little bureaucratic trivialities such as paying bills, having a check-up, grocery shopping, calling in a tradesman and, it seemed, list-naming. These were the things which he really needed someone else to organise for him, if only he had more of them to do. But alas, on account of the way his life was structured, this list tended to be rather short. Most of his shopping, washing, ironing and housework were attended to by his cleaning lady Olive. The condominium company looked after the building in which he lived, and his finances and affairs of a legal nature were left squarely in the hands of his accountants and lawyers. So for Drade, public holidays, festivals and TGIFs were the sorts of irrelevancy which only the non-leisured needed to worry about.

Not that Drade would ever have described himself as 'leisured'. The very idea! As far as Drade was concerned, the lists 'a'solutely' dominated his life and stretched out like the endless trans-Siberian whatchamacallit, offering no pause for a fellow to catch his breath, and continually replenishing themselves. With the mundanes list, for example, as soon as one had had, say, a hair-cut, the clock was reset, the countdown started again, and the list grew no shorter. The same thing happened with bills.

'One should be allowed to pay his bills every ten years,' thought Drade, 'and there ought to be one central place where one pays them, a sort of bills office where one goes once a decade, hands the dosh over some trusted official who then goes about distributing it to all who are owed - obvious really.'

Drade was astonished at how the simplest solutions sometimes evaded discovery by the cleverest of people. Of course, it would not work with all mundane; check-ups and the like had to be done regularly, otherwise there would be no point in doing them. No point going to Dentist only to find that, if you had come nine years earlier, all would have been well; whereas because you did not, a tooth or two would need to be extracted.

'Definitely not,' thought Drade, 'a line between mundanes that could be done on a regular basis and those that could be bunched together needed to be drawn up. Perhaps even new sub-lists containing, say, monthly, annual, and things-that-need-to-be-done-once-every-few-years.'

Drade wondered how such sub-lists would affect the formals; for not only did they invariably repeat themselves, but one tended to spawn another. Two years earlier, for example, cousin Havery's long-time girlfriend had keeled over and died from an embolism at her parents a forty-year wedding anniversary. The funeral was well attended, as one might imagine, and it was there that Drade met members of the Yorkshire branch of the family, of whom he had heard much, but with whom he had had little to do. Not that there was anything amiss about them, he had always assured himself, but he had always felt that the YB were happiest lurking in the shadier parts of the family tree. A friendly bunch notwithstanding, they had immediately invited him to a curious local dinner affair which had a name he could not remember, up in a place called Driffield or Draffield or Drateeled or thereabouts, and to which it seemed everyone and anybody within at least a hundred mile radius had been invited, and all of whom were, he had been assured, the closest of blood relatives.

On that occasion he had naturally exhibited a form most excellent (as he did on every occasion), arriving at Bortery Watch at precisely the allotted time and in exactly the correct attire. Drade had shunted his Volvo into a sort of cedar-covered cove, its wheels accommodating themselves well amidst its exposed roots. He had alighted absolutely, the man about town, out of town, and yet with something of the country about him. With a neat flick of his wrist he had flipped the car door back into its rightful place, and casually cradling a present from London City in his left arm, he turned with certain expectancy towards the house only to find it unlit, silent and quite obviously abandoned. He had paused and taken stock of the situation in that very measured way which was his habit, before tentatively padding towards the front door at the end of a cavernous porch much overrun with ivies and other creeping greeneries. The bell had clanged urgently but nothing had stirred from within, and it was at this point, his eyes having become accustomed to the darkness, that he had noticed the front door was ajar. He had paused and weighed up the idea of simply going in yahoo style – which he felt sure would be readily forgiven, as he had after all tried the doorbell and he was a blood relative, not to mention someone known far and wide for his good form – when he had become aware of a deep, bellowing, growling roar seeming to emanate from outside, under the ground, and round the back of the building.

The groaning and grunting had grown as had he circled the house, and Drade then had spied flame-light and flickering shadows sparring together some fifty yards or so into a small nearby wood. He had advanced towards them, not knowing what to expect, when at once the land beneath his feet had seemed to fall away into a hidden hollow, in which was set a folly of granite crowded with people at a long narrow oaken table. Drade's senses had been flooded by the glow of a thousand candles, the scents of cookings and roastings which had gusted towards him, the din and clatter of eatings, and chatter which had bombarded his ears and the warmth of innumerable handshakes and embraces as he had been tugged and pushed and pressed and prodded towards the centre of the swarming multitude.

'A rum lot indeed,' reflected Drade, as he had extracted himself from the rugged embrace of a fellow guest who, the moment of his arrival, had singled him out as the very best of fellows. And there had been many others, who likewise, had appeared to know him intimately and at the same time had been all perfect strangers to him.

The atmosphere round the table had been raucous that night and Drade had recalled feeling exceedingly self-conscious, being the only person who did not literally wash his food down with gallons of some local brew, to which all had seemed very much attached. The feasting en masse had been accompanied by much belching and self-excusing, singing and laughing, shouting and argument, and some tears too, and after many hours the throng had given way, as these things do, to a small cluster of hardened drinkers discussing matters of only mild importance in the gravest of manners. It had been at this time, that the patriarch of the group – a certain Donald Ramsey Drade – had lent over in Hamish's direction and started to refill his glass with whisky by way of introduction.

He had been a large man with a big white beard, a fine mane of white hair, swept back and which, as a result of some unsuccessful dabbling with hair dye, had had the slightest tint of blue at the edges. He had had a curious double aspect to his face on account of a childhood accident which had robbed him of his sight in one eye and contorted that side of his face with deep red scars.

'I knew your father,' he had begun in a deep gravelly voice, appraising Drade with his good eye.

Ramsey Drade had turned away to find a clean glass, after managing to drop his original one, and, being a man of a certain size, had found himself ill-disposed to grub around under the table to find it.

'That's right,' Drade had said. 'Yes, he was your cousin, wasn't he?'

Janus, had spun round to refocus his attentions upon the youngster. 'Your mother was my cousin,' he had said.

'They both were, weren't they?' Drade had said hesitantly.

'We didn't get on' had said Ramsey Drade, 'but he wasn't all bad - at least that's what people said.'

Ramsey Drade had reached into his mouth and quite deliberately adjusted his denture.

'But I have to say, I found him somewhat ill-mannered, especially were woman were concerned, What?'

Drade had not especially agreed, but had nodded anyway and swilled the whisky around the bottom of his glass thoughtfully.

'Ah, the formals...' Drade refocused his attentions to the present and upon his attire.

As he finished tightening the Windsor knot in his tie, he glanced at the reflection in the mirror of the duck's bill backscratcher hanging on the wall behind him.

'Funny, how he had decided to hang the backscratcher on the wall, whereas the two paintings he had acquired at an exhibition held by a friend of a friend had lain on the floor, propped up against a chest of draws for almost four years.'

He wondered why this was and glanced round the room. The traditional place for a painting was of course above the mantelpiece, but he already had one there – an oil painting of a hunting scene. His bedroom had three doors: one into the closet, one to his bathroom, and the third which lead into a corridor. These occupied a great deal of wall space. And because he disliked having anything above the headboard, in case it should fall during the night, the only real spaces left were a small one to the left of the closet door – which would look a bit odd – and the space where the backscratcher was.

'Well, that's that, I suppose,' thought Drade. 'On the other hand, why bother to have a back scratcher on the wall at all? Why had he decided to put it there?' It was just a functional item, after all, like a pair of nail clippers or a shoe horn; and whilst there was definitely something decorative about its handle, it was otherwise rather bland and to the fleeting eye, might easily be mistaken for a riding crop or something similar. On the other hand again, he had noticed that people frequently hung the most mundane of items in the oddest of places, like plates or knives, and a few weeks ago, he had even caught sight of a rather ordinary looking tea bag strung up in someone's entrance hall. Very odd – a teabag – he could have understood if he had found it in the kitchen, perhaps impaled on an old nail, as a result of being flung upwards by a tea drinker with burnt fingers – but in the hallway? On the other hand again (again) one should never underestimate the importance of the unexpected; for all he knew it might have been a famous teabag, an aristocrat perhaps, whose ancestors had been called upon to represent the general class of tea. Then again, perhaps it was an ordinary working class bag, being cured, like a ham, and quite innocent of finger burning.'

These considerations occupied Drade's great mind for a while longer, as he put the finishing touches to his appearance, such that, by the time he felt himself complete, he had weighed up so many different hands that it was a wonder he had come to any resolution at all. And yet, somehow, through it all, doubtless guided by pillars of fire and wondrous signs, decide he did.

Secure in the knowledge that he had considered the matter from all angles, he approached the article. Then he paused. Had he really considered all possible hands? He half reached towards it as if intending to dismount it, but paused again. What about the hidden hands one reads so much about? After all, in a sense, this backscratcher was an historical artefact, a remnant of an age when people had time to scratch their backs, and thanks to this ingenious device, the means. Thinking the better of it, he turned and went into the hall, glancing down at the two paintings as he left.

'They are a little garish for a bedroom,' he thought. 'Perhaps they would be better in the kitchen.'

This was not a simple throwaway judgement. It was one made from the very highest point; for of all defining qualities which a man possessed, taste was absolutely the thing which, for Drade, set one man apart from another. To Drade, more than anything else, it determined what one did, where one lived, how one dressed, with whom one mixed, where one went, what one ate, drank, read, listened to and ignored. More than wealth, titles, education, manners, brains, and all the rest, taste was the very litmus of a man. And like a litmus, as far as Drade was concerned, one either had it or one did not and if one did not,

'Well too jolly bad, sorry old chum. That's life.'

Taste could not be taught, picked up at school like a nursery rhyme, or learnt later in life as one would learn the names of all the capital cities of the world. Rather was it a birth mark, something one was born with like a lazy eye or unusually small feet; one might ignore it, overrule it, curse it or deny it, and yet was it always there, cheek by jowl upon a person.

One might see lying on a park bench a vagrant, someone of no fixed abode, of little learning and no chattels, unshaven, unshorn, unloved, wrapped in the filthiest mixture of rags which could be clad upon a person, and yet might he sport shoes so shiny, fine and elegant that they would grace any Jermyn Street shoe shop.

Drade had once spied a wild pig on his uncle's farm in Northumberland. The poor fellow had somehow lost the use of one of his back legs and lacked a lug. Yet as he hobbled along, Drade could not help but notice a certain dignity in his gait, as though the pig were deliberating over every step and assaying the terroir; and whereas his peers would snout their way through anything their path, old Hopper would delicately peck at this and that, seeming to hold back for just an instant each time. The pig had looked up at that moment, perhaps startled by the sight of two young hunters huddled behind a bush, sensing perhaps the presence of a kindred spirit. And in that space Drade saw the majesty that only Taste could bestow and placed a trotter gently upon the barrel of his cousin's gun, sparing Hopper's life.

It was Taste that made this possible. Intangible, un-buyable, indefinable and, ephemeral 'Taste'; and Drade thanked the Good Lord Above for endowing him with it in such abundance.

He plucked a light jacket from behind the door, picked up his bicycle clips and left, forgetting all about the paintings for another day.

Base

It was one of those lazy spring days in Sloane Square. Having chased the morning mists away, the sun beamed down cheerfully through the new leaves of the trees, bringing with it just a touch of warmth and a hint of the promise of the summer to come. People opened their windows wide in their red bricked tenements, welcoming in the new airs and beating out the dusts of their houses. They gazed down on black cabs and red buses, pigeons, Chelsea Pensioners and London life, or perhaps bronzed themselves a little, or read a newspaper, or exchanged a tentative word or two with neighbours quietly, reservedly, in that very English way. It was a day when nobody seemed to be in a rush to do anything in particular or to be anywhere especially. There was none of the usual bickering between hurried pedestrians and racing motorists, dumb struck tourists and duty bound shop workers. There were no queues in the cafes or at the newsstands. And for once, it was possible to stroll in leisure on pavements without the risk of being shoved off by gangs of boisterous youths or child-carting mothers five abreast. There was no pressure from pairs of smartly turned out salesman clipping along behind one, to get a move on, nor the frustration at the dawdling slowness of a pair of verbose pensioners in front of one, who keep on stopping for one another. Fashionistas had time to peer into expensive shop windows at stylish bangles and rings, watches and necklaces, squinting so hard in their efforts to make out the cunningly obscured prices that they well-nigh did themselves an injury; they had time to be lured in and parleyed with by someone so very genteel and clearly up at heel and with whom they would feign complete indifference to the price, being interested only in the look; they had time to compare, time to picture, time to talk, time even to buy from time to time. Friends had space to coffee together \- finally, to talk a little too loudly, to make expansive gestures and in leisure, smoke in and breathe out from cigars and cigarettes and tobaccos of all kinds without some self-righteous, puritanical non-smoker spluttering protests out over the rumble of a passing bus and through a cloud of thick exhaust fumes. Beautiful people could strut and preen about and perform that 'accidentally-here' look they had so practised in their bedsits in South London, while other expensive-looking types flitted discretely from home to shop to shop and back to home: butterflies of every hue, trying here, buying there and quick away before the sun goes in. Youngsters in love, oldsters in habit, singles a-looking, and all those shades of people in between, a-mingling with the greatest of ease.

Drade made his way through it all with some speed. He had never been a great athlete, but during these last few years in London he had increasingly turned to his bicycle and, given a decent stretch of road, he could get up quite a head of speed. He knew these roads well and darted gaily between the King's Road and the little passageways on either side. In and out he flew, the Chelsea Barracks on his left, on towards Cheyne, then back towards the town hall, past the bluebird on his right, through the World's End Estate, across the double zebra crossing here and there and into Lots Road.

The Base Clef or rather The Clef side of it, is a subterranean jazz bistro affair that lies between World's End and Putney Bridge. It is one of those places you only find out about when you end up getting dragged there at the end of a raucous night by some guys you barely know but who know someone you do, who perhaps you'd rather forget. At such time, it lacks the grit of a real jazz bar, the music is tame and the food domestic, so instead it serves as a late night drinking hole for those unable, unwilling or frankly too shagged out, to go to a real club.

The nightclub is in fact located amongst the rambling cellars of a large imposing Georgian house, in which a private club misleadingly called Base, or 'The Base' for the uninitiated, is situated. Founded almost two hundred years ago, in part as a suburban retreat for wealthy men to take their mistresses, it now boasts a small library and a couple of reading rooms on the ground floor, a large first floor bar and restaurant which has an uninterrupted view over the Thames, and six nice bedrooms on the third floor. Staff accommodation is to be found at the top of the building. From the road it might appear to be the house of a well-to-do doctor or some such, surrounded by high red-brick walls in which a large well-cared-for garden could be glimpsed. There are naturally no signs advertising the presence of Base (or, for that matter, The Clef below) and the garden gate is almost always kept closed and locked. The only other access point is via a rickety old wooden door in the outer wall, hidden-away to the side of the building. This is never locked, and so unexpected it is never sought, out and, when opened, one enters a large vine-covered courtyard from where the building proper can be accessed.

Thus there is nothing to stop the curious passer-by from wandering into the club and getting himself a meal, though it never had and probably never would occur to anybody to do so.

There was no parking, as most of the members lived very locally and walked or used bicycles (or perhaps buses) to get there.

Drade had never been into The Clef, but had frequented Base since his mid-twenties, assuming the membership from his uncle George, who used to use it as a place away from his Place in The Boltons. George had worked for a while for his own father's maritime brokerage, had married extremely well, and spent the last fifty years of his life shuffling between his house in Chelsea, his barge in the Harbour, and his club. He ate rarely, smoked mild Dutch cigars, drank black coffee during the day and Islay whisky at night, and lived to be 94, dying in the library, with a still smoking cigar clamped between his fingers. It was he who, in addition to the membership, had left Drade the duck's bill backscratcher.

Base was a club in its most traditional sense, which is to say, not strictly speaking, a club at all. Firstly, it did not welcome new members; rather membership was passed on from one generation to another and only very rarely was new blood admitted. Secondly, Base was not a clubhouse but a private dwelling, sustained by a discretionary trust, which owned a number of properties in the Chelsea area and was run by a live-in staff headed up by a 'Governor' appointed or reappointed annually by the members. Thirdly, its members were not really members but Trustees and referred to one another as 'residents'; and the club itself had no direct employees, as all the staff who worked there were contractors. There were no club accounts, and never had been; the Trustees had all known one another pretty much since birth and were, in any case, closely connected. There was no constitution, merely a set of 'understandings' which may or may not have been written down at some point, but nobody really knew for sure. The Trustees themselves were all men over the age of 25, and if one happened to inherit a residency before that age, one had to wait until the age of 25 before being appointed a Trustee.

And if you happened to be a woman, or at any rate not a man, well, there was no legal bar – but the fact remained that a woman could be neither a Trustees nor a resident, and although there was nothing to prevent a woman from being invited as a guest, woman tended to keep their distance, Base's boyish charms being generally not to their tastes.

'Base is to women and young men as the Woman's Institute is to men and young women,' joked one resident.

Being a club which was not really a club, or rather not being a club but posing as one, did lend Base many advantages. For a start, it was exempt from almost all the petty and unnecessary battery of legislation which had been introduced to regulate society since Britain's law-makers became infected by the continental obsession with codification. There were no useless fire doors, ugly signage, or adherence to building regulations which would have turned an otherwise beautiful abode into something that looked like some charity hospital or a clinic in long-forgotten Bangladesh. Being a private house, there were no mysterious rules about whether one could drink alcohol, or when one could drink it, how strong it had to be and how it should be measured; neither were there similar prohibitions on gambling or gaming or smoking or playing music for that matter, and frankly doing all the things that make a life Life and not some dreary obstacle course one had to complete before shuffling along. That whole lawyers' banquet of anti-discriminatory laws pushed upon the free Brit by those awful odd-dogging types was left at the old green door at the front of the building, as in truth they served no purpose anywhere other than to complicate the lives of the many and victimize the lives of the few.

The Trustees knew and respected one another and did not need to be forced on pain of imprisonment to do something obvious.

'Would I dream of smoking in front of somebody who didn't smoke themselves?' asked Rufus of Drade one evening out on the terrace.

Rufus was a theatrical type, who always spoke as though he were addressing an unseen audience, was continually fidgeting and glancing around and over one's shoulder, making large expansive gestures and lots of side-noises when one was trying to answer him and occasionally clearing his throat by way of regaining control of the conversational flow.

Drade had paused to give the question serious consideration. For occasionally there could be found a speck of wisdom amongst Rufus's many words.

Rufus had plucked another cigarette from a packet he had found lying on the balustrade – he inclined toward kleptophilia – dipped the filter into Drade's wine – to moisten the smoke apparently – and continued.

'Would anybody?'

'Well you were, in there a couple of minutes ago' Drade had said.

'No I wasn't' Rufus, who was also a fearful liar, had replied.

'Yes, you were,' had said Drade stoutly, 'you were sitting smoking in the big armchair and then, when you saw me, you said, "I think I'll finish this outside."'

Rufus had been silent for a moment as if trying to recall the conversation and then, backhanding the faux-pas dismissively, had gone on despairingly.

'Oh, you know what I mean, Hamish,' he had turned towards the Thames grandly, 'Where's the sincerity these days, where's the gentility, where's it all gone, Hamish? What has happened to this blessed plot...to this England of...ours?'

Aside from the fact that Rufus was half Russian and a quarter Greek, and of course a huge pilferer of lines into the bargain, the sheer force of his delivery and the earnestness with which he gazed seaward had struck a chord deep within Drade who had remained silent.

It was a quarter past two by the time Drade sailed in on his bicycle and propped it up against some delivery boxes in the courtyard.

'Saw you whipping along the Embankment the other day,' came a voice from behind him. 'Mighty fast. Been in training?'

Drade, who was in the process of removing his bicycle clips, glanced around. It was Harris, new to Base, or newish. His father had been an occasional visitor to Base, have been an out of towner, or rather an out of countrier – Irish in fact – and Drade had never met him, but had heard that he was of good pedigree. But for some reason Harris bothered him; he was nice enough of course, but perhaps a tad precocious for Drade's delicate tastes, a little too keen to make new acquaintances, a little too friendly, actually a little over-familiar all round.

And all this was disrespectful.

Friendships should be indiscernible at first, maturing slowly over time, until suddenly one became aware of their existence. In that way they were truly tested; and should they fail the test, they could be dissolved without either party being offended.

'Quick-quack friends do not last,' Drade had concluded some time ago, and once discovered, he had carefully filed the rule away in his great encyclopaedic mind for future consultation.

Harris beamed toothily at him from across the courtyard. His jolly round face flushed red as it often did, and exuded a playful honesty.

'Perhaps,' reflected Drade, 'I have been a little unfair. After all, Harris has only just qualified for residency and it's always a little tricky to find one's place at first.'

'And he can be very witty.'

Drade smiled to himself when he remembered how Harris had hidden another resident's bicycle in full view in garden, disguising it as a snow-covered bush, complete with little pieces of foliage poking out a few weeks ago, during some rare winter weather.

'No. God no!' said Drade, 'That would slow me down. But I can say that I made it from Sloane Square to here in about ...'

Drade glanced at his watch and then realised that he had no idea at what time he had left. He decided to improvise.

'...In less time than it would take a boil an averagely sized egg.'

Harris looked slightly confused.

'Must dash,' said Drade, patting Harris on the shoulder and turning towards the entrance.

'That'll teach him,' thought Drade smugly. He slipped in through a side door and thence up the scullery steps into the restaurant.

Belter was already in position; his hefty rear was perched somewhat improbably and indeed, to tell the truth a little perilously on the most delicately contrived of Chippendale dining chairs. Being very much a front-and-centre kind of a person, he had chosen to dine at the Kendrick table – named after Arthur Kendrick Sr, a transatlantic resident (now deceased) – which lay in the middle of the room facing the main entrance, and one which might easily have played host to a floral display in the front hall of a country house, or indeed dignified an open coffin at a wake had it not been seconded into the dining business some years before. From this seat, Belter commanded a view of all who came in and all who left, such that at any particular moment he was precisely aware with whom he was in company. Added to which, as the large double doors which guarded the entrance were always open, he could keep a similar tally upon all the other rooms on the floor. And, as if that were not enough, a long gilded mirror ran along the wall which faced Belter, thus affording him the ability to watch every dish which left the kitchen as well as note which leftovers were returned – information he always found especially valuable.

In fact Belter spent much of his life 'in position', for he was one of those who liked to know. To know, at any given time, who or what was where and why and with whom, as well as how they got to be there. And to ascertain these things one had to be 'in position'.

Thus would Belter frequent City watering holes and muscle in with drunken brokers during their lunch hours, leading the general debauched charge on Friday nights, before he made any major investments. His schoolboy blasé, natural confidence, and air of unassailable wealth allowed him to assume the role of a 'known-face' with ease; and he had no difficulty winkling out gems of information from the smashed innocents who confided in him during the small hours. When the market crashed through the floor, who would just happen to be sitting on a big pile of gold bullion? And once confidence began to seep back, who was there offering to sell back the shares he had swept up for nothing a few months before? At the races he would position himself some way away from the heaving mob of professional speculators that squeezed itself up against the stable doors, hoping to glean a speck of information which might improve their chances with the bookies, and instead Belter would chat causally to the trailer drivers, grounds men, locals in the village and the like, and then, when he had decided on a race's likely outcome would tell the bookies what odds he would offer them – if they were lucky – rather than wait like a chump to hear what they might offer him. Belter did not queue at the cinema nor wait for a table at a restaurant – that, he would, 'consider 'bad positioning'. Rather he would ring ahead, feigning to be the owner of this hotel or that travel agency, who was only calling to make sure that his tickets or table would be waiting for him when he arrived as they always were, and often complementary at that. Such savvy came to be relied upon by the few remaining grocers, fishmongers, butchers and bakers in Knightsbridge and Chelsea, who sought out the very best for him, certain as they were that within minutes of a fresh shipment of, say, sausages from Lincolnshire, Norfolk rhubarb, Somerset Cheddar or, for that matter, truffles from Tuscany arriving, that the esteemed Mr. Trelawney would somehow know about it and roll up to make a purchase.

Drade approached the Kendrick.

Belter barely looked up, busy as he was sieving off with his fork the pine nuts from a plate of salad and knowing, as he did, that Drade was about to enter, having spied his reflection a couple of minutes earlier in the glass of one of the ajar bay windows.

'It all started when people began adding nuts to salad,' said Belter, continuing to sift. 'You never quite know where you are with a nut.'

'What, you mean looks like a good one, turns out to be bad?' ventured Drade.

Belter had a particular way about him, where in the middle of a conversation, he would go completely silent and remain thus, often for a minute at a time, impervious to whatever was going on around him, only to re-join the conversation at some later point. If you didn't know Belter, this could be somewhat disconcerting and might even seem a little rude or off-hand, especially if you had come to him for advice.

In the mirror behind Drade, Belter eyed with suspicion a handful of half-eaten Brussels sprouts making their way back towards the kitchen, and made a mental note to avoid them for at least a week.

'The flavour, Drade, nuts and lettuce contradict one another like peaches and grass, or Asparagus and Barley – same thing.'

Since there was no doubting the former, Drade gave the benefit of the doubt to the later, and was silent.

'Sorry for having the entree without you Drade, it's this diet Doctor's put me on. It's called chromalavage. You see, a food's native colour reflects its atomic makeup – what you need to do is choose colours that naturally complement each other and eat them in the same meal. The complementary foodstuffs then pair up and simply pass through the system.'

'Like magnets?'

'Exactly.'

'But how do you know which foods colours go together?'

'Well, that's the clever bit, Hamish. It varies according to each person's corpocolonic aptitude, which itself changes on an almost a daily basis.'

'So, you have a chart or something?'

'No, no, much better. Each week, I go to Doctor and he does a test which reveals my aptitude for the coming week, and then I know what I can eat. Today is Wednesday, so I have to eat a rich salad appetizer followed by a small meat course and then a pudding - which must,' Belter jabbed his fork authoritatively in Drade's direction, 'have cream or another dairy product in it, which is primarily white in hue.'

'Like...?'

'Well, like eggs for example.'

'So, lemon meringue would be okay?'

Belter hesitated.

'Lemon meringue would be fine,' he said slowly.

Drade glanced down at Belter's enormous girth and then, sensing Belter's gaze, allowed his eyes to drift sideways towards the open terrace windows and then back innocently to Belter's face.

'So anyway, where's Barney?' said Drade.

Belter eyes settled once more upon his heap of salad and cheese.

'On his way,' he muttered.

The words had barely made their way through the mouthful of leaves being chomped by Belter's capacious jaws, when Barney announced his arrival with a palmed drum-roll upon Drade's shoulders and a healthy slap on the back for Belter.

'Oh, bloody hell, Barney! Do you have to attack a man while he's eating?' spluttered Belter.

The truth of the matter was that Barney had much too much energy, which caused him to bound around like a border collie caught in a cage match with a dozen sheep.

'Boys,' said Barney, pulling out, twirling and straddling a chair in one smooth movement, 'all good here? See you've started without me,' he nodded towards Belter.

'It's this new diet...' began Belter.

'Is that the one where you have to start eating ten minutes before and finish at least twenty minutes after everyone else?' asked Barney with a laugh.

Drade flew to Belter's support. 'Doctor's put him on it,' Belter nodded.

'A real doctor?' asked Barney.

'Course he's a real doctor,' Belter snapped, 'what do you take me for? He's got more letters after his name than Hawton's grandfather.'

'Any in front of it?' ventured Barney, his suspicions highly aroused.

Belter ignored him. 'So, what's new Barney, shot anyone recently?' he asked dryly.

'Umm funny,' said Barney, motioning the waiter over. 'It wasn't even a flesh wound – don't know what everyone is making such a fuss about.'

Belter had been alluding to an unlucky incident the previous week involving Barney, a tube full of buckshot and Anthea Gordon, a nonagenarian gardener who happened to be dead-heading a rosebush at the precise moment Barney was taking careful aim at a passing pigeon, and seconds before his arm was wrenched groundwards by one of his playful nephews. The gardener had taken the full force of the shot, albeit it at 20 metres, in the back; but fortunately, as it has been a cold morning (and she was prone to feel the cold), the combinations of duffel coats, triple linings, thermal underwear and a hefty wax jacket had absorbed most of the impact. Somehow the ninety-three year old had survived this clumsy attempt at assassination – something her grandfather, who had been a general, had not.

'I'll have the same as him – but less of it,' said Barney to the waiter.

Drade joined him, and soon the three of them were chomping away on their chromalavagically correct dishes as contentedly as a small herd of cattle, who had stumbled upon a field filled with grass and dandelions.

CPO

These moments of content did not last. For shortly after they had dined as well as any in the Kingdom and retired to one of the reading rooms, Belter outlined the reason for their gathering. Apparently, a plan which had been in the air for some years to build a mini-port in Chelsea Harbour had suddenly got the green light, and the building which housed both The Clef and Base was scheduled for demolition, as access for the large vehicles involved in port-building would be required. Naturally, they would be compensated, but nobody really cared about that, as the club's finances were very solid.

'I don't know why they call it a Compulsory Purchase Order, anyway; surely they are not compelled to purchase anything,' said Barney angrily. 'They should be honest about it and call it a "Forced Sale Order". That would get people to take notice.'

Belter nodded in agreement.

Barney Hoofsdew slumped back into his chair and glared moodily towards his outstretched feet. He was a well-built man, tall, blond, with high cheekbones and dark, blue eyes, who might have cut rather a handsome dash were it not for an unusually narrow face, which seemed to squeeze his features together and give him a somewhat cubist countenance.

Barney had gone to the same school as Drade and Belter, but finding it all very dull, had left a couple of years earlier and not gone to university, but drifted around important cities of the world for a few years, before settling in the right part of London. He had tried his hand at business, opening first a juice bar in the King's Road and then an art gallery just off it, but both had flopped and he had been forced to flee London for his mother's home in the provinces, while his father stepped in to clear up the damage. Now older and a little more circumspect, he occupied himself advising wealthy friends on how best to shield their money from The Inland Revenue, and had become something of an expert in setting up foundations, trusts and shell companies in far flung places.

'The trick to avoiding tax is to keep the money moving around,' Barney had told Drade once. 'When the government of one jurisdiction gets too greedy, just up sticks and put it somewhere else. Same thing applies to business – slightest sign of a tax rise or more regulation and my guys relocate. It's a bit more complicated with actual businesses – you have to move stock, set up premises and the like, but money itself can be moved with a few signatures and the touch of a button.'

'What if all the jurisdictions were equally greedy?' Drade had asked innocently.

'It'll never happen,' Barney had said. 'There will always be a differential, not because some places are less greedy than others – they're all greedy – but because some have understood that it's just a fact of life that when your tax rates are low, you attract wealth and business, and strangely enough, you end up collecting more taxes.'

That had made no sense to Drade, but having been assured only the day before that Barney was an 'a'solute genius' by someone who generally did make sense to Drade, he had been prepared to go along with it.

'So the secret to collect more taxes is to actually tax people less?' Drade had asked.

'Exactly,' Barney had said triumphantly. 'Strange but True.'

'So, if you had a business and you wanted to actually pay less tax, you need to head to a place with higher rates of taxation – or even better stay here in Merry Ol' England!' Drade had said.

Barney had gone silent at that point, and then with a dismissive wave of his hand he had changed the subject, and Drade, still reeling from the sheer depth of the debate had time to reflect on what a clever fellow Barney was. When they had been at school, Barney, noticing how fast rabbits breed, had worked out a system of retiring at thirty by simply breeding rabbits.

'Each rabbit pair can have up to a dozen young every month or so. And each newborn can be ready to litter up themselves when they're only six months old... ' he had told Drade as they had sat in 'the hollow' down by the music rooms, on one of those endless summer's evenings towards the end of term.

'So, if you start with two bunnies at the beginning of January, by June you might have sixty who are all starting to breed as well...'

Drade had lain back at that point and gazed up at the heavy branches of the cedars of Lebanon, which had clustered together to form this mossy retreat.

'Long and the short of it,' Barney had continued, 'going into year two, you might have a thousand breeding pairs instead of just one... And you can imagine where that leads.'

It had turned out that by the time Barney would be thirty, he would have bred many millions of the things which, even if he sold them for a few pennies each, would have made him a millionaire. He didn't follow through with it – which was a shame, as Drade had been looking forward to seeing what sort of a house a million rabbits needed.

'Perhaps he was a genius,' Drade had thought. 'Unlucky with that fruit bar though.'

Drade was yanked back to the present by Barney's protests.

'Here we are, your local council, your representatives, at the end of the financial year and we have completely run out of things to spend your money on, so we have decided to acquire Base and turn it into a lousy port.'

Drade took a sip of coffee and looked from Belter to Barney and back to Belter again. Belter said nothing and Drade took his lead from him and sipped again.

'So Belter, this is definitely going through?' asked Barney.

'That's what I heard from both Harris and Kim independently. Notices go up right now and it becomes official by the end of the month. The Purchase Order goes through on the nod because it has all been okayed with the minister, and then we have a few months to get out of the way so that their bloody cranes and things can get through,' replied Belter.

'Rats!' said Barney.

'We do get the land back at the end of it apparently, but what would be the point of that?' added Belter, his voice full of gloom.

A heavy silence fell upon the three.

'No chance of us fighting it, I suppose?' asked Barney.

'How?' said Belter.

'How indeed,' thought Drade. 'Everyone loves a port.'

Belter continued, 'The forces of the local council, the London port authority and the influence of the large construction companies, to say nothing of the project's investors, would be ranged against us. Nobody important really loses.'

'Also true,' thought Drade.

'What does Duppo say?' asked Barney.

'Says there's very little that can be done. He is looking into mounting some kind of legal challenge, and there is always English Heritage, but the problem is that even though the building is old, it isn't that old,' replied Belter.

'And the Governor? What's he going to do?' asked Barney.

'Who knows? We might be able to relocate – find another place, but it would be a nightmare, and take ages and I doubt it would ever be the same. This place has heritage and history.'

'And what of us? What are we going to do?' asked Barney, his voice cracking slightly.

'Good question,' thought Drade. It really was a shame that the people who made Base what it was – the characters they were, Drade's fellow Trustees – were truly his family more than his friends. In addition to Belter and Barney, there was Duppo, who was actually a first cousin of Belter's and a splendid chap, always helpful, even though he was another lay-lawyer. Then there was Duppo's brother Bixie, one of the few, one might say, who actually worked for a living: a surveyor with a partnership in Battersea. There was kilt-wearing Arthur 'Nobblie' McFaddon – tremendous fun, great drinker; and Jamie 'the boater', who actually recorded his permanent address as '1, The Thames' and was fighting some quasi-legal battle with the Post Office for it to be recognised as London's main thoroughfare. Then there was Kim with the limp, who was getting on a bit and who probably needed a stick; and his very good friend Francis, who had only just turned 25 and didn't need a stick but always had one. They were the best of friends.

And there were others too.

The clock out in the hall chimed the half hour, slightly more mournfully than normally, Drade fancied. There were footsteps scuttling up the side stairs, a door opened, and from a distant place an excited conversation between three or four club saplings sprang out, and for an instant engulfed the room with youthful energy, which was banished immediately the door was closed. Drade looked around him; he remembered how he had plotted with pals to steal the crown jewels on Memorial Sunday over here on the Black Table under the mirror, but then how they had decided not to follow through. He reminisced about how he had met Belter, after all those years, over here by the pigeon holes that held their post, and how he had at once been swept back into the exciting world of Belter Trelawney, who had suggested a spot of horse-spying that very afternoon! He considered how the same pigeon holes had delivered the bad news about his parents, and the good news about his cousin and that wretched attaché case. Over here, he once supped finely on French paté wines; and there, out there on the terrace he had spent a hazy summer's evening with the boys, shooting at apples with an air rifle. And the next day the Governor had had an exceedingly stern word with them all 'on behalf of all the Trustees,' and, of course, he had been right, and they had offered the most fulsome of apologies. How, at the bottom of the stairs, he recalled that it had occurred to him that he should like one day to fly an aeroplane, but by the time he had made, it to the top he had abandoned the idea as quite a needless exertion.

'If God had meant a fellow to fly, he would have been born with a pilot's licence in his pocket,' he had observed.

And who could forget how, on more than one occasion, he and the boys had become so remorselessly drunk that they had been forced to sleep over in the rooms upstairs, or when one of the lobsters had managed to cut itself free of its ties and escaped from the kitchen, blindly slashing out at and terrorizing all in its path.

Drade's eyes ran along the splendid wooden panelling which encased the room, imbuing it with such solid permanence. The chairs, clad in the softest of leather, with their high, broad, dignified backs, struck at just such an angle as to afford respectful comfort without grovelling. Ageless England gazed through the paintings, which adorned the walls, judicious and calm, tamping passions and soothing minds. The brickwork heavy and immovable, the columns Herculean, the carpeting soft and comfortable, the tapestry of The Great War and the heroes who finished it, the shelves full of mottled books jealously guarding innumerable secrets, the glass-fronted cabinets sparkling as they reflected the bright afternoon sunshine which streamed through the tall, sash-framed windows; all of these Drade saw, and the bar, discretely tucked away in a corner being worked quietly by Harry the barman; the newspaper rack, the occasional tables and the airs themselves.

Drade allowed his eyes to close that he might expose his senses to Base's heavy airs. And heavy they were, with the memories of a thousand meetings, of formal parties and black ties, of impromptu gatherings and fizzy wine, and cheeses and ports and late-night carding and fresh morning walks, of laughter and tears, of argument and agreement, of expectation and confirmation.

Base was their world; where would the world be without Base?! And worse still would be the manner of her passing: that Base should have the airs savagely smashed out of her, that she should gutted without ceremony, torn apart limb from limb in broad daylight by a heathen, soulless, pointless lump of metal. An unthinking, uncaring, unknowing, unfeeling wrecking ball on a chain. The ignominy! It must be stopped; it will be stopped – but hark, what was that? Had it actually been stopped?

Somewhere deep, deep within the limitless depths of Drade's unfathomable mind a bell was ringing. Or was it a foghorn? It seemed to clang, but sometimes at depth horns do clang. Whichever, there was something he had heard, read, seen, or perhaps simply dreamt, which might help in some way, if only he could lay a hand on it.

'My problem is,' he reflected, 'that my mind is so packed full of stuff that getting to something in particular was often well nigh impossible on account of something else getting in the way.'

He strained to reach into the gloom.

'Rather like an angler plumbing the depth of a very deep river with a very long arm rather than a fishing rod,' he thought. 'God it was dark, and the fish weren't taken by his bony fingers – cunning little devils – pop them on the end of my fork with some chromolavagically correct vegetable, like a carrot, if you happened to be a yellow fish – or perhaps a green one would be more complementary and more vegetable-like. Of course, there weren't any green fish any more; they had all been eaten by the plants. No, no...something was wrong...plants don't eat fish...not unless...'

'Drade,' the foghorn seemed to be saying. 'Hamish wake up!'

Drade started, his head bouncing off the wooden panelling to the side of his chair as though it had received a bolt of electricity. He must have nodded off. Something he found often happened during periods of intense concentration.

Barney was leaning over him and Belter was staring fixedly at him from across the coffee table.

'Nigel has just been in and asked if you wanted a light supper – it's fish tonight, straight from Billingsgate'

'I've got it,' said Drade.

'What?' said Belter.

'Fish?' said Drade.

'Fish?' repeated Barney. 'What is it that you've got?'

'I've solved the problem.' He paused looking gleeful from one to the other, 'the problem of the purchase order.'

'And?' said Barney.

'What do you think of that, my old pieces of pie?' Drade chuckled to himself.

'It just shows that when needs must, when it's really important, Hamish is absolutely up there with the best of them,' he thought.

'Depends on what "that" is,' said Belter drily, an eyebrow raised.

Professor Delaney

Professor Darren 'Dazzy' Delaney was a tall, thin-framed, austere-looking fellow. He was, judged Drade, in his late sixties, just muscular enough not to look lanky but not so much as to impart to him any rigidity. He wore jeans supported both by the thinnest of belts and a tucked in white t-shirt with the words 'Just Hangin'' on it in bright green letters.

One would imagine that during the sixties, when everybody else was 'digging the Beatles', smoking anything they could put flame to, and doing their best to look as enlightened as possible, the then young Darren was the class swot, being the one who would stay late in the science lab to finish that experiment, or the one who found himself fascinated by the latest news of computering afoot. Then, when the trauma that school is for those of a scholastic bent was over and most had dropped out and gone to new places like Africa or India, whence their grandparents had fled, or done a stint communing with nature in some dugout in Wales, Delaney had been the one who had safely enrolled on a science course at one of those new universities.

There he had spent three years huddled together with a bunch of other pimple-afflicted types who could not string a sentence together intelligibly, but who were frighteningly good at maths and had encyclopaedic memories for facts about all sorts of unlikely things.

The years passed and his school-friends had started to dribble back to Mother England and had then spent time circling the job-market like hungry sharks, or dipping in an out of college, or perhaps, even more alternatively, living in an inner city squat and being politically active before finally settling down. Whereas no sooner had Delaney graduated, than he had been fingered by his lecturers to join them in their never-ending quest to impart wisdom to the next generation of students.

He had been without doubt the funky, cool teacher – who was not actually funky or cool. The one who might have worn an earring – not a large, decorative one, like a pirate – but perhaps a stud or an uncomplicated loop: a placeholder for a life he had wished he had had. He would have been the teacher who went drinking with his students, smoked a cigarette or two round the back of the building, swore occasionally, and talked openly about taboo subjects like taking drugs. But the truth was he was, the most conservative of fellows: hard-working and dedicated, precise and serious. And whilst, without doubt, Delaney drove a daring-looking motorbike – it would have to have had a sidecar, because he had never had the courage to take a driving test, and he was by nature a cautious man. And whilst he was also a union man with had radical dreams, and wanted to be listened to, he was also one who would never complain out loud for the sheer terror of being overheard. As a young man he may have had long hair and a wild beard and possibly been a pipe smoker, yet as the years had gained on him, thinning his hair and greying what remained, he had carried his hair shorter and trimmed his beard closer, and the pipe became an ornament left on the bookshelf to gather dust along with a wood sculpture from Africa which had been brought back by one of his wandering friends.

Drade almost felt sorry for the man in front of him with his 'Just Hangin'' t-shirt, for, without doubt, Delaney was the least likely person to be causally 'Just hangin'' anywhere. Drade had found out about the good Professor by sheer chance in one of the old journals left by his grandfather. It was the article about mud build-ups in the Thames and the stilted oarsmen.

Delaney peered over his living room at the trio which had just bounded in unannounced from the street. A gust of air came in with them and blew a flotilla of papers off the academic's desk. As they glided and slid their way towards the floor, Barney tumbled out an apology.

'Sorry about er...' he motioned back with his thumb towards the open front door, which was visible out in the hall. '...We did knock but er...the damn thing just flew open.' He glanced round at Drade and Belter for support.

'We did – a couple of times actually,' said Belter hopefully.

The professor fixed Barney and Belter with an eye apiece. He despaired of the world for the calibre of youth it was creating. He would never have dreamed of bursting into someone's house.

'How very rude! How shocking!' he thought. How could it be that young people are so ill-disciplined?

Nevertheless, he showed no reaction, because knowing himself to be a forgiving, laid-back, relaxed kind of a guy, he managed to control his instinct to bawl the trio out of this house, and instead half bent down as if to pick up the papers.

Barney took the hint, immediately knelt down and having gathered the papers together, placed them in a careful pile upon the Professor's desk.

'Anyway,' said Belter, trying to draw a line under their somewhat disorganised arrival, 'we're here now – so all's well.'

'That ends well,' added Drade, whose sense of tone occasionally abandoned him.

Belter shot Drade a look that would have nailed him, had Drade noticed it.

'Yes,' said Delaney.

He appeared to be recovering.

'So you three would be the ones who share my concern about the lotic ecosystem of the River Thames?'

'Yes, indeed, the old lotics,' said Barney, smiling cheerfully at Drade, who obligingly smiled back.

'Lottie, lotic, lentics, as we used to say in Geography,' Drade giggled, and then paused, 'or was it Latin?'

Professor Delaney appeared mystified and looked from one to the other of the three, wondering at first, if by chance he had misread the letter they had sent him, which had seemed articulate and considered. It then began to dawn upon him that these were not in fact the three who had written at all, but just a trio of random people who had wandered in from the street. He decided to play along.

'Lentics is actually something quite different, and lottie is a contraction of the name Charlotte.'

Belter began to feel that this conversation was beginning to lose focus and authoritatively cleared his throat.

'We are the ones,' he declared.

The professor seemed mollified.

'Right, right, good. Well anyway, as I said on the phone, this research of mine is a little dated.'

He glanced down at a faded ring-bound book, which lay on his desk. A flicker of pride crossed his face and he reached out and tapped the book-cover gently.

'It was part of a much larger piece of post-doctoral work, that I did about forty years ago. Back in those days we scientists were extremely worried about global cooling and nuclear winters. The big thing was surviving the wall of ice which was making its way down from the Arctic towards Northern Europe and North America. My research challenged all that.'

Delaney paused without looking up. Years of lecturing had lent to him the remarkable ability to sense when he had a captive audience, and he certainly sensed it now. For captive they were indeed; as fish in a bucket caught on a hook. But in fairness, one would have to point out that the three friends, being by and large unaware of the 'wall of ice' theory, were rapt in anticipation of some thunderous revelation, rather than in awe of what had thus far been revealed. Nonetheless, all – even Drade, usually a little looser with his attentions than his friends – were utterly nailed.

'You see, I'm actually a physicist by training, with a special interest in fluid mechanics, dynamics, that sort of thing, and early one evening, quite by chance, whilst I was collecting some data for a quite unrelated experiment, I stumbled upon a curious phenomenon caused by an overspill of raw sewage after a particularly heavy storm. I called it...er...a poohluge.' Delaney sniggered and looked up.

Belter glanced quizzically over at Drade and then at Barney, who remained staring at Delaney.

'What I noticed,' continued the professor, hurrying along, 'was that just a tiny excess of sewage and other pollutants – like the exhaust from boat engines, for example, caused a disproportionate rise in algae formation and a much higher incidence of fluvial stagnation. Now ordinarily this wouldn't matter much because the river would simply dissipate the algae, but this particular point where this er...house of yours, er...is situated in what we call a dead-flow area.'

Again Delaney paused and looked from one to the other. His head bobbing up and down as if he were sharing their realization of the profundity of his find. His eyes settled upon Drade, who found himself inadvertently nodding back in sympathy – a reflex which became more vigorous the more Drade became aware of it, to the point that, after a couple of seconds, Drade found himself nodding encouragingly to his two friends, as if to elicit support. He received none. Barney continued to stare without a blink at the professor.

Belter spoke up, 'So the rivers would become muddier, would they?'

Delaney grimaced and threw an eyeball in Drade's direction before answering Barney.

'Not just muddier. The whole ecosystem would collapse!'

'The lotic ecosystem,' interjected Drade with some smugness.

The professor glanced with approval at Drade. His suspicions confirmed, he was the smarter one.

'You see,' continued Delaney, 'once a river starts to stagnate, water stops circulating, and algae and other, well...what we call autotrophic organisms start to flourish, which causes even more stagnation. It's a kind of vicious circle. Pretty soon, the river turns into a muddy sort of bog, and if nothing is done to remedy the situation, the river simply disappears.'

The professor paused – perhaps he was moving a little too fast – even the smart one was looking puzzled.

'Rivers are a critical component of a balanced ecosystem. If they disappear, the local effects will be staggering: plants dry up and die, and animals simply move away. Absolute disaster...'

'So what you're saying,' said Belter slowly, 'is that if they build a port near our house, the Thames will disappear?'

'Well, I wouldn't go that far,' said the professor with a hesitating smile, 'but...eh...it would certainly complicate matters.'

He chuckled. He had liked the impact his words had had. Perhaps the fat one was not as stupid as he looked.

'Are you sure you're not saying that the Thames will disappear?' asked Belter hopefully.

'Positive,' replied the professor, adopting a much more serious face, his earlier optimism gone. 'This needn't be a huge problem if all the pollutants are treated properly.'

'But what if they aren't?' persisted Belter.

'They will be,' insisted the Professor. He hesitated, thought, and finally added, 'Although they probably won't do as thorough a job of it as I would like. People don't know as much about fluvial dead-spots as you might think.' He sighed.

Barney glanced at Belter. Was this a breakthrough?

The professor continued, 'Plus there is, of course, the problem of actually getting hold of a copy of my work to find out about them in the first place. UPC doesn't archive all its research any more – no space you see. And to be honest,' the Professor glanced up, 'it wasn't all that well received.'

Belter glanced at Barney, and then back at the professor.

Delaney caught the look and read it well, adding before any suspicions could materialize, 'Not that I'm saying it was discredited or anything – not widely so at least.' He chuckled towards Drade. 'It's all political at that level. You know friends, favours, back-scratching and so on.'

Drade knew all about back-scratching and nodded with empathy.

The professor was encouraged. 'Or perhaps it was just a little ahead of its time.'

He paused and was briefly transported back to his PhD days; he had been younger of course, tall, athletic, handsome, popular and gifted. Goodness, he had really had it all; his untamed intellectualism and keen instincts came together to fire off one brilliant piece of work after another. Yes, perhaps with hindsight, he had been a little too challenging to the stuffy academic establishment. He was thankful they had been replaced, and grateful that he had been able to play a part in that vital evolutionary process. Yup...who knows, had it been a different time, a different place...well.

'How did you get to hear about it by the way?' he asked, addressing Drade.

'I'm widely read,' replied Drade with a knowing smile.

'Yes, yes, you must be,' mused the Professor. 'I wish I were.'

The three tramped down the garden path and away from Delaney's bungalow. Ely blossomed in the sunshine and Drade fancied he caught the faintest scent of summer in the air, carried past him by a light breeze. He allowed the latch of the wooden gate to close and scurried to catch up with his friends.

'Well, that was a lot of good,' said Belter presently, as the three of them approached Station Road.

'Yah, thanks for that Hamish,' rejoined Barney, his voice brimming with sarcasm.

'No problem,' cheered Drade. He began to whistle quietly, something he did when he was pleased with himself but did not want to show it. A blackbird seemed to whistle back at him albeit it with somewhat more skill.

'Very nice,' thought Drade, 'but lacking in tune; and without tune, you lack direction, and when you lack direction, you may be very good at what you do, but what you do will never be very good'

The blackbird, unaffected by Drade's criticism, continued his meandering melody.

Perhaps it was the synchronicity with which the other two walked – hunched over, hands in pockets – perhaps it was their continuing silence, perhaps their morose faces or perhaps that tremendous sensitivity for which the de Buxtons are famed, but presently Drade began to have the sense that his friends were not entirely happy.

'Something wrong boys?' he enquired airily.

'Well, yes there is actually,' said Belter. 'You drag us all the way here because of a piece of discredited research from an unknown institution, written before we were born, by an old man who doesn't think that building the port will be a problem anyway. That's what's wrong.'

Drade was taken aback. 'Well yes – all true. Yes, yes, I do see how you might think that.'

Drade did not resume the whistling, but instead joined the other two in staring at the ground, hands jammed into his pockets. 'Not, perhaps, my finest idea,' he reflected. 'Well intentioned and imaginative – certainly, but maybe a little optimistic.'

He kicked a stone with malice.

A family trait, the old optimism: his grandfather on his father's side had died in his early twenties trying his hand at breaking-in horses in Africa when he got himself skewered on a gatepost. Uncle Nathan on his mother's side almost died trying to swim Loch Ness in the middle of winter. He had some crackpot theory about freezing water triggering the body into doing superhuman things, which turned most definitely not to be the case. He, too, had been young. In fact, reflected Drade, with all the optimists in his family being so young, it was quite miraculous that baby Hamish had made it into the maternity ward at all.

Stopping in his tracks, Barney interrupted Drade's revelries. 'Of course, there is one advantage to an unknown piece of research from an unknown place by someone unknown, and that is that it probably hasn't been thoroughly de-bunked. There would be no need – like disproving the theory that the earth stood on the back of a giant tortoise – absolutely pointless.'

'True,' said Belter. 'Bunkish research has fewer detractors; on the other hand, it is more difficult to get people to believe it.'

'Yah, but once a piece of bunk has been generally accepted as non-bunk, it doesn't matter much if it is bunk or not. People simply go along with whatever the consensus view is – look at global cooling.'

By this time Drade had completely lost track of what was bunk and what was not, but he did not mind too much, and since it had been he, who had had the idea of going to Professor Bunk in the first place, the deep satisfaction that vindication bestows began to well up from within. He beamed at his friends.

'So what we really need to do,' said Barney, 'is get a consensus going that building a port where Base is now would be environmentally damaging.'

'Umm...' doubted Belter.

Barney continued, 'At the very least, we might be able to delay the project by a few months, or even a year, and then who knows, maybe the investors will change their minds.'

'Or run out of money,' added Belter.

'You never know. There might even be some truth in it.'

Spirits raised, the trio boarded the train at Ely station.

It was one of those old trains with separate compartments, which are still used during non-peak hours on the less important lines. The three bundled and slammed the door. There was more than a whiff of conspiracy in the air, with Barney and Belter making the main decisions as usual, with him, Hamish, ably in support.

Drade was immediately transported back to his schooldays, when they, musketeers three, had come together to brew beer in their dormitory. He recalled the research they had done, the sending out for books, and the muted discussions and arguments that had ensued once they had been read; the purchases they had made, and how they had secreted them into the building and managed to keep them hidden from their peers; how the brewing had been done in an alcove in an old room on a deserted floor just above the dorms and just below staff quarters; how they had sneaked down the stairs between classes and at all hours of the night to add sugar, stir and filter the mixture, check the temperature and the acidity, and do all the little things that needed to be done to bring their Shelly-like creation to fruition; and how finally, after what seemed an age, they judged that the moment of consumption had arrived; how only then did they invite the entire year to a 'late night drinker' in their dorm, where they had all feasted on the tastiest of cheeses, the crispiest of biscuits and a nectar of such refinement and civility that it was determined there and then that the process be repeated at the soonest opportunity.

Oh, and didn't they overdo it somewhat? Belter had claimed a touch of food poisoning and spent the entire next day in bed, as did poor old Guppy, who had vomited out of the window so forcefully during the night that he managed to hit a passing owl. But Drade and Barney had limped courageously to rugga practice early the next day, and had only been saved from ridicule by the fact that everybody else was feeling just as fragile.

Mr. Stephens could not quite figure it out. 'Sluggish!' he exclaimed to a colleague, 'it was as though they were pulling ploughs through a marsh – never seen such a dismal performance.'

The stock crashed together as the train came to a juddering halt at Cambridge and Drade was wrenched back to reality. He looked over at his friends, who were sitting opposite one another, deep in conversation. Barney leant forward spitting out ideas to Belter, who, ever the sceptic was sitting back, eyebrow cocked.

'What we need is some research into the 'global cooling' theory, and work out how it came to be accepted as a scientific fact on a par with evolution and relativity,' said Barney.

'To what end?' asked Belter.

'Well, if we try the same moves, the same strategy with Delany's theory, we might well be able to get some support and see where it goes.'

'So, you mean...create the impression that there is research out there which suggests that knocking down Base will prove to be bad for the environment?'

'Something like that, yah. I mean, perhaps we shouldn't really talk about Base or The Clef – it might look like self-interest. We should talk about the greater good of the neighbourhood...and the planet.'

Belter was being won over.

'Sow the seeds of doubt in their minds,' added Barney.

'Umm...yes...yes,' said Belter, moving his head back while he scratched his chin slowly and thoughtfully. 'I suppose it wouldn't do any harm to find out how they did it. Might be rather interesting.'

'Exactly,' said Barney. 'Why don't we try and find out as much as possible about global cooling, how the idea came to be accepted, how was it spread, and what did people do about it.'

'Fine,' agreed Belter. 'Drade, you in?'

'Of course,' said Drade, keen to make amends. 'Why don't we begin at, er...the er...that library just off Leicester Square?'

The Ice Wall Cometh

As guarantors of the common man's right to better himself, libraries, should always be places of quiet, of study, of thought and reflection, and in these respects The Westminster Reference Library fails miserably. The continuous rustle and shuffle of peoples' comings and goings, the clankings of lifts, and closings of doors, the mobiles, the mouse clicks, the stampings, the chatterings, the coughings, the droppings of pens, the heavings of books, and all the rest fighting against the intolerant roar of engines passing through the tourist ridden metropolis.

It is a curious place because, apart from the usual shower of students and pensioners, it is one of the few places in that part of the world where one can actually find locals. Not the wealthy locals who buy pied a terra in Soho, so that they can call themselves Londoners and belong somewhere, nor rich foreigners looking to escape the claws of greedy governments by investing in some property somewhere else. Instead there were people whose parents and grandparents were born, worked and died just nearby; who themselves grew up in central London and went to the local school before it was closed; and who, in spite of being driven out of the local pubs by the prices charged to tourists, deprived of local grocers (who themselves had been crippled by property taxes), afraid to wander around their own 'manor' on account of the violence and petty theft, and unable to get anywhere anyway on account of the traffic, had somehow stayed on.

There was Simon Affley of Cambridge Circus – thirty five years and still a marketer, as his father had been – working on his family tree; Simone Law, a professional pianist and teacher (much rested of late), who needed information about examination syllabi for some of her pupils; Adrian Winethorpe, working on a school project about traffic levels in central London; Gavin, his father, who needed some local archaeological information. There were legal assistants and bookkeepers, writers and journalists, tramps and viscounts all rubbing shoulders together in this democracy of words and letters.

At ten o'clock, Drade and friends, all of whom had made a gargantuan effort to be timely, found themselves amidst this motley collection of characters rummaging through papers, journals, books and pamphlets with the eagerness of a gang of bargain hunters at a flea market.

Belter buried himself in the microfilm section and sifted through an impossible number of old scientific journals – his legal eagle eyes scanning page after page, picking out the pertinent words and phrases and jotting them down. Barney worked online separating the mountains of unreliable, and at times downright misleading 'facts' from those that were well sourced, while Drade concentrated on articles in old newspapers and popular magazines. Between the three of them, and with six hours work and only two coffee breaks and nothing to eat, they managed to put together a picture of the past.

The 'global cooling' theory had never been as widely believed as, say, evolution. Even at its most popular, the idea had its detractors. Nevertheless, research into global cooling attracted considerable funding, created noticeable public unease, and impacted legislation around the world for decades. Research conducted by major organizations from the UN to the CIA supported the idea that the world was cooling, as did many eminent academics; and the popular press abounded with predictions of great famines, wars and disease when the cooling finally came about.

There were clearly important lessons to be learned here.

At Base that evening, Belter assumed the role of 'chap in charge', as he always did – not feeling comfortable any other way. Drade had a tendency to end up being 'chap in charge's chap', a sort of 'underchap', as it were, which left Barney – slightly left out – as a kind of was a kind of inspirational outsider character, who was nevertheless one of the boys.

Harry the barman wafted amongst them, dropping warmed goblets of nectar down upon the tables' velveteen greens. The clock by the door ticked and tocked heavily, and the bright fire crackled in its grate.

'So, what have we learned about global cooling?' asked Belter, to Drade and Barney, who were slumped opposite him cradling their warm brandies.

The first thing that struck Drade during his day of study in Leicester Square was that he had found it immensely difficult to nail down quite how and where the theory had originated. It seemed that it had been one of those times when an idea was everywhere and yet nowhere in particular. He searched for an analogy.

'You know when you are walking down Symons's Street and you are suddenly surrounded by the smell of coffee roasting, or Pelham Close early in the morning and somebody is always baking bread?'

Belter and Barney nodded.

'But try as you might to track down the cafe or the house with the baking you simply can't. Well, global cooling was a bit like that. During the seventies, the idea seemed to be everywhere, but it is jolly hard to nail down exactly where the ideas were coming from. At first I thought there was one definitive piece of research, but there isn't – just several rather inconclusive studies, which were quite narrow in any case.'

'There must be something solid somewhere,' said Belter.

'Not that I could find,' sighed Drade. 'There was a projection done by a some know-it-all at MIT, which predicted lots of global cooling in the eighties and nineties, but it was all rubbish because the boffins used different methods to make the calculations and it was just coincidental that the lines happened to be pointing the right way.'

'Is that it?' asked Belter.

'Well, there was something in Reader's Digest, or something, which included loads of anecdotal evidence for global cooling – you know, when I was a lad we didn't need long trousers, it was so warm – and that sort of thing, but nothing firmer; and National Geographic did a big dramatic spread on core samples, which seemed to suggest a cooling trend, but the models they used were all over-simplified and useless. I'm afraid that finding something hard and fast is a bit like trying to catch sticklebacks with one of those nets on a piece of bamboo: you see a great pile of fish down there, you lunge at them all with the net, not aiming at any one in particular, but hoping to bag at least two or three and you end up scooping up nothing.'

'So there was just a general something in the air?' asked Barney.

Drade pondered. This was one of those pivotal moments, one of those times when he really needed to be absolutely sure of his facts. He needed to get this spot on, no mess-ups allowed, no room for Hamish's notoriously close-to-the-bone sense of humour, no wobbling or vagueness; precision was the key. He sighed: the burden of responsibility weighed upon him and he glanced down at his notes.

'Well, one of the first things that strikes me is that every scientist interviewed in these magazines, seemed to be pictured with a suspiciously large tape recorder behind them.'

It wasn't that Drade had only looked at the pictures during his day of study in Leicester Square, but he would hardly have described himself as a bookish type – quite the opposite in fact.

'Printed words have the uncanny knack of putting a fellow to sleep,' he had observed once. 'Whereas pictures of things, or better still the real things, do the opposite. Probably why we sleep with our eyes closed.'

Added to which, it was generally reckoned that a picture be worth a thousand words, and given that Drade had seen hundreds of pictures that day, a simple piece of arithmetic would amply demonstrate the extent of his toil. Drade was well aware, of course, that these 'tape recorders' were old fashioned computers, from a time when computers needed whole rooms to house them in. He had read that somewhere.

'They're just old fashioned computers,' said Belter. 'In those days they needed to be that big because the parts were enormous.'

'I know, I know.' Drade snapped, more than a little annoyed at himself for letting Belter beat him to it. 'What I mean is that there seemed to be an unshakable faith in the power of science and its ability to predict.'

'It does predict and predicts very well,' said Barney. 'People have landed on the moon.'

'Yes, it does, but there have also been some amazing botch ups,' said Drade. 'Like, well...like global cooling. The point about the tape recorder is that when a scientist stands there with a mysterious piece of hi-tech equipment behind him, he immediately looks more credible. If we want to be taken seriously we need to produce images like that – lots of them. Not enough on their own, but a good start.'

'So we can use that unshakable faith people still have in science to our advantage,' said Belter

'Exactly,' said Drade.

'So we should get some scientists behind us?'

'Yes, I think that would be the way to go. Not quite sure how you would do it though.'

Drade paused and thought for a moment.

Now how would one go about getting the old boffins on side? In truth, Drade did not really know any personally, as all his university buddies had been called to the humanities. He did have vague memories of there being a 'technical section' at Durham, where the serious, swotty-looking types would gather. And he had always assumed that the top floor of the main library was where they studied; but since he had never been there, he could not be sure. They were never present in the local drinkeries, they tended to eat packed lunches and were never really out late. Perhaps he should suggest the three of them pop up to Imperial some time and have a look in at them – see how they operate and what gets them going.'

'What I noticed,' said Barney, 'is that nobody really seemed to care about global cooling until the media got hold of the idea and started to dramatize it. There were stories on Newsnight, a few TV documentaries and suddenly it was everywhere. The same thing happened with UFOs in the fifties: first aliens were just something loons with foil helmets cared about, then War of the Worlds came along, and suddenly everybody was seeing them.'

'Yes...a good film, a story or something, is very important,' said Belter. 'People have to be able to visualize these things rather than be presented with some dry, scientific abstract.'

'A picture is worth a thousand words,' agreed Drade, playing it safe. They were right of course but getting a film done seemed even more impossible than getting the scientists on side.'

'Umm, well, perhaps, we should go through the actual process by which the earth was supposed to cool?' suggested Belter.

'Ah, well, that's a bit easier' said Barney. He stood up reached inside an attaché case he had brought with him, and pulled out a bundle of photocopies he had made. These he spread out over a nearby coffee table so that they could be easily read. The three poured over them intently, as though they were maps to hidden treasure.

At length, Belter rose from the table and cleared his throat with authority. 'So, as I see it, the mechanism is this: heavy industry, which didn't really exist a couple of hundred of years ago...'

'It always starts with something like that, doesn't it?' interrupted Barney.

'What do you mean?' said Belter.

'Well, it's always something new, like er...heavy industry, motor cars, mobile phone signals, GM food, you know... Every time somebody invents something new there's always some clot out there with a crackpot theory which proves that whatever it is, it is going to bring about the end of the world. Whereas in fact, when the end of the world actually happens, it will be caused by something completely insignificant which was always there, like dark matter or something.'

His words hung in the air like a cloud of dark matter. Uncertain, Drade looked at Belter. As far as he could make out, Barney had made a fair point. Was Barney perhaps mounting a challenge to Belter's position as 'chap in charge'?

Belter was silent for a moment, his brow rising fractionally.

'Thank you, Barney – ever the philosopher,' he said, just managing to lace his honeyed words with Tabasco.

'Thanks,' said Barney to Drade's great relief.

'So, this industry,' continued Belter, 'pollutes the atmosphere by shooting out particles of dust into it. These form a protective shield around the planet and have the effect of reflecting the sun's rays. This causes the planet to cool marginally at first, but critically, the coldest parts of the planet – the poles – cool faster.'

Barney interrupted, 'That's because the heat is carried by convection currents, which move outwards from the equator; and the polar ice caps are the furthest places away from there.'

'Right,' said Belter, 'the poles are furthest away and they are white, so they reflect the sun's rays, and cool faster until hitting a tipping point which spawns another ice age.'

'So it's a sort of vicious circle?' said Drade

'Yup. So, the effects on mankind could in theory be devastating. Many of the world's largest population centres like London, New York, Washington, Berlin would be covered in ice, whereas other parts of the world, which are currently desert or jungle, would get a much more temperate climate. No wonder everybody was in a panic!'

'It's absolutely perfect,' said Barney. 'We need a theory of that calibre, simple to understand and promising dramatic consequences.'

'We do,' said Belter.

Barney looked down at the cuttings scattered upon the coffee table.

'It's so funny, because it was quite a big thing at the time, but now it just seems absolute rubbish,' he said.

'How so?' asked Belter.

'Well, it just seems to be so off-the-cuff. I mean you could just as easily argue that all that pollution actually makes the earth warmer by keeping the heat in, or that it makes the earth darker by keeping the light out, or whatever you wanted really.'

'True,' agreed Belter. 'It makes you think, doesn't it? How do people actually come up with these theories?'

'Well, that's what this is all about Barney,' said Belter. 'With a little imagination, you could prove just about anything. All you need is a skeleton of a theory and then you go hunting for the facts. Opposite of the way it should be, but I don't think we should get bogged down in the morals of it.'

'And besides,' continued Barney having appeared not to have heard Belter, 'so what if there was mass migration to new temperate parts of the world? Perhaps it would have been a good thing and had beneficial effects. Everybody seemed to be scared simply because of the possibility of change without really thinking about what those changes might bring. Perhaps we need to somehow get that into the debate.'

'What? Scare them with change, you mean?' said Belter. 'Just any change?'

'Yes,' replied Barney. 'Change bad, same good.'

'Might help, going to be lots of changes afoot, better the devil you know and so on...'

'Exactly.'

Drade had started to lose track of the conversation once more. 'So what are we talking about here? Old Prof. Delaney's theory of rivers clogging up scares people into opposing the port?'

'That's the idea,' said Barney.

'Umm...' Belter wasn't sure.

'It can you know,' said Barney. 'What we need to do is flesh it out a bit, build up a scientific consensus, and put it together with a colourful narrative, and people will start to get scared and at least begin to doubt the idea.'

The three fell into thought for a moment. Belter looked in Barney's direction – but through him – nibbling his lower lip, silently calculating the probabilities of success. Barney continued to study the cuttings on the coffee table; in his mind they had already stopped the port and were rushing on to have the whole area protected from future change by an Act of Parliament. Drade looked from one to the other, wondering where they would go from here.

At length, Belter broke the silence. 'I suppose there would be no harm in giving it a shot.'

'Better than doing nothing,' agreed Barney.

And Drade agreed too: as far as he was concerned, the only thing they had to fear was failure and perhaps a little personal humiliation. What was that when placed next to the future of their club?

The friends pulled their chairs closer together and plotted anew. In quiet tones they defined and redefined the nucleus of the idea handed to them the day before by Professor Delaney. They discussed the way ideas came and went. They talked about rumour, fashion, gossip, buzz, and, of course, consensus. They studied the whole notion of credibility: how it was possible for one to be incredible to some people but perfectly believable to others, all the while saying the same thing; and how to go about saying completely contradictory things to different people and seem perfectly consistent. There was much weighing up of the 'impact of this', much debate about the 'effect of that', and how 'would the other look' in any situation. Many a nectarine goblet passed its test upon their tongues. And friends did pass discreetly by and nod over politely as they did, or whispered the faintest of 'evenings' to them one and all, and keeping a reverent distance from the plotters as if sensing that something of import was in the offing. In the brew...

It was indeed an ambitious plan with lots of debatables and uncertainties, but as Drade peddled his way back home later that evening he could not help but feel excited at what was in prospect. Later still, cosseted by pillows and bedclothes of soft wools and cottons, in that uncertain place twixt wake and sleep, his toes stretched out to claim new unconquered territories amongst the sheeting, and he reflected upon Barney's maxim of 'scaring with change', and how odd it was that some people found the prospect of change daunting and fearful, whilst others found it exciting.

'Perhaps we're all scared of change, it's just that some of us like to be scared,' he thought. 'In which case, the type of change which would prove universally unpopular was the type that wasn't actually that scary.' He would mention that to the boys tomorrow.

Far, far below, in the square, revellers where throwing passing shots at one another. Good-naturedly, they staggered on, meeting others upon their ways, and greeted, and hugged and passed yet others with the merest of sideways glances, swaying slightly. Cabs trundled by, hailed down the instant they appeared or shot into the darkness – lonely souls searching, seeking kindred spirits all. Till gradually rest resumed there in the town, and many floors above Drade's friendship with Morpheus was refreshed and emboldened. And as he slept, yet in other parts of London, in the bakeries, on the trains, in the sorting offices, and upon the river, the day returned anew once more to trial those who dared to dream afresh.

Alfie

The need to provide a consensus galvanized the three friends into a frenzy of activity not experienced by any of them since their school days. The first thing that Belter did was establish a headquarters in Base itself. On the second floor there was a garage-sized room which at one point had housed linen, cleaning equipment and supplies for the building. These had been moved to an outhouse and for as long as anyone could remember the room had lain empty and was referred to by all as 'the broom cupboard'.

Belter persuaded the Governor to allow the three friends to set up camp in there, putting in photocopiers, computers, phone lines, internet access, tables, chairs, filing cabinets, noticeboards, as well as piles and piles of stationary, most of which had been borrowed from the nightclub in the basement, which always had too much. He also provided them with a PO Box for deliveries and mail.

'Much better that we do business in here,' said Belter on the occasion of their first official meeting in the Broom Cupboard, 'gives us a bit of privacy, and being on the second floor, doesn't disturb anybody else.'

The other two nodded; they appreciated that Belter had done a sterling job of getting the office set up.

'Seconded,' said Drade.

'Carried,' said Barney.

Having been trustees for most of their lives, they were familiar with the rubric of meetings and general comportment thereof.

'Now the first order of the day is finding out how we are getting on with this consensus building,' said Belter.

'Well, I've been thinking about this,' said Barney, 'you see the problem is that between the three of us, we lack gravitas,' said Barney.

Belter was silent for a second. 'You mean to say we're a little lightweight?' He sub-consciously rested his hand on his paunch.

'Well, what I mean is that in societal terms we are all pretty insubstantial.'

'Speak for yourself Barney,' said Belter, who had always regarded himself as one of the country's great mercantile engines, making sensible investments wherever he could and driving forward commerce and trade. Drade for his part, said nothing, but the word 'insubstantial' had slapped him on the cheek like a wet fish on a cold day. Granted, brain-wise he might not have been the tastiest cheese on tray, but he was very well respected in the circles he frequented and, in terms of society...well, it may have been a couple of generations since a Drade caught even a whiff of a title, but still, the smell of ermine lingers long.

Barney sensed the disquiet. 'Not meaning to be offensive, but, we three, let's be realistic. Young Hamish here has absolutely no occupation and, statistically speaking, would be classed as long term unemployed. You Belter would, I suppose, be a self-employed speculator, but not much more; and I am a Henry who dabbles in tax evasion. We are going to be batting on behalf of the environment, but we don't have a green credential between us.'

Drade was beaten, there was undoubtedly a shred of truth in what Barney was saying. 'Its all about heft,' he murmured as Barney continued to outline his ideas, 'I wonder if that's why elephants are prized for their intellect more than, say, aardvarks which look very similar?'

Belter took the criticism rather better. 'Fair point, Barney.' he said, 'we do need some heavyweight credentials. Shall we buy some degrees online?'

'No, I was thinking is that we need a supporter, or rather a standard bearer, for the cause of saving Lots Road from being turned into a port – someone substantive, educated, wealthy, classy, statesmanlike – a leader.'

'Sounds a pretty tall order,' said Belter. 'And where are we going to find someone like that?'

'Well, I was thinking about that too, and it would be well-nigh impossible for us to pull in someone of that calibre who would be interested in helping us. But there is nothing to stop us from creating a figure of great eminence to head up the cause.'

'Creating someone?' Drade was incredulously. 'Barney was smart,' he thought, 'and knew all sorts of things about just about everything – but I don't think he's quite up to actually making a person!'

'You mean inventing someone? A fictitious person?' asked Belter.

'Yes,' said Barney.

Drade breathed a sigh of relief. He was beginning to think that either he or Barney had lost it. Luckily, neither of them had, and they both remained the very sanest of people.

'A bit like the man that never was during the Second World War?' said Belter.

'A bit like that,' said Barney. 'What we should do is draw up a complete profile of the kind of person that we would like to head our campaign to save Base. It needs to be very thorough, so that we have a total understanding of who he is, where he comes from, how he got there, et cetera. We should know everything about him, just as if he were sitting right here in the room with us.'

'Right, so this man...should he be a bit of a greeny then?' asked Belter.

'Actually, I think it would be better if he were not. Better that he be a man of science – a real hard bitten, objective type, unaware of the world, above the petty squabbles that occupy the minds of those less intellectually endowed – the type who wouldn't notice if he were wearing two pairs of trousers, or if someone put sugar on his chips. The kind of guy they haul onto current affairs shows to lend the intellectually lightweight interviewer some credibility, but who, for reasons known only to himself, then goes on to rubbish said presenter, creating one of those awkward moments on the telly, which are such enormous fun to watch.'

'Right okay. Then what?' said Belter.

'Well, then, we build this guy up somehow, turn him into an icon, get him to lead protests against the port, and hopefully generate enough disquiet to delay it for a few months,' said Barney.

'And of course the other plus is that if there ever was any kick-back from our little scheme, we wouldn't be affected. He would be a kind of lightening rod, and we could remain more or less anonymous.'

'Well, quite,' said Barney.

'Yes, yes, I see. But he shouldn't be a crusader, but someone who is very reasonable and moderate and who lives for something modest.'

'His research,' said Barney.

'Yes, that's the ticket,' said Belter.

'Perhaps someone who has done well, made money and has a philanthropic side. Generous, giving, someone you can trust not to be acting in his own self interest.'

'He would have to be a generous one and not too oily. People are such cynics these days and always suspect the worst,' agreed Belter.

'A grant giver?'

'A grant giver. Yes, he would be a giver of money, and time.'

This was all getting a bit incredible for Drade, who had been forced to slip into high gear to keep up with his companions, who were now sparking away. Wherever would they head to next? Drade determined that the only way to keep a lid on these two was to race ahead and slow them down a bit. Mockery was not in Drade's nature, but he was feeling a little under-utilized at the moment, and from time to that he felt the need to remind people what a true polymath he was.'

'You'll be saying he's a vicar next!' he exclaimed. ('That'll show them,' he thought, 'I'll give Barney and his insubstantials!')

'A priest!' said Barney so inspired he completely missed the point.

'A bishop,' said Belter. 'No, hang on a sec – a Bishop of where? Might be a bit tricky''

Drade felt lost again.

Belter paused. 'But he might have attended seminary school somewhere and dropped out on discovering an even higher calling.'

'Yes, religious certainly, but not a priest – too risky.'

'Far too risky,' agreed Drade, as he had thought all along.

'Only one problem chums,' said Belter. 'What if someone wants to meet him, or if he has to attend a conference, present a petition, talk on the radio? How do we get round that?'

The three fell into thought, but before long Barney piped up. 'Well, of course we represent him; so it would be us who present any petitions, and radio's easy, just phone in the interview.'

'Because the professor's far too busy,' added Belter.

'Quite,' agreed Barney, 'and as for conferences, well, obviously he couldn't do them because none of us could carry that off, so we would have to keep postponing them, send in apologies, getting in substitutes and the like.'

'Going to be tricky,' said Belter.

'We'll have to cross that bridge when we come to it,' said Barney.

'Fine, so we create a standard bearer for the folks out there. And this broom cupboard will serve as his London office. We should put notice on the door and the letterbox. Oh, and he'll need a desk.'

'Yes, actually that's not a bad idea; he might not exist in reality, but if we are going to convince others about this person, we should begin by convincing ourselves. Let's get him his own stationary, bank accounts, file a few subscriptions to various magazines on his behalf. I'll take care of that lot.'

'Thanks Barney,' said Belter, 'we can rent out one of the Trust's apartments in his name. I'll have a word with Oscar.'

'Got to be done discretely,' said Barney. 'They can never be in on it – at least officially speaking.'

'Does he have any personal friends here in London?' asked Drade.

'No, no I don't think so, but he has got a club – the Noughet up by Russell Square – convenient for the universities and not of a high enough profile to attract attention.'

'Excellent!' said Belter.

'His own mug?' said Drade still doubtful.

Barney and Belter looked puzzled.

'For his coffee and tea,' explained Drade. 'My old tutor at Durham had one with his name on it.'

'To remind him?' quipped Belter.

'In fact it is little touches like that which will make the difference here,' said Barney. 'We need to start thinking of everything like that and remember that since our man doesn't really exist we are going to have to do everything for him, and yes,' he looked at Drade, 'someone might have given him a present of a coffee cup with his name on it. It's the sort of thing people do.'

Vindicated, Drade joined his friends in the task of creating an icon for the cause, and on that day Professor Alfie Cabot, scientist, inventor, writer, speechmaker, philanthropist and statesman was born. And the friends, having agreed an outline for him, set about filling in the details.

A Damnably Nice Chap!

To begin with, nobody had any idea that Cabot was Argentinean; but it turned out that his Mother was, and that Alfie stood for Alfonso. He had been born into a poor family, his father worked for the railways, whilst his mother did the best she could to bring up Alfie and his seven siblings in a suburb of Buenos Aires. He had been an unusually inquisitive child, yet shy, introverted and sickly, but an intellectual diamond, who has passed through his local schools with flying colours, gaining a Fulbright scholarship to study in the United States. After graduated with honours he returned to South America and had taken up a number of positions, being named Professor Emeritus at the tender age of forty two.

And the rest was, as they say, history.

The three modelled him upon Professor Delaney; Cabot too was trained as a physicist with a special interest in fluid mechanics.

The first thing the friends did was create a website for Alfie. This was a one hour job using one of those create-a-site-in-a-nite programmes. Finding pictures to put on the site was straightforward because, when one thought about it, no-one knew what Alfie looked like, so the three randomly selected a recently deceased academic from Argentina and used his videos and pictures on the site.

The videos in particular were an effective touch, but their inclusion was also a risky gambit; for although they were helpfully dubbed over in English by a heavily accented Barney, there was an outside chance that a lip-reading Spanish-speaker might stumble across Alfie's site and realise that the speaker was not who he was made out to be, and in point of fact, did not give a jot for environment.

'Is true that if eh I care for the world, the world she care for me' said Barney into an mp3 recorder.

Drade was impressed and even Belter nodded his approval.

'I have to say, he sounded more Chilean than Argentinean,' said Belter cracking another good 'un.

'Well, before coming to Buenos Aires looking for work, his parents hailed from the north of Argentina, – along the border actually,' said Barney.

'Is that a fact?' answered Belter as he copied and pasted photo after photo of his unwitting Argentinean accomplice onto Cabot's expanding website.

It was then felt that Alfie needed a page on Wikipedia, so Drade got to work and was astonished at how easy this was. It took him less than five minutes to set up, and five minutes later this page had not only been linked to his website, but also to his newly set up Facebook and Twitter accounts.

As well as having his own forum, Alfie quickly established a presence for himself on the forums of others, and was a popular addition to a number of newsgroups. His appeal was in part, because members could not help feeling exceedingly flattered that one as eminent as Professor Cabot should grace them with his presence, and in part because he was always so delightfully agreeable. It must have occurred to many that there was really something working in the world, that one from such humble and inauspicious origins as he could rise to the very pinnacle of his profession, and, yet remain so genial, down to earth, unprepossessing and yes...I'll say it for them:

'So damn nice!'

But there it was: a miracle on the Superhighway; and they do happen sometimes.

The three puppeteers worked feverishly to attract science undergraduates to discuss Cabot's many opinions. This turned out to be rather simple, as scientists, tending towards introversion, were only too happy to meet like-minded individuals. In addition, the good professor was offering five generous research grants to be given out in the name of a charity of which he had recently agreed to be a patron. Decisions as to whom the grants would be given would not be published until the following summer, but applications were welcome immediately.

The grants had been Belter's idea.

'Nothing gets interest quite as much as a pile of free money.' He smirked as he scanned the in-box of the email address especially set up for applicants. 'Like piranhas around a piece of meat, one can hardly make anything out for the spray.'

So great, in fact, was the stir that young Alfie was creating, that between the three of them they began to have difficulty keeping up with all the emails he was receiving; and it did not stop there. To create the impression that Alfie was truly an international figure, they set up PO boxes in Buenos Aires, Paris, Beijing and Toronto at very little cost, but made sure that any actual mail was immediately forwarded to his main London offices.

Endowing the Professor with publishing heritage proved a little more problematic. But only a touch more. Belter spent a day making himself familiar with the rubrics and conventions of the scientific paper, and concluded that three quarters of the average piece of research was essentially cribbed from the research of others. Furthermore, what remained was almost never ground-breaking, but either exceedingly timid or astoundingly obvious. Belter decided that as long as the vast majority of the publication was taken from existing research and the original bits were relatively innocuous, then, as likely as not, it would not be noticed, still less challenged, and if considered at all, would merely be seen as one of the professor's less important papers – the type that academics are required to knock out from time to time to maintain their currency in the academic world and to satisfy their higher ups in the institution in which they served.

With this in mind, by the end of week three, Cabot had written four books and published dozens of papers on a surprising range of subjects, all of which were generously made available online for free download. Each piece was essentially a montage of credible, but not terribly well-known bits of legitimate scientific literature and research, all of which were carefully acknowledged and their contributing authors duly thanked. By the end of the first month, the trio had obtained ISBN numbers for Cabot's increasing contribution to the academic world, and as a sideline, were advertising much of his literature for sale online via Amazon, Barnes & Nobel, and in fact all over the internet.

At the beginning of month two, the young Cabot had started to flex his muscles, and used the occasion of his being invited into the Portuguese order of St. Michael of the Wig to write in to the Evening Standard, bemoaning Britain's isolationist position when it came to respecting the environment. 'The sun shines on all of us,' he pointed out. His observation proved divisive: several people immediately wrote in advising the Professor to go back to Portugal if he liked the sun so much, whilst others immediately leapt to his defence. Upon seeing this, one outraged French academic sent an open invitation to the Professor asking that he might attend a conference on solar energy in Paris the following month. Cabot was humbled, as one might have immagined, but regretted that he had already promised to accept an honorary doctorate from the University of Waseda (near Tokyo) at that time. He did, however, find the time to send a brief message to be read out in his absence. It was Barney, having a natural flair for these things, who penned it (literally, as the Professor, being a kind of old-fashioned boy, still preferred to write certain things by hand). Once written it was placed carefully into one of the Professor's beautifully initialled envelopes and posted off.

As the weeks passed the three found ever more ingenious ways of getting other people to spread the name of Alfie Cabot at little or no cost to themselves.

Obituaries were perhaps the simplest and most effective.

'Easy as pie boys,' said Barney. 'All you do is wait for someone to die – the more illustrious and ennobled the better – wiki and Britannica them, write a summary and then add a pile of touching memories to personalise the eulogy. Remember the older they are, the fewer people are around to contradict you.'

'Yup,' agreed Belter, 'and we should always be nice about them. Nobody wins points for insulting the dead.'

'So,' continue Barney, scrolling through GoogleNews RSS feeds, 'today I spy that old Clark Schmidt has finally kicked the bucket at the tender age of 92.'

'Who's Clark Schmidt?' asked Belter.

'Who indeed,' said Barney, flicking to Wikipedia. 'Well he was one of the lesser well known members of the team that discovered DNA back in 1953 – degree MIT, PhD Cambridge England, blah, blah, blah, not married, excellent, no kids to dispute the record, lived alone until two years ago – even better, writer of limericks and er...'

Barney looked at Belter for inspiration. '...loved to sing in barber shop quartets, having a wonderful base baritone voice.' Barney turned to his computer and started typing: 'I remember once, some years ago at a conference in Canada, Clark followed me into the lavatory, switched off the lights, throwing the room into complete darkness. Then in the deepest of voices boomed 'What kept you Chuck?' It was an absolute scream, especially as there were two other people in there at the time whom Clark did not know about.'

'Bit lame,' said Belter.

'For Guardian readers – they'll roar with laughter!' said Barney.

'We're going to put this in Guardian?' asked Belter.

'We'll send it to all the papers. One of them will be bound to bite.'

'Right, well you try and get a couple of obituaries done a week and I'll put in a load of planning applications.'

'Planning applications?' said Barney.

'Yes, very easy. They cost nothing for listed buildings and conservation areas, and the council is obliged to go and publicise them far and wide to see if there are any objections. They only take a couple of hours each and they can actually be done online. Nobody bothers to check if the people who make the applications actually exist, they just want to know if there are any objections, and there won't be because I'll choose projects which are highly inoffensive in remote areas. Easy peasy!'

'Never would have thought of that in a million years,' said Barney.

The grand fabrication continued, and as days turned to weeks and weeks into months, still the trio laboured on.

Before the next month was up a new word made its entry into some of the online English dictionaries, first as a type of slang, but over time even reputable dictionary compositors began to consider the adjective 'cabotesque' as a possible new entry into the language.

'adj. syn. Expressive, Representative, Symbolic esp. in relation to popular sentiment viz 'the awarding of a knighthood to the entertainer was a cabotesque gesture by the prime minister.'

'Nice touch involving the PM and a knighthood,' said Belter, noting Barney's handiwork.

'Thanks,' said Barney, tossing an envelope into his out-tray. 'But what our man needs in order to make him even more important is substantive friends.'

'True,' agreed Belter, 'but they tend to be difficult to amass in a hurry.' He paused. 'How to get friends?' he murmured to himself.

'Well, I generally find that if you want to get on the right side of someone, do something for him,' said Drade. 'It worked at school.'

'Offer him something? Yes...but what?' asked Belter. 'The problem is that we don't want to be splashing money around on this and nobody can actually meet him. So he can't exactly nip round to people's houses and do their gardening for them.' Belter paused again. 'I suppose...' he muttered, and reached for a old copy of The Times, thumbed through it rapidly, stopped at a particular page and read an article. 'This might work,' he said. 'What you do is find an MP, or even another person of authority, speaking about something vaguely related to environmental issues, like..er...well, like this..Raymond Stoddard MP for Somewhere-up-North is campaigning against the building of a new superstore on the outskirts of Somewhere, so what Alfie does is to write a letter of fervent support. The MP's a nobody, politically speaking, so his getting a letter from someone as grand as Alfie will be something of a coup, and I shouldn't be surprised if at some point in the not-too-distant future he'll mention the support he received from Alfie.'

'Yes, sure he will,' said Barney. 'You never know we might have use for a bundle of unknown MPs at some point.'

The three applied this strategy to scores of MPs and public figures, and within a few more weeks, Alfie had been mentioned in Hansard several times, by members to whom he had given vociferous and unwavering support on a number of diverse issues, ranging from a new footpath numbering system proposed by the member for Kundley South, to a cross-party proposal to divide agricultural land use into no fewer than thirty-eight sub-categories.

Word soon spread to the House next door; one of their Lordships found himself inspired by a Cabot article on Cauliflowers and later that week, Judge Abrahams of the High Courts of London, had harsh words for a local magistrate who had only handed down some community service to two enterprising students. They claimed to be working for the Cabot Foundation and had succeeded in persuading a string of pensioners to part with much of their savings in order to provide shelter for London's homeless.

Even the Duke of Cornwall, long a champion of the environment, found himself quoting the ever-more-venerable professor on more than one occasion, for it so often happened (as it did to many of The Great and The Good) that this eminent academic had written upon issues close to his heart with such insight and perspicacity that they might have been composed by the good Prince himself.

So, over the months and little by little the name of Cabot came to be widespread, as his offices all over the world overflowed with research proposals from hungry students, invitations to speak also arrived from any number of academic institutions as did the usual fan mail which anyone of any level of notoriety attracts.

Ace in the Hole

And while Alfie was enjoying his remarkable transformation from a nobody, hailing from somewhere pampas-like in Argentina, to Britain's favourite professor, another idea no less surprising was gaining momentum in the bad lands of Chelsea.

It appeared that a groundswell of opinion against the port was growing all over the borough. And this was no accident.

'What I've done,' said Barney, during one of their many board meetings in the broom cupboard, 'is light little fires in different places all over the borough.'

'Fires?' queried Drade.

'Yes well, like this for example,' said Barney holding up a small, purple jar with a bright green label on it. 'This is Old Thames, now stocked at the very finest establishments in the King's Road and beyond. In fact, I have a meeting tomorrow at Harrods, and well, let's just say, I'm hopeful.' He winked at Belter and Drade.

'What is Old Thames?' asked Belter. 'Sounds a bit like Old Fruit! to me.'

'Glad you asked,' said Barney, ignoring Belter's stab at his juice bar experiment. He turned the jar to the side and read out the back label.

'Er...it says here...used since Elizabethan times as a face cream, Old Thames is derived from the Thames River muds found around Chelsea Harbour, and helps to rejuvenate dead cells, tighten the skin, and restore its natural shine...' Barney looked up triumphantly, 'A bargain,' he added, 'at twelve pounds a jar.'

'They'll never buy it,' Belter said bluntly. 'And what's all this about Queen Elizabeth? As far as I remember, she had terrible pock-marked skin and nits to boot!'

'We all live in Elizabethan times,' said Barney, 'and frankly, if big companies can get away with telling people that mixing petroleum jelly and cucumber is good for eyelids, and that bits of broken nutshell mixed with vegetable oil and lard is a great body conditioner, I can't see the problem.'

Belter looked unconvinced.

'Just a little fire – maybe it will take hold,' said Barney. 'And we've discovered a rare plant too.' He pulled a freezer bag out of a box at his feet and slapped it on the table. 'It's a type of seaweed. ' He handed it to Belter.

'You found this by the river?' said Belter studying the bag. 'Looks a bit slimy.'

'It is. But what we do is shove it in the oven, dry it, crunch it up and use it as a herb – tastes like, er...well, has a delicate earthy quality. Chef is working on recipes as we speak,' said Barney, 'he doesn't know where it comes from. Perhaps you could get your doctor to recommend it?'

'My man is a serious doctor, not some quack. He's not going to recommend Thames weed!' Belter paused and then added as an afterthought, 'What colour is it?'

'This is exactly the kind of thing that the Riverbankers might have eaten,' exclaimed a much excited Drade.

The other two looked at him.

'I went down there a couple of days ago to see if I could get some inspiration, and I bumped into this odd-looking fellow with a crystal stuck to his forehead. Apparently he's some kind of a shaman who believes himself to be a direct descendant of the "Riverbankers".'

Belter and Barney looked mystified.

Still Drade continued, 'According to him, 'Riverbankers' are the indigenous people, who survived for centuries upon the banks of the Thames, and whose capital – in times gone by – had been somewhere in the Lots Road area. Crystalman couldn't quite pinpoint the location of "Tamagea" but...'

'Tamagea?' interrupted Belter.

'Tamagea, yes, the name of their capital,' said Drade. 'But it's not there anymore.'

'Got washed away did it?' intoned Belter.

'Actually, yes, it did,' mewed Drade. 'But apparently the high metal content of the muds means that, using a special magnetic tool, he was able to trace where it was. And you'll never guess where the lines lead.'

'Tell us,' said Barney.

'Right under out feet,' said Drade. 'This building and garden was the centre of the town.'

'Small town,' observed Barney.

'Only a few inhabitants.' said Drade.

'The Riverbankers, eh.?' said Barney.

'The last of the fisher-foragers,' Drade went on, 'driven out by the Romans, returned during the Dark Ages, then driven out again by the Normans. According to this guy, to this day many of the locals are descended from Riverbankers.'

'Doesn't sound very plausible,' said Belter, 'but it would explain a few things.'

'The point is that he's got about a billion followers, who all believe the same thing. Shall I refer him to you, Barney?' asked Drade.

'Yes why not,' said Barney. 'And you know that old boat outside in the garden, between the allotment and the orangery? Well, the Governor has agreed to donate it to the Sea Scouts, and Jamie has given them a place to dock it next to his barge.'

'Excellent,' said Belter.

It seemed that all three of them were really pulling together, and matters were proceeding apace.

One morning, Belter, who normally arrived at Base earlier than most, arrived earlier still. He went straight to the broom cupboard, forgoing his coffee and toast, and two hours later, when Drade and Barney strolled in, Belter was still hard at work.

'Got something for us, Belter?' asked Barney, squeezing a cup of coffee and a plate of biscuits onto the cluttered table.

'Just a thought, Barney,' said Belter almost to himself.

Drade and Barney exchanged blank looks and then returned to their own tasks. Barney was working on some correspondence while Drade was busy going through the daily team leader reports and general Alfie-Supporters-Club correspondence.

At length, Belter looked up, plucked a biscuit from the plate, dipped it into the now cold coffee and swivelled round in his chair.

'Been thinking,' he said.

'Yas?' interjected Barney.

Belter held an index finger in the air, as if trying to reign in Barney's impatience. 'One would get the impression that many people had approved this planning application, after all, it is in the name of the council, which represents the fine people of Kensington & Chelsea. In fact, these kinds of decisions are made by a few individuals, and when you boil it down, you find they are made by a very few indeed, and all the other members of the council just nod along.'

'Okay, so who's responsible for this decision?' asked Drade.

'There are three,' said Belter, 'Chris Carpet, Marigold Templer and Kenneth Bobbin.'

'Kenneth Bobbin!' exclaimed Drade. 'I know him – he lives in Cheyne, and he's always buttonholing me about me selling him Dad's old Jaguar.'

'And you know one of them,' continued Belter as if he had known this in advance.

'Don't trust him an inch,' continued Drade, '...carries a plastic smile around with him like a knife.'

'But still you do know him,' insisted Belter.

'Didn't know he was a councillor though. Thought, had a place down in Kent somewhere, with bees or bedding plants or something.'

'No, no he's a councillor, who actually lives in that block near Dolphin Square. He doesn't even live in Chelsea,' said Belter. 'I found that out today.'

'So?' said Barney.

'Well, Hamish here knows him, so we've got an in,' said Belter, turning to Barney.

'Hang on, hang on there,' said Drade. 'I don't really know him. Just in passing, nodding acquaintances in fact, barely that.' Drade was back-peddling as fast as he could. The idea of making friends with the egregious Kenneth Bobbin was not something which he relished.

'I'd prefer to stroll through a steamy sewer on hot day than befriend Kenneth Bobbin,' he said as a simple matter of fact.

'But that's only one vote, what about the other two?' said Barney, ignoring Drade's plea.

'Traitor!' thought Drade, making a mental note never ever to trust Barney again.

'Been thinking about that,' said Belter. 'It's this Chris Carpet character – long standing Conservative member, former racehorse trainer, good pedigree himself. But doing a bit of research, you know, had a chat with some of the stable hands who used to work for him and it seems that during the sixties this guy was something of an outcast. Expelled from two schools, dropped out of the third, bit of a scrounger, bit of a swindler, bit of a fraud – nothing proven, but generally known.'

'Who'd have thought it,' murmured Drade.

'It all changed for young Chris when he married Lady T'raid Hemmingway and suddenly became very respectable. Got into racehorse breeding, had some success, and then he got into politics.'

'Long time ago,' Barney doubted. 'People change...'

'Yes, but this flyer from his campaign is very recent and paints a very different story. According to this the Honourable Chris Carpet spent his teenage years in the third world building villages and finding water.'

Barney took the leaflet from Belter and scoffed as he read another paragraph out loud.

'...Chris finally felt called back to his own country and got involved with helping budding entrepreneurs find their feet during the recession of the early 80s. He is still connected with these fledgling businesses today, some of which have become household names...'

'There's a good bit about his retiring young from business to concentrate on his other great passion – racehorse breeding,' added Belter with a smile.

'I dunno, Belter,' said Barney. 'How are we going to go about proving any of this?'

'I don't really think we need to prove any of it. It's just that yesterday, this arrived by post addressed to Professor Alfie Cabot.'

'And?'

'Well, I can't tell who it's from – it doesn't have a return address or anything – the postcode is SW10, which doesn't really narrow it down much. But it doesn't really matter much who it's from.'

Belter delved into the large jiffy bag and pulled out a handful of yellowed newspaper clippings.

'These scraps all relate to the misspent youth of young Mister Carpet.' He plucked one at random and scanned the article. 'This one for example is from the Eastern Daily Press on June 16th 1969 and it describes a police investigation into odds-fixing at Aintree. Mister Carpet helped police with their enquiries for two days before being released without charge.'

Belter handed the article to Barney and started to read another.

'This one is more recent, from 1985, about concerns that funds provided by the Surrey Enterprise Agency to support budding entrepreneurs had been misappropriated.' Belter sped through the article, mumbling to himself and then, out loud: '...Mister Curtain refused to be specific on what precise purpose such hospitality would serve, but assured us that he would deliver a more detailed response in due course. We are still waiting for that detail – though not with baited breath.'

Barney took it and showed it to Drade. Belter continued to study the contents of the envelope.

'He really is a caramel-coated cad,' he muttered.

Barney agreed. 'Umm, yes there is clearly something here, but are you just going to confront him with it?' he handed back the articles to Belter.

'Something like that,' said Belter. 'I'll choose something really juicy, beef it up a bit and then whack him on the head with it.'

'So that's two,' said Barney.

'Yes, now the last one is this Mzzz Templer, and she's going to be a lot trickier. You see, she's a Liberal.' The words dripped off Belter's lips like warm lard, for as everyone knows, Liberals as a group tend to be notoriously slippery characters, with their feet in so many camps it was well-nigh impossible to trip them up.

'Money problems?' asked Barney with some hesitancy.

'Born rich...very rich,' said Belter.

'Scandal?' suggested Barney.

'Plenty. But nothing she is ashamed of – it's all cool.'

'Dodgy friends?' offered Drade.

'Yup, but nothing illegal about that. No suggestion she's done anything personally. She's just comfortable with diversity' said a glum-faced Belter.

'Has she ever been politically inconsistent, changed her mind about something, not practiced what she preaches; you know, said one thing and done another' said Barney with a note of desperation.

'She is a Liberal,' explained Belter, 'so she has no fixed opinions about anything. She does all those things as a matter of course; but she gets away with it, because, whenever she does takes a definite position, she always qualifies it with weasel words and caveats, that she could be meaning just about anything. Completely untouchable in that respect, I'm afraid.'

There was a pause. Finally Drade piped up: 'Wasn't she the one who got involved with that scheme to recycle old computer parts and then send the proceeds to poor people in Wales?'

'Yes, I remember,' rejoined Barney, 'and when they investigated, they found that everything was being shipped off to China to be stripped down by little kids in sweat shops.'

'It was her,' said Belter, 'but she was exonerated. She really did know nothing about it.'

'Nevertheless, she might be someone whose conscience could be pricked, mightn't she be?' asked Barney.

'Got a weakness for lost causes and doesn't really scrutinise things,' mused Belter. 'Umm, we might be able to convince her – especially if there was a human angle.'

'I see kids fishing,' said Barney. 'Leave it to me.'

'Fine,' replied Belter. 'So I'll get on and tackle the Carpet.'

Drade sighed, 'So, I guess that leaves me with the Bobbin.'

Bobbin & Weaving

'Bloody typical,' thought Drade, glancing over his shoulder for about the tenth time that hour. 'When you don't want to see the man, you find him attached to you like an umbilical cord; but the one time you actually need him, he completely disappears.'

Drade had been staking out Kenneth Bobbin's apartment in the block of Thames-side council houses for almost two hours, having been reassured by Barney that the target was a creature of habit and would be making his way to a local cafe at around ten o'clock, pausing only to pick up a newspaper on the way.

Drade had positioned himself on the opposite side the Embankment and had taken a bench overlooking the river. This had the advantage of his not being too obvious to Bobbin, but the distinct disadvantage of forcing Drade to peer around at frequent intervals to make sure that Bobbin did not get away.

It was approaching ten thirty and nothing – not even a false alarm. Drade's thighs started to absorb the coldness of the wrought-iron bench. He crossed his legs to stimulate the circulation and impatiently exhaled. He wondered what he would say to the man, if and when he appeared, and reflected on how strange it was that, whilst the two had spent considerable time in conversation on account of the Bobbin's leeching ways, nonetheless, Drade could recall nothing about him except that he had taken a liking to an old, red sixties Jaguar which had belonged to Drade's father. Drade had taken the car for a spin down to Richmond one morning when Bobbin, who had spent the day in the park taking photographs of the deer, had caught sight of it and struck up a conversation.

During that initial encounter, Drade had had no idea that Bobbin lived so locally, and had prided himself on being an affable, approachable sort of chap so had been quite happy to natter away with the photographer cum-motoring-enthusiast-type who had been so taken with his Jag.

'Really floored her this morning along the M3, smooth as you like, hardly heard a thing with the overdrive,' he had muttered to himself. 'Amazing to think that the beast is almost fifty years old.'

Bobbin had nodded. 'Gearing and torque, goes back to Achimedes, doesn't it?'

Drade knew what a gear was but had no idea why talking should make a difference. He did know that Aristotle was Greek, however.

'Yup, good ol' Greeks,' he said with a knowing chuckle, 'all those years ago.'

Bobbin had seemed satisfied, and Drade had smiled to himself at the ease with which he had managed to dodge the flying spanner, as it were, and persuade a perfect stranger – an expert mechanic to boot – that he, Hamish de Buxton Drade, was not some clot who had simply inherited a nice car and had no idea how it actually worked.

'Being an expert in the old practicals is all very well, but real talent is about being able to don any costume and wear any mask,' he had thought to himself.

Mysteriously (or at least for reasons which Drade had never been able to fathom) Bobbin had let his natural curiosity get the better of his obvious satisfaction: 'When did Jaguar start using a straight-port cylinder head? Sixty-seven, or was it before they rebadged the Mark 2?' he had asked casually.

Very slowly and thoughtfully Drade's head had inclined skywards and he studied the heavens. affecting such severe absent-mindedness that one be might forgiven for concluding that he had not heard the question. Yet his mind was racing, torquing like a jaguar with verbal diarrhoea, one might say. This was a tricky one. If he simply said 'yes', as was his habit when presented with this type of diabolical conundrum, then he ran a double risk of firstly, not being right about the year of this straight-port thingie, and secondly, being wrong about the order of their introduction. On the other hand, saying 'no' was even riskier, as not only did he run the same risks in reverse, but he would have seemed to be mounting an open challenge to Bobbin's knowledge of matters mechanical.

How he hated the kind of complex question which did not allow of a simple 'yes' or 'no' answer. If he were running the world, Drade would have had them banned, or at least considered highly impolite to pose to all but the closest of friends.

'Complex conversation puts the kibosh on a person's thinking time by forcing him to concentrate on someone else,' he reflected. His mind returned to Bobbin: what should he do in the present situation? Firstly, he needed to stop studying the sky – there wasn't a cloud in it and he had already had enough time to admire its blueness. And secondly, he needed to defend himself. The words of Patton sprang to his mind: 'When in doubt, give the enemy a sound thrashing.'

He drew his head down to his opponent's level and, eyebrow raised with more than a hint of condescension, glared at him without blinking.

'Nineteen sixty-eight,' he said, 'you're confusing this model with the Mark 1.'

Drade was stunned with his own temerity and he felt his eyebrow drop a touch. He steeled himself: this was not a time for weakness. Bobbin opened his mouth as if to say something, and then closed it, spotting Drade's eyebrow which had pepped up again to uncomfortable heights, and sensing from the aggressive sideways cock of the man's face that Drade was not one to be argued with.

Beaten, Bobbin looked down and stammered out a face-saving excuse.

'Yes, yes, you're right off course. They look similar, don't they?'

Drade raised his other eyebrow. He had parried the other's clumsy advances and would now go in for the kill.

'From a distance, perhaps,' he answered, trying to seem as though he was doing his best, but not succeeding, in keeping a sarcastic lilt out of his voice. He had been going to add, 'fifty or sixty miles,' but had thought better of it. That was the great thing about old Hamish, he thought: there was not a drop of vindictive blood coursing through his veins. He would give another a slapping if he really merited it, but only to inform, never – repeat never to punish.

Back on the stakeout, Drade looked around again, and, to his joy, spotted the man carefully locking his front door. Drade jumped up and then, remembering to try to be as subtle as possible, affected an amiable stroll along the Embankment. He glanced across the road. Bobbin was proceeding at some speed in the direction of Battersea Bridge. Drade picked up his own pace, subtlety certainly had its place, but at this point he did not want to lose him, and he would rather have sprinted though the moving traffic and rugger-tackled Bobbin to the ground to get his attention, than have spent another morning freezing to death on that bench.

As predicted by Barney, Bobbin turned right; Drade followed. The cafe was at the bottom of the street, and now Bobbin was now approaching the newsagent. The plan was that, whilst Bobbin went and got himself his paper, Drade would slip by and casually take up a position in the café, whereinwhich after five minutes Bobbin would discover him.

'So the deer would seem to be stalking the hunter rather than the other way round,' Drade had remarked Belter a few days earlier when the plan was conceived.

'Exactly so,' Belter had murmured

'Like so many things in life which seem one way, but are in fact another,' said Drade.

Belter, who did not have a philosophical bone in his body, had managed an 'indeed' by way of not appearing rude, and then busied himself with other matters.

But Drade was not finished, for one could have created two Platos – and probably a Socrates too from the number of philosophical bones he had been endowed with.

'But, er...hang on a mo', if the hunter wasn't actually stalking the deer, then what would he be doing in the woods?' he asked.

Belter had paused for a second before replying, but this time he didn't look up, 'If the deer were really stalking the hunter, that would make the hunter the deer, in which case, would one really expect to find him anywhere else?'

It had taken Drade a couple of seconds to understand the unflinching logic of Belter's argument, but once he did, he had thanked his friend for clearing up the matter. 'Very damn smart,' thought Drade, 'and just like Belter.'

Bobbin was nearing the newsagent. Drade readied himself for a sudden dash to the cafe, but to his immense dismay, Bobbin passed the newsagent without giving it a glance.

'Now what,' thought Drade. 'Quick, a plan!' He scoured his capacious brain for all the plans he knew, but none of them seemed applicable.

Bobbin turned back towards the newsagent evidently; he had changed his mind.

Drade dropped like a stone and began to fumble with his shoelace. Presently, he glanced up; he had not been spotted, and Bobbin had gone into the newsagent.

'He must have forgotten,' thought Drade. Thanking God for Bobbin's absentmindedness, he whipped past the newsagent, making sure he was facing the opposite side of the street as he did so, and entered the cafe.

'Large coffee and some buttered toast,' he said to the barman, picking up a magazine from the rack, and leaning on the bar. Having secured his position, he started to leaf through the pages as casually as he could.

Right on cue, in walked Bobbin.

Drade glanced up, down, then up again, as if taken by surprise. He beamed at Bobbin.

'Kenneth,' he said, 'what a surprise!'

'Hello Hamish. It was you, yes. I saw you earlier, actually. You were sitting on the Embankment, weren't you?'

'Er...yes, I think I was. actually,' said Drade, slightly taken aback.

'Must have taken a shortcut to beat me here,' said Bobbin.

'Ha, ha, well, you know, just watching the seasons change,...ha, ha. And then when they had, I felt like a coffee.' Drade tried to keep the guilt from infecting his voice.

'Yes, well...' said an affable Kenneth nodding at Drade. He turned to the barman, 'Coffee to go, please.'

'Disaster!' thought Drade, 'he's about to leave.' He mastered his instinct simply to blurt out the reason for their meeting, and scrambled around frantically for something to talk about.

'Er, done any more of your fascinating photography hobby recently?' he asked, trying not to stammer, which was a failing of his when under pressure.

Bobbin seemed slightly surprised. Hamish had always had such a busy schedule, that whenever their paths had crossed before, Hamish had barely been able to spare him more than a few seconds; yet here he was, taking it easy, having a coffee, and wanting to talk about photography.

'Actually, yes,' Bobbin said, pulling closer to Drade.

'Gotcha!' thought Drade, 'the hunter dressed as a deer, bags the deer dressed as a hunter.'

'I had no idea you were a fellow snapper,' said Bobbin.

'Oh yes!' exclaimed Drade, 'all the time. Me...my camera virtually inseparable...'

'What's your speciality?' asked Bobbin.

'It varies,' said Drade, 'seasonally...you know...' Finding himself quite unable to pad this out, he looked around for a free table.

A familiar glint appeared in Bobbin's eye. Drade sighed: he knew that look.

The two sat down, but Gaol-time was slow for Drade encapsulated, as he soon was, in an endless discussion about different kinds of lenses, batteries, flash arrangements, shutter speeds, and film types. The advantages and disadvantages of digital versus traditional SLR were debated, along with which formats where best for which type of photography, and then, just as they were about to enter the minefield of colour development and pantones, Drade had an epiphany.

'Of course, my thing is ducks,' he said.

'Really?' said Bobbin.

'Oh yes, didn't I tell you? Yes, you'll often find me of a morning – most mornings, actually – down there by the river taking piccies of the little things.'

'I had no idea,' said Bobbin.

'Yes...the way the waddle along, and their funny looking beaks...looks like they're always smiling...wonderful, wonderful to see.'

'Indeed,' said Bobbin. 'Here's an idea, why don't we take a few photos together, make a day of it. What sort of hide do you use?'

'Er...a normal one, normally. And sometimes a big one. And at other times, a ...a smaller one. Depends on so many factors. Very complicated.'

'Well, I look forward to it,' said Bobbin, getting up, intimating his imminent departure.

Drade jumped up, half blocking Bobbin's way to the door, half dragging and half guiding the man back to the table.

'Of course, there won't be ducks there for much longer,' he voice cracking in affected regret.

'Why not?' asked Bobbin, with a note of concern.

'Well, it's this new hotel, or port, or whatever they're building there. Going to destroy the place apparently. River's going to dry up, weeds are going to grow, and the ducks will leave.'

'Very sad,' agreed Bobbin. But then he cheered up a little: 'Still, there's always the Serpentine, and it's closer to you, actually. We can go there.'

Drade's face dropped as he watched Bobbin leave the cafe. He answered his parting wave with a nod and became lost in thought.

'All in all, not a perfect outcome,' he reflected. What was worse, he had somehow arranged to meet the most boring man in the world to do the most boring thing - early some morning. And he had promised to bring 'the hide' – whatever that might be.'

Fishin' for Favours

'I'm calling it "RiverKidz",' Barney had announced to Belter a couple of weeks before.

'Got a contemporary feel about it,' muttered Belter, thumbing through a pile of receipts. 'Would that be "kids" with a z or an s or a p?'

'A z and it would be two words in one, with a great big capital K in the middle.'

'And what is "RiverKidz"?' asked Belter.

'We get some schools kids down to the river bank – just where they are going to build the port – get them busy will all sorts of things, and then get the Councillor down to have a look.'

'What sorts of things?'

'Well, I thought mainly fishy things,' said Barney. 'The kids catch a few fish, they study them, they learn about them, they might even eat a few.'

'Nice,' said Belter.

'And then, of course you've got Tage, Tasil...the Tamagean herb, you know?'

'Riverweed?'

'Yes, same formula. You get the kids to find some, to study it, perhaps even to nibble a bit of it.'

'You are joking!'

'No. What's funny about that?'

'I thought you were joking about them eating the fish. They're all totally polluted, not good to eat, if you start serving up fish with some disgusting riverweed everybody will die. All the kids'll die in a big heap – dead – and it will be your fault, Barney,' said Belter.

'Fair enough. No eating, but fishing – fine, studying them – fine, generally get close to the little blighters – fine.'

'Right, so the kids are all busy with the fish, and Suzzie the Liberal rolls up – then what?

'Well then, we'll give her a glimpse of the old Riverbanker's life,' said Barney.

'She is a Liberal, Barney, but she's not stupid. Don't try and bamboozle her; she'll see through it. She likes to make up her own mind, or at least to think she does. Her main weakness is she's so bloody naïve. So, what you need to do is persuade her to persuade herself that playing down by the river is like playing in the street for Londoners of a certain class, and let her do the rest.'

'I think you can leave this one to me, Belter,' said Barney. 'We'll start by getting a few eco-traps down there.'

Unluckily, not being a Riverbanker himself, Barney's prepared 'traps' had been installed back to front, which meant that the entrances, though which the fish were supposed to pass, faced the riverbank. So in spite of their being full all kinds of baits, designed to appeal to every fish-palette imaginable, the only way for a hungry fish to get itself trapped would have been for it to jump out of the water, flap its way up the bank and then flop itself obligingly through the entrance of the cage to feast upon the delights that lay therein.

'We'll have to turn them round the proper way and fill them with live fish from the market,' said Barney earlier that day, where they had discovered their mistake. 'What a shag!'

'I read somewhere that Tamagean fish are not known for their brains,' observed Drade, bringing to mind yet another of his uncle's articles. 'Something to do with mercury pollution. So, what you could do, is leave the traps as they are, fill them with live fish, and then, if anyone wonders whether a fish would be that stupid to get itself trapped in that way, we can just say that Thames fishes are not known for their intellect, and that only the stupid ones ended up in the traps.'

'I reckon you've got to be pretty smart, fish-wise, to figure out that the way to get to get hold of the bait was to go cross-country,' remarked Belter drily. 'Turn the traps around, Barney. I know where to get fish from.'

The evening started successfully: the children – around fifty of them – arrived on cue, screaming and shouting so loudly that one might have thought Hannibal's army to have taken a wrong turn and crossed the Thames rather than the Po. But this aside, they had been a well-behaved bunch, who had been divided into five groups of ten, or so, and who had immediately started to tackle the activities which had been laid on for them.

Ms Templer had been due at half past six, and Barney had arranged for both Drade and his new-found companion, the eminent Kenneth Bobbin, to be there doing a little wildlife photography; and Belter posed with a couple of his pals, as some of those fishermen one invariably finds stuck in the mud somewhere on every fine British riverbank. Barney had even managed to persuade a group of those queer, shabby types, who lived on the river boats nearby, to float a barge and a couple of rowboats round to where the main events were taking place, so that, all in all, by the time the effervescent councillor had appeared on the scene, there was quite a crowd in position, and there was something of a carnival atmosphere in the air, which was compounded by the sudden appearance of an ice-cream van, as well as a mob of completely unconnected onlookers.

'Rubbernecking blighters,' thought Barney. 'They probably think someone's drowned, and are just waiting for the police divers to start dragging the Thames.'

'Hello, hello,' said Ms Templer, the moment she caught sight of young Barney bounding towards her.

She had an unusual kind of voice: high pitched but not piercing; loud but not ear battering; a voice which carried, no matter where she was; and she spoke with an accent that could cut glass. She was a tall and mighty lady, whose dress managed to combine representative pieces from almost every tribe and ethnicity in existence.

Her top half sported an Indian Kameez-and-shawl combination, very brightly coloured and much-favoured by her on account of the general looseness of fit. She wore two different types of leg attire: the left leg accommodated a Cypriot version of a golfing plus-four; the right was garnished with something which might have originated in the Alps. One was left wondering how these two pieces were attached together at the midriff, but unless one specialised in this kind of thing, one would not be wondering too long. Her shoes were all-English, however, but interestingly Mediaeval – soleless wraps of leather and pointy toes, which would not have looked out of place on the feet of Thomas à Beckett. Her jewellery was broadly South American – an eclectic assortment of beads, bangles, straps and rings. And on her head was a queer item which looked like a beefed-up astrakhan with a Glengarry's torrie, stuck, like a cherry on top. If one did not know better, one might have supposed that she had walked from one end of Camden market to the other, stealing an item from each cart. But the effect was colourful and strangely beautiful amidst the Gullen greys of the banks of the River Thames.

Barney grabbed her hand and shook it with enthusiasm.

'So pleased you could make it to our little evening, our, er, special evening for the little ones.' he smiled and looked around benignly at the children.

Ms Templer, who was old enough to be Barney's mother, looked down at him with some admiration. She did like a man with a firm handshake – regrettably in her line of work, the kind of men she usually met were either limp-wristed ambiguous political types or sweaty-palmed bureaucrats. This Barney-the-Hoof was much more her cup of tea.

'So what have you got for me here, Hoofsdew?' she said snapped.

'Well, quite a lot actually. We just thought you'd be interested in coming down to this part of the Borough, and, er...have a gander at the sorts of things that go on here. I mean, it's not quite as busy as this every night, but there are a lots of on-going projects.'

'Right, well lay on MacDew' decided Ms Templer.

Barney Hoofsdew led Suzzie Templer to the first group of children, who were busy pulling fish out of the special traps and Barney and the councillor watched a somewhat rakish young man, who had probably been cajoled into extracting the catch, reach so deeply into one of the cages that there seemed a real possibility of his being sucked inside by whatever he was groping for. He felt around, his face wrung with concentration, as though trying to sense what his fingers were struggling to see.

'Got anything?' asked another lad of more sobering proportions – doubtless the class cajoler-in-chief – who would, one suspected, have had some difficulty bending down and grabbing anything, but no difficulty at all consuming whatever he might have grabbed.

The skinny lad said nothing.

'Maybe this trap's empty?' wondered a third boy presently.

'Maybe,' echoed Barney, trying his best to sound sincere and as he glanced at Ms Templer innocently.

At length the skinny lad jumped back, as though he had been shocked, or bitten, or tickled – or all three at once – by whatever it was he had clutched in his hand.

'Amazing,' staggered Barney as he and his ward studied a rather lethargic fish which one might have found flapping about uselessly at the bottom of a child's bucket.

Ms Templer seemed equally surprised; she studied the fish curiously.

Standing just behind her, Barney smiled to himself. 'Normally it's the fish who are hooked, but now it's the honourable Ms Templer.'

'But it's a mackerel – a juvenile blue,' she noted.

'Is it? Is it really?' asked Barney. 'Amazing!'

'Certainly is,' said Ms. Templer. 'Blue mackerel is a saltwater fish! No wonder it looks half dead. One of those awful boat people must have bought it at the local market and tossed it overboard.' She looked up and frowned at a barge full of swampy types.

'Damn,' thought Barney, 'what were the odds of Belter choosing a saltwater fish?'

'Amazing.' he said again, 'those resourceful boat-people – what lives they lead. Fascinating!' He looked up desperately up toward Drade.

'There's your problem,' said Ms Templer to Barney, 'idle, polluting barge-dwellers, and their kids don't go to school, so when they get older they all turn to crime. We really need to get to grips with 'em.'

'Yes, yes, quite alternative...amazing.' said Barney. Things were not going as planned. '...Decent people,' he emolliated.

'They don't wash, you know, and they're all on the social; then, in order to avoid taxes, they don't vote, and then they complain that nothing is done for them.' Ms Templer's fiery reputation was turning out to be well deserved.

'Well, the mark of a civilized society...' began Barney, trying to placate her, yet at the same time motioning to Belter, who even though he was fifty yards away had sensed that all was not well, and had already started to unplug himself from the muds, and saunter in their direction as well as any a fully booted-up fisherman could.

'What they need is a dose of civilizing,' stormed the councillor.

'...is how well it treats it minorities,' continued Barney, his voice trailing off a little. He was amazed by just how un-liberal Suzzie-the-Liberal was turning out to be.

The councillor remained to stare waterward.

'It's the mercury,' piped up Drade, suddenly inspired.

'What?' hissed Ms Templer.

'The mercury in the water,' Drade went on, 'it makes them stupid.'

Both Barney and Ms Templer stared at Drade for a moment.

'This particular chap probably drank some mercury out there in the Channel, went a bit squiffy, and swam all the way up the river, which is why he looks so knackered.'

Doubtfully, Ms Templer looked down at the fish.

'Amazing!' a rejuvenated Barney cried.

By this time, Belter had joined them, complete with bucket, rod, various nets and other tackle. 'Done much?' he said, his regionless accent totally at odds with the vernacular.

The larger of the boys held up the withered looking mackerel.

'Nice,' commented Belter. 'A mackerel, by the looks of it. Bit on the small side.'

'A juvenile...' clarified Barney

'Quite a swimmer, apparently,' said the still doubtful councillor.

'You'll never guess what I caught,' said Belter reaching into his bucket. 'Bloody great lobster! Never seen one that big.' He grinned, and his eyes sparkled from behind the mud he had smeared over his face earlier, to give him that 'authentic' look.

Again Ms Temple studied the catch. 'You found this here?'

'Yes, ˋbout twenty minutes ago,' said Belter.

'But this is an American lobster – look it's smooth here at the front. These come from the east coast of Canada. How the deuce did it get here?'

Belter went silent and even Drade looked flummoxed. A few spots of rain started to spatter down. Ever the optimist, Barney, sprang into action.

'Er...er...have you had a chance to visit the enchanted castle?' asked Barney, gently but firmly taking the councillor by the arm, and steering her away from the fish and back towards the bank.

'The enchanted castle?' queried the councillor.

'Well, we call...that is to say, the kids call it that...er...enchanted. It isn't really enchanted. It's just a place which is enchanting. It enchants,' he added lest there be any doubt.

Suzzie, Belter and Barney picked their way through reedy ground, and at length arrived at what might have been mistaken at a glance for a large mud barrier, on the top of which some scrubwood had washed up. A closer inspection revealed an element of design to it: an entrance, some rough openings, which might have served as windows, and even the impression of a chimney or flue in the roof. Four nearby muddy children constructed a channel of some kind to direct the waters around the mud house; whilst others were busy decorating one of its outside walls with a mosaic of pebbles and stones.

'Er...traditional..er..mud and brick, clays et cetera...mud house that a traditional Riverbanker would have lived in, and, er, some still do, I understand.'

The three of them stared at it. Suzzie-the-Liberal had a horrified look upon her face. Barney noticed it and decided that he needed to be more proactive in directing her attentions: 'Oh look, you can see where the old fishing rods would poke out. See, here and here,' he indicated with a long reed two holes about as wide as a finger. 'So, they'd stick their rods in here, and that way, they didn't need to hold them...amazing!'

He gazed in feigned wonder at the holes. But Suzzie's attentions were distracted by the channels, which the children were busily digging out – or more especially by what was flowing through them. She turned away and, in exasperation, Barney jabbed his piece of reed into one of the holes.

'Of course, nowadays, they are used as hides for wildlife photographers,' said Barney, becoming a little concerned by the councillor's behaviour as she seemed to be bending down to sniff at the mud. 'Yes, it takes a little getting used to doesn't it?' We live in such a sanitized world that we forget what nature smells like sometimes.' He paused. 'Did you notice anything in the mudhouse at all?'

Drade, who had somehow managed to overtake his pals and the councillor, half emerged from the makeshift hide. Barney shoved Drade's head back inside, before scampering after the councillor, who had started to wander further inland, following the channel the children had constructed.

Out of breath, he persisted, 'You probably didn't notice anything, which is why they prove such effective tools for the hordes of photographers who wend their way to this picture-book location.'

The councillor procured a long spade and was excavating the river bank.

Barney peered over her shoulder and struggled on, 'Some of them...er...come from as far away as Scotland, I'm told.'

Presently, the councillor drew herself to her full height, which, in conjunction with the slope of the bank, meant that she now towered over Barney.

'Sewage!' she exclaimed, 'raw sewage!'

'What?' puffed Barney.

'These kids are playing in sewage: excrement, human faeces, poo!'

'What are you talking about?' asked Belter.

'The water flowing though the kids channel comes from this tube here. And that comes straight out of people's lavatories!'

'Amazing, ' said a beaten Barney.

A couple of teachers, who had overheard the councillor, immediately turned to gather up the children and head them speedily back into waiting minibuses. The councillor swept away and within five minutes the entire place was deserted. Barney joined Belter and leant against the walls of the mud house.

At moment that Drade chose to spring out of his hide with camera and various lenses and light metres slung over his shoulder. 'It's Mercury-Man!' he exclaimed with a laugh, stretching out his arms, as if to embrace the world. Then noticing that the three of them were alone he said, 'Where is everyone?'

'They've buggered off,' said Belter with a sigh.

'Not good boys, not good at all,' said Barney.

Dead Wood

Later that evening, back in the broom cupboard at Base, the three, having washed and changed, warmed themselves on the electric stove which they had procured from The Governor. Without a word, they sipped cocoa and listened to the patter of drizzle upon the windows.

Drade cast his mind back about ten years, to his first year at Durham. He and a pal – Hugh Duggan, with whom, of late, he seemed to have lost touch – had got it into their heads to reverse the glass of two convex mirrors which had been hung high upon the walls in one of the libraries. It was to have been doubly sweet, for not only was it something of a challenge, given their physical proximity; but also the librarian, a dour, chain-smoking spinster, whom everyone called 'Hogger', used these mirrors to watch, spy upon, and control all who dared enter her domain. In fact, during the library's opening hours, the woman did nothing else but stare at her patrons; and only when the library was entirely empty did she catch up on her administrative work.

Many a time a student had been roughly shaken awake with the words, 'This is a library, not a bedroom, my dear.' And just as often been chastised for writing too noisily, or for opening the window unnecessarily, or for some other triviality. 'This is a library, not a bar, my dear,' Hogger had once said to Drade, when he had had the temerity to bring in a cup of coffee.

The librarian's vigilance ensured that getting up to flip the mirrors during the day was out of the question; a fly would have had difficulty moving in the library with Hogger in position. And, as she was never ill, never went to the lavatory, never ate, and never did anything that distracted her from her calling, she always was in position. During the night, the library was locked, as was the building in which it was housed, as was the street which contained the building; so, even then, it was going to be difficult.

But Duggan and Drade had found a rather ingenious solution.

About an hour before closing one afternoon, Drade had placed himself at one of the remoter tables, and Duggan, after approaching Hogger with a couple of books, had placed them rather insolently upon her desk. Without waiting, he had then strolled back towards a nearby shelf to glance at another book which had apparently caught his eye. Hogger had been incensed; in the thirty years she had been a librarian, no-one had ever dared do that; as the library was her domain, the desk was her person, and people who wanted to borrow her books had better hand them to her one by one, while she checked them out. To add insult to injury, this wretched student had not so much placed the books on her desk, but more, left them there for her to sort out, whilst he considered whether to take another! Duggan had then sauntered back with another book in hand, and this time he had half flung it upon the other two, throwing Hogger the kind of easy smile one might throw toss a waiter as one left a restaurant, before thrusting his hands into his pockets and showing her his back as he had looked up to admire the wood carvings on the ceiling. Although boiling inside, Hogger, remained outwardly stoical and had continued her watch, staring through Duggan at the other students whilst her bony fingers sought out the Rule – a heavily varnished, metre-long enforcer fashioned of unyielding black walnut, which she kept always unsheathed.

The Rule had then reached out to give Duggan's kidneys a single, sharp jab.

'I'm sorry,' Duggan had parried with good-nature, 'have you done them?'

'Done what?' had asked Hogger with restrained malice.

'Checked out my books.'

'Which books?'

'These books,' Duggan, had motioned towards the little pile.

'I see no books'

'These three here,' had said Duggan picking the first one up.

'I'm afraid those books are being held for someone else. I'm sorry, they shall have to be put them aside.' In triumph the Rule had relaxed and Hogger's head inclined to meet Duggans gaze; and that was the split second Drade had been waiting for. He had ducked down below the table and slid along the floor towards the very end of the most dimly lit row of shelves in the library.

And there he had stayed for four full hours, until at length, the librarian, having shooed away the other students, bullied the cleaners, bickered with the janitor, and caught up on the day's other tasks herself parted, leaving Drade alone in an oddly Hoggerless library. Only then had he crept over to the one window which did not face the inner street of the University, and had opened it. A few minutes later, Duggan was in, having climbed up an extendable ladder. The two were ready to commit an audacious crime of such comedic timbre that tales of it would echo for generations through the Durham's hallowed halls.

In every life there are those moments which one brings frequently to mind, and which are never forgotten. The moment in which Duggan and Drade had realised that the mirror had not actually been hung, but had been stuck with impossibly resilient epoxy to the wall was one such.

In an instant their elation had turned to chalk upon their tongues, and they had been transformed from daring leprechauns to blundering dunderheads, who now needed to get out of a locked library in a locked building in a closed street as soon as possible.

They had managed it, of course, but the moment had remained with Drade forever, as had the knowledge of the thinness of the line twixt success and failure.

Recuperating at back at Base, Belter looked up from his iPad.

'So it turns out that Suzzie-the-Liberal has three degrees, including a PhD in marine biology,' said Belter. 'How were we to know?'

'Yup, you can forget getting her support,' said Barney. 'As far as she's concerned, the whole of that stretch of the riverbank needs sorting out and regularising. She's not so much a liberal as a neo-socialist type; if you give someone like her access to firearms, she would have shot the boat people on the spot and us a few seconds later.'

'Yes,' said a pensive Belter, 'Funny how often that sort of thing happens: the illiberal Liberal, the elitist Socialist, the totalitarian Democrat. Sort of reverse psychology... like people who are really in charge having modest-sounding titles – private secretaries and civil servants. Whereas those who sound as though they run things – like Dukes and Earls – don't count at all.'

'You can forget about Bobbin too,' said Drade. 'He overheard our little conversation as we were cleaning up the traps yesterday after everyone had gone.'

'Really? I didn't see him anywhere,' said Barney.

'He was hidden in one of his photographer tents he uses,' said Drade. 'You know that reedy knoll just up from the traps?'

'Yes,' said Barney.

'Well that was his hide and he was in it. Apparently that's what a hide is.'

'So, he's gone?'

'Yup,'

'Not going brilliantly, is it?' said Barney gloomily, 'and the whole Alfie-charade thing is proving more and more difficult to keep up. For a start he keeps getting invited to conferences and there's only so many times he can say no.'

'Yes, I've had quite a few audience requests myself including several book-signings,' said Belter. 'If we don't watch it, we're going to start losing support.'

Where would they go from here? Drade sank deeply into thought, his great mind relentlessly turning the problem round and round.

Then Barney spoke: 'We could kill him off before he actually had to put in an appearance. Not literally of course,' he added at once noticing the look of shock on Drade's face.

Drade relaxed: of course, Alfie wasn't a real person – he knew that – good for him.

'So, he meets with an accident, and all that's left is the memory of him,' said Belter. 'Like a martyr?'

'Even more powerful in death than he was in life,' added Barney.

'But isn't that a bit risky, Barney?' said Drade. 'I mean, if he dies questions might be asked, or worse, there might be an investigation, and we might get into trouble.'

'Kill him off in another country,' suggested Belter.

'Of course, in South America!' said Barney. 'He was there visiting his sick mother and had an accident.'

'Got tangled up in the bedclothes while he was tucking her up, and accidentally tripped out of the window?' said Belter, eyebrow raised.

Drade closed his eyes, trying to picture the mechanics of the old boy tripping out of a window. The first problem would have been that unless he was mightily tall he would have had to be something of an acrobat. And secondly, why would a tangle of bedclothes act in such a manner? The professor might have panicked, of course – a touch of cloakaphobia. Quite a touch – more like a clout! Drade pictured the sequence of events: The man bends down to tuck the bedcovers in for his poor mother, who had been tossing and turning all night. Being one of those awkward, strong-willed octogenarians she objects to being 'tucked in' like a two year old, and throws the bedcover angrily away blanketing her good son. Panic sets in, and he begins to act irrationally, staggering here and there, hither and thither, becoming more and more cloakaphobic, his heart pounding, his head racing. In this fearful state he starts to jump up and down and make diving, lunging movements to free himself from the blanket, which due to his wool allergy is also causing him to sneeze, making it difficult for him to breath. In his struggles, he bangs his head against a wall and, slightly concussed, bangs it a second time against a cupboard. Then, in confusion, he tilts this time against thin air, and, with nothing to arrest his movement, goes head first through the open window and down to a grizzly death.

Drade shivered at the thought of it.

Barney was speaking, 'So if we're are going to kill him off, we should fix his date of death and make sure that all requests for public appearances are postponed until after that time. That way, it looks as though he's fine with appearing in public, but just very busy, and just when everybody is gearing up to meeting him, he dies.'

'Great,' said Belter, 'and we also need to make sure that by the time of his death he is heavily involved in opposing the Lots Road development, so that when he does go, it is us who are left to fight for his legacy.'

'Okay,' said Barney, 'so today it's June the twenty first, and the final decision is to be made on Friday the twenty fifth of October; so, if we could kill off Alfie some time in August, that would give us plenty of time to build up a campaign after his death.'

'Early September would give us more time to formulate his opposition to Lots Road; otherwise it'll look as though Lots Road were something of an afterthought.'

'September first it is, then,' concluded Barney.

'Right, and tomorrow I'll nip off and see if I can't persuade Councillor Carpet in some way,' ended Belter.

Cobwebs out of the Carpet

'Same haunches as her father,' said Belter, motioning towards a large black racing horse penned up in its stall. He noted the classic proportions of a thoroughbred like the lines of a formula one car – unmistakable.

'She breathes well, too,' he added. 'Just taken her for a run?'

A tall swarthy man, who had been leaning on a post, watching the stable staff brush down his pride and joy down, turned to face Belter. He had a fine head of black swept-back hair and eyes of the darkest brown, which seemed all the deeper on account of his long luscious lashes. His lips were full, his chin square, and cheekbones high. He was well turned out, too; tweeds and leather patches, with knee-high riding boots, and sharp riding crop which he held like a conductor's baton, made up the ensemble.

'Wealth really can smooth away many a defect, and yet...' considered Belter, 'rub too hard, and faults start to show.'

As for all that he exuded class, there was a certain gauntness in his face, a certain something in his sloping gait, a certain gameyness to his accent, and a certain shiftiness in his composure, which combined to rob the man of membership of a particular class, and simultaneously to brand him as belonging to another.

Nevertheless, as he approached Belter, the man, had an unmistakable, almost military, authority about him.

'And you are?' he asked haughtily.

'Just passing by,' Belter offered and proffered a hand. 'Belter Trelawney, from the Cabot foundation in Chelsea. Delighted to meet you – it's Councillor Carpet, isn't it?'

The councillor seemed a little surprised to have been sought out at such distance from his constituency and hesitated to take Belter's hand. 'Yes, yes it is. The Cabot foundation? Sorry, I don't think I've heard of you.'

'Professor Cabot – Alfie Cabot,' insisted Belter.

Clarity broke upon the councillor, 'Oh yes, of course. Yes, a great man. Well, what can I do for you?'

Belter decided it was time to start to crack the whip.

'Well, it's more a question of what we can do for you. You see, I work on the fundraising side of the foundation – we are entirely funded through private donations – and, er, well, we have been offered a rather surprising opportunity.'

'Really?' said the councillor, moving nearer to Belter. He had always had a tendency to compartmentalise separate facets of his life, and he did not want the stable hands to see the lord of the manor reduced to discussing petty council business with someone from a charity. On the other hand, he knew of Professor Alfie Cabot – who did not – and realised he could not simply dismiss the visitor. He put an arm around Belter's shoulders and gently guided him towards the doors of the barn.

They walked out into the yard and together strolled into the open grounds of Hillbrew Farm in Surrey, which served as Councillor Carpet's country seat.

'Yes,' replied Belter, 'a few weeks ago we were approached by an entrepreneur of some repute.' He glanced at Carpet who met his eyes with understanding – 'how very Chelsea,' thought Belter – 'who,' he continued, 'wanted to invest a substantial sum of money in the foundation and the work we do on behalf of the environment.'

'Lucky you,' said Carpet.

'Indeed, well, yes and no. The main project he was going to finance was actually your own "One Green" initiative, which made us at the Cabot Foundation extremely happy, I can tell you, because we all think what you are doing is absolutely great!' Belter beamed at Mr. Carpet.

'Thank you,' said Carpet, bowing his head. 'Modestly forbids.'

The two laughed together, and from a distance, they might have been father and son ambling through their garden talking about their shared passion for sailboats.

How impenetrable is the shroud that time and distance weave around the truth; for the two of them were about to be joined in battle. But only Belter knew this, and was coldly relishing the other's ignorance, whilst Carpet overcame his initial unease, and was beginning to wonder what all this had to do with him.

'Well, things were proceeding apace, when our angel suddenly pulled out, saying only that certain incompatibilities had come to light.'

'Oh?' said Carpet with a hint of concern.

'Er...with you,' continued Belter.

'Me!' Carpet was genuinely astonished.

'Yes you. Of course, our investor was pretty cagey and didn't go into details, but then after some, er.. .he... er...he did.'

Their strolling stopped and Carpet half turned, blocking Belter's progress; their eyes met and locked, expressions frozen for an instant.

Belter spoke first. 'Apparently, he'd been shown stuff by somebody else – I don't know who – about you – about your past, which well...you know...I mean, I said it was rubbish, and that from everything I had heard, you were the very best of fellows.' Belter paused. At this point he wanted to emphasise that he was on the councillor's side. He gave the impression of searching for the right words. 'Totally, I mean, utterly honest and dedicated to helping your constituents.' Belter shrugged his shoulders as if to say that, even though he had defended the good councillor's honour as best he could, he failed to assuage the businessman's doubts.

'But you know what these people are like – slightest whiff of scandal...' Belter made a gesture with his hand as if to imply escape or sudden flight.

Heads bowed, both men walked slowly on. Belter sensed a realisation slowly dawning upon Councillor Carpet.

Presently, the Councillor stopped, turned to Belter and spoke, his voice weaker and faded as though his lungs lacked air. 'Why did you come here?' he asked.

'Well, just to put you in the picture, and to assure ourselves that there is nothing in it' said Belter with a disarming cheeriness.

'You said there was something you might be able to do for me?' insisted Carpet with slightly more vigour. He had started to collect himself.

'Yes, as a matter of fact, there is,' said Belter. 'You see, our angel is a shy sort of fellow and doesn't really want to go public with what he says he knows, but he is keen that to get the truth out, as he says he feels he has been somewhat misled.'

'And?' said Carpet, almost spitting the word out.

'Well, what the man did was give us an entire dossier full of what he thinks is evidence – great big thick thing like an encyclopaedia.'

There was another long pause.

'So, what is it you can do for me?' asked Carpet, trying his best to sound convincing. But by this time, was fairly sure he knew the answer.

'Well, we can make it disappear,' said Belter abruptly.

This was not the first time that Belter had blackmailed someone, but Carpet was a councillor – he was really racing with the thoroughbreds now.

'Are you blackmailing me?' asked the councillor.

'Absolutely not,' said Belter, 'and I'll have you know that I'm a lawyer, and find your insinuation offensive.'

The two returned to their slow, almost nonchalant, ambling through the grounds. At length, Carpet stopped and wheeled towards Belter. He was a different man from the one who had faced Belter five minutes before. He was still tall, but now stooped so much so that he seemed to be the same height as his adversary; his hair was still black, but lay in a lifeless swath upon his head; the blood had drained from his lips, and whilst his skin was still dark, there was now a certain greyness to it.

'I've done nothing illegal. In those days insider dealing was fine, provided that there was full disclosure – and there was.' He entreated, 'you have to believe me.'

This was news to Belter. He didn't know anything about Chris Carpet being involved with insider dealing. His face betrayed nothing.

'I suppose you have the tapes?' said Carpet, looking at Belter, who again gave nothing away. But the poor unfortunate did not wait for an answer, but nodded to himself, as if his worst fears had been realised. 'Yes, yes. Again I say, having er...meetings with those colleagues in those places. Nothing untoward happened. We were all consenting adults, and it was all very discrete – no public displays of vulgarity, I can assure you.'

Belter found Carpet's pleadings almost touching.

The miserable councillor started to shake his head slowly. 'You have the photos, too, don't you? And the letters?' Again Carpet did not wait for confirmation. 'Yup, yup, of course. They gave you everything, didn't they?' He paused.

Belter was scrambling to piece this all together, his mind whirring like a dynamo, but externally his face remained impassive and cool.

Carpet wandered off to be on his own. He needed space. He took several deep gulps of air and breathed out slowly. Within a few short moments, his life had been turned upside down. He certainly could not deny his chequered past; yes, he had lied; yes, he had stolen; and yes, he had cheated – no doubt – but he had had to, to get to where he wanted to be. Had he played it straight, he would have been lying face down in a gutter somewhere. As it was, he had pulled himself up, and now finally he was in a position to start giving back. After all those years of bullying and blagging, he was ready to make amends. And suddenly – wham! – this comes out of the blue. Imagine if Ginny, his good wife, the Lady T'raid of Guildford, heard about this. She had always admired him greatly, and he had never told her about his past – not to deceive her, but to shield her from the terrible world. If she found out, she would desert him at once, and everything would come tumbling down.

At length he turned to Belter, who had stopped some yards away. Carpet was the very picture of a broken man, tears welling up in his eyes, his lip quivering. When he spoke, his voice was cracked and torn. 'What can I do?' he pleaded. 'Command me Mr Trelawney!'

'One bit of good news,' said Barney upon hearing an update on Belter's progress with Councillor Carpet.

'Yup, he's very much on-side,' said Belter, 'absolutely petrified. I wonder what he did exactly? Anyway, it doesn't matter; I didn't need to go into details.'

'And I hear Drade's got a bit of news, too,' said Barney.

The two friends shifted their attentions to Drade, who was leaning back somewhat perilously in his chair, one leg crossed over the other, with his hands behind his head, staring through the little window over the Thames, a biro sticking out of the corner of his mouth, upon which he chewed in the contented manner of a gate-leaning farmer on a piece of straw.

'Bobbin's been in touch,' he said presently, 'and we've had a bit of a chat; you know, kicked things backwards and forwards, found common ground, overcame our differences, and er...well.'

'You've agreed to give him your Jag, haven't you?' interrupted Belter.

'Hours of exhaustive negotiation, some arguing, haggling, biggling and baggling, but in the end I managed to persuade him that opposing the port was the responsible course of action.'

'Will he get the Jaguar out of it, or not?' asked Belter.

'Who knows what the future will bring?' a whimsical Drade replied. He paused, but sensing that he would have to say more, conceded, 'He will get his paws on my Jag at some point.'

'Fine,' said Belter. 'Great, well doesn't matter. It was a pile of junk anyway. Two down. We're never going to get Liberal Suzzie to help us, so the planning application might well go through. It's time to wheel out the big guns!'

Toeing the Line

Professor Alfonso Cabot choose a small, local paper to kick off his campaign.

'A very local paper,' grumbled Belter as he dialled the number, 'as far as I can see, it has a circulation of about ten, two of whom died years ago and haven't yet been removed from its mailing list.'

The editor, however, was duly impressed after the phone call from Mr Trelawney of the Cabot Foundation. He turned to his deputy. 'That was Professor Cabot's offices,' he said. 'He would like to send us an open letter in time for tomorrow's paper.'

'What'll it be about?'

'Coming to the Kensington Whisperer first, when he could have gone to any number of other papers, now that's what I call class.' The editor, removed his spectacles, shone their lenses on his tie and then replaced them, which was something he was inclined to do whenever he had a success.

'But what is the letter to be about?' persisted the deputy.

'Do you know, I heard Anders Brotzlovic talking on the radio only yesterday saying that he planned to co-write a book with Professor Cabot some time later this year.'

'So the letter will be about architecture, will it?'

'Anders Brotzlovic! Wish he'd send us an open letter. But Professor Cabot's the next best thing,' The Editor returned to his work and then looked up. 'I've absolutely no idea. This Trelawney character simply said he wanted to send in an open letter in Professor Cabot's name, so I said yes please!'

'Yes indeed,' agreed the deputy.

Back at Base, Barney was beginning to put something together. Presently, he started reading aloud:

'Dear Sir,

I write this letter to you, not simply in my professorial capacity as one who has studied fluid mechanics and fluvial dead spots for many years, and has thereby, dare I say it, acquired a certain knowledge of these matters; nor simply as one who has been humbled by a seemingly endless list of generous tributes. Mainly I write as myself, Alfonso Cabot, a concerned citizen of Planet Earth, one of six billion people bound indelibly together by the common bond of our shared humanity and collective responsibility.'

'Nicely put!' said Drade, 'exudes modesty, but with just enough arrogance at the edges to scare anyone who questions the modesty.'

'Yes, it is nice, isn't it,' said Barney, 'I thought I'd go on to say ...um something like:

'Thus it is that I feel qualified to opine on the matters which I turn to below, but it does not explain why I have chosen to express myself openly.'

'Don't like the word "opine" much,' said Belter, 'a bit OTT.'

'Plus rhymes with whine,' added Drade.

'Yeah, bit whiney,' agreed Belter.

'Ok, how about:

'So I feel qualified to express myself...'

'Better,' said Belter.

'...on the matters below, and indeed as one who has been blessed with abilities not shared by all, and fortune shared by but a few, I feel a certain obligation to make my opinions clear.'

'Fine,' said Belter.

'Now, I was going to add,' said Barney, 'er...

'For whilst others, through no fault of their own, may not see when errors are committed, I do see; and whilst others may ignore what they see, feeling impotent in the face of seemingly overwhelming opposition, I cannot ignore what I see, knowing that I do have the capacity to overturn those odds; and whilst others again may take no action, having greater preoccupations to hand, I must take action, having been, might I tentatively suggest, selected from the many for just such a purpose.'

Belter shook his head, 'No, no, no. Firstly, I don't understand you one hundred per cent, and in any case, it's far too high-handed – absolutely not. All this chosen one stuff is completely off pitch.'

Drade could not have put it better himself. What a God-given knack Belter had for whacking the proverbial nail. And he was quite right about the high-handedness; all very well when the high-handedness was obvious and clear for all to see, but, if even slightly obscured by difficult words or complicated grammar, it invariably came across as somewhat low-handed, or even back-handed, which was even worse.

'No, I know, fine, so let's forget that bit,' said Barney, 'er, so it continue:

'So I write this letter to you, compelled by an inner sense of need, and at the behest of many of my dearest friends and colleagues who share my opinions concerning the proposal to build a new port in Lots Road.'

'Good,' said Drade.

Barney went on:

'I have given the matter both measured and temperate consideration for many months now, and you have my assurance, that I entered this study with no pre-conceived opinions and no axe to grind in respect to one side or the other.'

'Why would you?' murmured Belter with a smile.

'And with that in mind, I was persuaded that the port would provide some measure of employment for the local area, and further, that the companies involved had every intention of behaving in a responsible manner with respect to the environment. I also accepted that, at present, that part of the Thames is something of a dead spot (if I may), abandoned as it has been for many years, and that some measure of development could be desirous.'

'Clever,' thought Drade, 'set them up, and then tear them down!'

'But even this I am aware of, and I have taken on board many of the arguments in its favour. I do wonder whether building yet another port on the banks of our glorious river Thames would really be in the best interest of the people of this Royal Borough. Turning first to the matter of the creation of some local employment, I notice that many of the positions that will be made available will call for certain people with specialised abilities and knowledge, which Chelsea, not having an especial porting tradition, does not possess. Further, I would bring to the attention of your readers the example of the port at Tower Bridge which is staffed almost exclusively by foreigners.'

Thus the professor dipped his toe, so to speak, into the water of local debate, but even he was not prepared for the tsunami that followed.

It was three days later that Belter, Barney and Drade met again at Base. Being early August, Barney had taken the opportunity to do a little cycling up in the Lakes, as was his habit when he needed to relax; Drade had gone off to Bristol to attend a formal at his cousin Claire's; and Belter had gone to a cottage he kept in Normandy, where he spent most of his time consuming Brie, wine and bread and recuperating from the stringent diet he had been following for almost three months.

As usual Belter was the first into the office in the morning, and he was astonished to find that, instead of the usual pack of 100 letters or so, his way to the broom cupboard was blocked by almost four black bags full to the brim.

The Governor greeted him,

'Morning, Mr Trelawney,' he said, 'somebody's birthday?'

Belter grinned and picked his way through the jam of letters. A few minutes later, Barney bounded in, shortly followed by Drade.

'Have you seen that lot?!' said Barney, trembling with excitement.

'Yes, very encouraging,' said Belter. 'We really need to sort through it, and start grouping our supporters, get them organised and ready for the big push.'

It was late into the evening when the three had finally started to get a grip on matters. Essentially their supporters could be broken down into a number of distinct groups. There were small, local, often single-issue environmental groups, very similar to their own, except that they lacked a figurehead of heft, like Cabot. They found what was quickly becoming known as the Cause – an attractive standard to gravitate towards; and they were doubtless that they might gain from its reflected glory. Then there were concerns like The Clef itself, which would find themselves at a considerable disadvantage, should the port go ahead. Then there were the places of learning, from primary schools, all the way up to colleges of further education; the professor's characterisation of the jackal-like nature of the private enterprises which were behind the plans had played very well here. Then there were those who, representing labour, worried about 'just how regulated this port's working practices would be'; and those from land, who saw any kind of construction as a threat to what was theirs. There were revolutionaries, who detested any kind of change; and anarchists, who detested everything. Feminists, animal-rightists, libertarians, agnostics, religious fundamentalists, religious interpretists, Taoists, religious non-believers, non-religious believers, fattists, Thamesists, naturalists, and everyone and anyone, who had little to do and much time to do it, flocked to the Cause.

Within a week, the issue had caught the eye of the national newspapers. Initially, news of the campaign was run on quiet news days, but then as momentum grew and the days became quieter towards the end of July and into August, not a day seemed to go by without a sympathetic news report: a family's houseboat stranded upon a mudbank in a stagnant river, which, it was observed, was less than twenty miles from a large foreign-owned beer factory; or an octogenarian swimmer who needed to be rescued when, after diving at his favourite spot, he found himself plunging head first javelin-like into half a metre of mud – he blamed four new jetties which had been built to accommodate the tourists.

Invitations poured in for the Professor to attend and speak at summits, conferences, sit-ins, sit-outs, demonstrations and debates; and, most unusually for a man as shy as he had been of late, Professor Cabot agreed to attend them all – even when the events overlapped – such was the man's enthusiasm. It was so great in fact, that Professor Cabot had selflessly cancelled all of his prior appointments and engagements, so that upon his return from a brief visit to Venezuela the following week, he determined to devote his entire life to the cause of blocking the port project.

The week after that Barney came bounding into the broom cupboard full of excitement. 'Got an interview, got an interview!' he wheezed.

'When?' asked Belter.

'Now, right now. They're supposed to be ringing through!' And right on cue the telephone sprang to life.

'Answer it, Hamish,' said Barney. 'I'll be Alfie; put 'em on hold and then pass 'em through to me.'

Drade picked up the phone. 'Good Morning, Cabot Foundation, how may I help you?'

And so it was, moments later, that the world first heard the voice of the great Professor Alfonso Cabot.

'Professor,' said the interviewer in that deep, stayed, non-judicious voice which British presenters always possess, 'very good of you to join us,'

'It's my pleasure, Antony,' answered Barney, 'and can I say, that back at home you , sir, are a superstar – very, very famous.'

'Well, that's always nice to hear,' said the Antony, who could not help being slightly flattered. He continued, 'Professor, you are here today to put the case for a review of the Lots Road port, and many people, I think, would find that a little confusing.'

'Why so?'

'Well, we Brits know who you are...'

'I am Alfonso,' interrupted the Professor.

'You are indeed Alfonso, Professor Alfonso Cabot,' confirmed the interviewer, 'Polemicist, philanthropist, intellectual and critic; and we know that, and we know where you are from; the son of poor parents, we...'

'Poor, with the money yes, but rich in spirit – my father, he was a romancing navvy, who loved to sing, and my mother, she loved to listen, so they got on very well.'

'Yes, but the point is: you are of humble origins...'

'Yes.'

'...and many of the projects which you get involved with are about helping people, born into, er, disadvantage, to better their circumstances.'

'Well yes, that is very true. But it is more, er...general than that. I like to help people for to improve the justice for everyone.'

'Well quite,' said the Antony, 'so why the interest in Lots Road?'

Barney looked feverously around for inspiration, but received nothing but blank looks from Drade and Belter. He continued regardless, 'It's like this, when I was a little boy, I was every day playing in the fields back home.'

'In the Pampas?' suggested the interviewer helpfully.

Barney grinned. 'Yes, just so. Anyway, I remember there was once I saw these little ants who are always working, going here and there, caring a little sand or perhaps a small leaf for to build their houses.'

'I see.'

'This is right, no? They work very hard and so they can live. I see this many times and I watch curiously always...'

'They are incredible.'

'They are. anyway, one day while I, er...was...studying the little ants, there was a strong wind and a big piece of wood fall down from the house and arrive on the head of this ant.'

'Very unlucky'

'Yes,' said Alfonso, 'unlucky, but life is like that.'

'We are all slaves to fate,'

'Just so,' said Alfonso, 'Anyway, the ant is not dead. By chance he live and he push his way out from the wood.'

'Very lucky,' said the interviewer.

'Yes, well, er...perhaps,' continued the Professor, 'but, unfortunately, one leg it is stuck under the wood, and even if he push and push very hard, still he cannot be free.'

'I see.'

'So, I have a choice, or I do, er, nothing, or just a little bit I help.'

'What did you do?'

'I decide to help a little bit and, I er, move the wood a just little bit.'

'So the ant was free and could continue to go about his business?'

'Just so,' said Alfonso, 'well, because his leg is really stuck, it come off and in fact he just move around and around for a few moments, and, er, then, er, he a lie very still, I think maybe he, er, dead. But at that moment I learn that for to make the life fair, sometimes we must help just little bit.'

'So you have got involved with this, er... the Cause for this reason?'

'Yes. I have decided to help just little bit for the next eh few months. I, er, think is right.'

'And what sort of things are you going to do on behalf of the Cause?' asked the interviewer.

'Well, it's not really me who is organising all the things, but there is a petition very big is sent to the Council, and we hold many meetings in the area, with important people. Next week, I have to go back home to visit my mother – she is very ill – but when I come back, I hope to spend the full time to help a little in this.'

'Well,' said the interviewer, 'I'm sure we all wish you the best of luck and trust you will be back to keep our listeners updated.' Barney replaced the headset with a gleam and turned to his co-conspirators. 'Highly unlikely,' he said with a sigh.

Fishy business

Argentina a can be a dangerous place, especially for those of idealistic bent, prepared to put their beliefs ahead of their safety. Professor Cabot was one such, and within days of his arrival in the country came news of his departure from the planet. Initially it was thought that the great man died quietly and alone, trying to rescue some endangered infant iguanas; as it happened, he had effected the rescue successfully, but was then mistaken for an interfering naturalist by the iguanas' mother, who immediately gave chase, causing the good Professor to trip and fall down a crevice so deep and so very unknown that there was absolutely no chance of finding his body.

'What a stroke of luck that his died alone,' mused Drade to himself moments after Barney had related the bad news. He realised in an instant that luck had played no part in the matter; and he thanked his lucky stars that his musings had been to himself.

'But if he died alone, and they never found the body, how do they know he died at all?' asked Belter.

Barney stopped typing and looked up.

'His clothes were discovered with iguana tooth-marks on them right by the unknown crevice, so the locals assumed the worst.' Barney paused. 'I think that's reasonable.'

'So who interviewed the locals?' persisted Belter.

'Nobody interviewed them per se,' said Barney slowly, 'but word gets around.'

'Not that convincing,' doubted Belter. 'I think you need witnesses.'

'If we had witnesses, then there's a trail which someone might conceivably follow,' said Barney.

'Well in that case, I think you'd be better off with a few locals who saw him fall in – the type who don't like outsiders much. They relate their tale to the family and then disappear into the Pampas.'

'Fine,' said Barney a touch of irritation.

A message splashed across his website first alerted his many admirers, and was followed by a heartfelt pleading from his family not to send flowers. Instead, well-wishers should contribute to the late Professor's most recent and all-consuming passion: namely, the blocking of the port at Lots Road, Chelsea.

'Which family?' asked Belter.

'His family; his mother.'

'Too ill,' said Belter, 'and his father's dead.'

'What about one of his seven siblings?' posited Drade.

'Well, I think you'll find most of those have disappeared into the Pampas, too,' said Barney, 'except perhaps one: a crazy one, who is kept apart from the world in a special home. It's all precautionary, in any case; when you read something like, "the family said.." nobody bothers to dig about and find out who precisely said it. It's just something which is accepted.'

Barney updated the many sites where Alfie had made his mark, with the terrible news.

Immediately, even in death, Alfie found himself bombarded with messages from well-wishers from all sections of society. Some expressed regret that a great standard bearer for the cause was gone, but swore nonetheless to carry on the standard as he would have wished. Others mourned Cabot the man, a humanist who suffered when others suffered, and was joyous when others felt joy.

'Prof. Cabot had a heart so big that no cause was too small for his consideration,' reflected one who seemed to straddle both of these camps.

A few even recalled with fondness the first time they had met the great man at some conference or other, or how he had taught them when he was a visiting lecturer to wherever, or when by sheer chance they had both bumped into each other in a bookshop or some such in the most unlikely of places.

'Here's one guy who claims to have been his room-mate back in pampas-land,' said Barney.

'He had a few,' said Belter.

'Will he get over it?' asked Barney.

'All very sad,' mused Belter, as he put the finishing touches to an obituary he would send into The Times anonymously 'from a friend' – he would make sure that he posted it from somewhere near the Houses of Parliament, so it would be clear that the friend was someone of import, and not merely one of the late academic's army of drone followers.

The immediate effect of Alfonso's death was to cause a flurry of activity at Cabot central; all those impending projects and interviews, which the Professor had generously put his name to before his death, needed to be cancelled, which left a lot of disappointed publicists and producers. This, however, presented opportunities to the Cause: they were only too happy to help 'fill in the blanks' with yet other publications and productions. And on the other hand, Alfonso's death brought a great deal more publicity to the Cause itself and their objections to the Lots Road development project – something heightened by a curious rumour, which started doing the rounds, that the academic's demise was a professional hit paid for by the development company.

It was Barney who proposed the 'Day of Oneness' to commemorate the great man.

'What on earth is a day of oneness?' asked Belter.

'The oneness that is when scientist and man, man and neighbour, neighbour and community, community and people, people and planet come together,' replied Barney reading aloud from a draft of a flyer he had been preparing.

'That's absolute bollocks!' said Belter.

'It is, it is,' agreed Barney, 'but better the bollocks that be, then the bollocks that bain't – especially if you are a horse,' he said whimsically.

'Surely nobody will buy into that,' said Belter. 'What do you think, Drade?'

Drade took a judicious pause, then picked up the draft flyer and studied it. He had not been following the discussion, distracted as he was by a couple of ducks who had somehow made it in from the Thames and were waddling along the path towards Base. He did his best to catch up with the conversation. 'Difficult to say,' he said presently, 'on the one hand, Earth Day has already been done with some success, and on the other hand, people will buy anything. So...' he paused again to give himself time to assess how his contribution had been received, moving his head from side to side, as if weighing the arguments carefully.

Belter and Barney ignored him. Resuming their discussion, Barney said, 'What I'm saying is rather than wait a couple of years to do a memorial service, by which time everybody will have forgotten who Alfie was and what he stood for, we should strike whilst the iron is hot – call everybody, make this a huge deal, the big push to get planning rejected, or at least delayed.'

'I agree,' said Belter, 'we should do something now, but why the "day of oneness"?'

'Well, it needs to be a day of something. If you say a week or a month, people will lose interest. A day gives them something to focus on.'

'What about an hour, or a minute?'

'Yes, yes, I suppose it could be something shorter. The shorter the better in the sense that the shorter it is, the less people will think they actually have to sacrifice to take part, and thus the more appealing it becomes. But if it is simply a "moment of oneness", we won't have enough time to do stuff – light candles, toll bells, reflect sombrely and so on. There might even be the suggestion that we are a little un-ambitious. I mean, after all, a "moment of oneness" – what is that? A day is more solid without being too much of a commitment.'

'Umm...but what about all this oneness stuff.'

'Oneness sounds vague, and can mean anything to anybody. It's like, er, "yes we can" or "peace out ". In fact, these things mean nothing at all, but they are generally positive and optimistic in tone, and therefore very difficult to argue with. I suppose oneness suggests togetherness, agreement, harmony, and the like, but at the same time, it doesn't get into the difficult business of explaining how to achieve any of those things. Environmentalists will see the appeal to oneness as an attempt to live in harmony with nature; socialists will see the equality in unity; capitalists will imagine simplified government and the primacy of the individual, and so on.'

'It does also sound slightly spiritual and godly.' Belter seemed to be coming round.

'It does, it does...and it is,' said Barney.

'Fine. A "Day of Oneness" it is,' said Belter deciding. 'And let's hold it outside the Council's offices in Patriot Square.'

'Good idea,' said Barney, 'but what we need is a mascot, a point of focus for everybody.'

'Some water from the Thames – in a bucket?' said Drade.

'Umm...' said Belter.

'It's just that this is the whole point of the Cause, that the development is going to cause the river to dry up. Having a bucket of water as our mascot underlines our commitment to the Thames,' said Drade.

'Umm...everybody carrying a bucket might look like they were protesting about buckets, or rehearsing for Singing in the Rain, or collecting for rag week or something. People would focus on the bucket, rather than what's inside it,' said Belter.

'How about a fish?' suggested Barney.

'Yes that's it!' said Belter, 'a great big dead fish. Everyone in Patriot Square should be issued with a fish, and at a certain point toss them at the front door of the council offices.'

'In desperation,' said Barney with a theatrical flourish.

'Rather than toss them, which might look a bit disrespectful, they should lay them out like corpses by the entrance and around the side of the building,' suggested Drade re-entering the conversation. 'All those silvery scales, would look very striking.'

'You're not 'erring us' said Barney indicating that this could be a newspaper headline.

'A Carp-et of death' added Drade with a grin.

'So okay, the fish are in position – what then?' asked Belter.

'Then the vigil begins...' said Barney, 'we all wait together, holding hands, singing songs and looking sad.'

'Just imagine how much those old fish will start to smell – especially if it's a long day,' reflected Drade. 'I don't know if I will be able to bear it.'

'Oh well,' replied Barney, 'we can always nip back to Base if it starts getting a bit much.'

'Why, of course we can, have a spot of supper –you never know, it might be one of the last times,' said Drade.

'Now,' said Belter, keen to move things along, 'objections to the granting of planning permission will need to be dealt with by five o'clock on October the first at the central offices of the Kensington & Chelsea Council in Patriot's Square, so we need to make sure that there is plenty of time to be able to conduct the laying of the fish with dignity.'

Barney agreed, 'Nothing so undignified as a rushed funeral.'

Drade nodded, and the planning for the big day began.

By this stage, the Cause had any number of volunteers to call upon, and it was decided that they be divided into three teams: Team Lots led by Barney; Team Patriot led by Drade; with Belter heading up Team Cabot. Teams Lots and Patriot has responsibilities for the rally and vigil which were to occur on Barney's Day of Oneness.

Being more of a people person, Barney was responsible for turnout. He did this by first selected a number of his best volunteers to be 'Street Leaders', whose job it was focus the interest that the Cause had generated these past months into 'feet on the ground'. Having done this, the Street Leaders coordinated with each other to ensure that, on the day itself, everybody would be marching in step. In principle, Drade was responsible for the vigil: making sure that the PA systems, stage, big screens and lighting were functional; that there was a plentiful supply of signs and placards, fireworks and smoke bombs, and all the usual paraphernalia of a modern-day protest; that entertainment and refreshments were laid on to stop people from getting bored, and that the relevant authorities were informed. In reality, Barney did most of the leg work here as well, working feverishly to make sure that everything hung together properly; although Drade, who could barely keep up, did his best to be helpful where he could.

Team Cabot was responsible for handling media and public relations, with one or two trusted members seconded to 'Dark Ops.' of which, the less said, the better...The television stations were only too happy to comply – this was going to be huge, for as well as the mind-boggling numbers of people that were planning to attend, an astonishing number of well-known celebrities had also promised to come.

'I can't actually confirm any names,' said Belter, speaking on the telephone to a TV person. 'These people are coming as private individuals, and not as film stars.' He stuck out his tongue and made a face as if he had just stepped in a large cowpat.

'All I can say, is that everybody's coming.' He paused and then added pointedly, 'And I mean everybody.'

'NB?' asked the voice at the other end.

'I'm not going to confirm that,' said Belter.

'Cannot or will not?' insisted the voice.

'I could confirm that, but I'm not going to,' said Belter.

'Thanks,' said the voice, 'What about AB?'

'Which AB?' said Belter, 'AB on her own, or AB and the whole of her family, including DM and the whole of his?'

'Really?!'said the voice, 'so I suppose that would include SE?'

'I suppose if DM were coming, then so would SE, yes,' said Belter. 'But again, these are just suppositions. I am confirming nothing.'

'Yes, I know, I know, don't worry, we'll triple source it. Thanks Mr Trelawney,' ended the voice.

Belter placed the received down and looked to his pals.

'Good news,' commented Barney, 'that's one of the big channels in, what about the others?'

'They're all in,' said Belter. 'I've have promised them the biggest turnout since the Royal Wedding, and what makes it even fruitier is that they are all expecting different people.'

'Why does that matter?' asked Drade.

'It increases the likelihood of them turning out, and ensures no conferring between different channels,' said Belter.

'Plus, the weight of expectation on these celebrity chappies will be lower which will mean they are more likely to forget the whole incident afterwards,' added Barney.

'What about all that triple sourcing business?' asked Drade.

'Oh, they won't bother,' said Belter, 'just isn't the time, and anyway why would they? To tell the truth, by the time word gets out that these people are going to appear, there will be so much hype, they probably will turn up.'

Belter made another call. 'I realise that you have no direct interest in what happens to the Thames, but this event is something which you really want to be a part of...' He covered the telephone and whispered to Barney, 'Care for Cats East Cheem.' Barney nodded as Belter continued 'Battersea Dog's Home's in,' he paused, 'thank you very much, you won't regret it. We'll mail you the details.'

He put the receiver down.

'Another one bagged up and ready to go, Barney. Email address is on the site.' Belter turned back to a little project he was working on with that much more carefully selected group of volunteers ...

The Big Day

The day began ordinarily enough. It was raining of course, with deep grey skies, and the damp air was charged with a clingy mixture of warm traffic fumes and puddle spray. The red towers of the World's End estate frowned down upon the steel and glass insta-builds of Lots Road. Gulls hovered and parried the airs above the Thames with clumsy grace and desolate cries. What scant summer there had been was already starting to take its leave of the metropolis, heading south and carrying great flocks of birds, staring ahead, intent upon warmer climes. In its stead, and emboldened as each day passed, autumn's withering presence could be seen amongst the trees, and heard funnelling its way though gullies and passageways, and blustering about the open spaces like an invisible dervish army whipping up dust and grit and leaves and litter all around. As unavoidable as the sound of the city breathing, ten million souls squeezed together, fighting for every chink of space. The traffic: the scratching and screeching of breaks, the groans of creaky red buses starting and stopping, the breaking of lorries heaving and blocking, and cars and vans and cabs and all shuffling painfully forward inch by inch, with streaky lines of bikers weaving impossibly through it all. There were other sounds too: the grinding and girding of cranes, the rumble of heavy machines and cement mixers, pneumatic drills and diggers all going about their passionless business, scaffolding crashing down in one place, loading up being done in another, dogs arguing with cats and children laughing and jostling as they shoved and cajoled their way to school.

'Standard, Standard!' yelled the newspaper seller, as though his very life depended on it; and then immediately he confided a quiet, 'thank you sir,' to a customer, who had made a purchase without pausing his stride for an instant.

The pavements of the King's Road teamed with people streaming into work that Friday morning – hurrying, scurrying and worrying. And though resolutely glum to a one, they had still a certain cheerfulness about them which only the English could muster at such times. Perhaps it was the optimistic manner of their dress – leggy women in skimpy skirts, young men in stripy shorts – as if to say that the winds, which were all around, were not quite nippy enough. Perhaps it was the ubiquitous brolly, carried, but rarely opened, as if to say that the rain, that splashed down remorselessly, was not really wet enough. And though they trudged, they did so lightly, as though this daily, grinding traipse to work was little more than a stroll around the block. And whilst they moved at a pretty pace, their progress was smooth, without pushing or colliding, as if there was no great urgency about their business.

And in Lots Road, too, there was life: the rouges and roughs began to gather at Bonhams for a banter and light fencing, the Lots Road cafe was crammed, windows dewed-out by perspiration and the expectation of plates of grease-laden-bacon, frizzley sausages, margarined toasts and innumerable cups of tea. The newsagent's entrance tinkled and clanged so much that it might have been the revolving door of a first class hotel; and next door, the petrol station became a pit stop once more. Boom! An aluminium barrel crashed out of the lorry and rolled along the road, plopping through the open cellar doors. Slam! The door of a refrigerated delivery van was shut, and another delivery was made.

In the reading room at Base, however, it was as quiet as always. The calm before the storm. Drade stood before the bay windows, which opened onto the terrace, and gazed outward over the garden wall and towards the river, a cup of hot, black coffee steaming in his hand. 'Funny how when it rains, the Thames always seems wetter than normal,' he said out loud, glancing back towards Belter, who was casually leafing through a copy of The Times.

Belter threw Drade a perplexed look, and, saying nothing, returned to his paper.

Downstairs a door slammed. Drade half turned.

'It's Barney,' said Belter having had just seen him flying on his bicycle down Lots Road.

Barney strode in with such vigour that he appeared to drag half of London in his wake. He was flushed with excitement and, rubbed his hands in order both to warm them and to burn off some energy.

'Bright and early, I see. Good news, good news...' said Barney. Turning to Harry, he ordered 'White coffee please, two sugars.'

He did a twirl in front of Belter and Drade, then asked, 'What do you think of my new look?'

'You look a complete mess,' said Belter. 'Why are your trousers falling down, and where did you get that rubbishy jacket?'

'It's my street look,' said Barney, 'rustic, working class with an insouciance of soul.'

'But nothing fits!' said Belter, 'you look like a homeless person who's mugged another homeless person and stolen his clothes.'

'It's part of Gabar's "Of the People" campaign. I saw it in a magazine at the barbershop. It's very in'

'So these vestments ennoble you, do they? The street-weasel look.'

'Fitting doesn't necessarily mean that same as contain, you know,' countered Barney.

The three clustered together by the window. 'So are we ready to do this thing?' asked Belter in a low voice, which was shade deeper than normal, and had a more serious edge to it.

Drade felt a tingle run up his spine. 'I think so. Yes, yes I think so,' he said, glancing with gleaming eyes at Barney. Drade looked back at Belter, who fixed him with a stern look. 'Ready as I'll ever be.' He let out a short nervous laugh.

'Not a day to drop the ball, Hamish,' said a still stern Belter.

'I'm not going to drop the ball,' replied Drade on the defensive.

'He'll be fine,' said Barney to Belter.

'Thank you,' said Drade, more than slightly miffed that the idea of his being the weak link seemed to be generally accepted. In their excitement, they had obviously forgotten what a solid old war-horse he was. Had he dropped the ball when he managed to persuade the honourable Bobbin to come on side? No! Course not. What about Professor Delaney, or those reporters from The Evening Standard? To suggest that he Hamish 'Bostic-Paws' Drade, was anything less than a safe pair of hands was laughable.

Harry approached with Barney's coffee. The three became silent. Harry too said nothing, but put the tray on a nearby table. Drade watched with appreciation. There was someone you could rely on,' he thought.

Officially, nobody at Base, except the Governor, had any idea what had been going on in the broom cupboard these last months; but, of course, in reality, everyone knew precisely. Even if no-one had noticed the unusual comings and goings, special deliveries and quiet conversations, the sheer volume of mail that arrived, and was thrown out by the sack-full every day, would have given them a clue. Nonetheless, the official position was the official position, and, officially, today was the day when lawyers for the Trust, would present to the councillors meeting in Patriot Square, a petition, signed by the trustees, against the development of Lots Road. Of course, officially, they were aware that there was some kind of public protest planned, but the Governor had been careful to distance Base and The Clef from these happenings, and nobody at Base was intending to put in an appearance – officially.

'Will you be taking lunch here today?' asked Harry, as thought it was a real possibility, as the three were preparing to leave.

'Well, you never know,' said Barney with a wink. 'Might have to take cover here at some point.'

'I see,' said Harry, returning to his labours betraying nothing.

The three wished one another the very best of luck, and parted ways at the old wicker gate. Drade headed towards Sloane Square; Barney towards Redcliff Square, where there was to be informal gathering of 'street leaders'; and, rather mysteriously with a quick wave, Belter about-turned and disappeared upstairs into the broom cupboard.

Normally, the Patriot Square area was immune to the endless colic of the Embankment traffic, sitting as an island between bridges, a little way back from the river. But today, it was hectic, even here, because the transport infrastructure of West London seemed to have gone completely haywire. Some young drunks had, the night before, decided to tamper with hundreds of the signposts in Kensington, Chelsea, and even in Westminster itself. Arrows were turned to point in exactly the opposite direction to the correct one; others were simply removed, covered or reversed, so that they served no purpose whatever.

'Well prepared these rascals were,' mumbled Sergeant Hamblin, looking with curiosity at the neat manner in which the nut and bolt fittings had been removed from a sign for Trafalgar Square. He rubbed the end of one of the bolts with this thumb, noticing how smooth it was. 'They must have brought their own tools. Now, why would a bunch of hooligans go out on a Tuesday night armed with a load of tools? ' he pondered. 'And there must have been a fair group of them – dozens of them. Who would have that sort of time on their hands?'

Sergeant Hamblin knew the answer before he had posed himself the question. His eyes narrowed and his lips tightened. 'Students!' he rasped. There was nothing quite like of a bunch of lazy, good-for-very-damn-little, over-opinionated, arrogant, little, know-nothing students to get the sergeant's blood churning. Again and again in his long career he had run up against them, either as drunkards being a menace to public order, as protesters threatening violence to all around, or as druggies smoking cannabis, as if it was tobacco. And they were always so litigious and barrack-room lawyer-like and precious about their human rights. They should get themselves real jobs, instead of going out and pranking about the town, inconveniencing everybody. The sergeant busied himself with finding the evidence to support his instincts.

Speaking of pranksters, another issue, which floated into Sergeant Hamblin's in-tray first thing in the morning, was reports of several fake tour guides, who had gathered large groups of unsuspecting tourists, and marched them to a couple of different locations, promising some kind of free rock concert, where various important and famous people were pledged to be. The sergeant could not figure out for the life of him what the scam was; but years of experience told him there was something fishy going on.

Meanwhile, traffic-wise, things went from worse to terrible, as both Battersea and Putney Bridges had to be closed: the former, because the barrier which regulated traffic appeared to be welded shut; and the latter, because a large water pipe which had unexpectedly burst, and the water board was losing about a thousand gallons a second, to say nothing of the hazard to traffic.

'Odd that that both problems should have occurred at the same time,' said one of the engineers from the local water company.

'It's always the way,' replied his colleague, munching upon a sausage sandwich. 'You have no problems for years and years, and then suddenly it all goes wrong at the same time. Look at those fire hydrants this morning in Chelsea. Had to close off most of the King's Road and Sloane Square too, 'cos some burkes let them off.'

'Yes, but that was caused by some burkes, whereas this... Makes you wonder, doesn't it?'

His friend swallowed the last of his sandwich and stared thoughtfully over the Thames. He pitied the poor buggers travelling into work this morning – it was going to be a nightmare.

Things were not helped by local radio stations and traffic organisations getting dozens of calls, texts and mails from drivers, alerting others of jams and accidents, which had never happened but had had the effect of driving traffic down roads, where by rights, traffic had no business to be, and where cars invariably broke down and had to be abandoned. The police counted eighteen such cars in Chelsea alone – mostly hire cars, presumably belonging to tourists – which had simply been left in the middle of the roads, blocking both directions of traffic.

If that was not enough, no fewer than four underground stations – Victoria, South Kensington, Knightsbridge and Hyde Park Corner – needed to be shut down all morning due to multiple bomb scares. They turned out to be false alarms, but were pretty scary nonetheless, with the usual chaotic scenes: blue lights of all descriptions, and reporters all over the place.

'You never can be too careful,' Belter was heard to mutter upon receiving the news from his broom-cupboard-bunker at Base. He picked up the phone for the umpteenth time that morning, and made another well-placed call.

Unsurprisingly, the result of all these shenanigans was curiously helpful to the Cause, as they seemed to drive traffic and people to the very place where the vigil against the port was taking place. The result was total confusion, chaos and a great magnification of the numbers involved.

Centre Stage

In Patriot Square Hamish de Buxton Drade was grappling with complexities of his own. As was his way, he had not dithered, following the great parting of ways earlier that day in the garden of Base, and had immediately mounted his steed and galloped, as well as any cyclist could, towards what had become known as Centre Stage, stopping only at The Chelsea Bun to pick up some light sustenance.

'No General ever made a mistake so great as to march his men on an empty stomach,' had advised his geography master. And he surely knew. Although it did occur to Drade that it had been the same master who cautioned, 'Not to be hungry while cooking,' and also 'Not to eat between meals,' which, when taken together, implied the use of some clever piece of mental trickery, the likes of which were quite beyond Drade. Nevertheless, old Stan had been a thin man, and had lived to a great age; so whatever he had meant, it had worked.

Arriving at Patriot Square, Drade was surprised to find quite a number of people already there – about fifty of them, in fact – buzzing about in every direction, like bees in a florist's. At this, he was, to tell the truth, a tad disappointed, as he had intended to be the first on the scene, leading, as it were, from the front. But, as he gazed at the frightening hive of activity which seemed to be all around him, he quickly overcame his nobler instincts, and decided that he could be equally as effective leading from the back, rucking and pushing the wave of human interest ahead of him, and making sure there were no slackers in the ranks (or, for that matter, deserters to the flanks). What was more, being known for his generosity of spirit, the last thing he wanted to do was steal focus. Far better that he be the silent partner, the prime mover, the hidden hand, the one whom one does not see – unless, that is, one happened to be at the back of the crowd.

Drade studied the scene, the gaze of the creator unknown: a couple here, enlarging the platform with scaffolding boards; another few there, making sure the hoardings were attached properly to the girders, which formed a skeleton around the stage; chairs in a line; tables two by two; souvenir salesmen moving into position; and a large screen and projector bursting into life. Behind the stage, portable lavatories were being delivered, and on the opposite side, an inevitable kebab seller was setting up. There was a loud crackle as a bearded man tested the microphone with the hoarse voice of one who spoke little.

'One two, one two!' he croaked.

'Loud and clear!' yelled another with jolly sarcasm.

All around the square the aged lime trees were tethered together with red and white tape, forming an enclosure of chained colossi, which fluttering in the morning breeze. Orange-vested orderlies arranged mini-stands filled with leaflets and brochures and whistles and hats and florescent items, torches, bangles and just about everything else that could conceivably be used to get attention, whilst friends took photos, made phone calls, engaged sleepy-eyed passers-by with excitedly jabbered information about...

All that planning and preparation, the long nights and early mornings, quick teas and gulped down luncheons, the perspiration, the self-denial, the covert brilliance, the heroes unsung; all that and more coming together to a single point, smoothly like marshmallows drenched in honey, thought Drade with satisfaction. He inspected the swarm, hoping to pick out someone he recognised, someone he might appoint as his adjutant – at least as his acting adjutant until his the real one made his presence known to him. He saw no-one who looked even vaguely familiar, the problem being, that much of the marshmallow-making had been done online, or in some virtual way, and that the few actual people whom he had met had been part of Barney's Street Gangs.

Drade thus found himself in the surprising situation of his being in charge, but with nobody knowing it. He was a general without his baton, as it were, and whilst he surveyed the scene, he pondered how best to recover it. The merest frown flickered across his handsome brow and then was gone, as he noticed a skirmish of sorts starting to develop around the main platform.

From the peripheries, he couldn't quite make out what the people were saying, their words cloaked in an unholy mixture of home-county accents and traffic roar, although there was no doubt that the voices were becoming loud and animated, and that there appeared to be the beginnings of a scuffle. This was just the sort of happenstance which warranted a spot of that authoritative buff, of which those of a certain class were genetically endowed. He approached the huddle, and even as he did so, from its midst came the dull thud of a thrown punch finding its mark.

Drade paused. The last thing he wanted to do was to steal focus, yet on the other hand he did want to find his baton. Steeling himself once more, he sauntered towards the ruckus, as inoffensively as he could, wheeling his bicycle in one hand, his bag containing a couple of sandwiches in the other, his lips pursed as though whistling quietly to himself (a comforting feint he had often found handy when confronting rabid dogs upon his travels in the wilds of the West Country).

He approached the rabble, which was now a score, or so strong, using the front wheel of his trusty bicycle as a makeshift bragging stick to part the throng. The throng parted not, but instead, closed ranks against him. The arguments grew more heated, and Drade fancied he caught the whiff of the odd obscenity being hurled ...and was that another punch?

It seemed that the space underneath the platform had become the subject of a turf war between two tramps, which had raged, at times violently, all night, calming down at first light, with the arrival of some donated food, but, which was now being pursued more vigorously than before.

This was just the sort of difficult situation which Drade revelled in. The type of conundrum where arguments on both sides were so finely balanced that the slightest of cat's whiskers would send the scales of judgement crashing down on one side or the other: an assay which would have tried a Solomon in his prime, reflected Drade.

He pushed forward with his bicycle more eagerly but to no avail. The turmoil continued, and the surrounding gaggle, which initially had tried half-heartedly, to pull the warring vagrants apart, now began to take sides and openly cheer on their respective combatants on. Still at the rear, Drade side-stepped his way along the wall of broad-backed youths, like a crab in a grotto, intermittently probing for vulnerability with his bicycle, till at last, he sensed a weak point and attempted with his sandwich bag to gouge out a gap between two teenage girls. The effect was instantaneous; as one they turned upon him, shrieking like banshees at the sight of an exorcizing priest – the first, claws outstretched, going for his throat; the other aiming a kick at his shins.

How strange it is that so often accident and chance should come together to shape a path for fate to follow. How right for Drade; for, by luck, the effect of these two breaking ranks caused others to tumble out, propelled by the two protagonists who, in turn, locked together, came barrelling through at some speed, hitting Drade's front tyre, and separating upon impact, like a coconut cracking apart, as it hit the ground. Both picked themselves in an instant though, and, like wild cats, hissed and snarled foully at one another, but the tightness of the crowd that now surrounded them, and the presence of Drade and his bicycle in its centre, prevented further engagement.

Thus it was that Drade, having inadvertently succeeded where the multitude had failed, found himself the unwilling arbiter between these two grizzled champions of the great outdoors. An uncomfortable situation to be sure, for whilst he had been born to lead, and it was his duty to be at the centre of things, was this new bear-fancying role really for what he had been born?

'Hamish!' shouted one of the many. 'It's Hamish Drade, guys, from the Cabot foundation!'

Drade, who was still struggling to come to terms with his new situation, and at the same time trying to parry the fists and spittle that passed between the two tramps as well as admonish them in firm, yet non-provocative tones, barely heard his name passed around, or the overtures that followed. But within moments he had been borne away by five or six of the fluorescent-vested types towards a table at the side of the podium.

'Hamish,' said one of the glowers, who Drade later found out was called Paul, 'firstly, really good to finally meet you, mate.' He put his arm round Drade and hugged him in that suspiciously informal way in which today's footballers celebrate goals. Without wishing to, Drade found himself returning Paul's embrace; a little less eagerly, it must be admitted, but no less suspiciously.

'Thanks, old...er...mate,' he spluttered.

From the other side of the stage a youth shouted over, 'Yeah, Hamish, it's me, m_d42, from InoX.'

'Hello!' said Drade, 'nice to finally meet you.' Naturally he had no idea what m_d42 or InoX might stand for, but he felt this phrase 'nice to finally meet you' might be used a lot today.

'Later,' said the youth.

'Indeed,' rejoined Drade.

Another enthusiastic sort hailed a greeting from afar, something about an 'out' and then a 'good deedman'; and when yet a third 'winged him a shout-out', and a fourth presented him with a fist to shake, Drade began to get the same sort of sensation he had experienced with the YB at that strange gathering in Yorkshire, in which everybody knew, him but he knew nobody.

'Now,' said Paul, 'we need your input.' He paused, and led Drade out, away from the stage, towards the centre of the square. He had a decisive, military air about him, pausing at strategic moments when he spoke, and spitting the words out.

Drade found his concision most welcome in the circumstances.

'The big screen's there,' Paul pointed towards the screen which was now showing a rolling news channel, 'and the people are here.' He motioned with his hands, 'So, if you are going to be talking into the microphone, there,' Paul pointed towards the stage, 'then the people here will only be able to see the you in front of them or via the big screen, over there, but not from the council offices, which are over there.' He turned and pointed to the Borough Council's administrative headquarters, which, if Patriot Square were a large dining table, lay at its head.

This was news to Drade. He knew of no talking. 'Talking?' he queried.

'Ah yes,' said Paul, 'been a bit of a change of plan.'

'Change of plan?'

'Well, Barney Hoofsdew's just rang me and said he'll have to leg it to Tilbury, or somewhere like that, for the fish sometime this pm.'

'I see,' hesitated Drade, 'and by "talking" you mean, "talk in his stead".'

'Yes,' said Paul looking at him in a curious way, 'in his..."stead".'

'Understood,' said Drade, his head still grappling with this piece of news, 'I think I'll let you call that.'

'Fair enough,' said Paul, his instincts that Hamish was a natural leader confirmed. 'Well, in that case, it would be best if you were to make your speech up there, and then wander down through the assembled people, up to the front door of the offices over there, where you can make your final presentation.'

The final presentation? thought Drade, supposing that there was no way of wrapping the two up together. 'No chance of someone steading in my place, is there?' hoped Drade. 'Just my old vocal chords are a little weary this morning, after some heavy presenting last night.'

'Know what you mean, had a skinfull myself,' said the earnest Paul. 'Don't worry, mate you'll have a mic...good one too. When I was using it earlier, it picked up my stomach rumbling.'

'Great!' said Drade to the retreating Paul, 'I was wondering whether I'd have a microphone...mate.'

'Damn,' he thought when Paul had gone, 'there was no getting out of this one; he would have to speak.' Public speaking was something he dreaded. 'And damn Barney, too! Where the hell was he, anyway? So like him to leave his best chum in the lurch.'

Drade rested his weary limbs upon a handy bench, put his head back and, allowing his mind to wander a little, tried to figure out what on earth he was going to say as he 'wandered through the assembled people'. Wandering down an aisle of people wasn't natural for a chap, he reflected; it was the sort of thing brides did at weddings, whereas the groom, nervous, afraid, sullen in some cases, hung-over in most cases, was already in position at the foot of the bar. The only time that a man moved through an aisle was at his funeral, and that was hardly through choice.

'I suppose I could tell a couple of anecdotes,' thought Drade. 'Nothing too racy, nothing offensive, perhaps the one about the two tortoises who go for a picnic and forget the bottle opener.' He brightened at the idea, and pursued it further, 'Then move on to draw parallels between the tortoise forgetting the bottle opener and us as a society forgetting about the things that are important to us.'

He pondered the possibility a while longer, and then decided against it. 'Bit complicated for the man in the street,' he thought.

He was still chewing on this, when his attentions were caught by a familiar face grinning at him from the other side of a pelican crossing at the far end of the square. At first he did not recognise him, and it took several moments for it to click. It was Harris from Base, in the most bazaar get-up imaginable: gone were his customary tweeds and cloth ties, and instead, he sported a ghastly off-yellow blazer, under which lurked a pair of shiny pink braces and a red bow tie. On his head sat a bowler hat, so large it almost enveloped his face; and in his hand he held one of those large green umbrellas favoured by the sort who play golf. Drade wandered over to him. 'What on earth are you doing, Harris?' he asked.

'Shush!' said Harris, looking around, fearful that someone might have heard, 'my name's not Harris, it's Ponsonby, Clive Ponsomby.'

'Sorry, was that Ponsonby, or Ponsomby?' asked Drade.

'Not sure,' said Harris, 'which sounds best. I'm pretending to be an Englishman, you see.'

'You are an Englishman – well, more or less,' said Drade.

'Yes, I know, but I'm pretending to be the type of Englishman that the foreigners think we are. Therefore the umbrella,' he said, lifting the item into the air.

'And the hat?' asked Drade.

'Yes, that too. All part of my disguise,' said Harris.

'Why do you need a disguise?' asked Drade.

Harris lowered his voice still further. 'I'm part of team Cabot,' he whispered. 'Belter asked me to help out...I'm bringing you people!'

At that moment a coach drew up and honked its horn several times. Harris started and turned around and with a cheerful wave said, 'Here they are now, see you later old son!' He rushed over, umbrella aloft, to greet the tourists who exited the coach.

They were from Asia, possibly from China, reflected Drade.

'This way for Bono and friends,' shouted Harris, 'just follow the umbrella. That's the way, madam. Bono, the pop star from Hollywood, this way. The Beatles, this way. Elvis no way!' he glanced over at Drade, who was staring at him with some incredulity.

'Absolute maniac!' thought Drade, 'why people believing him?'

And yet they did. Obediently trooping after the umbrella, excitedly chattering amongst themselves, and taking photos at every opportunity. Harris took them on a tour of the square first, pausing every so often to impart a gem of local knowledge to his willing hostages, before moving on, and finally gathering them around the podium, where he posed for pictures with several of the girls who had taken a liking to him.

'Incredible,' thought Drade.

A loud, screeching moan interrupted his thoughts. Drade turned again. Another coach drew up and, there to meet it, appearing out of nowhere, was kilt-wearing Arthur McFaddon, blowing for all he was worth into a set of pipes slung over his shoulder. A cheer went up from the passengers as they tottered out into the square. Arthur threw a broad smile to Drade before commencing the tour of Robert 'Sloany' Braveheart the Bruce's birthplace.

Drade shook his head in disbelief and tried once more to return to the problem of wandering the aisles – 'lonely as a cloud' without doubt. But again he was robbed of the solution by the approach of Barney, his posse of Street Leaders and the massed ranks the Cause's foot soldiers. Drade was stunned by the multitudes which put in an appearance – there must surely have been five thousand. All that was needed was a loaf or two of bread and, well, the fish was on its way.

'Hello!' hailed Barney from afar; he really needed to bellow over the noise of the whistles and the shouting and tooting of exasperated drivers' horns, 'what do you think?'

'Not billy bad!' yelled back Drade.

The two drew closer to one another.

'So how many have you got?' asked Drade.

'About six hundred,' said Barney, 'and the numbers will grow throughout the day,' he paused, 'I'm getting a thousand fish!'

'A thousand!' said Drade, 'Where you going to find those?'

'Think of the impact,' said Barney, 'Got a deal with a docker. They might be a little on the old side.'

'Right you are,' said Drade. 'One thing Barney, I was talking with that man over there – Paul, I think his name is – and he said that I would have to sub for you on the old platform this afternoon.'

'Yes, sorry, didn't get a chance to let you know,' replied Barney.

'Ah, yes, well, that's okay, I know now,' said Drade, 'the thing is that public speaking is one of my weaknesses, or rather, should I say, not one of my strengths?'

'Ah,' said Barney, 'Well not to worry, keep it short and sweet, tell a joke or something.'

'My thoughts exactly,' said Drade. 'I was thinking about the one with the tortoises and the bottle opener.'

'Umm, maybe...umm. Hang on a mo, just got to check on that lot over there.' And with that Barney he was off to help a group of confused volunteers with the poster arrangements.

'Mr Drade?' a voice said from behind.

Drade spun round and found himself confronted by a three man news crew with a camera shoved into his face.

'Hello!' he said, slightly startled and taking a step back.

'Quick interview?' said the shorter of the three.

'With me?' asked Drade, looking desperately around for Barney again. 'I'm not sure I'm quite the person you're looking for, but eh ...fine, fire away.'

Drade addressed himself to the interviewer, and then to the cameraman, and then looked directly into the camera itself, finally deciding to look at each alternately to the extent that he felt himself slightly dizzy.

'This way,'directed the third newsman.

'Ah yes,' said Drade, 'that's better.'

The shorter man spoke first. 'We've just spoken with some of the councillors who support the Lots Road development project, and they tell us that every study they have conducted shows that it will bring trade, commerce, jobs and prosperity to an otherwise desolate part of London. What could your foundation possibly have against it?'

This was not the kind of question Drade had been expecting, and he felt as if he had been bashed in the stomach by a very angry oarsman. He stared at the interviewer for a second and then at his two accomplices, hoping to divine some clue from their faces as to how he should respond. But he saw nothing. This was an obvious trap. 'Are you sure? Are you quite sure?' he queried, trying his best to sound sincere. 'Have you checked the small print?'

'The small print?' asked the interviewer.

'The devil is always in the detail, sir; loitering amidst the small print, skulking amongst the notes. You should always check them. In fact, whenever I read a study, I make it a habit to start there, and only if I find it devil-less, so to speak, do I bother with the rest of it.'

The interviewer looked flummoxed.

'I think you'll find,' continued Drade with growing confidence, 'that most experts would agree that the port will be a total waste of money and ruin a beautiful part of Chelsea and the Thames.'

'We've been told that the Lots Road Development Agency has been at pains to observe, and indeed supersede every guideline for environmental responsibility.'

Drade effected a flabbergasted expression, 'Who told you that?' he asked, 'and did you triple source it?'

The interviewer seemed taken aback by Drade's sheer aggression.

'Er, well, for a start, Sir Richard Lyons is the chairman of the Agency's board...'

'Sugar!' said Drade, 'they make sugar don't they?'

'Who?' asked the interviewer.

'Lyons,' said Drade, 'Sugar people – unreliable – plus he's on the board.'

'And...' said the interviewer.

'So, he's unsound. One of them,' said Drade.

His adversaries appeared confused. 'No, no, I think the point is this,' interjected the third man, 'Sir Richard Lyons is a well-known champion of the environment, great friend of the Duke of Cornwall, expert on conservation, written several books, and he wouldn't have joined the board if he in any way thought that the agency was unsound.'

Drade felt trapped. 'Sir Richard is a good man,' he said. 'He probably joined the Lots Road Development Agency to rein them in.' He looked over the interviewer's shoulder, and pretended his eye had be caught by someone beckoning him over.

'Two seconds,' he mouthed to the phantom someone.

'...to rein them in?' said the shorter man.

'Absolutely, that's what they do.' said Drade. 'And now if you'll excuse me, we have work to do'

And with that Drade turned, approached one of the helpers, and feigned an enormous interest in the contents of a box under the stage. The news crew slank away almost immediately, as they have a tendency to do, having found bigger fish to fry. But it was several minutes before Drade dared look up.

The Off!

Drade stood up, weary, head bowed, and with all the relish of a condemned man invited to 'do breakkie' with the hangman. He climbed the few steps to the podium, where Paul was making last minute adjustments to the position of the microphone. Paul flicked its foam head a couple of times with his finger.

'Can you hear me at the back?' he asked.

A general murmur of agreement went up and Paul, having patted Drade on the back, hurried off the stage, leaving the Master alone at its centre.

Drade looked down upon the multitude. And the multitude looked up, innocent and blank, with no idea of what to expect, which was hardly surprising, as Drade had no idea what to deliver. He clutched the podium and swallowed his throat dry, his heart pounding inside his chest, and perspiration seeping from his forehead. The hush was all around; the sound of the traffic receded swiftly to a very far place; birds stopped singing in the trees; leaves stopped rustling in the breeze, which, too, died a silent death; the drizzle itself hovered motionless in mid-fall, refusing to break up the freeze below and around; and no one, no soul, no creature, no being moved except the cameras, which rolled on silently. Seconds dragged by like eternities, each increasing the pressing urgency of now.

The hour, the minute, the second, the very split of the second was upon him. This was his moment. He must deliver.

But he did not. Drade spoke no word, uttered no sound, said nothing. And as the moment came and went, he breathed more easily, his skin became dry, and his mind, dazzled by the sheer weight of their expectations, became clear. A profound calm descended upon him and his animal instincts rose mightily to the fore. Now he began to hear the murmur of the people, the will of the chosen few. He sensed their needs, he knew their desires, and when he spoke, he did so slowly and solemnly to each and every mind directly.

'Two tortoises go for a picnic,' he began, 'and when they get to the top of the hill, they open up their picnic basket, only to find that they had left the bottle opener at home...'

It was a long joke, and when done, Drade paused to assess how his words had been received. He had known that this had been a risky gambit, and was always going to go one of two ways: either the crowd would fall about laughing being composed of relaxed, wide-awake, good-for-laugh types, who one wouldn't mind at all spending an evening with; or they would be serious, humourless, sombre log-like-green junkies, who would simply not get it, and remain as silent as tombstones.

The multitude stared at him in silence. This appeared, however, to be going a third way. Perhaps they were getting it, but they just didn't think it was funny. Their reaction made him wonder whether, perhaps, he had imagined that he had started speaking at all, and, that in fact, he had yet to say anything. The thought even crossed his mind to say nothing more and to see what happened. But he resisted the temptation and pushed on.

Mercifully, at that point, and from nowhere, Barney bounded onto the boards. Barney was a natural extravert and loved to work a crowd. Clapping and clacking, laughing and roaring he leapt at the microphone, whipping it off its stand and, in the same movement, put his arm around Drade thanking him profusely with his first breath for that excellent introduction. Turning to the crowd, with his second breath, he thanked it for turning up, and assured all that this was going to be a day they would tell their grandchildren about; a day when they had stood up for the planet, stood up to be counted, stood up to those who would have them stand down.

'This is going to be a day when the good people of Kensington and Chelsea would not do nothing! And now, good people, our man in Westminster: I give you the one, the only, and thank the lord there's only one of them, Mister Simon Kutt MP. Simon, this way if you please.'

The representative for the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea, the Rt. Hon. Simon Kutt MP, strutted onto the stage and took his place at the podium. He was tall man, in any case standing well over six feet, but with his heels and the stage, to say nothing of his own sense of self-importance, which he graciously carried around with him like a brass band, he seemed to tower over his constituents, whom he humbled with his presence.

He thanked Mr Barney Hoofsdew of the Cabot Foundation for his kind words of introduction, and threw Drade a nod. Then he placed and replaced his thick glasses upon the bridge of his nose, heightening the sense of anticipation, and commenced in a loud, rather horse-like bellow.

'Thank you, people of Chelsea for attending this rally in such numbers,' he began, looking around benignly, 'and I have to say, it is particularly heartening for me to see so many young people here today; for this proposed development will be around in your future, in this is your town and your neighbourhood...' The emphasis on the word 'your' had the unintended effect of awakened a suspicion in the minds of his listeners.

There were a few indecisive cheers. Barney, who was perched to the side of the stage, found his mind wandering.

The MP continued. 'I remember the first time I really came to understand the meaning of environmental responsibility.' The man reached into his jacket pocket and extracted a wedge of papers. He placed them upon the podium and thumbed through the first couple of pages. An inaudible groan went up from the crowd, for the representative had a well-deserved reputation for making exceedingly boring speeches; although, given the occasion, there was some hope that this one would be a little more exciting than those delivered within the still, dark, echoing halls of Westminster.

It was not. In fact, the MP managed to drone on for almost half an hour, mainly about himself and the formative experiences of his life; and just when those still awake were beginning to wonder what this had to do with the Lots Road building project, the cunning politician began to weave these disparate strands into a piece of self-aggrandizing propaganda. '...and so that is why I went into politics,' he intoned. 'As you know, we Conservatives have always been, and are, and always will be,' he added with a promptness which quelled any dubiety, 'great believers in enterprise, unwavering friends of business, and advocates for the mercantile class.' Again one could not help having suspicions that the man harboured a certain, cultivated distain for that particular 'class' of people.

He took a brief pause, as if expecting at least a smattering of applause for the courageous position he was taking. None, not even the merest suggestion of a flutter, was forthcoming.

'But why?' he asked – the rhetoric was no bad thing, as, by stage in the lecture, the audience was sleeping so soundly, that there was a greater chance of getting an answer from Professor Cabot. 'Because,' he continued, 'we Conservatives believe that a good government is one that spreads contentment and happiness throughout the nation, and we alone realise that it is only through trade and commerce that this can come about. But whilst trade and commerce are very important, they will always remain a means to the end and not ends in themselves. In this case, I feel there is a clear conflict of interest, and as your representative, I cannot, in all good conscience, but come down on the side of the people.

Of course,' the MP rounded upon the local council and their impotence in the face of demands by their friends in big business, 'that might make for a few awkward silences at those grand dinners one gets invited to.' A smile crept onto his face, 'Perhaps nice, plump directorships might be a little harder to come by.' His smile grew broader, 'And it's always risky to take on the rich and the powerful – especially if you are the rich and powerful – look at our local councillors,' he allowed himself a chuckle. 'But I want to be able to sleep at night.'

'No problem there,' reflected a few insomniacs.

And so it went on: the dilettante local councillors, paralyzed by their indifference to the ordinary voter, unable to differentiate between self-interest and those of society, doubtless lining their own pockets (he implied on more than one occasion), or, at best, demonstrating the kind of incompetence with which only the left of the political spectrum was acquainted.

After what seemed like an era, the honest public servant turned to the matter in hand: 'So finally, I turn to the matter in hand,' he said. 'There is, as I am sure you are aware, a meeting later today at the Offices of the Borough Council behind you. It will be ten o'clock in thirty seconds, which will give our councillors exactly seven hours to make the right decision, and I have the honour of starting the countdown clock right here behind me.'

The MP reached for a hammer from under the podium, and struck a large bell behind him. There was a loud clang, at which Drade, who was leaning against the stage, inches away from the dinning brass, almost fainted. By good fortune he was revived by a series of loud fireworks behind him, let off by Barney with the assistance of Paul, as the countdown got underway.

Next it was the turn of the Archbishop of Westminster to take the stand. A hugely paunched man with large square thick-rimmed glasses, he had the curious ability to look without seeing, and to make everyone in front of him feel that he was talking to them personally. At the same time, the sheer extent of him made everyone behind him feel completely left out, as if they had arrived at the concert only to find that the venue was full and the doors closed.

The man was no po-faced parson either, judging without emotion and chastising from behind the lectern. This bishop was a crusader, an evangelist charged by God – and perhaps a tot of something to change the wicked ways of man.

Manoeuvring his great bulk about the stage, with a surprising adroitness, he railed against big business, and how it was destroying lives and communities. How it turned people into consumers, how it extinguished our humanity, and how, in the end, those at their helm would pay the price – if not here, then there, in the eternal and unforgiving fires of hell.

The rhythm of his oratory alternated between calm, repetitious and endlessly unpunctuated word flows, during which time his body seemed to sway like a snake charmer; and periods of great excitability, during which he would wave his arms about like a Gully Gully appealing to heaven and hell at the same time. His voice stiffened the sinews and summoned the blood, only to crack with emotion at its climax.

The preacher left the stage to a foot-stamping roar of approval, which was a huge contrast to the honourable member's exit, which was itself memorable only because he had so very nearly tripped on some rather ungodly wires.

At half past ten, children of a local primary school took stage. They held hands and sang about loving, sharing, caring, healing, hugging, feeling and then rather bizarrely they sang about how irrelevant the colour of one's skin was. Shameless though he was, even Barney could not prevent a smirk shooting across his rapt-in-wonder-at-the-wisdom-of-these-young-kids face. A quarter hour later, some environmental rappers jumped upon the boards to assure everyone – in rhyme – that all was not lost, as long as we believed. At midday, there was a band, The Left Footers, who also sang – very loudly – and at the same time, there was an announcement that food was being served, with all proceeds going to the Cause.

The audience stampeded towards the stalls, which must have been rather disconcerting for The Left Footers who played on bravely. But indeed, all was righted when, half an hour later, the audience began to dribble back, only to find that the band were still there. At two, there arrived some Indian dancers – generously giving their time; at two thirty, performed a group of mimes who also juggled – a silent affair; and twenty minutes after them, there was a yoga demonstration, in which a yogi twisted himself into the most unnatural of shapes, and remained motionlessly thus for a good five minutes. During this display, there was much shifting about in the audience and pawing at the ground; and one young person asked whether, perhaps, the yogi had died, an observation which profited the boy a clip round the lughole. But this did set right tone for the more serious address by Professor Deleany formally of UPD, which followed.

'I didn't know the late Professor Cabot personally,' began Delaney, 'but I have been assured by some acquaintances, that he was one of the best.' His head motioned vaguely in the direction of Barney and Drade, who both looked away and around.

There was a ripple of agreement from around the stage.

'Neither have I had a chance to assess much of his work, although I understand it is very through, precise and well-reviewed, and further, that he and I were essentially walking in the same direction. It is indeed a great pity that our paths didn't actually cross.'

Barney gazed towards the heavens, as though from out of the gloom of the grey, grey clouds, he could, perhaps, make out the face of his dear, recently departed mentor, who also lamented an opportunity lost.

The professor looked down at his notes, his lecturing instincts of his coming to the fore once again, and continued.

Back-scratching & Arm-bending

Councillor Kenneth Bobbin tweaked the lace curtain and looked with caution out of the window at the growling crowd. He turned to face the room.

He was in the large meeting room of the council's offices in Patriot Square, housed in a building which had been built in an age when the future portended great expectations, but which in this these defeatist times seemed pretentious at best. There were four large windows on one side, which faced Patriot Square. Yet inside, it was dim, partly on account of the heavy drapes and thick lace curtains, which hung like shrouds and cobwebs around the windows; in part because the thick, embossed wallpaper was stale yellow from years of smoke and neglect; and in part because the sombre darkness of the wooden furnishings seemed to trap and hold the light into a functional void, dismissing hope and banishing sentiment. The walls were naturally bare, except for the usual joyless signage, which buildings of a statist stamp have a tendency to be littered with, and a solitary notice board, upon which hung some miserable missives from on high. And everything, from the contradictory and duplicative array of bolts and spigots upon the door, to the brutish lockets which guarded every little cupboard, spoke to the great confusion of mind, from which those who had dominion over these little outposts had a tendency to suffer from.

In the centre of the room lay a large, highly decorated, oblong table struck from good oak, doubtless pilfered in some way from the houses of the mighty in times past. Much too large for the room, much too high for serious use, much too grand for what use it was put to, and much too finely crafted for those who used it, it underscored the pitiful state of its surroundings. And around this altar to keptocratic ineptitude sat the eight who presided over the affairs of the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea.

'I'm not changing my mind at all...no...not at all,' spluttered Councillor Bobbin.

'But I don't understand,' said Suzzie Templer, who was seated at the foot of the table, 'there are three names on this proposal: yours, Chris's, and mine; and now suddenly you say we should listen to the people. In what way is that not a change of heart?'

In fact, Kenneth Bobbin had changed his mind, and he knew it. His new friend, Hamish de Buxton Drade had as much as promised him the Jag at an almost unbelievably competitive price, on the proviso that he withdraw his support from the planning application. One might have thought that this exchange would, in some way, offend the Councillor's honour, but the truth was that opportunity, to Bobbin, was as a dead carcass to a jackal, and he stuck to his guns.

'There's no change,' said Bobbin, approaching the table, 'I still believe in the port, I still support it and think it would be a great idea in many ways; but I also think that...er...you know...we are here to represent the people, and if they don't want it then in all good conscience...'

Templer interrupted him, brandishing a copy of the original proposal. 'You said here that you supported the application for planning permission, and would vote for it, and now you're saying you won't.'

'And I will support the application, as I...' He glanced at the other councillors around the table, '...as I said I would.'

'I just don't understand,' said Templer.

And she truly did not. Suzzie Templer was a rare find in the world of local government; being born into substantial privilege, she had never really experienced first-hand the courser side of life. Perhaps because of this, or perhaps despite, she was determined to do right by as many people as possible, and was the only person at the table who had entered the dirty world of the professional politics for no other purpose. This made here dangerous to her enemies, and even more so to here allies. She glared over at Bobbin finding offence in everything about him, from his weak lopsided gait, to the saliva that had started to trickle out of his closed lips and down towards his non-existent chin. It was clear, this weakling had found the sight of the mob of moaning do-nothings in the square too much for him. She had an almost overwhelming urge to jump up, biff him round the face, and command him to stay the course.

'So, you will vote for it?' asked Templer testily.

'So, I...er...yes, I will vote for it, unless...but I think that we should at least listen to the objections that are being, er...' He motioned towards the window, wiping his mouth with his hand as he did so.

The noise from outside grew as the multitude seemed to near the building, and strangely a whiff of rotten fish passed through the dead airs of the room and were quickly absorbed by them. One of the councillors scribbled something on a piece of notepaper and passed it to his colleague, who studied it, then scribbled something back, at which the first councillor smirked, stopping the instant he caught a look from Council Leader Major Strawley, who glared at him from above his bushy black moustache.

A strategic two seats down from Suzzie Templer, sat Councillor Chris Carpet, who until now, had been completely silent. He had known that today would be a difficult, because, although he supported the Port, not least because he had received assurances on more than one occasion that he would asked to join its board when an appropriate amount of time, had passed he knew that that blasted bullying Belter 'scumbag!' had him over a barrel, and there was nothing he could do. So desperate had he been to avoid scandal, that not only had he promised not to support the planning permission, but that he would do everything in his power to make sure it did not go through by voicing aggressive opposition to it.

Carpet squinted over at the spinsterish stenographer, typing away in the corner. She looked very alert, and he doubted that she would miss a trick. At that precise moment, there being a lull in the conversation, she glanced up and met his eyes.

'Damn,' thought Carpet, who had a tendency to paranoia, 'she knows, too!'

He switched his gaze to Suzzie Templer, who was fuming like a boiler about to explode, and texting furiously away on her Blackberry. The blood had risen to her neck, but remarkably seemed to have stopped there.

'Or was it,' wondered Carpet, 'that she was wearing so much foundation on her face that one simply couldn't see her pallor change?'

He reflected on the irony that the woman should also be wearing blusher. Either way, her neck was now so dark, that in the half-light, he could barely make out the Mexican ruby necklace she was wearing against her skin.

He decided that now was as good a time to act as any, but he had to be subtle.

'Ken,' he pleaded, 'I agree with Suzzie; this kind of thing is really not on; you make a deal, you have to stick to it.'

'Have you looked out there?' questioned Bobbin, once more at the window.

'Yes, yes, I know about them,' said Carpet, 'but you see we are here, not just to respond to those who shout loudest, we are here, because in an election, in which everyone in the Borough had a say, we were chosen to represent their views.'

'Exactly!' cried Suzzie Templer, 'that's democracy.' The colour in her neck faded a shade.

'But everyone in the borough is out there!' said Bobbin. 'How much of a mandate do you need?'

Carpet stood up, with a deep sigh, and walked over to Kenneth Bobbin, taking his arm like an old friend, 'Ken.' he sopped with a casual glance out of the window. He paused, and feigned surprise. 'My God, the man's right! and they've all got fish in their hands.'

The other councillors jumped up and peered through the lace curtains.

Down below was a long line of people stretching from the farthest reaches of Patriot Square, right up to the front door of the council offices itself. Each person carried a dead fish, either by its tail, so that it dangled forlornly, or above their heads like Zulus with little silver spears. Some, especially children, carried the fish in twos; others in threes; and some carried two fish, one in each hand; and one person, who had obviously brought his own fish, carried a half dozen of the things slung over his shoulder in a sort of brace. The line made a slow and sombre shuffle towards the office entrance, and at its head were five or six volunteers, who took the slithery little offerings, and put them in their correct place. Already, the little patch of ground, which passed for a garden, was covered in an ever-spreading, silvery-scaled carpet. Such was the funebral mood, that if knew no better, one might suspect the building to be a mausoleum, housing the lying-in-state of some dictator – perhaps one of the great fishes, for whom, in their grief, all the other fishes had laid down their lives.

'Right, right okay,' said the council leader, turning towards the table, 'let's be rational about this; let's calm down.'

Templer, with reluctance had joined her colleagues at the windows and was staring down in horror; she had never seen anything quite like this before. The only other place where she could recall seeing this kind of sincerity had been at a football match. 'Quite astonishing!' she thought, 'could they be right?'

She turned away and joined her colleagues at the table. All that is except Kenneth Bobbin, who seemed to be the most affected. 'There's television crews out there, –two of them, no three, or bloody hell, they've put a picture of these windows up on the big screen.' He ducked down and crawled back to the table, even though there was no real possibility of the cameras picking him up.

'Kenneth, Kenneth,' said the leader, 'Kenneth, my boy sit down, let's see if we can sort this out.'

Kenneth complied.

Carpet looked up again at the stenographer. He needed to show support for Templer, whilst at the same time, push everybody against her. 'I think we need to be calm and not rush to conclusions, just because of one well-organised demonstration. Suzzie would you agree?'

Suzzie did not look up; she was becoming less sure of her ground, but she nodded anyway.

'This port is a good thing,' continued Carpet, 'good for jobs, good for the borough, and as for them out there, I mean, it's not as if a bunch of hooligans and a few reporters are going to have any real effect on the opinion of the people is it?' A predator by nature, Carpet noticed a slight flinching from a couple of the other councillors when he used the word 'reporters'. Perhaps this was a nerve he could tweak a little. 'I vote we go out now, and confront them down there in the square. Show them that we're not going to be intimidated by a few silly TV cameras.' A groan went round the table, and Carpet tasted speckles of blood in the air.

The dissent was not lost upon the major. One thing he had learnt in politics was that, with the exception of being booted out of office, the very last thing representatives wanted to happen was to be forced to account for the decisions they had made. In that sense, they could not really win; for if, as councillors, they truly advocated for their constituents, and opinion turned against them, it was they, and not the voters, who would be made to carry the can. On the other hand, if they ignored their constituents, and did whatever they liked, and opinion turned against them, the same thing would happen.

In this case, the major had no particular views on the proposed development, and had long ago decided to remain neutral; until, that is, a definite consensus emerged. At that point, he had determined to spring upon it like a ninja, skin the bugger, and present it to the people as yet another marvellous coup for Major Jack Strawley, the people's champion.

As a junior officer, he had found the only sure way of getting round some shoe-shining captain, or bag-carrying major was to use stalking horses to hide behind, and proxies to do his bidding. But today it would be more complicated, as unluckily two of the councillors, both stalwarts of his, were oddly absent: one had had to deal with a demolition crew, which had turned up at his house out of the blue; and the other couldn't get out of his house, because his door handle had fallen off or something. So negotiating an agreement would require a certain delicacy. If he came down on Bobbin's side he risked the ire of the lady councillor, which could be terrible indeed. (He had been on the receiving end of it some while back, and it was an experience not easily forgotten.) On the other hand, as much as he hated to admit it, what that creep Bobbin was suggesting was not altogether unreasonable. He stroked his moustache, deep in thought, and looked from one councillor to the other. On his right sat Chris Carpet, who had supported the port in the past, but who knew where he stood now? (Slippery fish that one.) On the other hand, Carpet was a careerist, and the thing about careerists was that they were like sharks: they had to keep moving forwards, otherwise they would die, or worse still, feel like they were going backwards. Perhaps this could be used to his advantage? Immediately to the major's left was Peter Sucket, one of the quietest people he knew, who, in the past seven years or so, had been heard only twice. Sucket was an ex-shop-steward in one of the local hospitals, who had effectively been grandfathered into the council on the backs of the unions. He was naturally Anti-business so 'talking to the people' would be fine with him – provided he did not have to answer them, that is. Next to the unionist was the eminent Kenneth Bobbin, who was still darting backwards and forwards like a rat trapped in no-man's land, (odious creature). Then there sat Adrian Hermes, another quiet one – private school, Young Conservative, skipped university, joined a local accountancy firm, they pulled strings and got him the nomination. He had indicated that he would vote in favour of the port – but not really a fighter – the major calculated that he could work around him. At the foot of the table sat the formidable Suzzie Templer. And to her left there was Marcus Rudd, a local businessman, somewhat over qualified for this sort of hod-work and doubtless using the council as a stepping stone to Westminster. A classless oik whose favourite wine was probably 'French', reflected the major. He supported the port in the past, and was pushy and aggressive to boot; all in all he would not be a walkover. Finally, sandwiched between Rudd and Carpet, was the only other woman in the Cabinet: Angie Halliwell, just nineteen years old and very clever and very opinionated. The major didn't care for her a great deal, but she had opposed the port in past, so could prove useful.

'Now they're lighting candles,' observed Bobbin, popping his head around the curtain, 'and sitting down around the fish.' His colleagues, with the exception of the major and Suzzie Templer, who remained glumly at the table, leapt to the windows, taking up positions either side of the window frames.

And so they were. Barney had arranged it with the local constabulary that traffic pass to either side of this section of the square, which enabled the, by now, over a thousand people to take up seated positions around the cordon of fish. Each participant had been issued with a candle, which emitted a fragile but insistent glow in the breeze.

'Looks like they're planning to make a night of it,' said Marcus Rudd.

'How on earth are we going to get home, then, through that lot?' asked Adrian Hermes.

'I say we go out now, while it's still light, and have it out with them,' said Carpet in bullish mood.

'I agree,' rejoined Rudd, 'little monsters!'

Major Strawley now turned his gaze to Suzzie Templer. She was the key, but how to get round her? He looked at her thoughtfully, and reflected on how the modern woman was so unlike the mothers, girlfriends or wives of yesteryear. In those days if one needed to get a female onside, one simply complemented them on their hair (They had almost always just 'had it done', and were convinced it made a huge difference.) Then again the bashful presentation of a bunch of flowers; or the simple act of standing up, when they entered, or left, a room, had worked wonders. And if he had come across any thinkers, he would have invariably sought their advice on which clothes to wear to a wedding, or which curtains might suit his rooms and the like. But these simple tricks did not really seem appropriate here.

He continued to twirl his moustache thoughtfully. 'How to go about it?'

Suzie Templer's father had also been a greatly moustachioed military man; cold, distant and critical, he had been prone to furious tempersome outbursts, which were often preceded by nothing more than a tightening of the lip and a curious glint in the eye. Perhaps it was the sight of the major apparently glowering at her from above his bushy lip gear; perhaps it was the smell of rotten fish, which put the councillor in mind of a long-forgotten, teenage dalliance in the university's fish store; or perhaps the earlier sighting in Patriot Square of the thrashing mixture of dead fish and passion had reminded her of the unfortunate death of her own beloved professor – presumed to have been eaten by piranhas in an Amazonian tributary and who was by coincidence also called Alfie.

Who can say with certainty how small currents come together to make large waves? but at length Suzzie-the-Liberal looked up.

'Fine,' she snarled, 'let's call the brutes in.'

Base forever!

The airs at Base were different that night. Banished forever were the forbidding shadows of an uncertain future which had cosseted every nook and cranny, and found their way into every heart that cared these last six months; and back with solid permanence was found in all places a joyful sweetness, languid and full of light indifference, as of old.

A full house, with Belter at its head, greeted Drade and Barney, as they entered into the reading room late that night; and upon their entrance, a deafening roar and a stamping went up, which would have brought tears to the eye of any patriot who watched, as young men poured forth to defend the flag. They fell upon the two like hungry puppies, and slapped and hugged and kissed and tickled and bore them both aloft; and, ignoring their laughter-laced objections, carried them protesting towards the bar. Gone was the blind-eyed reserve and oblique intimations that had secreted their purpose for so long; and in their place were sheer, unadulterated congratulations and thanks. Even old Harry, behind the bar, managed a broad smile, and took it upon himself to second-guess what would be their tipple be. And when he had poured, he poured again, and then another, until all were served, and then swug fine well himself, 'to polish the bottle'; and with a practised flip, he wristed it empty into a bin some ten yards down the bar.

'Speech!' cried a raucous someone and others agreed. There was a tinkling of glasses.

'Hamish, they're calling for you,' said a mischievous Barney, preparing himself to charge to the rescue once more.

But this time Drade, having dismissed a folly of inquisitive reporters for a duck, and having stared down that the unruly mob in Patriot Square, as well as being the most adaptive of fellows in any case, was more than equal to the task.

Jumping up upon a chair, glass in one hand, and Harris's umbrella in the other, he addressed his audience.

'Friends...' he began.

'Romans, countrymen,' cracked one from the back.

'Er...if you wish. Why not, well, countryman, certainly...er, except for you, Biffa, you old Welshmen you...er...I bring good news!'

There was a whooping and a chattering that would have done a brace of baboons in heat proud.

'Due to the very good works of our very good friends...er, Barney there, whiffing a bit over by the bar; Belter who is...' Drade looked around, but Belter has slipped into an anti-room, not really being one for crowds or speeches, '...Er, somewhere, probably poking his head in through the serving hatch to catch any stray slops...er, Harris,' Drade raised his umbrella a shade.

A cheer went up as Arthur came in, staggering under the combined weight of his wretched bag-pipes and the liberious evening temptations of The King's Head and Eight Bells.

'And, of course old Nobblie here, ...and others...'

With a knowing look, he raised his voice to quash the rising anticipatory merriment and continued: 'I can confirm what everyone seems to know already, which is that the council in their wisdom, have changed their minds, and that Base is now not going to get knocked down! So, good news for everyone, I think, and three cheers for Base!'

A roar went up anew, followed by various impromptu speeches, calls for yet more drinking, glass banging, and singing of the first verses of the National Anthem and Jerusalem; and if one had been inclined to tally the precise number of cheers that went up that night, most would have given up after a thousand, and yet the cheering continued until well into the morning.

Eventually calm returned to Base, but lightness remained; little gatherings played cards here or discussed sports with feverish enthusiasm there. A couple of philosophers in one corner bickered about pointless minutiae; a group of art critics in another debated the merits of a work of great mystery, presently being exhibited in a private gallery nearby. Some sat alone, reading, or perhaps, awaiting others, or, having met them, departing together to begin a night elsewhere.

Belter, Barney and Drade, having managed to shake off even the most insistent well-wisher, retired to an anti-room; and Harry, having recovered his composure, but looking flushed of face nonetheless, attended to their needs, as the friends slumped back into the welcoming arms of spring and leather, shattered after what had been a tumultuous day. Silence reigned amongst them, as they reflected upon what they had done.

Drade took a sip of cognac and let it slowly evaporate down his tongue. Thoughtfully, as was his way, he held his glass up a touch and gazed through it, noticing how glass and liquid conspired together to colour and curve and ripple and crease the paintings on the walls, finding it strange that this effect occurred whether he swilled the liquid or not.

For a moment he wondered what it would be like to be a grape. Being one little fellow on a bunch, stuck to a vine, halfway down an endless line of other similar vines, which were themselves but one row in a vast army of plants surrounded by countless other vineyards upon the sides of gentle slopes somewhere in France. The solitary grape, which had risen from the dying embers of a springtime blossom, could know little of the world around him, but that it brought him light and dark, rains and winds, and sunshine and chill. And, all things considered, this little fellow would have had a somewhat dreary existence, given that his window upon the world was restricted to the sight of hundreds of other grapes, each of similar appearance, and only being broken occasionally by a passing farmer, a flying insect or an imperious spider. And yet, and despite, and perhaps because of, those circumstances, which would have driven many to despair and depression, this courageous little grape grew and ripened; and whilst others around him may have been gobbled as they slept by gangs of wild boar, and others plucked by the pin-precise bills of passing birds, and still others were stuck down by disease and pestilence, yet did our little hero cling to life and sweeten upon the vine.

'To think,' thought Drade, 'that when crushed, fermented and suitably matured, that little fellow makes quite a treat upon the tongue. The world is truly a wonderful place!'

And Belter, too, was deep in thought, but at length spoke up, once more overwhelmed by his ubiquitous need to know. 'So, what did you offer her Barney?' he asked later that evening at Base.

'Didn't offer her anything,' said Barney stoutly, 'she simply had to respect public opinion.'

'Barney?' asked Drade.

'I reasoned with her,'

'And very reasonably you offered her....umm?' prompted Belter.

'A gentleman does not kiss and tell,' said Barney.

'You kissed her!' said Drade, shocked to his core. 'I say, Barney, that's a bit steep. I mean, obviously extreme circumstances, times of war, and so on...but you actually...'

'No, course not,' said Barney, 'I mean, a gentleman does not...actually, I'm not sure what I did mean. But I definitely didn't kiss her.'

'Thank God for that,' said Belter, 'I was just polishing up one of Alfie's medals of honour to pin on your chest.'

'No, no, no need. In point of fact, a gentleman would never kiss her. No, she was actually very aggressive at first, started talking about how she didn't like being held to ransom by a small mob of layabouts, blah, blah, blah...'

'I see,' said Belter.

'And then, when I'd calmed her down, she got quite chatty, and I explained that for us this was a very real issue. The port would destroy countless lives and livelihoods down there, and that's why there was such grass-roots support of the Cause in the borough.'

'And that won her over did it?' said Drade.

'No it didn't, but it calmed her down. And then I started to confide in her.'

'You didn't?' said Belter.

'No, I didn't, but I pretended to. I started talking about my work with the Cause, and how I had begun to think of life after it.'

'You proposed to her didn't you?' asked Belter.

'Will you shut up Belter!' said Barney. 'I told her that the last few months have been very wearing for me, and that I was considering disbanding the structure of the Cause, and this was making me very upset because, there was still so much good to do in other areas.'

Belter and Drade were silent.

'And...well, to cut a long story short, I asked her to take the reins.'

'And she bought it?' said Belter.

'Yes,' said Barney, 'told her that the Cause should become more than a one-issue movement, that it should devote itself to fighting other battles for the people.'

'The Causes,' said Belter with a hint of sarcasm.

'Indeed,' said Barney. 'It needed someone with vision and energy, and I told her that she would have no problem maintaining the momentum we had built, as her statesman-like decision to publically change her mind had given her great cache with its members.'

'Wow,' said Belter.

'Then I went to Paul, informed him of the situation, and the last thing I saw was Paul and Suzzie Templer up on stage with the Left Footers dancing the night away, with all the other people below.'

'And I suppose the other councillors just fell into line?' said Belter.

'Pretty much,' said Barney, 'except for that low-life Marcus Rudd, unmovable. But he was out-voted.'

'And the fish?'

'Ah well...' said Barney.

'It's a funny thing,' reflected Drade out loud, 'that our MPs and local councillors are supposed to be the best of the best, and in reality they are such an awful bunch.'

'Most of them,' agreed Barney, 'greedy, ambitious spiffs by and large. Shame really.'

There was murmured agreement.

'You know my great, great grandfather owned half of the City?' said Belter. He didn't pause to see if they did know, but went on. 'Well my father told me once that a few hundred years ago, around the time of the revolutions in France and America, the wealthiest people in Britain got together to work out how to make sure that the same things didn't happen here, and the solution they came up with was to give more people the vote.'

'How so?' asked Drade.

'Well,' continued Belter, 'The idea was that rather than have these agitators running round the countryside creating trouble, they would be allowed to win themselves a seat in Parliament . That way they could have them all locked up in one place, where they couldn't do any harm.'

'Really?' said Drade. 'Well I suppose that makes sense, and it's easier to keep an eye on them if you know where they are.'

'Exactly,' said Barney. 'Well that was what the rotten boroughs were for.'

'The rotton whats?' asked Drade.

'They called them "rotton boroughs",' said Belter, 'seats in remote places which could virtually be given to the right sort of people.'

'The Rotters,' added Barney.

'A smart move, actually. You see, the more awful they were, the safer the seat they were given, so that come election time the real troublemakers didn't need to campaign at all, which meant that they never came into contact with the public until they retired.'

'Ingenious,' said Drade.

'Of course, now that we're all living longer,' continued Belter, 'they are dangerous even in old age, which is why more and more of them are getting stuffed into the Lords. I shouldn't be surprised if, in another twenty years or so, all their lordships will be entirely elected.'

The clock chimed the hour – four times.

'Fancy a trip to France this weekend?' asked Belter at length.

'Can't,' said Barney, 'going to Salisbury tomorrow night, bit of a do going on and then got to be back first thing Monday for meetings.'

'Meetings?' asked Belter.

'Meetings,' said Barney firmly. 'With friends.'

'Other friends?' said Belter.

'Old friends,' said Barney remaining tight-lipped.

'I see,' said Belter. 'What about you, Hamish?'

'Got a formal,' said Drade, 'Christening in Scotland.'

'Fine, well in that case, I might as well stay away for the week,' said Belter.

The groups of happy fellows in other rooms thinned away, some stopping to wish the three a 'good night' and a 'well done', whilst others merely nodded and left. Quite recovered, Harry set about putting the place in order, and, at length, the Governor appeared at the door to drop off the papers, his two spaniels in hand, ready for their morning constitutional.

The glimmer of greys grew at the bay windows, and distantly came and went the rumble of a morning bus, which set the birds a-whistling in the trees.

END

