 
### Chapter One

### A New Shell, A New Start

### When the sleepy village of Blinkington-on-the-Treacle discovered that their local public house, The Field of Corncrakes, had a new owner; well, you can imagine the stirrings.

### Set in idyllic and yawning woodland, Blinky, as it is more commonly referred to by the populace, positively cried out, nay, yearned for its oasis of comfort and confusion to be re-opened.

The massive heart attack suffered by pub landlord, Norman 'Spoon Eyes' Willis, had stunned everyone; not least his pet corgi Vincent, who was unfortunately asphyxiated while trying desperately to escape his owners oncoming twenty stone frame. Essential social pleasures had been denied the inhabitants of this opulent glade since that tragic day. Gossip had been nudged to the back burner and its flame was barely flickering. In a village the size of Blinkington-on-the-Treacle, this will never do...

Modern vehicles did little to stimulate the abnormal boundaries of Arnold Matson's insatiable imagination. Cars today, said Arnold, had no personality. Speed, as any flailing turbine engine will tell you, isn't everything: and as Arnold's immaculately bees-waxed bottle-green Hillman Avenger tip-toed into the dozing village that contained his newly purchased hostelry, net curtains fidgeted and twitched. In the mid-sixties, when Arnold's pride and joy had discreetly mooched off the production line, we were not a nation who spread the marmalade thick as you like on a Sunday morning, tossed the bank statement aside, and nonchalantly flicked through the glossy supplements to 'ooh and ah' over the endless choice and temptations of this year's model.

Four-wheel drives, diesel and turbo, were not topics of major concern. A sad reflection then, of our so-called modern society, that the sight of such a harmless individual adhering impeccably to the Highway Code in his ageing but pristine jalopy, should be the subject of so much consternation. Without trial, Arnold Matson had been found guilty of that most preposterous of crimes: merely arriving in a backwater as a total stranger.

### 'Good Lord,' hissed Miriam Spurgeon, reaching for another garibaldi, 'He's pulled into the car park.'

'Cars in car parks – whatever next,' belittled her husband Alfred, whose peaceful morning saunter with a broadsheet was promptly extinguished.

Seeking solace in the biscuit-barrel proved short lived. Alfred's left wrist received a firm tap and he was given his orders.

'Biscuits can wait, Alfred,' purred Miriam, fine-tuning her pince-nez.

### 'For heaven sake...'

'Alfred!' Wisely he remained silent, and joined the commandant by the alcove.

Blinkington-on-the-Treacle may contain its fair share of like-minded Spurgeons, and I dare say their pet Pekinese and shag piles will continue to flourish for many years to come. For now, though, they need not detain the likes of you and me. We must press on: for Arnold is about to enter his newly acquired premises.

Best porcelain sunlight creeps uninvited through a dusty recess window; toying and teasing the bedraggled pate of Arnold Matson as it does so. He sips hot tea as he mulls over the miracle of a spider's gossamer glinting on an unemployed whiskey optic. Every man should dream, but in my humble opinion, few should be allowed through the gateway they imagine leads to paradise, for it rarely provides what the overactive imagination has promised. Arnold Matson, on the other hand, was under no such illusion and spell as he contentedly dunked and contemplated. Oh, excitement was unquestionably throbbing in the well harnessed ribcage beneath his straining cobalt cardigan; but when a man has been dealt life's snorters as regularly as Arnold, he does not look to the hypothetical horizon for the comforting mirage; he is merely glad that, for the time being at least, that very same hypothesis is simply calmness personified.

### No surprise then, when a single wood mouse that has been wintering in the disused chimneybreast of the dormant hostelry, is not only spared as it scampers for cover over the hearth's dusty brickwork and scattered kindling; it is also smiled at and waved to by the contented new landlord as it momentarily sidetracks his tranquil infusion and daydream.

A smattering of the unwanted surrenders itself to the lime scaled bathroom sink as the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf delicately trims both nasal and facial hair; a minor detail, some would say, that he ought to attend to more often. Indeed, since the collapse, not to say disintegration of his marriage to Martha Wheatsheaf (nee Baines), it gives me no pleasure whatsoever to report that cleanliness and Godliness have, in the case of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, packed their separate bags and hopped it. At the risk of venturing towards blasphemy, I would even go as far as to say that if God allowed anyone to come near his right hand with finger nails and body odour such as those possessed by our Colin, the shop steward in charge of hosannas and what have you would pull the big man to one side, demand an emergency meeting and threaten an almighty, angelic walk-out. That is not to say we should laugh and ridicule at the demise of the ripe and high reverend, for he still has much to offer in his present confused and self-neglected state. However, his carbolic and holy deodorant shall, for the foreseeable future, remain superfluous. With lemon-tinted bifocals ready to fend off unwelcome intruders to his bloodshot peepers, and tattered moccasins champing at the bit as they snuggle up to threadbare cotton socks (one black, one navy blue), the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf double checks himself in his lopsided hall mirror, begrudgingly accepts what he sees, snatches his day-glo cycling helmet from a bereaved hat stand, and is gone.

Where once a wooden bench, perhaps nestling under overhanging trees, possibly by a duck pond or horse trough, conjured up the quintessential picture of an English village green; we are now, dear reader, faced with an equally vivid, but more abysmal scenario. Nothing would have given me more pleasure than to report back to base, as it were, that the idyll, which we all remember and still occasionally crave, is alive and well. Not so, I'm afraid, in the case of Blinkington–on–the-Treacle. Don't get me wrong; for I should hate to tamper with the cerebral enthrallment you have fashioned for yourself in order to maintain an interest in these ramblings. Let me make it as clear as Muriel Spurgeon's six o'clock g and t, that your first impression of this enchanting village was indisputably correct. Absolutely. It's just that...Oh, I suppose you might as well meet them...

Ronnie and Aubrey Bickerstaff are twins. More to the point, they are thirty-year-old twins who should know better. As the spectacularly inoffensive retired librarian, Gerald Ashcroft, once pointed out to the pair, shortly before he was dispatched to the local infirmary with various cuts and bruises, 'Sitting on your derrière, drinking cider all day, is not an occupation!' Some ten years later, it would seem that Gerald was mistaken in his supposition; and as I witness Ronnie and Aubrey once more sprawled on the bench under the naked and slightly embarrassed Horse Chestnut, I personally see no sign of a hiatus in the brother's insatiable guzzling quest of their chosen fermentation; although, no doubt you will be relieved to hear that Mr. Ashcroft made a full recovery from his horrific assault. I was rather hoping to get an update from Gerald regarding the loathsome duo, but I was met with a firm "Clear off!" when I attempted communication through the letterbox of his cottage some two weeks ago. He doesn't venture out much these days, apparently; while flashbacks of duck ponds, cider bottles and menacing tattoos continue to wreak havoc.

I would unflinchingly gamble my late grandmothers surgical stockings on the fact that we are all agreed when it comes to recognizing it does indeed, take all sorts to make a world. I mention this in passing, not merely to let you in on a little secret that the inhabitants of Blinkington–on–the-Treacle have yet to discover for themselves; but also to blow the bugle on behalf of Arnold Matson; a man too modest to tell you himself that he is not only a first rate publican; he is, in addition - and I can't put too fine a point on this – a man who knows his onions when it comes to the business of entomology. Now, for those of you at the back who haven't been paying attention, an entomologist is someone who studies insects; and while I wouldn't want to put you off your lightly coddled ovoid this fine bright morning, I'm afraid I couldn't think of a way to convey that particular detail to you without it appearing like a small lead weight that had been precariously perched on the very tip of my tongue, before plopping unceremoniously into your restoring cuppa. For that, I apologize.

I fully appreciate that there will be those amongst you who, having trusted the author thus far, have stumbled across the last few sentences and suddenly decided that this is where you get off; this is the station for you. Fine, I understand that. Your decision; no hard feelings. Insects, after all, are not everyone's idea of happiness and escapism when, perhaps, one was expecting some rural tale containing leafy lanes and golden Labradors. In this instance, if you'll forgive the expression and mixed metaphor; the prosecution has snapped me with my pants down, and I have to admit, unlike a Dobsonfly; I don't have a single, never mind plural, leg to stand on. But what if I were to tell you that Arnold Matson knows and understands – just by studying insects, mark you – why your neighbour's eldest boy nearly went off the rails, almost became an anarchist, and decided against getting married and having children? Don't then, the cogs, which are currently quiescent and aloof, slowly begin to creak with an ounce of intrigue? And what of the honey bee that has laboured feverishly to provide you with a treat to spread lavishly on hot buttered toast; who has worked his stripy little socks off in parks and gardens, before once more joining the throng in a buzzing waggle dance that collects, pollinates and finally contributes to an economy worth billions of pounds every single honeycombed annum? As for female earwigs kicking their husbands out of the matrimonial home when the sprogs are born; well, that's enough to liquefy the tear ducts of any black-hearted cynic...

### Snugly cocooned beneath his discount duvet, Arnold Matson snores contentedly, blissfully unaware that an overweight moon has peeped from the clouds, winked at the village, and made off with its memories. In four hours, Arnold will welcome his first customers...

Cantankerous spinster and ex-postmistress Edith Moseley strangles her third tea bag of the morning, settles a one-sided argument with the fridge door, and introduces a thimble of semi-skimmed to her rusting concoction. Two sweeteners are callously evicted from their capsular home before plummeting to the murky depths. Prudently, they are stirred, as though in a cauldron. Her redundant teaspoon is discarded, hits the gaping basin, ricochets as if it were about to emit shrapnel, and takes refuge by the butter knife. The quivering hands of the wall clock cower and creep towards 7.00 a.m. Escapees of sand audaciously trickle through a mummified egg timer; the device appearing to freeze and hold its breath for fear of reprimand.

### A fragrant stratum of talcum powder and aniseed balls compete for pole position in Edith's slipstream as she effortlessly sashays her way towards the porch door and sacrosanct patio. A solitary starling concludes preening itself on a branch of an unloved plum tree and is about to bask and chirrup in thin, early morning sunlight. Uneasily observing Edith devouring tannins and disentangling hairgrips, the creature whistles a single, off-key expletive, gathers its belongings, and scarpers to a nearby rooftop. Two snails conspire to put a spurt on as they catch sight of lilac carpet slippers and scarlet ankle socks that, from a mollusc's precarious perspective, may as well be a giant in jackboots.

### Miss Moseley inwardly declares war on humanity and wildlife for another morning, casts the dregs of her teacup towards the evergreens; then returns to her kitchen table to begrudgingly finalize the compilation of an altogether familiar shopping inventory.

### Chapter Two

### Grumpiness and Gelignite

A more agreeable, though no less complex organism of the parish is the author and part time children's entertainer, Reginald Frimpton: the unanimous declaration on hearing that particular piece of startling information undoubtedly being, 'Who?'

'Scoff at your peril' would be my stinging retort to that dismissive, for it may surprise you to learn that Reginald Frimpton, a man you wouldn't know from Adam if he juggled boiled eggs in your garden, (I suppose he may well have done but that's not the point), is none other than the revered crime writer, Felicity Grayling, whose adaptations for television are too numerous to mention. I suppose the three that instantly spring to mind are the seventies classics 'Behind you, Bob,' 'Gelignite Girls' and, of course, the cult mini-series 'The Psychotic Dumplings,' which won Grayling an award for the year's most unlikely newcomer. The show was translated into twelve languages, screened in over thirty five countries, and not a single individual confessed to understanding a word of it. Reginald admitted in an interview several years later, that the idea came to him when his absentminded father, Lionel, unwittingly locked him in the coalhouse of their dilapidated Hunslet prefab before departing on a ten day sabbatical to the seaside resort of Bridlington. With only 2 cwt of nutty slack for company, the seven-year-old Frimpton experienced horrific hallucinations and, upon release, ran straight to his bedroom to scrawl down the germinations that would later appear in a cliffhanging episode about a homicidal pensioner addicted to suet.

That Reginald Frimpton elected to opt for Felicity Grayling as his preferred nom de plume is, to my mind, neither here nor there. It was Reginald's choice and I respect that; a little disturbing but there we are. Each to his own and what have you. If he can live with the fact that every so often his publisher is going to forward fan mail to his home for the attention of a woman called Felicity, then so be it; none of my business. What I find a little more difficult to comprehend, is why a man by no means short of a bob or two, feels the urge to dress up as a clown or conjuror at weekends and pull rabbits from a top hat and so forth, in order to amuse a gaggle of screaming kids with lime jelly oozing from every orifice. Frimpton maintains that it gets him out of himself, and I don't doubt for a moment that it does; though why anyone in their right mind would relish being bombarded with half-sucked confectionary before being subjected to an invasion of dwarfs, whose idea of fun is pulling off your toupee and ramming a sticky finger up one's nose is, I'm afraid, quite beyond me...

The vibrant and acute amongst you will no doubt have deduced that the village of Blinkington-on-the-Treacle lies ever so slightly off the beaten track. Indeed, the old adage 'you would have to be lost to find it' succinctly sums up the picture I'm painting. Throbbing society, it is not. Many of its younger inhabitants are given to commuting to various places of employment during the day, while the more senior of its natives gently shuffle on with their various routines and peculiarities. It is something of a surprise then, to find myself reporting on this glorious morning that the doors of The Field of Corncrakes public house are already open with the church tower's clock hands barely having groaned round to 11.00 a.m. Take my word for it; this sort of behaviour constitutes history, for no thirst was ever slaked at this hostelry before late afternoon in bygone days. The gregarious constitution of Arnold Matson, however, sees little mileage in keeping the doors of his watering hole bolted during the daytime if he is to establish a rapport with the local populace. It was with this vim and pep nailed to the mast of his general demeanour that Arnold had greeted the morning as he unveiled his premises for the first time. An ancient battle-scarred Jack Russell dutifully reciprocated by relieving itself against the car park wall before limping away manfully in search of canine trouble. It was still early...

### Seeping pride and gushing modesty accompanied Arnold Matson as he welcomed and served his first customers. The majesty with which he had drawn two pints of best bitter was the balletic dray horse equivalent of Swan Lake, if you follow me loosely; and having introduced themselves to mien host, Philip and Charlotte Drysdale, a pair of besotted hikers from a village containing too many vowels somewhere in the south east, clumsily removed their backpacks and matching bobble hats and made themselves comfy in the bay window. The brace affectionately touched tankards in celebration of nothing in particular, before rubbing noses Eskimo-fashion by way of further flirtation. Gooey-eyed and at one with malt and barley, Arnold leans on one elbow, devours the image, and places it in a cosy mental picture frame overflowing with memories. Suggestive giggles continue to snuggle and rebound, and Arnold leaves the young couple to swoon and tickle it out amongst themselves...

### The wasp, as wasps do, appeared from nowhere...

### Bearing witness to the little irritants heading for my glass of refreshing ale at various cricket fixtures over the years, I have long since reached the conclusion that this is the prime reason they can never fly in a straight line; they must be permanently sozzled to their very antennae. This black and yellow burglar was no exception, and the froth on top of Charlotte Drysdale's shimmering pint guided the pest in as smoothly as lights on an airport runway. Having successfully docked to the rim of the mother-ship, the creature nonchalantly cleaned its back legs and proceeded to tuck in. The startled couple temporarily ceased their canoodeling, gawped at the pocket-sized intruder, and watched its staggered flight take it only as far as the sun-kissed window behind which they were seated. To my mind, that should have been an end to the matter. Not so, Philip Drysdale...

Stealth aptly describes the mannerism by which Drysdale removed the rolled-up broadsheet from the top of his rucksack, powerfully tightened the pages of truth and fabrication until totally satisfied he held a club of destruction in his print-stained palms, and signalled his fiancée to step aside. It was painfully clear that the gauzy boozy blighter who had momentarily delved into his sweetheart's libation, was now about to pay for his audacity. 'Philip!' squawked Charlotte. 'It's alright, darling...he won't feel a thing; not in his condition.' Drysdale fixed his stare before taking an exaggerated backswing.

The velocity and venom he intended to generate here would be more in keeping with felling a rampant wildebeest, and should he miss his proposed buzzing target, the likelihood was he would bring down an entire curtain rail with all the trimmings. He was never afforded the opportunity. Arnold Matson seized Drysdale's wrist before it detonated. 'Now, why would you want to do that, Son?' purred the landlord. Drysdale spun round, transfixed. Matson loosened his grip, tossed the weapon aside and gestured to the lad to take his seat. 'Let me tell you a little something about insects,' proffered Arnold. The strangers were all ears...

### If I were to inform you that Philip and Charlotte Drysdale did not get, nor particularly desire, the gateway to leave the company of Arnold Matson until some five hours had elapsed, that should give you ample indication of Arnold in full stride on his beloved subject. In-between serving refreshments to the odd customer, Matson would immediately return to regale and bewilder the young couple with non-fictional anecdotes of wasp stings, Queen bees, termites, cannibalism, hybrids, spiders nerve impulses and even, at one point in mid-afternoon, while simultaneously dissecting a pork pie and enthusiastically inviting Philip and Charlotte to sample some homemade chutney, serenading them with an absolute belter of a tale about Warblers and evolutionary suicide.

### Chapter Three

### Arnold's Reflective Reflection

It seems to me that the germination for lifelong obsession rarely begins with a fanfare. Many a fixation tends to creep around the nooks and crannies for a few years before gently tapping one over the psyche and whispering, 'Remember me?'

### Three months of tapioca-textured atmospherics had slithered past in a prolonged and sometimes hiccoughing heartbeat at The Field of Corncrakes, and several grains of doubt unusually preoccupied Arnold Matson as he obliged his gyrating grey matter with a blunderbuss of a nightcap.

Feeling more drained than deflated, Arnold had scratched and delved for a crumb of comfort to his condition. Another steady, if unspectacular day of trade had passed pleasantly enough and, to a certain extent, Arnold felt his house was in order. But there was something else...it nagged, and it kept on nagging...

### Having successfully ushered out the last two hangers-on of the evening, he ponders once more on his lonesome. He manoeuvres his drink onto an irascible bar towel, draws up a devoted high-stool, and awkwardly plants and nestles his weary frame. Semi-stifling a yawn, he absentmindedly runs a hand over a day's fretful chin stubble...

### Accepting the view from a customer's perspective, Arnold gazes at his reflection in the unforgiving bar room mirror. The landlord and its replica raise a glass to one another, quaff heartily in tandem, and try, once and for all, to dislodge a packet of cheese and onion crisps that are resisting courageously in a cardigan pocket before finally conceding to half-hearted exertion.

### Could this listless shadow possibly be the same Arnold Matson that had arrived so enthusiastically a mere twelve weeks ago? Can life's fizz and effervescence be hijacked and replaced by a sack-full of soul searching in a mere ninety days...?

### A tired mind and an over active imagination are more than capable of mixing and producing a lethal cocktail, and it could easily be argued that an early night is what was called for; there are times when one has to simply draw the veil. Arnold sipped on and abstinence was never an option...

### Every passing second, thinly resonated by the wall clock, gave the impression it was being accompanied by a relentless, pounding bass drum, whose crippling decibels showed no sign of abating. Arnold Matson covered his eyes and gingerly massaged the temples on his throbbing cranium...

'What is it you're after, Arnold?' echoed something ethereal.

### Matson slowly removed the hand that momentarily protected him from the outside world and gradually raised his line of vision towards the bar room mirror...Apart from the actual frame, the mirror had vanished.

### His reflection no longer existed.

As Arnold questioned his own sanity through bleary eyes, he began to configure a new vision that was emerging, as though through a sea mist, on the back wall. It took a few more seconds to unravel and become fully apparent, but there was no escaping the sepia evidence as it steadily unfolded...

Terraced houses choc-a-bloc with gossip, parochial cars waiting for the soapy lather of Sunday attention, a bus driver and his conductor in no hurry at the terminus, the tiny patch of mud and grass that doubled-up for kiss-catch and the cup final, the mongrel dog that flecked for fleas, ignored affection and witnessed everything...Unmistakably, this was the street where Matson had grown-up as a child. With crystal lucidity, he recognizes himself leaning against his parents garden railings. He is eight-years-old.

How, you may ask, can a man of some fifty summers be so sure of his age in a time-lapsed delusion? The answer lay on a simple platter...

### What Matson is about to witness, albeit, on this occasion, in a tired man's hallucination, can comprehensively be described as his defining moment. Over the subsequent years, he has dreamt it ten-fold, he has mulled over and re-examined his adolescent stupidity; he has even begged forgiveness from the almighty...

### The song thrush which landed at the top of the garden was a juvenile of perhaps, one month. It foraged and hopped as greedily and cautiously as all young birds do. Unusually, for an adrenalin-charged youngster, Arnold Matson was simultaneously leaning against aforementioned railings. As ever, he was in a world of his own. A couple of his closest friends were away on the family sabbatical and the young mite was biding his time as to what particular piece of mischief he would like to exploit next. Peripheral vision made the decision for him...

### Arnold turned his head, caught sight of the creature and remained quite still.

### The bird seemed anything but fastidious and was clearly finding an abundance of nourishment to command its attention. Whenever the bird hopped and revealed its back, Matson crouched an inch, and then another, until he came to rest on his haunches. The stone he intended to launch as a weapon now lay within arm's reach. The bird continued feeding...

### In one astonishingly quick and agile movement, the lad grabbed the stone and dispatched it towards the harmless creature. The shriek of laughter which emanated and accompanied the missile should be enough to convince you the jury, that Arnold Matson never dreamed in a million years his projectile would connect with its target. This was harmless fun, borne out of juvenile boredom.

### In the commotion, the chick had indeed tried to make its escape. When it was barely two feet in the air, the stone struck and the thrush fell to the ground. Abhorrence grabs Matson as he rockets towards the catastrophe.

He arrives in horror to find the bird helpless, lying on its back. It shudders twice before life is finally extinguished.

Matson dropped to his knees beside the creature and wept as he watched tiny speckled breast-feathers flutter in the afternoon breeze. Miraculously, by the birds head, there was some movement...A solitary caterpillar inched steadily on its way, oblivious to the whole disastrous incident. From such juxtaposition of fragility and heartbreak, Arnold Matson's appreciation and love of nature were born...Some forty-two years later, Matson weeps on a bar stool. His reflection has returned to the mirror opposite and it was time he got some sleep...

When a generous portion of a farmyard hits the digestive system, the world takes on an altogether different glow, and last night's mental derailment had simply evaporated as Arnold expertly prepared and bulldozed his gargantuan fry-up. Four rashers or five was about as taxing as it got, and as Arnold unbuckled his trousers, burped contentedly and poured more beverage, not even the sycophantic ramblings of the twin presenters on his battered radio could extinguish the new found spark. Arnold was back; and life's precarious seesaw once more had bells on. A shave, a shower and something for the seagulls and Matson was ready for his morning constitutional...

### There's an altogether different air about a public park in midweek. Even the leaves which blow across the apocalyptic sports ground appear to enjoy more freedom; trees seem to sway with a sigh of relief, knowing they are safe for another few days before some sprog decides to deface or clumsily clamber up them; birds actually emerge as opposed to making a run for it...

### Arnold was at one as he whistled his way through an impressive medley of unforgettable prehistoric melodies that all merged and congealed as soon as they left his lips. He cared not a jot. His extensive repertoire had just inexplicably amalgamated Peggy Lee with Mario Lanza, when something stopped his gallop.

### On passing the peace gardens, Arnold did a double take; for there, on a graffiti-blistered bench, resplendent in full regalia and exhausted bicycle clips, completely disheveled and unquestionably sobbing, perched the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf. He was absentmindedly tossing peanuts to a small group of pigeons while simultaneously remonstrating with himself and shaking his overheated noodle. Arnold observed, cogitated and decided he must do something...

'Vicar?' Arnold tried his utmost so as not to startle. More peanuts, more pigeons.

'Vicar?' A tad higher ratio.

### 'Arnold.'

### No head movement but at least an acknowledgement.

### Tears were indeed free-flowing and Arnold weighed-up awkward options.

'Mind if I join you?' He simply had to say it. More peanuts for the gathered throng; the bag is then proffered to Matson. The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf continues to stare vacantly and does not see Arnold decline. He softly edges himself beside the distraught clergyman. Silence, as an eternity passes...

### 'Birds know,' sniffled Wheatsheaf, eventually.

'So do insects,' comforted Matson. An agitated breeze adds to the conversation...

'Oh, of course, you and your insects.' Arnold half-smiles and shrugs. The silence is deafening, save for the squabbling cooing at their feet. Matson lets contemplation run its course...

'Shall I tell you what ruined my marriage, Arnold?' Matson's hush merely opens the floodgates.

'Shall I tell you?' For the first time there is eye contact and the clergyman's pressure valve erupts with an unexpected hiss...

'Words.' Wheatsheaf's admission had icicles on it.

'Can you believe that, Arnold? Language ruined my life.' Matson's raised eyebrow gives Wheatsheaf the right of way and he wastes no time in pressing the accelerator. 'Three days I'd been married...three days! Oh, we were only kids and it was a long time ago but...' Arnold pops in a solitary peanut and tags along. 'Martha was all I wanted...we didn't need anything or anybody...just each other...simple people, simple jobs...simple...and what does she go and do? Have you any idea, Arnold?' Matson's bewildered blink contained the expectancy of a drum roll. 'She went and joined the local library!' exclaimed Wheatsheaf.

### Three or four frowns of various degrees of puzzlement were now etched upon Arnold Matson's normally placid brow line, and it took him a moment or two to come to terms with the absolute lack of sensationalism that had emanated in the vicar's crescendo. Arnold's initial train of thought had been more along the lines of Martha pulling off a bullion raid: or, on a slightly less preposterous scale, some fairly vivid imagery involving Wheatsheaf returning early to the matrimonial homestead, only to discover his newly-baked bride in a bubble-bath with the milkman. He plucked up the necessary to ask the obvious. 'The er...local library, vicar?' The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf dislodged his venom in a single word that wouldn't have sounded out of place in one of Poe's worst nightmares...

### 'Poetry.'

### The effect was that of a boa constrictor hissing through a cheese grater.

'Books...took over her entire life...' He petered out.

### I'm never quite sure how much nature reads into the human condition but, in this instance, the pigeons that had previously been contentedly pecking in and around Wheatsheaf's scuffed leather sandals, hadn't hung around to find out.

### Thin drizzle brought the curtain down, and the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf had been through enough for one morning. Arnold's whispered proposal of a hot toddy back at the pub was both bashfully and gratefully accepted...

### The thirty-minute transformation of a depressed clergyman to glowing comet simply had to be witnessed to be believed. The combination of two hot toddies and a new found confidant had elevated the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf into something verging on a sky rocket; give or take an ounce of cumbersome insecurity as he scrutinized his first pickled egg.

### It shouldn't be overlooked that the vicar's ears had changed colour; radiant pink satellites vibrating either side of a contented head coupled with mini hot-air balloons masquerading as facial cheeks. Whiskey and warmth had completely transformed his barometer.

### For his part, and to illustrate in racing parlance, Arnold Matson had stumbled across an early faller, helped him remount, steered him towards the gallops and let him off the bridle, possibly for the first time in the whole of Wheatsheaf's bamboozling steeplechase. Tiny nodules of egg flecked the holy man's chin and cassock as he imbibed once more on fine malt and a drop from the kettle. Contented effervescence personified.

### Matson's simple question popped in like a baby's comforter.

'How's the world now, vicar?' No words were necessary.

### Arnold Matson systematically begins cleaning bottles and optics to remove dust that scarcely exists.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf mulls over memories that will never go away.

### The wall clock continues to bear witness and divide the day...

### A single shaft of sunlight provides its own miracle through a side window.

### 'So, why religion?' muses Arnold Matson, as he wipes and absentmindedly polishes the bar room mirror.

### The clergyman thanks Matson for everything, finishes his drink and gets up to leave.

### 'So, why insects?' wonders the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf...

### Outside, it is autumn.

### Chapter Four

### The Lilo Inflating Championships

### It was the day of the lilo inflating championships and Blinkington-on-the-Treacle's shoe-horned showground fairly fizzed, basked and proudly fidgeted. The beer tent drooped contentedly and candy floss and general nonsense were doing the relaxing rounds. The compendium of young and elderly incumbents of the village manfully tackled plates of local and unfamiliar delicacies; while various breeds of dog, nasal senses in overdrive, enthusiastically dragged their owners to all four corners and occasionally sniffed or confronted fellow canine chums in hazy, watchful sunshine.

### Lilo-inflating had first reared its rubbery-head in the early 70's and 'Blinkies' natives had no intention of letting the tradition diminish and give way to greater excitement in more modern times. A nicely infused crowd was now in attendance and pockets of anticipation and banter purred in the background...

### Gerald Saveloy, current holder of the title and hot favourite to retain, drew heavily on his lopsided cheroot and leered toward his challengers. Saveloy had made the short hop from nearby hamlet Slanting Mortimer and was well- supported by over a dozen boisterous individuals, resplendent in ill-fitting trousers and swimming nicely against the incoming tide of fervent hops and barley. Local hopes were pinned on the effervescent, if somewhat concave, Bernard Shillito. However, underestimate Bernard at your peril, as he felt himself to be nearing peak condition, having trained extensively on Ribena and cow heel chowder for a solid six months. The swagger and deliberation was over and the whole of Blinkington-on-the-Treacle, with the exception of Granddad Wilberforce, snoring blithely in a groaning deckchair, drew a collective breath...

### All contestants puckered nervously as landlord Arnold Matson mounted the podium, kazoo in hand.

### "Pfffrrrp!" jettisoned Matson, signaling the juddering of a battalion of chest wigs and singlets the colour of Victory V lozenges... The resulting melee was later reported in The Daily Tumbril as, "something between a pizza and a trampoline."

### Despite springing a keyhole puncture, the irreproachable Saveloy was deemed to be the winner on all three judges' cards after twenty minutes of furious action. Too heartbroken to stay for the presentations, and strangely ungracious in defeat, Shillito immediately sped, then sputtered his way over the horizon in a rusting Triumph Herald.

### Chapter Five

### Glum Spectacles

### Arnold Matson's first taste of village 'excitement' provided warmth, comfort and a lovely sense of bewilderment as he took his late constitutional that evening. The street lamps seemed to wink and say 'Good evening, Arnold, you're settling in nicely' as he sauntered on the back of a memorable day. While time hadn't exactly stopped since his arrival in the village, it had certainly slammed the brakes on; and as he collected a stamped-out beer can from the pavement and deposited it into a waste bin, he reminded himself that this is the life he had chosen and these are the cards that have been dealt him.

'Will you ever be satisfied, Arnold?' There was that voice again.

### He pulled up his collar and headed for home.

### The mental images from a day of fun and tomfoolery were once more making way for reality. He may have only been a landlord for a few months in the sleepy back-end of nowhere but even this early in the proceedings, his takings needed a drastic improvement and shake-up.

### His bank manager's letter on the mat this very morning had told him as much. He strolls thoughtfully past the old people's nursing home; Cedars, thanks his lucky stars and ponders the dreams of its helpless and harmless inhabitants...

### Cast adrift in the seas of her own amusement, Violet Bleach fingers sepia photographs on the devoted eiderdown, sighs and ponders. How was it that she had come to marry Stan? Grudging of gullet and sideboard of stomach, each evening her husband had left Violet to her three night curlers and sewing to worship the double blanks and backslapping crudity at the crumbling legion.

### With her teeth in varnish and mind in transit, Violet remembered with wistful tears the time she had first come to Blinkington-on-the-Treacle with her father, a widowed osteopath. Though not the most delicate of maidens, Mr. Protheroe's only daughter was still considered a prize catch in the village, but no longer by Archie Mohair, who left to become a window dresser at Doggett's Pie Shop following a brief flirtation. It was summertime when Stan, the local pram welder, popped the question and pledged his breath to Violet. The congregation of St. Disinfectant's fairly steamed with well-wishers who had all contributed to the organ player's gymnastics and the lifeboat that stood garlanded in the vestry.

### A bronchial lapse nudges her reminiscence back into the shoebox under the bed. Tomorrow reaches out a helping hand...and takes it back again

### Chapter Six

### Enter Aunt Doris

### Three fire engines masquerading as the bar room, bedroom and living room telephones shook Arnold out of any early lethargy that remained the following morning. Hastily abandoning four snorkers sizzling and singing in hot fat, he made a frantic bee line, tripped over coconut matting and snatched a receiver.

### 'Corncrakes.'

### 'Well if that's your attitude!'

### 'Aunt Doris?'

### 'Are you going to leave me standing out here as an ornament?'

### 'Where are you?'

### 'On your doorstep, cloth head...'

### Sausages fully abandoned, Arnold dunked a fig roll.

### 'I can't believe it, Auntie. What are you doing here?'

### 'I was worried about you.'

### 'Why would you be worried about me? You don't even know what I've been up to.'

### 'Trust me, Arnold. I know you backwards.'

'But why the surprise entrance?' quizzed Arnold, mulling over a switch to digestives. Doris brought the hammer down.

### 'Because I know you're unhappy and I'm here to help.'

### 'Oh, it's just the little things,' groaned Arnold, pouring himself more stewing char.

'And it always will be, Arnold,' checkmated Aunt Doris. Arnold dunks and gives up as his boat disintegrates to the bottom of his tea mug.

### 'Do you remember when I first introduced you to nature, Arnold?'

### 'Of course,' returned Arnold, 'That's why I went on to become an entomologist.'

### 'Oh, I see...' breathed the old lady, 'and here's me thinking you were a pub landlord.'

'I only came here to get away, to start again,' countered Arnold, rising to the bait.

### 'Good nest sites are hard to find, Arnold. Any bird or insect would tell you that,' purred Doris.

### 'What's that supposed to mean?' Matson was fast losing patience with his visitor.

### 'Evolution favours teamwork,' the old lady went on.

### 'Are you trying to tell me I'm lonely?' demanded Arnold.

### Doris let him simmer down for a moment, and then continued.

### 'Animals are forced to live with their relatives for many reasons. In most cases, ecology is to blame.'

### 'I'm well aware of that,' said Arnold.

### 'With nowhere to go, the only choice is to stay at home...For a termite, home is a fallen log. It may be crowded, but to set-off into the unknown in the hope of setting up another branch of the family is a risky business...'

### 'Look,' said Matson, his patience finally derailed, 'I don't need any of this. Why have you turned up like this and what is it you want from me?'

### The outline of Aunt Doris was gradually evaporating and Arnold Matson, beginning to tremble in astonishment, found himself facing an empty chair as the old lady disappeared into the ether.

### Chapter Seven

### A Dollop of Larkspur

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf delicately peels an orange, longingly examines every single segment, caresses the smooth fleshy texture and pops in the scented memories. The bitterness, the pips, the juice and stringy bits...this is life. His ten-year-old cat, Desmond, gives him a baffled, unsettled look and decides it is time to murder something in the overgrown garden. Fresh coffee is percolating and our holy man is vibrating as a new day beams down on St. Disinfectant's. It is almost impossible to believe that it is less than six minutes ago when Colin caught sight of his face in the back of a kitchen ladle, shrieked like a hysterical hyena and thought life wasn't worth living. A spot of flower arranging, a lukewarm shower, a mouthful of something resembling a croissant and he's back. Later this very day he is in charge of the service for a much-loved pillar of the society, Mr Hedley Antcliffe, a former professional spin bowler and renowned fishmonger, who sadly passed away during the week. Credit where credit is due, Hedley's soused herring was second to none, and once he got started on the underestimation of cod cheeks in the family home, you couldn't stop him.

### Alas, due to a tragic accident involving his electric violin and a home-made vat of fourteen percent Scrumpy, Hedley, clean bowled, as it were, at the ripe old age of ninety-five, accepts his lifetime promotion in three hours' time and the family business mantle, including plastic parsley window dressing, gets handed down to his eldest son, Cyrus.

### The remaining Antcliffe family thought it a good idea to present the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf with one of Hedley's old diaries to help him prepare his farewell sermon speech. After what seems an eternity, Colin's coffee has finally dripped through his twenty-year-old percolator and he settles down at his kitchen table to peruse the old man's memoirs...

August 1st, 1972:

### Have you ever noticed how the coat hangers in the spare room wardrobe resemble very thin triangular cats?

March 23rd, 1976:

### I was thinking today of my old childhood sweetheart, Madeira Plunge. How I used to love playing marbles in the safari park while she entertained us all with impressions of a goat formation dance troupe.

June 14th, 1981:

### Really wanted to go to the cinema today, but am unusually low on funds. Instead, took custard flan from the fridge and placed my table lamp six inches from the surface. Turned off all other lights in the living room, and stared at the flan for two hours, then switched lights back on. It felt just like I had been on a moonwalk.

December 16th, 1986:

### Very unlike me to be bored. To rectify, offered to neutralize the odours in next door's horse box with a homemade concoction of my own based on sherbet and Florrie's hairspray. In a last ditch attempt to shake off lethargy, dropped my lump hammer onto a small pot of raspberry yoghurt.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf wiped a tear from his eye, scratched his head in total bewilderment and decided he had better go and have a lie down for an hour...

### Chapter Eight

### Man the Lifeboats

### Now, while I have no doubt that there isn't one amongst us who hasn't, at some time or other, caught something out of the corner of our eye and for a split second, perceived to have spotted a black cat leaping out of the wallpaper, I am equally convinced that there cannot be too many people out there who, whilst casually preparing a few sausages in a frying pan, are called up on the telephone by a dead auntie who insists she pops in for a natter over tea and biscuits. And yet these are the circumstances surrounding our very own Arnold Matson. Alright, he has never exactly been 'man-of-the-year,' but the dishevelled, quivering wreck that is currently lying in a hot bathtub, holding on to a plastic yellow duck and asking 'Why me?' to his aquatic mucker, is not exactly in the frame of mind to scrub himself down, dry off the torso and fill in the entry form for the 'Brain of Britain' contest. The poor old lad is frazzled and confused to his very core; in fact, and I'm not one to kick a man as he writhes on the carpet, so to speak, but at this precise moment in time I would wager that there are more bubbles inside Arnold's spinning cranium than there are on the surface of his bath water.

### So what's to be done, dear jury?

### Well, I've heard tales of chaps in similar distress who have either a) Hit the bottle (as Arnold has his own public house I can only advise him to steer well clear of that particular option, b) Take a sabbatical (not really on the cards at this moment in time as I'm pretty sure that Arnold doesn't even know where he's left his car keys), or c) Read the small-ads for a local exorcist and get them to pop round and do a job-lot on the entire building (Mmm...a little melodramatic for a man of Arnold's constitution and besides, it may well turn out to be the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf who volunteers and Arnold could find himself in a worse state than he was before...)

### No, there is only one thing to do when life has got you on the ropes and the referee is looking into your eyes deciding whether or not to call off the contest...you must turn to your friends.

'But I don't have any,' mutters Arnold amongst the steam and loofers. Not entirely true, Arnold, you old buzzard. There must be at least half-a-dozen people in this village who don't find a pub landlord obsessed with insects a little odd. All Arnold has to do is try and remember who they are and invite them all round for a few drinks behind closed doors, get it off his chest, hear other people have problems like his own and realise he is not alone.

'It might work...' he unconvincingly mutters to his Captain Nemo toy submarine, before once more submerging beneath the waves.

Retired Signalman Harold Garstang pops in another rusk as he fastidiously makes headway at the reference library. Tracing the history of the common minnow had certainly proved a challenge, and the pain in his left temple was now the equivalent of a hydrogen bomb. His excruciating expressions had not gone unnoticed however, and Pinky, Harold's faithful three-legged cocker spaniel in his canine wisdom, decided enough was enough.

### Smirking and comatose, and now enjoying what little ventilation there is to be had on such a sultry evening, old Mr. Garstang wafts himself in his pale blue deckchair, sips approvingly on one of the Co-op's cheaper tinctures, and drifts as his mind parasails to the larynx of Moira Anderson, purring on his Dansette.

### The nuisance of the telephone in his kitchen breaks the spell and Harold toddles off to investigate.

'Good evening, caller, do tell all.'

'Harold?'

'In person, my dear boy. Who's this? Reveal thyself.'

'It's me, Arnold...your local friendly pub landlord,' he added nervously as his mind hit the buffers.

'Arnold, you little rascal. Pray tell, what's on thy mind.'

'Are you feeling alright, Harold?' asked Matson, swerving nicely back to reality.

### Garstang did the same.

'Sorry, Arnold; been relaxing to a bit of music and I'm still out there. What's up?'

'Just wondering if you and a few of the lads fancy popping round for a few drinkies during the week. It's that quiet on Wednesdays these days that I don't bother opening so it would be a behind closed doors job. Nice chat, free grub and what have you.'

'Free anything these days interests me strangely, old friend,' said Garstang, drifting away with the fairies again.

'Great,' said Matson, 'I'll get ringing round a few of the others.'

### Then, realizing he didn't really know too many of the others he added,

'Who do you reckon would enjoy coming, Harold?'

'Leave it with me, Arnold, my dear. I shall fetch my lasso.'

'Right,' said Arnold to himself, 'You've done it. The ball is rolling. It's taken you all day to pluck up the courage to ring up some lushed-out old signalman, but you did it.' He rattled down sardines on toast and opened his doors for another evening of local gossip and intrigue.

### Chapter Nine

### The Smaller Picture

### Allow me to let you in on a little secret, which, of course, you may or may not already be aware of...

### Any insect would be astonished by our ability to see. Their eyes are built with not one but hundreds of lenses, each of which concentrates light upon a sensor. However, dear reader, insects are nature's victim. As any movement could mean death, they have a bird's-eye view of the world; every object in their sights, any activity at once detected...There, wasn't that marginally more interesting than last night's shipping forecast? Bear with me; I am coming to the point...

### If I re-read the juicy information above, it occurs to me that those magnificent tiny insects which Arnold Matson has placed so close to his bosom in his studies, are absolutely right in their little world, and we mere mortals are all too often guilty of not seeing what is going on right under our collective noses.

### Take, for example, all the inhabitants of this village...

Not a single man jack among the five-hundred souls has one iota of a clue that the landlord of their one and only hub of the community is currently fretting himself senseless and living on a diet that a starving goldfish would swim away from. As some wise bozo once observed, 'You never know what's going on once that door shuts.' Too right; but then again, in the case of dear Arnold, his doors are open to the public nearly every day of the loony week and still no-one has an inkling that the man is mentally climbing up the wardrobe with a view to leaping off and crashing head-first into the tallboy, if you follow my allusion. No, for my money next Wednesday's get- together with a few rogues and acquaintances cannot come soon enough for Arnold Matson.

### With that very prospect in mind, let me quickly introduce you to a few of the individuals that I feel certain old Harold Garstang, bless him, will have rounded up on Matson's behalf...

### 'Moot Point – Turf Accountant'

### Seen by many as something of a wide boy, Moot arrived in Blinkington-on-the-Treacle after a successful venture into trout dating. We always took it that he meant trout farming but didn't like to bring the subject up for fear of embarrassing him. Personally I have a lot of time for Moot and, as I am such an awful gambler, Moot reciprocates by taking a sizeable slice of my income from me when placed on half-lame nags that haven't a cat in hell's chance of winning anything.

### Reginald Frimpton

### Ah, this is an interesting choice of individual.

### As touched upon earlier in these ramblings, Reginald Frimpton is actually the revered crime writer, Felicity Grayling, whose many successes include 'Behind you, Bob' and 'Gelignite Girls.'

### As Reginald is also a children's entertainer in his spare time, I reckon his light-hearted banter, occasional card trick and optical illusion might be just what the doctor ordered for Arnold Matson. Of course, if Reginald's 'It's ShowTime' routine doesn't go down too well, he's always got his vanishing act to rely on for a speedy exit.

### Councillor Ted Scampi

### Once again, Harold Garstang has plucked a plum from the proverbial pudding in getting old Ted Scampi to attend. A member of the local council for over thirty-five years, Ted was the first man in the village to propose we close down the public toilets after he slipped on a discarded crisp packet in one of the cubicles and broke both his ankles. His request was turned down flat by the committee and three months later Ted returned to office, still on crutches, growling at all and sundry. He is also renowned for not taking a blind bit of notice to just about anyone who is talking to him, which may well prove to be a fantastic asset for Arnold Matson as he gets it off his chest to someone who doesn't give two hoots.

### Chapter Ten

### An Edith Sunday

To my mind, Edith Moseley and Sunday have one thing in common.

### I find them both extremely difficult to deal with...

### A genius, whose moniker for the moment escapes me and therefore shall remain nameless, once said that it is only around 4.00 p.m. on a Sunday afternoon when a man finds out who he truly is. I know exactly where that boy is coming from. Sunday morning, around the hours of nine and ten, must go down as a couple of the most agreeable and tranquil time passages of my creaking week; but come Sunday afternoon you would think that some garage mechanic has broken into my homestead and let all the air out of my personality's tyres. The world may be spinning but at that time of the day it feels as though the big bus driver in the sky has gone straight past me at the terminus and I will just have to tough it out until he comes round again to pick me up on a Monday morning. I digress...

### Edith Moseley resides in Linctus Avenue. She worked as the local postmistress from around the beginning of the Crimean War until the early 90's and it is no exaggeration to say that a sizeable percentage of the local inhabitants breathed a noticeable sigh of relief when she finally waved cheerio to her date stamp and slithered into retirement. I have always thought she missed her true vocation in life; she could easily have gone on to be a lion tamer or tank commander or some such, and though it would be unnecessarily cruel of me to say that Edith is no oil painting, I don't think it is beyond the realms of possibility that if St. Disinfectant's church had ever lost one if its Gargoyles over the passing years, Edith Moseley could have been called upon to sit up there on one of those crumbling ledges as a more than adequate replacement. The woman simply puts the fear of Bob into people.

### Unsurprisingly, she has never married, although (and I find this difficult to believe even though I see the words before me), there was a man for a time. If memory serves, his name was Maurice Ogglesby, and he held a fairly responsible position at the water board. I once said hello to him as he removed his bicycle clips before venturing up Edith's driveway gravel and it struck me there and then that he had the expression of a man who is about to take his final stroll before being strapped into the electric chair.

### I have to say that I retain a strange admiration for people like Edith Moseley, ostensibly because it requires an incredible inner strength and dedication to maintain the high levels of hatred and revulsion that she exudes every single waking day of her existence. We shall now cut to the mustard...

### If you have been paying any sort of attention, you will cheerfully recall that the slightly peculiar Harold Garstang is currently calling up a few troops to rally round and enjoy an evening in the company of Arnold Matson next Wednesday evening. What then, possessed the silly old sausage to ring up Edith Moseley to enquire if she would like to tag along? Some kind of brain-fever has clearly swept over the man. The bottom line is, Harold and Edith were at school together, back in the days when pieces of slate were handed round to kids in mud huts. Suffice to say, they go back a long way and old Harold, bless his bellybutton, has, for reasons unknown, always had a soft spot for Edith. Indeed, he is just about the only bloke I can think of who she hasn't chewed lumps off. Anyway, the upshot is she accepted his invitation, but what her presence and personality will do to a man in Arnold Matson's current condition does not bear thinking about.

### Apparently, at any one moment, there are a hundred thousand people suspended over the Atlantic in some form of aircraft. Many of them have seeds, insects and more in their turn-ups or their luggage. Other creatures travel in soil or crates and I believe that those nice chappies in the United States Customs Service intercept three thousand species of potential pest each year. While it's not exactly on the same scale, next Wednesday, at The Field of Corncrakes public house, a veritable cornucopia of fruitcakes and individuals descend upon the mixed-up, lopsided world of Arnold Matson. If there are any would-be or indeed, practicing psychoanalysts out there amongst you, it would be lovely if could tag along...be sure to bring your pesticide.

### Chapter Eleven

### A Doctor's Report on the Local Butcher

To find one's goldfish dead in its bowl can be a traumatic experience, but to find one's goldfish in front of one's television smoking a clay pipe and humming along to Edward Elgar sounds more like someone's cogs are on the move. The dreams of village butcher Reginald Slack were often of such ludicrous proportions that his wife, Ada, had taken to staying up into the early hours until, as she put it, 'Reg has done.'

### Two nightmares which have lodged in Ada's mind (not to mention poor Reg's) needed, I felt, further examination. Ada vividly recalled the screams from a winter's evening three years ago when Reg encountered a torpedo attack from a German U-boat, the captain of which was a one-eyed hippopotamus called Brian Clegg. Apparently, all missiles fired from Captain Clegg's war vessel went straight up Reg's rather surprised nostrils until his cranium could not, as it were, hold any more ammo, and he awoke with an alarming screech of 'Stop, Cleggy, Stop!'

### After several weeks of fairly demanding therapy, we finally dislodged from Reg that a certain Mr. Clegg had been the Slack's former milkman, who, it turned out, had a weakness for liquorice pomfrets while doing his rounds.

### Another famous occasion was when Reg dreamed that he was the captain of his local football team Nocturnal United, who miraculously had reached, and indeed won, the F. A. Cup final. On approaching the Royal Box for the collection of silverware, Reg noticed that the hands of all the spectators applauding his side's well-deserved 2-0 victory were covered in tiny pink feathers. It was later established that as a child, Reg was often left for long snoozes and safe-keeping in his mother's laundry basket, and on one poignant occasion he had become involved in a gurgling tangle with the fluffy toweling lid from the top of the toilet seat.

### Reg, from all reports, was quite an aggressive baby and was certainly teething at the time, so I feel it is a safe assumption that the young mite's three front gnashers and shoddy polyester workmanship produced the ensuing pink wreckage...

### Chapter Twelve

### Lunch with Councillor Ted Scampi

### An invitation to share a trough with Ted Scampi needs no prolonged consideration before the acceptance speech is delivered.

### 'Beeley's Bistro, one o'clock. See you there, Ted.'

Throughout the village, the general consensus on Councillor Edward Scampi is a straight yea or nay. You either love his brash, big-mouthed bullishness or you wouldn't trust him any further than you could sling your grandmother's bedstead. For my money, I've always liked the old devil. Alright, he comes at you like a Rhinoceros diving from the top splash and only listens to every fifteenth sentence you say to him, but I still insist that his heart is a decent nugget and his spirit and liberality are as genuine as his late-father's Trilby and Victorian tie pin.

### I arrived at Beeley's a few minutes early but old Ted had beat me to it and was already in full swing on the blower, while one of the waiters desperately tried to edge into the picture as Ted went through the gears on a spot of business...

### 'No, what I actually said was, that to tune a xylophone properly you must have your ears syringed and then lengthened by special lead weights and pulleys. Only then can you be certain of perfect pitch.'

### 'Are you ready to order sir?'

### 'And blow-football and threepenny bits hardly get a look-in these days - and whatever happened to gimlets for pity's sake?'

### 'I can recommend the lemon sole.'

### 'And when Sir Dennis announced he thought that everyone knew that courgettes were bilingual and the price of tortoises in Venezuela are the equivalent of three bedroom semis in Stoke Poges....'

### 'Or the haunch of venison?'

### 'And don't try to tell me that it's possible to squeeze eleven sea-lions into a Vauxhall Victor and still have room for grandma to finish her macramé because my lymph glands wouldn't believe you ........ Sorry? Who's that?'

### 'I said, are you ready to order sir?'

### 'Still, what's a mongoose between two lopsided goalposts...?'

### 'Ted, good to see you,' I managed to squeeze in before he left the runway again.

### 'Ah, there you are,' he boomed, before turning to the waiter and adding, 'two of whatever the chef recommends and another couple of bottles of this delicious Chateau whatever it is...'

### 'Certainly, Sir,' hissed the exasperated waiter, and sauntered off to get the grub under starters orders.

### I have dined with Ted Scampi on quite a few occasions and despite the fact that I have never had the chance to choose something of my own from the menu, I've never been let down by his faultless taste and open expense account. His first bottle of red was already almost a dead soldier, but he managed to pour me half a glassful before the reinforcements arrived.

### 'Ah, splendid, splendid,' Ted chirruped to the waiter, 'Just leave 'em there; we'll see they don't escape...'

### The waiter headed for the relatively safe foxhole of the kitchen. Once the wine had arrived there was only one thing I needed to do. I asked the obvious and lit the blue touch paper. See you in about ten minutes...

### 'So, how've you been, Ted?'

### 'If you ask me, they had it coming all along...all along, they had it coming.'

### 'Mmm.'

### 'Elect people like that on to the board, you're asking for trouble.'

### 'Mmm.'

### 'Frederickson's no more than some sort of glorified maggot farmer; Tindall has all the insight and enthusiasm of a half-eaten tube of Smarties and when it comes to ideas and initiative, I've got more time for a trawler full of dead whelks than I have for Eric Sutherland and his loopy mistress. If it is a woman...got my doubts...'

### 'Quite.'

'You see,' said Ted, mellowing in a lay-by as he topped up our wine glasses, 'What it all boils down to is this...' First, second, third gear through to fourth and away...

### 'Ask any police dog and he'll tell you where the bones are buried. Whisper 'I love you' into the shell of an untrained Bulldog, it'll turn round and whip your ears off, pronto.'

### 'Sure.'

### 'Gunslingers don't wander into the saloon bar with peashooters in their holsters.'

### 'With you there, Ted.'

### 'You don't catch the Dalai Lama reading his copy of The Beano in public, no more than you'd see Buzz Aldrin screaming 'Remember me?' at the man in the moon.'

### 'Too right.'

'Anyway...' Ted petered out. I quaffed and anticipated another mini-hurricane at any moment. It never arrived.

### 'I got a 'phone call,' said Scampi, seemingly back on the straight and narrow.

### 'Oh, yes?' I said.

### 'From old Harold Garstang. Trying to line me up to attend some sort of cheese and wine bash at the local ale house.'

### 'Arnold Matson's place. Nice bloke. You met him?'

### 'Some sort of insect freak, by all accounts. Get him a seat on the council with those qualifications.'

### 'He's an interesting man, Ted. You'll like him...Anyway, it's not just insects he's into; he loves nature generally. Knows his stuff.'

### 'I could have a word with him about my Wilting Magnolia,' said Scampi, inspecting the wine label.

### 'He once let me in on a little secret about Gorilla's,' I said.

### 'Really?' sighed Ted, now peeling off said label.

### 'Apparently, they only have a one-and-a-quarter-inch member.'

### 'You're kidding,' said Ted, perking up.

### 'It's true...and Arnold also told me that the Chimpanzee, a copulator of gigantic appetite, with hundreds of sexual encounters and dozens of females each year, fares little better.'

### 'Blimey,' said Ted, genuinely impressed...'Maybe I'll not mention my Wilting Magnolia after all...' he said.

### Chapter Thirteen

### Think

### Lionel, do you find me .......... interesting?

### Amanda, you intrigue me more than the tactical field changes relating to afternoon point-duty undertaken when directing the Amoeba Society's annual charabanc trip to Weston Super Mare.

### Lionel, do I fill your dreams at night?

### Amanda, with the exception of every third Tuesday in the month, when I dream of a bloater in a Boston Crab with my ex-sister-in-law, you fill my nocturnal adventures.

### But Lionel, is my sensitivity one that tempts you?

### Amanda, even more than the dichotomy of a cheese grater found in the herb garden of a well-known perch wrangler.

### Lionel, how do you contain yourself when I dress alluringly?

### Dear Amanda. I concentrate totally on the summer timetables of the Bingley and West Yorkshire light railway, in conjunction with the total number of holes in a Peek Freen bourbon.

### Oh Lionel, would you go beyond the limits of the law for me?

### Amanda, not only would I shave totally any Welsh window dresser that you care to name, but happily display the results on Albanian television. Furthermore, the battalions of anchovies dozing in the delicatessen of Mole's bakery shall no longer sleep soundly in their cabinets!

### Lionel, tell me how I..... inflame you.

### Oh, Amanda, like a knapsack of haggis wrapped in several pairs of Wainwright's trousers, I crave the fullness of your jam tins. As one who is unable to bicycle upright, you are my velocipede of voluptuousness.

### But Lionel, what about matrimony...?

### Arnold Matson grabbed the remote control and switched off his television set. After the shock of having a conversation in the bar with the apparition of a dead relative last week, Arnold has been trying to keep calm and relax as much as possible, but if what he's just been watching with one eye closed for the past half-an-hour was supposed to pass as entertainment, he'll go back to thinking, thank you very much.

### As the anodyne driveling stream of the television had been trickling in one ear and out the other, Arnold, as usual, had been contemplating his miniscule place in this ginormous universe.

### His mind had been mulling over how bees, ants and wasps have an unusual way of deciding who is born male and who female; as you do when you're sat watching the telly...

### No, the reason these creatures do this is because it gives mothers control over their progeny and leads to unexpected patterns of relatedness. They can make it worthwhile to abandon sex, to slave on behalf of others of one's own kind, or – now and again – to murder them.

### 'Control over their progeny,' muses Arnold, 'Maybe I'm still tied to my dead mother's apron strings and she sent the ghost of Aunt Doris in to tell me to find a partner...she wouldn't dare appear herself and tell me face to face.'

### It is fifteen years to the day since Arnold's mother, Cecily, was returning home from a shopping trip into town. Laura Richardson, Arnold Matson's fiancée, was in the passenger seat, having just chosen her wedding gown.

### Neither woman had time to think anything else as they collided with the other car that had spun out of control and cleared the central reservation...

### Chapter Fourteen

### Outpourings at the Vicarage

### 'Come in, come in,' says the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, amending the position of his fishing basket and holdall to enable Arnold Matson to squeeze past and into the hallway.

### 'Good of you to see me, vicar,' said Arnold, 'I know you're a busy man.'

### 'Colin, please, Arnold...call me, Colin,' said the Reverend, 'Please, come through to the living room.'

### For days now, Arnold Matson had been thinking that the inside of his head had been fairly scrambled and chaotic; that was until he had taken three more steps and entered Wheatsheaf's front room...

### 'Go through and make yourself at home,' said Colin, 'I'll go and prepare us some tea.'

### Make yourself at home? It'll take me a fortnight to find something to sit on, thought Matson. Arnold's first impression of the place resembled a cross between the aftermath of an invasion during the blitz and a recycling plant.

### The room was certainly impressive by design, but if the architect who had sweated blood to get this place from drawing board to bricks and mortar could see what had happened to his baby since his flash of inspiration, I reckon the coronary unit at the local hospital would be his first port of call.

The bookshelves were groaning and buckling under the pressure, but at least they were moored in the relatively safe harbour of the living room walls and alcoves. It was when you scanned the floor and mountainous tables that the true picture unfolded. Being a publican, Arnold Matson is certainly no stranger to dealing with empty bottles, but even he doubted whether there would be room for this lot in his car park, never mind the actual pub.

### He began to nose around, sidestepping overflowing cardboard boxes, wellington boots, lawn mower parts, broom handles, take-away cartons, piles of washing, tool boxes, framed photographs of Alsatian's, untouched family packs of fruit juice, an unassembled vacuum cleaner, a garden scythe, bin bags full of crockery, curtain rails, an old bicycle frame and an ancient-looking rocking chair containing a ventriloquist's dummy...All this flotsam and jetsam, yet Arnold had only managed to make about three-yards progress...

### He spotted an airline ticket on the central table. Out of curiosity he picked it up and examined it. The ticket was from twenty-five years ago.

### And so it went on...newspapers from a previous decade, bank statements scattered like confetti which Arnold didn't feel he should intrude upon, long-playing albums, some in sleeves, some gathering dust and leaning against an old fireguard or washing powder box...

### 'Here we are, Arnold...' The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf calls softly from the hallway as he returns with the refreshments.

### Arnold decided he had better grab a book from the thousands on offer in-case it looked as though he had been rummaging through the wreckage.

### He snatches one at random. Would you believe it...'How to Achieve Self-Sufficiency.' Matson quickly fumbles it back on the shelf and turns to half-heartedly smile as the vicar re-enters the room.

### 'Ah, there you are, Arnold...enjoying the library are you?'

### 'Unbelievable,' returns Matson, in stunned incredulity.

### 'Arnold, it's such a nice day I thought we might enjoy our tea in the garden,' suggests Wheatsheaf.

### Before Matson has managed to say, 'Lovely,' the Reverend Colin is toddling in his open-toed sandals towards the greenery. Arnold manages to edge, slide and slither his way back through the obstacle course of the front room and is relieved to be heading towards fresh air once again. Unfortunately, en-route, as it were, he has the misfortune of passing and glancing into the kitchen. Different room, same chaos...Knowing he is about to drink tea that has just been prepared on this unhygienic bombsite, Arnold merely shakes his head in disbelief and makes his way towards the company of the Reverend Colin who has settled nicely at a bench underneath the overhanging apple tree.

### Evolution is, for most of the time, a race to stay in the same place. The worst enemies of any animal are among its relatives and descendants, who need the same things and may have evolved better ways to get them. Unless a parent can keep up with its children, its fate is sealed. Most cannot, and disappear. As a result, at any time, just the tips of the twigs of any evolutionary tree are visible...

### To his surprise, and after the shock of seeing the living room, Arnold Matson found the garden at the vicarage to be extremely pleasant. With his love of wildlife, Arnold welcomed the idea of an overgrown haven that encourages all types of animal and creature to make a home.

### The tea cup he is about to sip from had seen better days and doubtless the tannin stains around the lip of the vessel would all add nicely to the flavour and experience, but you can't have everything...

### 'Nice little sanctuary you have here, Colin,' complimented Arnold.

### 'Oh, do you think so, Arnold? I'm so pleased you like it,' said Wheatsheaf, proffering a strange-looking cup cake, 'I'm afraid my knowledge of nature doesn't stretch anywhere near your magnitude but none the less...'

### 'That's the beauty of nature, Colin. You don't need to know anything to be able to enjoy it. Just sit still, keep a look-out and prepare to be amazed,' enthused Arnold.

### 'Oh, quite...quite,' chipped in Wheatsheaf, innocently.

### Both men took in the tranquility before the reverend returned to home ground...

### 'You wanted to see me, Arnold? Something troubling you, perhaps?' prompted Wheatsheaf.

### For the present, and still, to some extent, in a state of shock at having seen the total squalor in which the man opposite him chose to reside, Arnold felt the least he could do is turn the tables on the holy man and keep things light and conversational. It was, after all, a beautiful autumnal afternoon.

### 'I never knew you were a fisherman, Colin?'

'Oh yes. Fished all my life,' said Wheatsheaf. Arnold gave him the green light.

'What is it you like about it?' The reverend thought for a moment before he answered...

'Well, patience and respect are two of its finer virtues, I should say. Waiting for three hours under a fishing umbrella, eating cheese sandwiches in a thunderstorm, while watching a tiny float doing nothing except bobbing in a torrent of raindrops...' He petered out before concluding, 'I'm not sure Cistercian Monks could endure the sort of solitude for the number of years that I have...' Arnold was content to listen to the man.

### 'But come the moment when the float goes under and you strike and feel the connection with what you have waited so long for...and they are such beautiful creatures. Once you unhook it and let it swim away...'

### Arnold slowly pointed out a Robin on the branch of a Hazel tree and both men enjoyed its song for a few moments.

'Have you never fished, Arnold?' enquired the vicar.

### 'No, I haven't. Strange that, really,' said Matson.

'You'll have to join me sometime,' said Wheatsheaf, warmly. Matson was genuinely taken by the idea.

### 'I'd like that, Colin. Thanks very much,' he said.

### 'Hey, I may have never been fishing, but how about this for a story,' said Matson, recalling his studies.

### 'Go on,' said Wheatsheaf, pouring more tea.

### 'I bet you didn't know that a female codfish can live for two decades and lay nine million eggs a year,' said Matson.

'Good gracious,' breathed the vicar. Matson went on.

### 'And it has been calculated that if no accident prevented the hatching of the eggs and each egg reached maturity, it would only take three years to fill the sea so that you could walk across the Atlantic dry-shod on the backs of cod.'

### 'Good heavens.' The reverend was totally amazed.

### A few moments passed as they both contemplated.

### 'Now, what did you want to see me about, Arnold,' said Wheatsheaf.

### 'Oh, it'll keep, Colin,' said Arnold Matson, settling back to enjoy the late-afternoon sunshine.

### Chapter Fifteen

### Introducing Stribley Wainwright

Harold Garstang's shortlist for the friendly soiree at 'The Field of Corncrakes' was coming along nicely, but there is one character I admit to having totally overlooked, and wouldn't you know it, Garstang has remembered the old oddity and pulled the rabbit from the top hat. Stribley Wainwright is the editor of The Daily Tumbril, a local newspaper that is so left-field and controversial, it even ignores its own title by being published every fortnight. To say Stribley is his own man is the understatement since God was a lad. I wouldn't like to hazard a guess as to his age, but even a conservative shy at the coconut would land me on the top side of eighty years young. The man is a true legend and, more importantly, a true gent and a cascading fount of knowledge, both factual and downright spiritual. Sporting an everyday armour of Kirkdale Tweed and trusted brown Oxford brogues, Stribley arrives in his office each morning not much more than an hour after the cockerel has ceased coughing and crowing, and he oversees everything on the rag until late afternoon when he slips off to the local in his village, 'The Cowboy's Ears,' to catch up on the latest gossip over a dram or two with the lads. There, in a tidy nutshell, you have Stribley Wainwright. An example to us all.

### Just the effort he must put into tying his Dickie Bow is enough to make me want to flag down the nearest passing reflexologist to double-check if I'm still alive. In fact, when I see a yawning queue of school kids of a morning, wondering where their next ounce of energy is coming from, I feel like handpicking half-a-dozen of them, marching them into Stribley's office and letting the old lad loose on them with an hour's worth of verbal square bashing and inspiration.

### He has always been proud of the fact that his newspaper refuses to jump on any headline bandwagon the broadsheets and red tops go with; his theory being that if every paper in the land is suffocating you with the same old story about a celebrity wedding or an earthquake ten-thousand miles away, how in the name of Spongero is a man supposed to keep up with vital issues such as cats up drainpipes or giant marrows exploding in greenhouses?

### His most controversial editing decision came in the early seventies when he nodded off in his armchair while watching a cup final. The match was so boring that Stribley found himself in deepest slumber land and dreaming he was on a beach in the Bahamas with a gaggle of scantily clad synchronized swimmers. He was just about to approach one of the ladies when the referee blew the half time whistle, startling Stribley back to consciousness and causing him to spill two inches of best malt whiskey straight down his new moleskin trousers.

### From that day to this, there has been no sports coverage in The Daily Tumbril and his female readership has increased ten-fold. Knows what he's doing when it comes to the ladies, does our Stribley...

### Chapter Sixteen

### The Mysterious World of Reginald Frimpton

While we are still taking our collective thoughts off Arnold Matson's apparitions and mind- set, I have managed to line up a real treat for any foggy day that may fall on you. I have loosely touched on part-time children's entertainer and revered crime writer, Reginald Frimpton in earlier jottings, but the man called me late last night and invited me round for the odd vol-au-vent and chin wag.

### Reginald Frimpton, a.k.a. Felicity Grayling, is pretty much a recluse to all intents and purposes, so for me to get the nod on a one-to-one was not to be sniffed at. For reason's few can fathom, Frimpton / Grayling has sold books by the lorry load and screenplays by the bucket-full, and yet I myself would have to describe his work as an acquired taste. Still, each to his own and all that, and my jaundiced view of his back-catalogue wasn't going to spoil a couple of hours in his company.

### I arrived in good time and spotted Frimpton trying to round up his two pet pigs which had escaped from their grandiose mock-Georgian sty in the top field. Once thing's had settled down and Frimpton had shown me where one of the animals had bit him, he relaxed on a sofa with a colossal port and brandy.

### I began by asking him where he gets his ideas and inspiration from.

### 'Well, the initial spark for most of my novels tends to come from things I notice in the aisles of supermarkets,' he explained.

### I goggled as he went on, 'I'll give you an example...a couple of months ago I was unpacking my shopping and I happened to notice that all the bar code numbers on the back of my mouthwash, toilet roll and pan scourer came to a total of ninety-nine.'

### 'And that inspired you?' I asked.

### 'Of course it did...I drove straight back into town and bought myself a cornet with a flake in it...hahahahahahaha...no, no, no, I'm only messing...no, I'll give you a true example...'

### It was dawning on me why journalists had given up on this bloke years ago. He glugged on his port and brandy and went on.

### 'I'd had writers block for about two years and one morning I thought to myself, Felicity – I always call myself Felicity when I'm writing – Felicity, I said, this cannot go on. You're torturing yourself and for what? You don't need the money, you've got pots-full so stop it, stop it, stop it...Anyway, I took no notice of my inner-voice and shot down the supermarket...'

### Here we go again, I thought to myself.

'So there I was, loitering with intent by the frozen peas, when all of a sudden I spotted this sign in the distance. I could see it was over by the ready-meals so I went to investigate...' I was on the edge of my seat.

### 'I didn't want to blow my chance so I slowly crept up on my target...

### And there it was, right above the liver and bacon...a sign that read "Buy One, Get One Free" Well, everything clicked into place and suddenly became clear as day...'

### 'And that's what you called your next novel?' I asked, tagging along.

### 'Exactly,' shot Reginald, choking slightly on a piece of crab meat...'The following Monday I told my publisher that the waiting was over, the new title had landed and the ideas were flowing like chip shop vinegar.'

### 'And were they pleased; did they like the title?' I said.

### 'No...' sighed Frimpton...'they told me to change it to "Blast-Off, One Grenade for Freedom." Said it had more impact...sold three-million copies...'

### And there you have it. A potted version of a man who can safely be described as one of the luckiest souls that ever put quill to foolscap.

### I swear to you he doesn't have a clue what he is doing and yet his fan-base grows on a daily basis. A nice enough chap, but he could well be on the back-end of the moon for all he knows. No wonder he waltzes into the part of children's entertainer at weekends; he wouldn't have a clue who he was otherwise. Still, he was kind enough to give me signed copies of his last ten novels and a Battenberg cake that we never got round to opening.

### 'I always eat that stuff,' he told me, patting me on the shoulder as I left, 'Spurred me on to write my first million seller that did. "The Dying Prisoner of Battenberg." Give it a read some time...'

### Chapter Seventeen

### The Cheese and Wine Bash

The day had finally arrived, and despite having felt his own spirits rise considerably since witnessing the shambolic lifestyle of the local vicar, Arnold Matson woke up on the Wednesday morning wondering if he had done the right thing by inviting a few passing acquaintances and local fruit cakes to his public house for a heart to heart. After all, any sort of get-together tends to end in tears if everyone in the room is as self-opinionated and eccentric as some of Arnold's guests clearly were, and that's before they've guzzled free wine and laid into the pork pie and canapés. Couple that with the fragility of his own mind at this moment in time, and the whole evening could develop into twelve rounds of amateur boxing. No, he must remain calm. 'I know,' he thought, 'I'll give Harold Garstang a call and see how many people he reckons might turn up.'

### Without a great deal to concern or distract him on his social calendar, old Harold Garstang was just adding a decent dollop of Scotch to his morning porridge when the telephone rang. His all-time favourite's The Ink Spots, were belting out 'If I Didn't Care' on his wheezing but loyal gramophone player and his three-legged cocker spaniel, Pinky, barked along to the cacophony of noise as the telephone and Ink Spots collided. Matson, recognizing he must have got the right number, waited patiently as Garstang called 'Hang on, hang on,' and turned down the volume. The dog continued for a few more seconds. 'Now, quiet Pinky, quiet,' ordered Garstang. The dog mooched, or rather limped off, without further ado.

### 'Good morning, caller,' sang Harold.

### 'Harold, it's me, Arnold. Sorry it's a bit early but I'm just checking about tonight. Is it convenient, I can always call back? Didn't realize it was this early.'

### 'Nonsense, dear boy. Up before the lark has shaved in this house. Just preparing a spot of sustenance on the old stove. Porridge with a drop of the water of life.'

### 'Oh, in that case I'll call back. Wouldn't want it to go cold,' said Matson.

### 'No, no, no,' insisted Garstang, 'if I tuck into that now it'll take my lips off. Speak away, old thing, speak away...'

### 'Just wondering how many people you had managed to round up for tonight,' asked Matson.

### 'Well,' replied Garstang,'It's hard to call at this stage. I ended up contacting about thirty, thirty-five, I suppose.'

### 'Thirty-five!' squawked Matson, 'I thought you were only going to invite about half-a-dozen or so!'

### 'Calm down, Arnie, calm down lad,' soothed Matson, 'there won't be anywhere near that number actually turns up. In any case, I found out at least four of the people I tried to contact were dead.'

### 'Dead?' gulped Matson.

'Comes to us all, dear boy, comes to us all...hang on, I'll just give the porridge a stir...starting to look like ready mixed concrete.' Arnold listened to the odd clank and Garstang strangling a line or two from 'If I Didn't Care' and continued to fret at the other end of the line. Harold returned from the stove.

### 'Zed Victor One, are you receiving me?'

### 'Yes, I'm here, Harold,' said Matson wearily, and then picking up the pace, 'So, what do reckon, Harold? If I put enough grub on for about a dozen, do you think that will just about do it?'

'Ample, dear boy, ample. What can they expect for nothing?' Garstang had a point. 'And in any case,' the old bloke continued, 'it's not as though they're going to run out of booze, is it? See you tonight about six. Grub up...'

### Arnold Matson heard Garstang burst into a refrain from 'Whispering Grass' and the receiver went silent.

### Chapter Eighteen

###  Contemplation

### During the final hours before relative strangers converge on his public house and homestead, Arnold busied himself preparing food, which he always found therapeutic, and generally fretted about how the evening was going to pan out. Leaving Harold Garstang in charge of the guest list was, to a certain extent, a bit like throwing a thousand piece jigsaw into the air because you believe it will all fit together perfectly when it comes down and lands on the carpet. Garstang's social contacts must run far and wide; the old boy has been around a while. On the grand scale of things, Matson has been in this village about two minutes and only knows a handful of people.

### This train of thought was getting him nowhere. He will finish organizing the victuals for this evening and take a stroll to clear his head. Some hope...

### It was a little after one o'clock when Arnold Matson left his pub and headed towards Cranberry Woods to take in some fresh air and change the picture in his imagination. 'Switch off for a couple of hours,' he told himself, 'and you'll be fine.'

### Late autumn and early winter were now converging and the clouds overhead looked strangely menacing as Matson peered back across the valley. He was also glad of the extra couple of layers he had pulled on before donning his trusted fleece and waterproof, for there was no question that the temperature was plummeting.

### Mid-week in Cranberry Woods is nothing short of a holistic sanctuary for Arnold Matson. The likelihood of meeting anyone was fairly remote and that is just the way he liked it. He would occasionally share a footpath with a dog walker as they briefly acknowledged one another, but once he headed off the beaten track the place was his own.

### Within thirty-minutes of leaving his pub, Matson may as well have arrived on a different planet. He slowly makes his way through the thicket to the fallen oak that he feels is a personal friend and which provides the perfect resting place. He quietly unpacks his flask of coffee and settles down in the light undergrowth. All he has to do now is stay silent and let this majestic little world unfold around him.

### Once he has become part of the scenery, he begins to wonder...How many tiny pairs of eyes are upon me now? He spots a species of hawk hovering in the vale in the distance as it waits patiently for any sign of movement that will signal its supper. The unmistakeable echoing sound of ring doves reverberate in the copse to his right and as his eyes become accustomed to the undergrowth which surrounds his feet, he begins to pick out the detail of sleeping shoots and fungi. There is not a single murmur of traffic noise in earshot, and the only movement in the magical pure stillness is the steam wafting and evaporating away from the coffee cup he clasps in his gloved hand...

### Matson is at one with creation and slowly drops his head back to thank whoever may be looking down upon him. The answer appears sooner than he could have imagined...A solitary coal tit, its tiny, inquisitive head flicking from side to side, watches him intently from a conifer as Matson gently reclines and smiles towards the heavens. Move now and the moment will be lost forever.

### Eye contact between a man in his element and a harmless creature. For thirty-seconds there is nothing else that exists on the planet. Four thousand, five hundred million years since the earth was spun from dust and rock around the sun and it has come to this. Matson silently admires the perfect form that clings to the branch barely twelve feet away from him. He is jealous of the simplistic beauty of the creature's allotted time on this planet. It will never know money, it will never have to queue for food and it has never to concern itself with love. It wakes early, it avoids danger, it sings to find a mate, they have offspring, they move on.

### The bird suddenly hears something it cannot trust in the woods...and is gone.

### Chapter Nineteen

### Suds and Hallucinations

### The failure of tomatoes, apples and figs to cross is not some magical property, but comes from descent with modification. Quite often, one local blend does not combine well with others. Sometimes – as in the two inherited errors that jointly cause the smoky grey fur of the Persian cat – the nature of the interaction is known, but more often it is not. If the failure of adapted mixtures to work together becomes complete, the populations find it impossible to exchange genes when they meet, and each becomes, in effect, a new species.

### Now, all of the above may be considered a little melodramatic when it comes to inviting a few mild acquaintances over for a few drinks, but as Arnold Matson shaved and nicked himself on the chin with a new disposable razor, he couldn't help thinking that Darwin's jottings had much in common with his current situation. 'One local blend does not combine well with others' could well prove to be bang on the button this very evening.

### Undoubtedly, his afternoon in the woods had done Arnold the world of good and after a hot soak the thawing-out process would be complete. His preparations had gone swimmingly. The food was ready, the lounge bar warming nicely as the evening approached, the curtains were drawn and the room was lit for the perfect conversational ambience. He had cheered the place up with a few fresh flowers and he would light one or two candles a bit nearer the time of his guest's arrival.

### His bath now ready, Arnold steps into the warmth and suds and slides slowly into the herbal-scented pleasure, leaving only his glowing mini- pumpkin of a head lapping contentedly on the surface. Long sighs of contentment are gently exhaled in a rhythmic cycle and it is only a matter of minutes before the sighing is replaced by deeper breathing and a light snoring...The head remains perfectly still and safe above the bubbles, but Arnold Matson's imagination has taken flight elsewhere...

### Lord's Cricket Ground, St. John's Wood, London...A capacity crowd of almost 30,000 are basking in warm sunshine and chattering with almost uncontrollable expectation as the clock ticks round to 11.00 a.m. Arnold Matson slowly makes his way down the famous pavilion steps and is, at once, greeted with a deafening silence. The only sound that resonates around the ground as Arnold makes his way to the middle is the odd cough in the distance. The food napkin he wears tucked into his shirt collar flaps appreciatively in the strengthening breeze as he strides towards the centre of the field. All the while Arnold is turning his disbelieving head to all four sides of the ground, only to be received by the same, silent stares from all the spectators. He eventually arrives in the middle and takes a seat at the head of a dining table that has places set for fifty people. The cutlery and glasses are immaculately arranged and he holds up a crystal wine glass to the light to inspect and approve of its unmistakable authenticity. He places the glass back on the table and casts a steely glance around the ground like a gladiator awaiting Caesar's thumbs signal. The crowd remains absolutely silent and still...

### A crescendo of noise slowly begins to swell as the crowd get their first glance of Harold Garstang, resplendent in tuxedo and cummerbund, leading his entourage of forty, hysterical and hungry friends, down the pavilion steps and onto the field to milk the thundering applause from all parts of the ground. Some are letting off party poppers and all are glugging from champagne flutes as they make their weaving way towards the shocked and lonesome figure of Arnold Matson seated at the great dining table. Harold Garstang's face is looming larger and larger towards Matson and he frantically waves his arms to get the old man out of his line of vision so he can identify the faces of the other guests trailing in Garstang's wake. 'Get out of the way, get out of the way!'

### Matson yells but Garstang's laughing face just gets larger and larger as he finally reaches the middle of the field and stands over a cowering Arnold Matson. The crowd's hysteria has reached bursting point as Matson covers his head with his hands and his body assumes the foetal position. 'Leave me alone...leave me alone...I don't know any of you, leave me alone!' screams Matson.

### Arnold Matson splashes frantically in his bath tub and sits bolt-upright in the spinning, steaming room. He takes several deep breaths to calm his shaking, stares straight ahead for a few moments, and slowly takes a towel from the hand rail...

### Chapter Twenty

### We Are Gathered Here Today

### The estimated time of arrival for Arnold Matson's guests was six o'clock, which did nothing to explain why someone was trying to put a hole in his back door by hammering on the knocker at ten-past-five. Dashing downstairs in his clean vest and unbuttoned shirt, plus, thankfully, crisp new boxer shorts; he unbolted the timber to find Harold Garstang and an unfamiliar female companion on his door step. Welcoming them both in from a bitterly cold night and hiding his modesty behind the door, he asked them to go through to the lounge and make themselves at home.

'Sorry we're a bit early,' said Garstang, 'but we finished our game of cribbage a bit rapidly and thought we might as well pop along.'

### Arnold remained bashful behind the door but enough of him was visible for Garstang's companion to give him a quick once up and down inspection.

'Oh sorry, Arnold,' apologised Garstang, 'this is my old and very dear friend, Edith Moseley.'

### Matson couldn't quite make out whether the expression on Edith's face was one of constipation or ensuing frost bite, but she continued staring for a few moments longer before making a low resonating noise, not unlike a hand drill going into a piece of particularly tough masonry.

'Would you like to go through?' spluttered Matson, 'I'll be right with you, I've er...' he stammered.

'Just got to put your trousers on,' completed Garstang, 'anybody we know? Ha-ha. Come on Edith, let's go and get comfy...'

### Edith then opted for a high-frequency register of disregard, as though she was inhaling a generous pinch of snuff through an alto saxophone, before the pair eventually hobbled confidently into the lounge bar. As soon as he was in the clear, Matson shot upstairs and tried to collect his thoughts after a somewhat inauspicious start to the evening.

### Two minutes into his evening and already Matson was back to his all too familiar state of anomie. Pulling on his trousers and looking himself straight in the eye in his wardrobe mirror, he told his reflection to get a grip of the situation and delved into his memory bank for a crumb of comfort. Of course...it was as plain as the spot that was beginning to appear on the side of Arnold's nose, 'Oh, my Lord what is that?' shrieked Matson...'oh, it's just a shadow, calm down, you're alright...'

### He remembered his ounce of reassurance...What seems so complex – bee society – obeys simple rules. They allow each colony to be efficient but adaptable. A shift in preference adjusts the economy to cope with whatever hits it. The most wonderful of all known insects, that of the hive bee, can thus be explained by natural selection having taken advantage of numerous, successive slight modifications of simpler insects.

'I'm not afraid of Edith Moseley,' he told his full-length mirror.

### He zipped up his flies like a man going into battle, worried once more if it was a spot and not a trick of the light, and went downstairs to join his early arrivals.

### Pausing in the doorway of the back bar, Matson observes Garstang and his companion, Edith, as they waste no time at all in helping themselves to the buffet laid on by their host. They choose a simple selection of tit-bits and settle at an alcove table. Matson continues to watch the couple from his vantage point and isn't overly surprised to see that Garstang has snaffled a bottle of wine from the freebies on offer. Matson doesn't begrudge the old boy his indulgence and, after his own brief encounter with Edith in the hallway a few minutes earlier, fully understands why any man sitting in the company of this woman feels the need for Dutch courage to make things go with any kind of a swing.

### Harold tucks into his nibbles and amicably chats away. Edith Moseley's expression rarely alters throughout and she continues her Pavlov's dog impersonation along with her incessant staring into the distance, which gives the impression she is trying to straighten sheets of corrugated metal from fifty paces. Matson strokes his chin and cogitates for a further thirty seconds before he draws a deep breath and enters the fray.

'How are we all doing, alright?' he enquires. Edith Moseley turns her head in dismissive computation to check who else is in the room.

'Food alright?' prompts Matson.

'Is this meant to be crab?' Edith hisses.

'Well...' deliberated Arnold, 'It's a sort of crab mix, really,' he burbled, 'crab, herbs, a few surprises, a bit of mayonnaise...'

'It's got wedged underneath my palate,' said the delightful Miss Moseley.

### And I hope it stays there, thought Matson before opting for a conversational diversion as he plops next to the relative sanctuary of Harold Garstang.

'So, how've you been, Harold, my old mucker?' slides in Matson, trying desperately to dig through the ice.

'Oh, not so dusty, Arnold. He keeps me going, you know.' Garstang pats his three-legged dog, Pinky, on the head and startles it from a doze.

'Can't be easy for a dog when it's only got three legs,' empathises Matson, simultaneously observing Edith Moseley contorting her face as she examines an unfamiliar presence amongst the lettuce on her ham sandwich.

'It's chervil,' Matson chips in helpfully.

'Is it really?' replies Edith, unimpressed, before ousting every speck she can detect and dispatching the offending intruders onto a paper napkin.

### Observing Edith Moseley chewing, Arnold is reminded of the powerful, grinding mechanics in the rear of an old refuse collecting lorry and the carefree expression and rotating lips of a camel about to venture across the Sahara desert. Her face maintains the same wary look of mistrust with each mouthful she chews and swallows, as though she is convinced that sooner or later one of the morsels will be the one which contains the poison. Harold Garstang pours half-an-inch of red wine into an ash tray and places it by his three-legged dog's nostrils. The animal perks up, laps down the liquid, shakes its head and sneezes, before returning to the horizontal. 'Helps him sleep,' asserts

### Garstang. Matson makes a flimsy excuse and leaves the couple to their own antics. 'What if no one else turns up?' Matson thinks to himself as he changes a new barrel of best bitter. He needn't have worried. After what seemed like an eternity, six o'clock eventually ticked round and the cavalry arrived; not that Matson knew them from Adam...

### A first meeting with Councillor Ted Scampi is not dissimilar to being confronted by a force-ten hurricane in a trilby with a whiff of strong aftershave thrown in for good measure. Arnold greeted him at the back door and Ted breezed and bugled straight through to the lounge bar. He gave Garstang a pat on the shoulder which jolted the old boy forward by about eighteen inches before he turned his attention to Miss Moseley.

'Hello Edith, love, how's your belly for spots?' he boomed.

'Ted,' acknowledged Edith dismissively, before popping a whole pickled onion into the lion's den.

### Arnold Matson's worries had receded a little by six-thirty. The fear of thirty or forty strangers descending on his pub was no longer a concern and he took heart from the fact that he was landed with a sum total of seven people to wile away the evening with. There would have only been six but the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf popped in unexpectedly to say hello and Arnold persuaded him to stay on as an ally.

### Although it wasn't a cast of thousands, it was certainly an eclectic mix. Local newspaper tycoon Stribley Wainwright had made an appearance, along with Turf Accountant Moot Point. The final guest, somewhat unexpectedly, was crime writer Reginald Frimpton, who had left his non de plume Felicity Grayling at home for the evening and arrived on his treasured Triumph Bonneville motor cycle ruddy-cheeked and oozing bonhomie.

### As soirees go, it had its moments of enlightenment, but it certainly contained its fair share of spikey and awkward exchanges. I could paint you a picture with the most delicate of brushes as to what actually emerged throughout a very long evening but that would be a premature insight into seven very different human beings. The fact is, when Edith Moseley decided it was way past her bedtime and asked her host to open the back door, Arnold Matson was unable to fulfil the request. During the eight hours or so that everyone had been chatting, arguing or otherwise, the heaviest snow fall for thirty years had hit the village and the powerful drifts against the building rendered them helpless. They were cut-off and trapped...and no one was going anywhere.

### Chapter Twenty One

### Happy Families and the Big Freeze

### Blearily opening his eyes the following morning, Arnold Matson takes a split second to realise that his public house now has seven guests residing in it. He lies stock-still in his bed and stares straight at the ceiling. Moments later he blinks in rapid succession in an attempt to waken himself from slumber and disbelief and then listens for any sign of conversation or movement. An unfamiliar rhythmic hopping, accompanied by inquisitive sniffing and frustrated growling in the hallway, tells Matson that Garstang's three-legged cocker spaniel, Pinky, is awake and investigating. Arnold leaves the warmth of his nest, slips into his dressing gown and pulls back a curtain. He is greeted by a white, frozen blanket of stillness, illuminated by a watery sun. A solitary wood pigeon stands like an icy-feathered statue in a tree opposite. Feeling the chill, Matson steps into the snugness of his carpet slippers and makes his way down to the kitchen...

### With four twin-rooms at his disposal, accommodation for everyone had not posed a problem in the early hours. A tad of the old wartime spirit had risen to the surface and people paired-off accordingly. Edith Moseley, I would imagine to the relief of all and sundry got a bedroom to herself.

### According to the local news the snow last evening and throughout the night had taken everyone by surprise and even the gritting lorries were deemed inoperable at this stage. Pro tem, the village was snookered and the seven inhabitants of The Field of Corncrakes public house were just going to have to tough it out; but how long it would be before cabin fever set in was anybody's guess...

### By around ten o'clock every slightly groggy and shell-shocked guest had assembled in the lounge bar. The aftermath of dirty glasses and various remnants of food had still to be cleared away and although none of the gathered throng was exactly performing cartwheels, the overall atmosphere, considering the circumstances, was remarkably chipper.

### Well, Arnold told himself, this is your ship, you're the Skipper; you'd better offer some words of comfort to the stranded crew. He put down a slice of toast and marmalade, wiped a few crumbs from his lips, tightened his pyjama cord and took centre stage.

'Can I just have a word?' he sang out, at a volume that rather took him by surprise. The hum and chatter lowered noticeably and Arnold was in the spotlight. 'Now, I know this has all has come as a bit of a bombshell, but I don't want any of you to panic or worry. I'm sure there are worse places to be snowed-in than a pub ('Hear, hear,' calls Ted Scampi, to mild amusement), 'but we have everything we need on theses premises till things cheer up. There is a freezer full of food so there are no worries on that score. I want you all to relax, make yourself at home and treat this place as though it's your own. Now, who's for a spot of breakfast?' Matson stepped down from his imaginary soap-box and, much to his astonishment, was given a light round of applause by his tiny audience, all except Edith Moseley who was busy rummaging through her handbag in search of a nasal inhaler.

### There may be one or two flaws in Arnold Matson's strangely-stuttering personality, but when it comes to preparing a full English breakfast, the man has no peers. Stribley Wainwright, resplendent in his trusted trilby, also volunteered his services and performed admirably as Arnold's roundsman. Rather surprisingly Edith Moseley had stepped up to the plate and offered to lay the table, albeit for the purely selfish reason of getting her circulation moving and ridding herself of cramp in the left-leg. Harold Garstang was on duty for the tea and coffee while Moot Point was put in charge of the toaster.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf spent most of the time on the telephone as he frantically rang round a few of his elderly parishioners to enquire about their well-being. Councillor Ted Scampi could be seen letting off steam towards just about anyone who appeared on the television news on the set above the bar, even though he couldn't hear a thing anyone was saying because the volume was muted. In the distance, Reginald Frimpton continuously rebounds a cue ball off the side cushion of the snooker table as he gazes contemplatively towards his beloved snow-covered motor cycle.

### The breakfast was a resounding success, and the banter which accompanied the sea of arms reaching out for various sauces and more liquid refreshment, was low-key but light-hearted as everyone came to terms with the unusual situation and their new short-term family. Within thirty-minutes the sustenance had been demolished and the dishwasher was now taking care of business as it smoothly droned in the pub's kitchen.

### Snow continues to fall as Arnold Matson stares vacantly out of his bedroom window and prays forlornly for an unforeseeable thaw.

### By late-morning Arnold had sauntered down to the bar to see if his any of his guests wanted anything. As he had made his way along the corridor upstairs, the snores of Edith Moseley were fiercely emanating through the closed door of her bedroom as the old girl caught up on some much-needed rest. Strange how anyone can sound that aggressive when they are fast asleep, thought Matson. More out of habit than anything else, he dotted a couple of bar menus around the place, but no one was going to starve so soon after one of Matson's fry-ups.

### Councillor Ted Scampi was giving someone hell on the telephone and Moot Point was cat-napping in an armchair as Harold Garstang sidled up to the bar and slid onto a stool. No words were necessary and Arnold draws a pint of best-bitter for the old bar-fly. 'There you go, Harold,' says Matson, placing the perfect pint onto a crisp new beer mat. Garstang acknowledges the service and takes an appreciative and thoughtful quaff of his ale. Placing his pint pot on the bar, Garstang remains meditative and unusually quiet.

'You alright, Harold? Something bothering you?' enquires Matson. Harold Garstang looks over his right shoulder to make sure no one is within earshot.

'Can I have a word with you, Arnold, in private?'

'I'm all ears, Harold, what's up?'

### Garstang double-checks over his left shoulder this time. He turns slowly towards Arnold once again and curls his index finger slowly to beckon Matson towards him. Matson obliges and the two men are now face to face.

'Why all the mystery?' says Arnold.

'It's about Edith,' whispers Garstang.

'What about Edith?' questioned Matson. Garstang takes a tiny swig of his pint.

'She's seen something...' Garstang confides.

'Seen something?' Matson doesn't follow. Garstang paints a clearer picture.

'In here...last night,' he states. Matson screws up his face amid the confusion.

'A woman,' says Garstang.

'Woman, what woman? Edith's the only woman here,' said Arnold, getting even more confused.

'An apparition,' pronounces Harold Garstang.

### Matson stares at the old man and remains silent for a few moments before saying 'Now, look, Harold – '

'Edith's a Medium, Arnold; she knows what she's doing...she knows what she saw.'

### Matson is finding all this impossible to take in. One night and half a morning in the company of these people and already we are into the land of the living dead.

'Harold,' asserts Matson, groping for an ounce of common sense, 'can we just drop this? I've got enough to cope with at the minute so please, let's just drop it, eh? Besides, you don't think I believe in all that rubbish do you?'

'Then who's Cecily?' asked Garstang.

### Matson looks at Garstang, hesitates for a second and says, 'My mother's name was Cecily, so what?'

### Harold takes a long draft of beer and looks at Matson over the rim of his glass.

'She just wanted you to know how sorry she is,' adds Garstang.

'For what?' asks Matson.

'For killing your fiancée...Laura,' concludes Garstang.

### Chapter Twenty Two

### Square One

### Take a stroll into one of those novelty shops that you see dotted about the place and you will undoubtedly come across a selection of children's ornamental snowstorms which fit snugly into the palm of your hand and come to life the moment you shake and turn them upside down. Lots of shimmering flakes are suddenly stirred into action and the plastic figurine in the centre of the device cops the whole blizzard and is unable, until the thing calms and settles again, to do anything whatsoever about the situation. Indeed, the male or female stood in the firing line is more than likely to be subjected to another flaky dowsing before the object has lost its power to amuse and is placed back on the shelf once again. And to top it all, even when the scene has calmed down, the poor bloke or woman glued to the centre of the display is still unable to escape the confines of the bubble as it is hermetically sealed. What I am getting at is that you can see out but cannot go out and trouble could, at any minute, erupt when some perfect stranger turns your house upside down. Such was the line of thought preoccupying Arnold Matson as he considered and steadily digested the outlandish news given to him by Harold Garstang some two hours earlier.

### In a way, what had surprised Matson most about Harold Garstang's revelation was his own startled reaction and reply as the news hit him and caught him completely off guard. Arnold's counterpunch had been 'You don't think I believe in all that rubbish, do you?' when he knew full well that he did believe in an afterlife; he just didn't see why he should admit it when he felt he had been made to look a fool after being subjected to sensitive information in such a ruthless fashion. No, he needed to remain calm and gather his own thoughts. After all, where's the constructive mileage in storming into Edith Moseley's room and demanding some sort of psychic explanation? Besides which, she had only emitted grunts and monosyllabic oratory ever since she got here.

### The simple facts remained and must be addressed. Seven people were marooned in Matson's home and they would all be expecting an evening meal later today. He could easily expect his guests to help themselves but it wasn't Arnold's way. Dwelling on what he had been told in the bar earlier was not going to help matters and the more he kept himself occupied with routine and mundane chores, the less he was going to worry and the quicker time would fly past until this predicament had run its course.

### It was a toss-up which one of Darwin's quotes seemed more appropriate at this moment...'How paramount the future is to the present when one is surrounded by children,' mused Arnold, before seeing the perfect irony and whispering to himself, 'It's just a pity that I'm surrounded by a bunch of crazy adults...' He wiped a chilled circle of condensation from a window pane, observed the motionlessness landscape of the car park and sleeping fields beyond, and made his way through to the stark reality of the pub's kitchen.

### Chapter Twenty Three

### Game On

### I may not be a practising psychiatrist but as a keen observer of the human race, I can guarantee you the following...Put a handful of men into a room that contains a dartboard or snooker table and sooner or later, a metaphorical gauntlet will be thwacked across the slavering chops of some poor soul and a challenge will be laid down and graciously accepted.

### Following the rigours of downing and digesting a hearty breakfast a few hours earlier, the majority of the male contingency had buried themselves in newspapers that were at least two days old, or they had embarked on a series of strenuous yawning and stretching exercises in the comfort of obliging leather armchairs. But as soon as one of the gathered clan, in this case Stribley Wainwright, could be bothered to summon up the extra energy necessary to stroll the full six-yards and grab himself a cue from the line of wooden soldiers standing to attention in the rack on the far wall, it was action stations.'

### Anybody fancy a game?' he exhaled as he examined the cue from handle to rubber tip to make sure she was gun barrel-straight. 'Why not?' said Moot Point, creaking into life. As Councillor Ted Scampi had resumed his full-time residency on the telephone and Harold Garstang had headed for the safe haven of his room to sleep off three early pints, the only foursome available was Reginald Frimpton and the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf; but having declared himself 'Utterly useless, I'm afraid,' the Reverend Colin felt the need for no further excuses and went to help Matson on cookhouse. Frimpton, without a doubles partner and temporarily beached for the nonce, offered to play the winner. However, Reginald did manage to come up with the best-received suggestion of the day thus far.

'Anyone fancy a drink?' he offered.

'Pint,' came back almost simultaneously from the two men of the baize.

### Frimpton toddled off to find Arnold Matson and do the necessary and returned a few minutes later with a heaving tray of frothing inspiration. He then volunteered to act as scorer and settled himself by the immaculate mahogany and brass-rails of the board on the far wall. Wainwright racked-up the reds and Moot had shown surprisingly nimble footwork as he manoeuvred round the table and popped the colours on their spots.

### Both contestants had chalked the tips of their cues fairly meticulously and it looked, to all intents and purposes, as though the pair of them knew what they were doing and a keenly fought contest was being anticipated by the capacity crowd. Alright, there was only actually Reginald Frimpton in attendance but as soon as he has managed to unfasten a particularly dogged resistant packet of smoky bacon crisps, the tension and expectation could well reach fever pitch...

### I dare say that there will be quite a few of you out there that have never played snooker on a full-size table, so I shall give you a tiny ringside insight, if you'll forgive the mixed metaphor, as to how vast an open space this greenery appears to a novice when he hasn't played for a while; in the case of our current combatants, Stribley and Moot, that's an aggregate total of about forty-five years.

### The person who takes the first, or as it is known, the break-off shot, is not under a great deal of pressure. Everything is laid out neat and tidy before you and there are fifteen lovely shiny reds to aim at on the winking horizon. However, what quickly becomes apparent to the enthusiastic novice as the game unfolds is that you more or less require a powerful pair of binoculars if you intend to hit anything that is staring back at you from the other end of the table. A full-size snooker table, you see, ladies and gentlemen, boasts the almighty dimensions of twelve feet long and six feet wide. What I am coming to is this...

### Reginald Frimpton had not only polished off his packet of smoky bacon crisps and been to collect himself another pint before either Stribley Wainwright or Moot Point had potted a ball, he had also had time to remove a biro from his jacket pocket and manage to fill in five tricky cryptic clues from yesterday's Times crossword before a red was finally sunk and a cry of unbounded, relieved delirium was heard from the far end of the table.

### How many hours men, and to a lesser extent women, have spent watching sport over the years clearly doesn't bear thinking about, but the three hours that drizzled away over the course of the ensuing afternoon needed a medical report to excuse it from mental cruelty and tedium. The highlights and magical moments in the four frames played, at best described as sporting Greek tragedies, were so rare that by the time they arrived, the two people observing were simply willing whoever was at the table to put the object ball out of its misery in order to shake off a collective lethargy verging on that of three half-house bricks immersed in a bucket of lentil soup. Who actually won the frames need not concern us; just be grateful that you didn't have to witness any of the sorry affair.

### Realising life was slipping away, the three men returned their cues to the wall rack, waved their hypothetical white flags of surrender in honour of the game itself, and convened at a comfy table for a post-match analysis. More beer was ordered and soon the awful cloud of their inept display was a distant memory.

'Arnold tells me you're a successful writer, Reggie,' said Moot, clumsily tearing open a packet of cheese biscuits.

'Well,' said Frimpton modestly.

'No, no,' chipped in Stribley Wainwright, 'there aren't many people in this world who do what they want to do for a living.'

'Snooker players, for instance,' stated Moot, with a dollop of irony.

### All three acknowledged their shortcomings in that department before Frimpton went on, 'I had loads of jobs before I became a writer...shoe repairer, milk man...I actually wanted to be an accountant but I failed miserably.'

'How lucky did that turn out to be?' threw away Stribley, 'You must employ an army of them these days.'

'Just the one,' said Frimpton quietly, not understanding what all the fuss was about. 'Actually, Moot, I've always held a strange fascination for men in your position. I mean, how does one become a bookmaker, for goodness sake?'

'Well, I'd made a pot of money in a barmy venture I got involved in and I'd always loved horse racing so I thought let's give it a shot,' said Moot, thinking back a few years before adding philosophically 'Like anything, it has its good and bad days...but it knocks spots off coal mining.'

'Same with newspapers,' agreed Stribley Wainwright, helping himself to a few of Moot's cheese biscuits, 'Some days I ask myself what I'm doing in a cramped-up office editing an article about a protest and petition for a new Belisha Beacon, but as you say, Moot...'

'Actually,' said Reginald Frimpton, rising from his seat to fetch more ale, 'Oscar Wilde summed up your two jobs in a nutshell.'

'Oh aye?' said Stribley Wainwright, mildly intrigued before he drained his pint pot.

'Indeed,' said Frimpton, collecting a few empty glasses from their table to make a bit of room, 'Wilde said, "What could be more immoral than a newspaper? It condemns gambling on the front page and prints racing tips in the back."

'Good, isn't it?' smiled Frimpton.

### Moot and Stribley eye one another across a gaping silence.

'Just get the beers in, Reggie, there's a good lad,' said Stribley, bringing the curtain down.

### Chapter Twenty Four

### Thaw

### For the next two days the routine that had been forced upon the eight individuals scarcely altered. The instinct that arrives with the wisdom of maturity dictated the pattern of the long hours they were reconciled to spending in each other's company. They had all formed an opinion of the people they wanted to get to know a little better, and whom they found interesting, and conversely, they knew who they would prefer to avoid like the proverbial.

### Somewhat interestingly, Arnold Matson had observed, all the guests tended to prefer their own space, which was quite understandable given the amount of claustrophobia the scenario had enforced upon them all. Chit-chat was, of course, part and parcel of the everyday routine, but even when it came to basic pastimes like a game of cards, where one would imagine three or possibly four people participating, solitaire tended to be the format which was favoured.

### The hour or so which followed the evening meal, when the ritual of sharing a table had given way to a period of communal relaxation, had become a fascinating human-observational post for Arnold Matson. His immense love and knowledge of the behaviour of insects and animals was now in its element, as he settled back with his after-meal coffee to studiously observe the mannerisms and idiosyncrasies of his house guests. Their routines, while not extraordinary, were incredibly consistent; whether it was the meticulous application of Edith Moseley's lip moisturiser, the extraordinarily exaggerated nose blowing feats of Councillor Ted Scampi, or the simplistic contentment of man and beast as old Harold Garstang runs a friendly and reassuring hand over his beloved pet dog's belly.

### The thoughtful studiousness of Reginald Frimpton as he cuddled his post-meal brandy, the repeated flecking behind Moot Point's left ear as he repeatedly tried to disturb something that clearly didn't exist, Stribley Wainwright's ritualistic removal of his trilby as he examined the hat-band for the umpteenth time to remind himself of his dead father, and the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf slowly moving his head from right to left and then back again, as he kept a silent, loving and attentive eye on the members of his flock. It was all a pattern. A beautiful, simplistic ritual that may as well be a field full of cattle as they settled for the long, inevitable evening...

### The issue of who belongs where in the natural world can sometimes be sidestepped with 'varieties,' 'races' or sub-species. Seventeen and a half thousand species of butterfly have been described – but they are divided into a hundred thousand subspecies. All this points to the quandary faced by those who make lists. Where do the boundaries lie? In the silence of the night, icicles are slowly beginning to melt as eight individuals drift on a sea of imagination, helplessness and darkness.

### Chapter Twenty Five

### Beneath an Icy Surface

### Birds don't rise early for the sake of it.

### The daily grind of the office or checkout does not concern them.

### They have two lines of communication; call and song.

### Gossip works perfectly well in the car park of a local supermarket when A has not seen B for ages and feels the urge to compare the price of this and last week's soap powder but, in a world where action is literally the difference between life or death, our feathered friends dare not devote a second of their time to hobnobbing and tittle-tattle.

### For almost three days, a bleak silence had hung over the village but, at last, a new morning signalled a change, and the occasional creature could be seen flitting from tree to tree as it spotted an opportunity for nourishment and much-needed sustenance. Just as the temperature had dropped so freakishly some seventy-two hours earlier, the barometer, persuaded and led by the hand of this warmer weather front, surged into life to encourage both man and beast.

### With snow and ice melting at such a devastating rate of knots, there would undoubtedly be a price to pay in parts of the lower-village, but as 'Blinky' had no river to speak of flowing through its centre, things could be much worse and the populace was in a much healthier position to emerge from hibernation than would prove to be the case in neighbouring hamlets.

### Along with the usual irresistible cholesterol and calories on offer for their final breakfast together, the stranded guests had something else to look forward to after they had drained their respective coffee and tea cups; a return to freedom. The mood around the breakfast table reflected the shared optimism of a crew that had collectively seen the rescue ship on the distant horizon, and they speared their extra sausages with gusto.

### The general conversation had noticeably increased by several decibels, and when Arnold overheard, amongst the good-mannered banter, 'Oh, absolutely, we must get together again sometime,' it was a clear indicator that the jailer was approaching with his set of keys and the prisoner's cell was going to be unlocked within the hour. Matson had never seen Edith Moseley appear anything other than hard-faced, but even she seemed to have been lifted by the prospect of release. His mind drifted...

### The bulldog was once a savage animal, whose speciality was to fly at the face of its quarry and to use its massive jaws to bite and hold on to the victim's nose. Its own set-back nostrils help the dog to breathe as it did so. The sport was outlawed in 1835. By 1900 the bulldog had – with no conscious attempt to change it – become 'a ladies dog as its kindliness of disposition admirably fits it.' The purists were far from happy; particularly when furtive crosses with pugs further tamed the breed. Dogs, like people, change...

### By mid-morning, all but two of the house-bound guests at Arnold Matson's public house had left the premises to set off on a manageable, though still fairly precarious journey homewards. I say two guests remained, but one of the pair was about to make an unexpected announcement and departure.

### Harold Garstang held out his right-hand in a gesture of friendship towards Arnold Matson.

'Well, thanks for everything, Arnold,' he said with all sincerity,' you've looked after us as though we were your own.'

### Conversation between the two men had been kept to a bare minimum since Garstang's spiritual revelation in the lounge bar two days ago, but Matson bore the old man no malice.

'It's been a pleasure, Harold,' he said, shaking Garstang warmly by the hand, 'It's been different, but nonetheless, a pleasure.'

### Matson's sentiments were undoubtedly genuine, but there is much to be said for the old adage that when a heart has been broken, it can never go back to the shape it once was. There was no question that what Garstang had told Matson in the bar on that freezing morning had made such an impact on Arnold that he felt he would never quite see the old man in the same affectionate way that he had done previously.

### And yet, why should Matson's opinion of Garstang alter at all? Garstang had merely acted as the messenger boy and hadn't intentionally delivered the news in any spiteful manner. He had simply, if a little insensitively, presented the facts pertaining to an apparition that had been observed by his life-long friend, Edith Moseley. Garstang had meant no harm, so why look on him in a different light now?

### But there she stood. The same unfathomable and impenetrable character as the one who had arrived for a drink and a chat three days ago. Chat? When did she ever as much as change her expression, never mind chat?

### Which is why Harold Garstang's next couple of sentences were almost as big a revelation as the one's he had delivered previously in the lounge bar.

'Well...I'll be going, Arnold...I'll see myself out. I don't live that far away and he'll get me home alright, won't you boy?' Garstang's faithful canine raised one eye half-heartedly. 'I'll be going?' thought Matson, before taking the pair of them in one at a time.

### The chill and ice from the last few days seemed at once to return to the hallway, and the mechanism of the wall clock was the only sound to be heard. A few long moments passed until the silence was broken at last.

'I want to stay Mr Matson,' said Edith Moseley, with an invisible frost on her breath...'I want to talk to you.'

### Chapter Twenty Six

### An Inescapable Web

### Evolution, natural selection, struggle for existence, instinct and difficulties on theory; you name it, Arnold Matson had studied it. As he prepared fresh, percolated coffee, Matson's mind raced and returned, as it so often did, to the simple beauty of the inexplicable. How strange is it that a bird, under the form of woodpecker, should have been created to prey on insects on the ground; that upland geese, which never or rarely swim, should have been created with webbed feet; that a thrush should have been created to dive and feed on subaquatic insects; and that a petrel should have been created with habits and structure fitting it for the life of an auk or grebe! He flicked the wall switch to employ the coffee machine and returned to what is swirling amongst his previous thought process...

### So how come a man arrives in a village no bigger than a postage stamp, makes a fresh start in life with no more emotional baggage to carry than many other people, settles into a more civilised, and supposedly, healthier pace and lifestyle, keeps himself to himself until one day when he casually invites a few locals round for a drink and chat; how come, he reiterates again, how come he has been landed with the woman currently sitting in an armchair in his lounge who, he discovered three days ago, saw a clear vision of his deceased mother who apologised to him, through this miserable mystic, for a car crash that accounted for the life of his fiancée fifteen years ago?

### Arnold Matson stares out of his kitchen window, looks to the heavens for an answer and is greeted by the smallest ray of sunlight as it momentarily manages to escape a leaden sky. He watches a blackbird cautiously weighing-up its options after days of deprivation.

### Arnold is certainly aware of one thing. He must be incredibly tolerant. Most people would have told her to take her miserable soul elsewhere by now...

### But the fact remained. What she had seen and indeed heard, was as clear and concise as any image and information could have been and for that reason alone, he had to hear what the old woman wanted to say to him...

### He carries the tray of fresh coffee through to the lounge bar and for the moment, doesn't notice Edith Moseley in the room. His vision is impaired as the lounge is bathed in brilliant sunshine streaming in through the side windows until it meets the angle of a deep alcove, which suddenly plunges the remainder of the room into shadow. He adjusts his vision and peers into the distance. Eventually he spots Miss Moseley's outline and notices that she is sitting with her back towards him. He makes his way towards the old woman and making a conscious effort not to startle her, coughs slightly as he nears where she is sitting. She turns her head very slowly to the left and as slowly again, returns to her original posture.

'Here we are,' Matson says gently as he nears Miss Moseley and places the tray on the table where she is sitting. As he does so, she bows her head, which Matson takes as an acknowledgement and thank you. He seats himself in an armchair opposite Miss Moseley and begins to pour the coffee. He places one cup in front of her, settles back in his chair and takes a slow, thoughtful sip.

### The slight protrusion of Miss Moseley's head scarf makes it impossible for Matson to see the old woman's eyes, but as she gradually raises her head from where she has been resting her chin, her full face eventually emerges and is illuminated by thin sunlight. To his surprise, Matson notices there are tears on the old woman's cheeks. No words are said as the pair observe one another for a few, long moments. It is the first time Arnold has seen the woman show any sign of vulnerability.

### Miniscule flecks of dust across a thin band of sunlight are the only signs of movement in the room. More moments pass...

'How do you protect yourself from the world, Mister Matson?' says the old woman quietly.

### Arnold blinks slowly and considers.

'Protect myself?' replies Matson, slightly unclear.

### Edith draws the bottom of one hand across her cheeks.

'What armour do you wear to keep the world at bay?' she went on.

### Arnold studied the woman.

'Why would I want to do that?' he asks, with an ambiguous shrug.

### Another silence before she reminds him of the guests that left earlier.

'The Councillor relies on his big mouth, that newspaper man does pretty much the same; Harold, sweet thing, has his drink, the writer escapes to his fictional world, the bookmaker depends on his effrontery and the dear Reverend has the comfort of our Lord...' she reels off, as though she had been practicing the mantra...'And all I'm saying is,' Miss Moseley continued in a much more measured delivery, 'What is the preferred cloak of Arnold Matson?'

'Are you saying I'm weak?' Matson snapped, seeing through her half-baked psychology.

'I'm not saying anything,' purred Edith, as she reaches for her coffee and continues to study Matson and the aura that surrounds him.

### Now this woman was finally in his presence, Matson refused the urge to get angry or buckle to whatever mind games she has in store. She clearly had her reasons for wanting to stay behind and talk when she could have just as easily left with the others. He leans towards the offensive.

'Why were you crying earlier?' he probes.

### Edith Moseley leans back in her chair, stretches her arms above her head, joins her hands and turns her palms towards the sky and half-smiles as she gently relaxes her neck by rolling her head from side to side, as though she is saying to Arnold Matson that she has every answer to any question he could possibly care to ask.

### Unlocking his front door with a true sense of relief, the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf combines an almighty sigh with a single footstep onto his hall carpet before he realises the disaster he has returned home to. The sopping squelch under his right shoe tells him all he needs to know, and it is at once clear that the vicarage has been flooded in his absence. If the tidemark up the wall was anything to go by there must have been a substantial amount of water through the building.

### Further along the hallway Wheatsheaf can hear his pet cat, Desmond, as it calls out in frightened confusion from the kitchen it has become stranded in. The flood water had caused the door to snap shut and as Wheatsheaf races along the hallway to rescue his beloved animal, he is relieved to see, as he pushes the door open, his tiled floor swimming in an inch or so of receding water mixed with the soggy paste remnants of cat food and biscuits, and his scared and startled friend frantically toing and froing on the work surface onto which it had instinctively leaped for safety when the water struck. Amid wailing and shushes of comfort from the holy man, Wheatsheaf holds the animal close to his chest as it clings onto his shoulders. He repeatedly whispers 'It's alright, it's alright' into the old tomcat's ear and its calls are slowly replaced by a loving and contented purring as the reverend carries his friend and goes to inspect the rest of the damage.

### The shambolic and slightly squalid lifestyle in which the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf has chosen to reside doesn't particularly concern him. He fully realises his home is a mess, without the added inconvenience of flood water, and he knows he must address the problem at some stage. What is of more concern at this very moment is Wheatsheaf's awful dread of discovering one single cardboard box in his living room.

### One box which contains the memories and diaries of his whole lifetime.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf never knew his parents and, apart from the briefest of wartime flings, his mother never had time to get to know the father. Colin became an orphan within the first month of his life, as soon as his mother admitted to herself she had neither the means nor the affection to support her new-born child.

### Wheatsheaf knows there will be no emotional road back if the box containing his memories has been ravaged by the flood water...but as he gets closer to the living room the carpet underneath his feet begins to return to a more familiar texture and Wheatsheaf's spirits noticeably start to rise. Mercifully the flood water never made it this far and the reverend realises as much. He pushes open his living room door to be greeted by the usual chaos and clutter, but the treasured box of everything he holds dear, stares back at him from the corner of the disused hearth.

### He crouches ever so slowly and lifts a framed black and white photograph of his foster-parents from the top of the memorabilia. He puts his lips to the glass, sways contentedly from side to side and sobs with almost painful relief, while his cat purrs blissfully against his grateful body...

'Harold informs me you are an expert when it comes to insects, Mister Matson?' said Edith Moseley, removing her head scarf and appearing slightly more relaxed.

'You stayed on here to talk to me about insects?' Matson returns the ball back across the net.

'I'm genuinely interested,' replies Miss Moseley, before sipping her coffee and settling back into her armchair.

### Matson assesses whether the woman's comment is for real or a diversion. He thinks long and hard before delivering his assessment.

'There is nothing in the natural world that doesn't affect all of us in some shape or form, Miss Moseley.'

'So...amaze me,' the old lady prompts, with slightly less arrogance than Matson expected. He warms to his subject, but not before he adds, 'Look, Miss Moseley...Edith...can we just stick to first names? This is awkward enough.'

### Edith's response was as simple as it was condescending.

'Whatever you say...Arnold, my dear.'

### Arnold's catalogue of knowledge regarding natural history was nothing less than substantial but, put under the spotlight and feeling not a little intimidated, his opening salvo, at first, merged into a cloud of uncertainty as it slowly formed in his mind. He considered for as long as it took to regain his composure and confidence before finally delivering a sentence that he felt certain would connect with this woman a little further down the line.

### There was no rush and he knew Edith, despite her cranky belligerence towards the rest of the human race, had shed tears in the company of a relative stranger only a few minutes earlier. He presented the image as though the words were wrapped in a box given as a birthday surprise...

'It does not take much to cause bees or any other animals to act in a complicated or elegant way,' Arnold began. 'Three simple and familiar rules are called for; variation, inheritance and natural selection. The variation may be in the genes or in past experience and the vehicle of inheritance can be DNA or memory, but whatever the machinery, a complex pattern of behaviour soon evolves.' Miss Moseley understood the facts stated by Matson and said as much.

### If nothing else, it made a welcome change from the inane wittering's of Harold Garstang and she was keen to learn more. She topped up her cup with lukewarm coffee and proffered the pot to Arnold, who momentarily placed his right hand over the top of his cup to say he had enjoyed an elegant sufficiency. His mind was clear and the facts were flowing.

### However, he was not prepared in any shape or form for the devastating effect his next words would have on Edith Moseley.

'The monarch of a bee hive is not a male but a single female,' continued Matson, hitting his stride once more. 'The queen, who lays nearly all the eggs, is helped by several thousand female workers, accompanied at times by a lesser number of males called drones.' Arnold Matson disgorged the facts like a professor at a lectern. 'She depends on the workers for food and can lay two thousand eggs a day. The workers construct the nest and feed the young, either with the secretions of a special gland, or with honey or pollen. Some are builders, others undertakers who throw out the dead.'

### Edith Moseley is genuinely transfixed by the information but she has no idea that Matson's crescendo is about to push her emotions over the edge.

'When the queen dies, another is elected by feeding her with a royal jelly that transforms a lucky larva's status...Once a year the queen allows the males a chance for sex. When their job is done they are judged useless, and killed or thrown out...'

### The whole speech could not have had more impact if it had been accompanied by a full orchestra and Arnold Matson was raising the baton once more...when he suddenly stopped.

### Edith Moseley sits like a frail statue; her thin, gaunt hands clasped together on her lap showing blue veins protruding under the pale, delicate skin. Tears are streaming down her face and she makes no attempt to dry them as she lets the flood come. The flood that has been welling up for three-quarters of her lifetime; all relating to a secret that has been eating her very being from the inside for more than fifty years, has finally risen to the surface. A secret she can contain no longer and one which she will share with Arnold Matson this very day.

### Chapter Twenty Seven

### The Missing Piece

### Arnold Matson had found it surprisingly straightforward to steady Edith Moseley's lurching ship and steer it clear of breaking up completely amongst the approaching rocks. Three days ago he would never have believed that the old lady who had arrived on his doorstep and who, judging by her persona that day, may as well have been carrying a banner above her head declaring 'I hate the world and all it stands for,' could possibly be the same person as the one sitting in his upstairs living room clutching a medicinal bowl of brandy and trembling like a wheat field. Arnold had fully expected Miss Moseley to capsize completely when he had gone to put his arm round her as a crumb of comfort in the downstairs lounge, but she showed no resistance whatsoever and indeed clutched onto Matson's arm as he led her gently through to his living quarters, where, he figured, it wouldn't be quite so capacious and would, therefore, make a much cosier confessional once the poor old thing had regained her composure.

### He added a drop more brandy to Edith's warming measure and there was no more resistance from his guest than there was from Arnold himself as he sploshed another inch of much-needed cognac into his own glass.

### Shock has an unerring knack of ageing people almost instantly, and the Edith Moseley that had breakfasted with Arnold barely three hours ago seemed to have put on about ten years in the last fifteen minutes.

### She had remained silent ever since Arnold had sat her down and made her comfortable in his favourite armchair, but every so often her lips showed signs of movement and Arnold could detect a hissing, repetitive mantra.

'Sixty-four...' she kept saying, 'sixty-four...sixty-four...sixty-four years.'

### The greater part of thirty-minutes dragged by and slowly elapsed before Edith Moseley's mental fog and inner-sadness showed any sign of lifting.

### She finally spoke with an unlikely warmth and clarity...

'I never meant to hurt you. You know that, don't you?'

### Arnold looked at the old woman but he wasn't quite on the trail.

### She quickly went on, 'what I saw in the bar the other evening...what I heard...'

'It's all forgotten,' said Matson, as calmly as he could muster, 'let's just leave it shall we?'

### An unfamiliar, long, silent pause of mutual respect flowed between the pair.

### Arnold Matson has had plenty of time to assess the situation since Edith Moseley opted to stay on for a chat and he didn't believe for one moment that this woman, who had broken down so uncontrollably earlier, was here for any small talk concerning the spiritual world. She was here for much more selfish reasons. She needed to talk and more importantly, she needed someone she could trust to listen.

### Edith Moseley's vision of the apparition of Arnold Matson's mother had paved the way in her own mind that this man was hurting in a way she could recognize and identify with. This man could be trusted with the biggest secret in Edith Moseley's long and lonely life.

### Arnold Matson instinctively knew that the next sentence this woman conveys would be the one which releases her human pressure valve and lifts the darkest veil that has descended on her troubled soul and twisted it beyond all recognition.

### He put down his glass, went slowly across to Edith and pulled up a nearby chair. He gently took the old woman's hands in his own and looked into the sad pools of her eyes. The question formed in Matson's mind but Edith Moseley had answered before Arnold could ask her what was wrong.

'I'm his mother,' said the old woman quietly...'the vicar of this parish...the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf...' She drew in a huge breath of courage and relief...'he's my son, Arnold. He's my little baby...'

### Matson stared and his heart more or less stopped in its tracks.

'I'm his mother...and I'll never be able to tell him.'

### Chapter Twenty Eight

### Mining for Clarity

### By definition, one tiny rock must, inevitably, finally dislodge an entire cliff face. In the case of Edith Moseley, one sentence had produced an emotional and psychological landslide. Once her secret was out into the open or at least, shared with Arnold Matson, the rest of the week wouldn't have been sufficient for Edith Moseley to pour out what she had to say, never mind the remaining few hours they spent together. Sixty-three years of guilt, the subject of Edith's mantra earlier is one heck of a time for any mental pressure cooker to bubble away with the lid screwed firmly shut and how Edith had managed to maintain her secret for such a period of time the Lord alone knows.

### However, one thing occurs to me about secrets; once one appears after the bearer whispers 'But you mustn't tell anybody,' it usually takes about three minutes before the smoke signals begin doing the rounds and about another five minutes before someone is banging on your door saying how sorry they are to hear what's happened. Suffice to say, Edith's confession had flattened Arnold Matson to such an extent that he was still having to pinch himself that the last few hours had actually taken place and there was absolutely no question that this bolt from the bluest of blues was going to go any further.

### The priority at the top of the agenda was not Arnold Matson's integrity and trust, for they are truly set in stone and can be relied upon ad infinitum; no, the first consideration must be that of Edith Moseley's new mind-set and how she wants to move forward once she has finally stopped shaking and gathered her equilibrium.

### The antidote to grief and regret cannot be plucked from the shelves like cans of processed peas. There is no label; there are no instructions on the tin. The solution, if indeed there was one, would need time to reconstruct, and for a woman of some eighty-one summers, time isn't something Edith Moseley takes for granted.

### Early November light was giving way to evening darkness by the time Arnold and Edith arrived back at her bungalow. Having consumed more than enough brandy between them, the pair had wisely agreed that Arnold would be foolish to push his luck behind the wheel of his beloved old car, if indeed he would have managed to get it to splutter into life after laying dormant during the recent cold snap, in order to return Miss Moseley to HQ as it were, and they had decided to walk the half-mile or so through the village and had clocked-in in no time at all. Other than a stroll to his favourite woodland, Arnold's exercise regime these days was practically non-existent and the wiry sprightliness of Edith's slightly hunched pace had somewhat surprised him. Following the adverse weather, the footpaths still concealed the occasional slippery demon but Edith, holding firmly onto Matson's arm, appeared to be dragging her new confidant along in much the same manner as a determined terrier does when taking its labouring master for an evening constitutional.

### Miss Moseley's outside porch light is automatically triggered and breaks the descending gloom as they approach her home, enabling a simple floodlit search of her handbag for the front door key.

### After the day's events, Arnold is in no hurry to leave the old woman to her own devices and offers his services to make sure everything is alright inside her home following recent fluctuations on the weather front. 'I'd like that. Would you mind, Arnold?' Edith says gratefully. Once inside, Edith switches on the hall light and the obligatory kettle takes first priority. 'You'll stay for a cup?' Arnold smiles and raises his eyebrows. 'Good,' says Edith, before busying herself with a couple of other light switches and making her way over to the kitchen sink.

'It's nice and warm, Edith,' chips in Arnold.

'Heating's on a timer. I don't mind living on my own but I'm buggered if I'm going to sit in the cold.' Shades of the old Edith, thinks Matson.

### He is invited to have a quick look round the place to make sure everything is in order and the pair are soon reunited in the simple comfort of the cosy living room. Antimacassar covers are in no short supply and several ornaments adorn the tasteful pastel walls. A couple of framed photographs are on display on top of a small bookcase while other larger pictures take pride of place on the hearth chimney breast. An old black and white photograph in an elaborate-looking frame grabs Arnold's attention. The child in the picture could be no more than a couple of days old and Matson quickly averts his eyes as he realises who it must be. Edith hands Arnold his tea cup and saucer. 'Yes, it is him,' she says casually, before proffering a digestive biscuit. Arnold accepts one out of politeness. Feeling slightly embarrassed at having been caught out he considers for a moment.

'You know, Edith...' Matson began.

'Not just now, Arnold,' concludes Miss Moseley, as though she were placing a friendly veil of silence over his forthcoming suggestion.

### Chapter Twenty Nine

### Out in the Open

### In much the same way as seaside towns resemble glamour models that have removed their make-up once autumn and winter arrives, the identical simile can be applied to the village of Blinkington-on-the-Treacle as long, warm days are eventually devoured by a chill and unforgiving stillness. A layer of something indefinable goes missing and we are left with a much starker picture, where every little crack and crevice is there for all to see. It's almost as though buildings seem to recognize they are not going to be stared at and admired for their architecture for a little while and as no one is watching, they let themselves go. The harsh reality is another year is flying past and people and buildings alike are all feeling a tad jaded.

### Two weeks have come and gone since eight people were marooned in his public house, so it would be something of an understatement to say how relieved Arnold Matson feels to be back in the old routine. Trade, as ever, remains unspectacular but, after the events and revelations of the past fortnight, Arnold now happily accepts that there is much to be said for the mundane.

### The fact that Edith Moseley has trusted Arnold with her lifelong secret is one that she can safely rely upon to remain just that; and it is a responsibility which Arnold inwardly wears with a badge of pride. During the course of the evening at Edith's bungalow, she had eventually divulged and shared a mountain of inner turmoil with Arnold, and the fact is his feelings towards the old lady have been completely transformed. All the bitterness and hatred she aims towards the world is, in reality, nothing of the sort. She is picking on herself. Sixty-three years of self- loathing all pertaining to a one night stand as an innocent nineteen-year-old girl.

### Edith had told Arnold that she couldn't believe her luck, or possibly destiny, when she got snowed in at the pub knowing that her secret son, the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, was under the same roof. As she pointed out, it was the longest time they have spent together since he was a babe in arms.

### She had gone on to say that there were times over the course of those three trapped and isolated days, when she had been tempted to take her unsuspecting son over to one side and finally confess all...but what good does a confession of such magnitude and improbability from a seemingly bitter and cranky old lady do to the unsuspecting mind of a parish vicar when he is told by his own mother that she gave him away some sixty-three summers ago? The man cannot simply wipe the slate clean, rewind his life and start again. Indeed, and Edith Moseley had said as much to Arnold; the news in the single sentence she dare not utter to Wheatsheaf contained enough potency to kill him. No, the guilt of Edith's actions all those years ago, she reiterated, must remain with her the rest of her days, and bearing her soul to Arnold Matson was all the deliverance she could hope for in the meantime.

### Edith had also explained her reluctance to accept that she is blessed, or as she put it cursed, when it comes to dealing with matters of the occult. Strange voices and visions have been a part of her life since she was a child of eight or nine and it was only in her late-twenties that she finally made any sense of it all. What used to terrify her as a girl, she eventually accepted as a way of life. She has never exploited the situation for financial gain and, on a number of occasions, the phenomena has enabled her to reassure people who were hurting beyond measure.

### Miss Moseley had asked how Arnold's interest in insects and nature had begun and he told her the tragic tale of how he had killed a young song thrush with a stone when he was an eight-year old child; how his heartbreak had turned his life upside down and taught him respect. Edith confessed she has a soft spot for birds but little else in the garden; 'especially slugs,' and Arnold had lightened Edith's mood by informing her that slugs are hermaphrodites, and so are able to mate with themselves which, to Matson's surprise, prompted a response of 'that must come in handy' from the old woman.

### The conversation throughout the evening, as varied and slightly surreal as it was in places, invariably swung back to her secret son and Arnold explained how he and the Reverend Colin had slowly but surely become mates lately, which brought a noticeable glow of pleasure to Miss Moseley's demeanour.

### Edith asked Arnold if he thought her son was lonely, and while Matson didn't exactly dodge the bullet, he moved slightly out of the line of fire by extoling the virtues of the splendid work the vicar does for his grateful parishioners. 'That wasn't what I asked you, Arnold,' the wise old head had countered, and Matson had managed to wriggle off the ropes by saying Colin was probably far too busy to be lonely for very long. Once again, Edith spotted the kind transparency in Arnold's subterfuge and patted him softly on his knee by way of calling a truce.

### Half-a-dozen customers are dotted around The Field of Corncrakes public house on this chilly, but glorious November lunchtime. A real, roaring fire crackles away merrily and its wafting smoke scents the room to accompany any glowing memory one cares to recall as people sip, stare and drift away. The bar's permanent fixture and fitting, Harold Garstang, sinks the dregs of another soldier, Arnold puts down his book, refills Garstang's personal tankard and returns to his seat. The ritual is clockwork personified, little or no conversation is exchanged and the small matter of payment can wait until later. Garstang takes a couple of peanuts from the complimentary bowl on the bar and drops them, without looking down, to his faithful, dozing dog, Pinky. The peanuts bounce gently off the top of the pooch's cranium and come to rest by the side of their erstwhile neighbours, thrown by Garstang after he received his previous pint. Pinky continues snoozing and if it can drum up enough enthusiasm to do so may well lap up the salty snacks later. This animal is no fool and is well aware of the protracted daily duration...

### To give you a further illustration of how slowly time plods on in these parts at lunchtime, my mind is drawn to a very relaxing sabbatical I once enjoyed in County Kerry, in the far-west of Ireland. Unsurprisingly, I was sitting at the bar nursing of pint of the old black stuff when I asked the bartender if, by any chance, there was a bus I could catch which would take me back into town. The man replied, 'Oh yes,' very softly and went about his chores which, as far as I could ascertain, amounted to more or less nothing. I eventually finished my pint and got up to leave and thought I would just confirm that there was definitely a bus due which would spare me a four-mile walk. 'Oh yes,' the bartender assured me, 'there's a bus alright...it comes every Thursday at four o'clock.' As today was a Tuesday, I sat down on the stool again and ordered another pint...

### Once the chemicals have started to work their magic, Harold Garstang's tongue begins to make contact with his brain cells and conversation is forthcoming. This routine can burst, or rather, groan into action at any given twinkling during his second pint. In Harold's case, it rarely arrives as a 'Eureka!' moment; it tends to appear after he has just exerted himself by say, opening a crisp packet or possibly taking a pinch of snuff. Either way, Arnold Matson knows more or less to the minute, when the daily gem will be fired in his direction and always has a little something up his sleeve to put a ripple on the surface of the stagnant pond which nestles between Harold Garstang's ears. Right on cue, here he comes...

'What are you reading about, Arnold?'

'Dog shows,' replies Matson, without looking up.

'Oh aye?' says Garstang, before taking a long draught of beer and leaning back on his bar stool like a child settling down for its bedtime story.

'Did you know, Harold,' says Matson, stirring into life for the sake of his own sanity,' that there are eleven thousand dog shows a year in the United States?'

'Blimey,' utters Garstang.

'And seven billion dollars is spent on veterinary fees alone,' adds Matson.

'You're in the wrong business, Arnold,' quips Harold.

'The first dog show in England was held in Newcastle in 1859 but the Americans didn't take up the sport until a few years later with a display of Queen Victoria's deerhounds; a dog called Nellie, who walked on her hind legs because the front pair was missing, was deemed the overall winner and was given the first prize of a pearl-handled revolver.' Here endeth today's sermon, thought Arnold. 'The stuff you learn, eh?' breathes Garstang, pushing his tankard towards Matson for the predestined refill.

### Chapter Thirty

### Strength from the Past

### A scattering of photographs lay before Edith Moseley on her living room table. Every image, memory and emotion, which time, if it had a heart, should have erased and dissolved, remains constant as she subjects herself to the sepia and black and white reminiscences of an old biscuit tin. It is no exaggeration to say that Edith has not strolled down memory lane with pictures of her family since the day she was paid a surprise visit by her elder sister, Vera, but almost thirty years of life's river has trickled away since then.

### It may only be two weeks since she confided in Arnold Matson that she has a secret son, but her thought process and assessment of the world she lives in, and the people she is surrounded by, has undoubtedly altered. Anger and resentment have been replaced by a warm cloak of serenity, and while it may be a bit too late in the day to place an advertisement in the local paper which states she would like to apologise to the entire village for her forthright grumpiness over the years, it is never too late for anyone to change; and at the ripe old age of eighty-two, the spectacles Miss Moseley adjusts on the bridge of her nose as she picks up a faded photograph of her mother are, at least, inclining towards the rose-tinted variety.

### Her upbringing is best described as strict but fair and the whole of the Moseley family, young and old, all helped to take a share of the workload from her father, who ran a reputable hardware business in a small village not ten miles from where Edith resides today. With six children to clothe and feed and the small matter of a World War to contend with, long hours and honest graft were the orders of the day.

### Losing her father while she was still a teenager elevated young Edith up the responsibility chain overnight, and the loss of her mother two years later, unquestionably through a broken heart, simply heaped more and more onto the two young girls in the family. Their four younger brothers were more than a handful and it was only the intervention and helping hand of an elderly aunt that brought the necessary stability to the homestead. Edith had looked upon it as grounding for independence and she never spoke a truer word. To this day, the individual that crosses her had better be made of stern stuff...

### Edith Moseley lovingly takes the framed photograph of her baby son from the wall and goes through to her conservatory to further reflect in her favourite environment. Potted plants and dazzling sunshine are her only company as she caresses a sixty-three year old photograph of an offspring who must remain a stranger. She takes a leaf between her thumb and index finger and gently wipes dust from a thriving plant before thanking her lucky stars for its simple beauty. Once she has settled on a comfortable white cane sofa, she plumps up the cushions, relaxes back with the photograph and stares longingly across the back porch and neat garden lawn.

### Her garden may be in a state of undress as it lies in the throes of early-winter, but it is not long before the warmth and cosiness of her conservatory begin to take Miss Moseley's imagination to another place...

### A child, little more than four or five years, peeps out from behind a large shrubbery and goes into hiding again. His mother pretends not to have seen the boy and calls out as she continues her search for him. 'Colin,' calls Miss Moseley, very softly, from her daydream...The youngster's face appears once again, this time from behind the garden shed. No sooner has the face emerged when it vanishes again, and tiny, mischievous giggles and laughter echo in the distance. 'I'm coming to get you,' whispers Edith, clutching the framed photograph to her bosom. The child stands stock-still as his mother quietly edges towards his hiding place. His eyes are glowing with excitement and expectation as the grassy footsteps creep closer... She slowly begins to count and the child waits open-mouthed, tingling with anticipation at the oncoming reunion...'One...two...three...Boo!'

### Edith Moseley's telephone startles the old lady back to reality and the image of the son she never witnessed playing in her garden, is lost until the next time.

### Chapter Thirty One

### Preparing to Catch a King

### There is one part of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf's dedicated but slightly skew-whiff existence that cannot, in any shape or form, be scorned upon or ridiculed. He may well be noted for his somewhat shambolic dress-sense, as well as a man who is not averse to making toast with bread that is two weeks past its sell-by-date, but when it comes to his hobby, nay obsession, the reverend is second to none when dealing with all things piscatorial. Mention angling to this holy man and you will be rewarded with a fishy encyclopaedic sermon to savour and marvel at. His love of the sport dates back to when he was five-years-old and it is fair to say that some fifty-eight years later, his enthusiasm and fondness of the riverbank are still powered by the same dynamo as they were when he donned short trousers.

### Angling, fishing, splodging, call it what you will, is the most popular participation sport in good old Blighty, with an estimated three million souls out there doing their darnedest with rod and line in fair weather and foul. To the uninterested, no doubt, the pastime has all the excitement of a game of tiddlywinks while slightly tipsy on bad sherry, but it is there that myself, and the good reverend, would have to take issue with you.

### To say that angling is just about catching fish is rather like saying breathing in and out will keep you alive. Now, I'm not going to sit here and contest that breathing is not a vital component when it comes to remaining upright and animate, of course I'm not; all I'm saying is that it is only one of the key elements necessary in making life complete. If you have the good fortune to catch a fish or two on your day by a river or pond, fine. But let us not underestimate the other simple treats that your adventure has up its sleeve...

### The fish may well be in sparse supply as you sit there contemplating; the heavens could just open, drenching both you and your cheese and pickle sandwich in the process; the field you have to cross in order to gain access to your chosen spot may well contain a disagreeable bull, who stirs from his slumbers and takes issue with the fishing-flies attached to your hat or, perhaps worse still, a warm, steaming present, unceremoniously off-loaded by a passing heifer, goes unnoticed by your good self as you whistle along your merry way before stepping in it, and in so doing postponing your saunter for several minutes while you scrape the delightful stuff off your wellington boot with clumps of grass and a dried stick. No, the treat to which I am referring, which comes free with every fishing trip, is Mother Nature herself. Birdlife abounds, the occasional handsome horse pops up in a field opposite; a water vole shimmies past in the water's edge and, the cherry on top of the cake, the majesty of a family of swans gliding down the middle of the river to stir you back to life and wonderment as you sit there not having had a fishy nibble to disturb your float for an hour or two. The earth's bountiful treasures and all for gratis. These are the delights currently circulating around the contented imagination of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf this crisp and life-affirming morning, as he busies himself in the small workshop at the bottom of his spacious garden.

### Preparing for a fishing trip is all part of the escapism and enjoyment for Wheatsheaf each time he is afforded the luxury, but at this time of year there is an extra spring in the reverend's parochial step as he meticulously examines his trusty old lures, hooks and spinners. The rest of the season belongs to coarse fishing, where small ponds and meandering, narrow rivers are the order of the day. Shoal fish, such as the beautiful roach, are caught and returned to the waters as the sun beats down and the Mayfly enchants; but come November and December, the Reverend Colin turns his attention to a predator that has graced this planet for half-a-million years; a creature whose bones have been found in association with harpoon heads dated around 9,500 BC.

### This fish is the undisputed king of all river fish and goes by the name of Exos Lucius. It is more commonly referred to as the Pike.

### There was a time, in his much younger days, when Wheatsheaf would have caught these magnificent beasts and killed them for the table. Not anymore. Through age and wisdom, the barbarous side of the reverend's approach to angling has been banished, and should he be fortunate enough to share a battle and land a creature on the upcoming trip, the only memento he would afford himself is a photograph of his catch once he has unhooked it. After that, it will be lowered lovingly and gently back where it rightfully belongs and left to fight another day.

### The particular river of choice flows some one hundred and thirty miles west of Wheatsheaf's parish and he is planning to make the journey in mid-week and stay overnight in his faithful old camper van. This will enable him a good night's rest and an early start on the riverbank the following morning.

### Preparing a simple supper cooked on a gas stove, with only the night sky and a glass of red wine for company, is the reverend's idea of earthly nirvana, and he hums and softly sings snippets of songs to himself as he continues his preparations for next week's venture with child-like anticipation. 'I must remember to give Arnold a call,' he tells himself while inspecting the spokes on his huge fishing umbrella; 'a trip like this would do him the world of good.'

### Arnold Matson received the reverend's invitation later that same evening and accepted graciously. As they were due to travel on Tuesday afternoon, he would close early, and as Matson didn't open his pub on Wednesdays during the winter, the overnight stay wouldn't present a problem. Arnold feels a complete change of scenery is just what the doctor ordered and on his return, he knows a local spinster he can tell all about it.

### Chapter Thirty Two

### In the Middle of Somewhere

### When he asked the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf what he needed to bring for the trip, the vicar had told Arnold to just bring himself. While he appreciated the sentiment, Matson's gregarious and generous nature ensured that whatever happened over the next couple of days, the two men were not going to run out of sustenance, and as the second of Arnold's two hefty holdalls were hoisted into the back of Wheatsheaf's uncomplaining camper van, there was a friendly air of exuberance and banter as they double-checked the sliding-doors were secured, climbed aboard and steadily made their way out of the pub car park.

### The weather forecast for the next few days was encouraging. Clear, pale blue skies and falling temperatures were, the reverend remarked to Arnold, 'perfect for the fish we are after.' As Arnold had never been fishing in his entire life, he smiled and took the man's word for it before using a little conversational chicanery to divert Wheatsheaf's train of thought, just in case he was getting into his obsessional stride a bit too early in the proceedings.

'I'll treat you to a meal en-route if you like, Colin,' Arnold proffered.

'See that big pot under the side seat?' countered the reverend. Arnold turned his head and acknowledged the bulky utensil.

'Beef casserole,' said Wheatsheaf proudly, 'Supper under the stars for you tonight, Arnold, my boy.' The vicar was at his sentimental best and Matson was more than happy to tag along.

### In a strange way, the steady journey to their destination, consisting as it does, of a three-hour duration, would have a made an interesting fly-on-the-wall documentary. After all, here we have two men, both experts in their respective fields, trotting out anecdotes and observations in glorious detail as though the knowledge and information is common place. There was no boasting or one-upmanship; just a couple of blokes temporarily without a care in the world sharing story after story. Arnold even managed to amaze the Reverend Colin when they devoured a couple of cheese and tomato sandwiches to maintain their energy levels. 'Shall I tell you something about tomatoes, Colin?'

'Fire away,' said Wheatsheaf, tucking in and checking his rear-view mirror.

'Tomatoes were once shunned because they were thought to be poisonous,' began Arnold. 'This one's safe though, isn't it?' chipped in Wheatsheaf.

'And at one time,' continued Matson, 'they were only grown as ornaments.'

'Now, that I can understand,' said the reverend, 'I've not had a decent tomato for years.'

'Too right, Colin,' agreed Matson, 'eight million tons a year are produced and nearly all of them taste of nothing. Mind you, wild tomatoes are sexual but your farm-version is self-fertile. Maybe the farm-version should try to get out more...'

### Both men smiled at Matson's allusion and Wheatsheaf's Dormobile motored on its merry way.

### An incredibly vivid full moon welcomed the pair as they eventually approached their riverside destination. Wheatsheaf indicated to turn right for the final time today and swung the steering wheel to steer their home for the night over a cattle crossing and onto an arch bridge. Traffic in these remote parts at this time of the evening is virtually non-existent and Wheatsheaf stops the vehicle once they arrive at the brow. He pulls on the handbrake and it resonates in the chilled silence of the evening.

### Without speaking, the Reverend Colin opens his door and clambers from his seat. The door slams behind him and he takes the few necessary steps around the vehicle to give him a view out over the river, which is brightly illuminated by spotlights built into the structure, along with the natural beauty of the overhead moon. The Reverend Colin leans against the top of the bridge and is joined by Arnold. The image before them is so stunningly beautiful that neither man says anything for a moment or two, and the only movement in the picture postcard is the breath they exhale and the swirls of descending freezing fog across the headlights of the camper van as its engine purrs contentedly.

### The river flowing under the bridge beneath them has serene, colossal power and this is the sole reason Wheatsheaf wanted to check on its current condition.

'I've never seen it this high, Arnold.' Matson wasn't quite sure of the implication and asked the question of a layman.

'Is that good or bad?' he said softly, not wanting to intrude on the magical atmosphere.

'Well,' said the reverend philosophically, 'we could have done with it being a bit lower.' They admired the view for a few more moments before heading back to the warmth of the Dormobile.

'But it won't spoil it for us. Come on; let's get parked up for the night and get that casserole on.' He slipped his faithful friend into first gear, drove slowly down the incline of the bridge and headed towards the peace and solitude of his favourite secluded recess.

### To a certain extent, Arnold Matson feels like someone who has spun a coin into the air, waited for it to drop to the ground and, instead of it landing on either heads or tails, the object seems to have come to a halt on its edge, leaving Arnold, as it were, in the epicentre of the emotional crossroads of Edith Moseley and her secret son, who at this very moment is adding a drop more seasoning to his home-built casserole, which is coming along nicely as it warms through on the gas stove. The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf is unquestionably in full-flow in his blue and white striped pinafore. His hands flit effortlessly between the large glass of red wine he draws warmth and inspiration from, to the wooden spoon he tastes and stirs with. Having laid the table with the basic essentials, Arnold has been ordered to relax and enjoy by the good reverend, and the two men chat amiably as the casserole bubbles to gastronomic perfection.

### Observing Wheatsheaf in his glorious pomp, Arnold wonders how such a meticulous individual can possibly be the same character who chooses to live a life of squalor and paucity of provisions when he is under his own roof at the vicarage. The bottom line is he is delighted to see the clergyman so happy and he tells him as much. Wheatsheaf momentarily breaks off from his culinary duties and turns to Matson. 'If I can't be happy here, Arnold, I shall never be happy anywhere...' He tops up Matson's glass and begins fingering his shirt pockets. 'Now then...bay leaves, bay leaves...' he mutters, before producing a tiny plastic pouch which contains the herb. 'Put them in as a bouquet garni back at the vicarage...just a couple more to freshen things up,' he mutters to himself. Arnold sips his wine, shakes his head and smiles then relaxes back into his chair. Steam and condensation abound on such a bitter evening but the Reverend Colin is in his element...

'So,' said Arnold, dipping another hunk of crusty white bread into the mouth-watering sauce of his beef casserole, 'how many years have you been coming to this spot then, Colin?'

'On and off,' Wheatsheaf considers, topping up their wine glasses, 'the best part of thirty-years, I suppose. I've not missed a trip out here in winter for as long as I can remember.' He loosens the belt on his corduroy trousers, manages to supress a burp and continues, 'Martha and I first came here just after we got married. She was never one for fishing but she'd put up with me while she got on with her reading, knitting, poetry, whatever...'

### A mixture of fond and painful memories suddenly formed a backlog of mental traffic in Wheatsheaf's imagination and he pulled into a safe layby.

'Here,' he said, ladling more meat and vegetables into Matson's bowl, 'have a drop more.' Momentarily derailed, the reverend's demeanour lost its radiance, but once Arnold had allowed the holy man to gather his thoughts and return his attention to his supper, he wasted no time in ushering him towards the safety and comfort of his beloved hobby.

'You've still not told me what fish we are going after tomorrow, Colin.' It was as though Matson had flicked a switch to illuminate the man sitting opposite him.

'Pike.' Wheatsheaf's garlic-scented annunciation arrived in such a respectful and enthusiastic growl that, as he unhurriedly pronounced the word, his mouth gave the impression he was mimicking a goldfish in a bowl.

### Suddenly he was tucking into his casserole as though a warning had just been issued regarding national rationing. He tore bread and mopped-up the aromatic sauce in his bowl, quaffed heartily on his red wine and ladled in more sustenance. He unselfishly offered Arnold yet another helping who, in turn, politely declined as he simultaneously patted his amply satisfied belly.

### No more than ninety-seconds could have elapsed before Wheatsheaf set down his spoon, wiped his perspiring brow with a tea towel and came up for air, but during that time Arnold had toyed with the idea that not only was he in the presence of a man with extraordinary chameleon-like tendencies, he was also sharing the company of someone who appeared to be on some kind of obsessive, driven mission.

### When two relative strangers are occupying, what amounts to, a single cell, the considered subject for conversation can be a delicate blossom. Rather than performing a U-turn regarding their discussion, Arnold decided to plough on and hope for the best. Before he had time to do so, the reverend was his genial and placid self. Wheatsheaf's idiosyncrasies may not be easy to anticipate, but if Arnold Matson has learnt anything at all about this man's nature, it is the predictability of a period of serenity once the eye of the storm has disappeared over the distant horizon. However, not even Arnold Matson was prepared for Wheatsheaf's thunderbolt which, as it left the holy man's lips and entered their enclosed world, automatically signalled to both men that this was going to be a long night...

'Do you ever think about your parent's, Arnold?' the Reverend Wheatsheaf asked softly.

### Rain was falling gently on the roof of the camper van as Arnold Matson replenished two wine glasses and searched frantically for his reply.

### Sooner or later crossroads require a decision, and as Arnold stood in the middle of this particular junction, he saw no mileage in launching into a lengthy monologue about his own personal history. After all, he had fond memories of his own upbringing and there were no ghosts lurking in his closet. No, when someone asks a question that cuts straight to the mustard, it is not because they want to hear your answer; it simply means they themselves need to get something off their chest. Arnold returned the serve.

'Why do you ask, Colin?' There was a pause as Wheatsheaf considered for a moment. This is the man in a nutshell, thought Arnold. First he is on cloud nine and serving up food which is truly fit for the gods; the next minute you feel as though you are watching him from a box at the opera prior to him delivering the big climax. The reverend's speech, as it took to the stage, was incredibly measured and mercifully calm.

'I never knew my parent's, you see...I was adopted.' Wheatsheaf placed the fingers of his right hand into the palm of his left and stroked the back of his nails with his thumb as he considered. 'There isn't a day goes by when I don't think about them; who they were; what they did for a living...why they didn't want me.'

### Already being in possession of the facts, Arnold Matson immediately forced himself to appear more surprised by the news than he actually was. It could have been an awkward moment but the transition was seamless. 'Come on, Colin,' said Matson, trying to raise the reverend's chin off the floor, 'You don't know the full story so why torture yourself?' Wheatsheaf nodded slowly in agreement and half-smiled. 'And in any case,' Arnold went on, trying to keep it light-hearted, ' some of the most amazing people throughout history were either adopted or born out of wedlock...the prophet Mohammed, Leo Tolstoy...Leonardo da Vinci, he was born out of wedlock.

'Really?' said Wheatsheaf, somewhat surprised, as his unpredictable spirits showed signs of rising once again. 'Absolutely,' confirmed Matson, pouring the pair more wine, 'Mind you, old Leonardo had one disadvantage.'

'And what was that?' quizzed Wheatsheaf, perking up even further.

'He shares the same birthday as me,' said Matson.

### Wheatsheaf's emotional shipwreck had been averted and the two men touched wine glasses. Matson's relief at not having to play the resident psychiatrist was tangible and he decided to throw another log of comfort on the hypothetical fire.

'In any case, Colin; if you think our lives are complicated you should try being a cuckoo.' Wheatsheaf appeared slightly puzzled.

'No, no,' continued Arnold, paving the way for his anecdote. 'The cuckoo has resisted the temptation to diverge into numerous kinds found among many nest parasites.' The Reverend Colin rubbed a russet-coloured cheek and paid attention. 'Now,' Matson went on, 'that's odd, you see, Colin, given that cuckoo females are divided into distinct races, each able to mimic the eggs of its host.' Wheatsheaf was showing grim determination to learn, while the wine in his system was trying to persuade him to relax. 'The answer,' said an equally squiffy but determined Matson, 'lies in cuckoo cuckoldry.' He paused for a moment, checked with himself that he had pronounced the phrase correctly, looked somewhat surprised to find that he had, and picked up where he left off. 'Oh yes...the male's insistence on sex with any female, whether or not she belongs to the race that brought him up.' For an instant, Arnold thought he saw the holy man's ears wiggle but put it down to a trick of the light and charged towards the winning post. 'Female cuckoos bear more allegiance to a particular host, be it redstart or warbler, than do their males. As a result, a cuckoo who was himself brought up by warblers may father an egg found in a redstart nest.'

'Amazing,' breathed Wheatsheaf, understanding every other word Matson was saying. 'Now the crux is this, Colin, lad,' said Matson refocusing, 'Egg colour itself is inherited down the female line, so that females stay with the bird by whom they were fostered. As males are so much less faithful, their promiscuity explains why the cuckoo has not split into many species, each true to its dupe.'

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf sat mesmerized for a few moments, placed his wine glass on the table and let out a sigh that had travelled all the way up from his socks. 'I'll make some coffee,' he said in a studied whisper, before attempting the three short steps required to take him as far as the Dormobile's doll's house kitchen cabinet.

### Caffeine and fresh air soon had Matson and Wheatsheaf's bubbles back in the centre of their respective spirit levels. The visibility outside was that of the inside of a Victorian chimney, but once again Wheatsheaf's impressive organisational skills had risen to the surface and both men had made steady progress along the main gravel track armed with powerful torches. They did not intend to venture any great distance; this was merely a stroll to eliminate the remaining cobwebs from their slight overindulgence after supper, but from Arnold Matson's point of view, a walk in the chilly darkness all added a touch of 'Boys Own' adventure to his mini-break. Wheatsheaf certainly knew this place like his own backyard, and he gave a whispered running commentary as he highlighted various landmarks with his torch beam.

### The path itself twists its way through a forest of conifers, while remaining virtually parallel to the river they will fish tomorrow. Each time the two men pause to examine and admire a feature they have stumbled upon, the only sound in the chilly silence is the vast expanse of water in the valley below them as it wends its way to an inevitable ocean.

### The fantastic moon which greeted Matson and Wheatsheaf when they arrived earlier, now has the companionship of scudding cloud, but its illumination is still impressive whenever the two men emerge from the overhanging denseness of the glade.

### Barely fifteen minutes have elapsed since the explorers left the unwashed dishes and empty wine bottles behind them; and yet, in this short space of time, it is as if the earlier part of the evening belongs to a distant dream, if indeed, it ever existed at all. Such is the impact of stillness and silence when your significance in the great scheme of things is reduced to that of an ant; as your senses are heightened, without any distraction whatsoever, by what you observe directly before you in the beam of a torch light.

### The gravel track eventually splits and gives the option of an alternative route up a steep incline. Arnold Matson feels this may be the end of their little adventure, which he has found totally magical in its intensity.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, however, has a surprise up his sleeve and asks Arnold to follow him.

### No small effort is required as they make their way up the steep gradient for less than three minutes, but as they reach the brow of the forest the path comes to an end at the top of the plateau.

### Suddenly there are no trees to block their visibility, and from their vantage point, from what feels like the summit of creation, they can see the tiny shimmering lights of a populated village in the valley in the far distance.

### No words are necessary as two friends observe the world below them.

### They are not part of it; they have escaped. They are the only two men on earth.

### Spinners, bobbins, forceps, treble-hooks, dead-bait, wire traces and swivels. Not your normal topics of conversation over a brandy nightcap, granted; just the sound of an enthusiastic holy man and his apprentice preparing for the following morning. It's fair to say that Arnold Matson hadn't envisaged being stuck on a riverbank with a garden cane and string with a hook tied to the end, but he certainly never imagined the amount of accessories and pre-planning necessary to catch, whichever way you looked at it, a fish. However, as soon as he voiced his surprise to the reverend, he was provided with a detailed lowdown that would have given Isaac Walton a run for his tuppence. 'This is no ordinary fish,' the vicar informed Matson, in a manner not dissimilar to the Chief of Police once he has received a tip-off that King Kong is on the loose again. 'We shall be using three rods,' he went on, briefing his one, rather confused soldier for action, 'we will both be walking the bank using spinning gear, and this little fella,' he said, opening a small ice box and producing a dead herring, 'will be doing his level best on the other rod. Pike can smell them a mile off,' he concluded, popping the specimen back alongside its dead relatives. Wheatsheaf had gone on to explain that Pike, despite the fact they are predatory, are opportunists when it comes to eating.

'They're like a lot of people,' the reverend reasoned, 'they tend to eat whatever is put in front of them. Not too crazy about exertion.'

### Matson's naturally curious mind was warming to the task but even he was taken aback after his inquisitiveness enquired how big these beasts grow.

'The British record is forty-six pounds thirteen ounces,' Wheatsheaf announced, with enough pride to suggest he had caught the monster himself. Matson released a hissing whistle in surprised appreciation.

'Don't worry, Arnold,' Wheatsheaf reassured him, 'if you catch one a quarter of that size tomorrow it'll still feel like you have hooked a runaway train.'

### Matson didn't have to wait long for more superlatives. 'Streamline power. Majestic, camouflaged, unforgiving killing machines,' the vicar added, slipping his right hand into an awesome- looking stainless steel mesh glove. Arnold wasn't quite sure if the vicar's talents stretched to a spot of fencing as well, but the explanation was forthcoming. 'This,' said Wheatsheaf, holding out his hand and forming it into a claw, 'is what you wear to protect yourself as you lift the Pike out of the landing net by its gill covers. They have teeth everywhere. One sudden movement of their head without this on and...' The vicar clenched his hand shut to hide the ends of his fingers.

### Blimey, thought Matson; this man seriously missed his vocation in life. His sense of melodrama is more suited to hosting tours round haunted castles than the pulpit. He edged him back to reality.

'So, what time do you reckon in the morning, Colin?'

'Eh?' Wheatsheaf answered vaguely, preoccupying himself with the ratchet and gears on one of his casting reels.

'What time do you want to get started?' Matson persisted. Wheatsheaf emitted an elongated 'Ooooh...sixish,' while adding a spot of oil to the devices mechanics before coming back to earth, 'Up at six, decent breakfast, pack a few sarnies, fill a couple of flasks and away we go, Arnold, my boy.' And with that, the reverend returned once more to his own little world as he inspected and double-checked an endless cornucopia of gadgets and apparatus; treating each precious, inanimate object with the same affection a mother shows her children before safely tucking them into bed for the night.

### Arnold Matson had the distinct feeling that Wheatsheaf's ceremony and routine could well drag on for another hour or so, but he didn't begrudge the old chap his harmless pleasures. He had informed the reverend that he was about to turn in for the evening and thought he heard him respond, but he was soon chuntering away to himself once more in a land of his own.

### Arnold brushed his teeth, prepared his basic bed and slid into his sleeping bag. As he familiarised himself with his warm and surprisingly comfortable new nest, he propped himself up on his pillows and observed Wheatsheaf as he quietly pottered, occasionally tutted and frequently mumbled throughout a ritual he must have performed on a thousand previous occasions.

### Was the old boy lonely? Probably. Was he happy with his lot? At this moment in time, unquestionably. Like families gathered at Christmas, social animals are permanently poised between cooperation and conflict, but right now it occurred to Arnold Matson that all that is missing from the picture he sees before him is a playpen. He chuckled softly to himself as he plumped up his pillows, settled down and got comfortable. A vicar, his toys and a playpen...

### It had been a long, fascinating and exhausting day and the outline of Wheatsheaf's body eventually began to blur and dissolve as Matson's weary mind drew him towards sleep. Every now and then an extraneous noise or cough would interfere with Arnold's attempts for solid slumber, and he would drift momentarily back to consciousness, until his exhausted soul finally washed away on a steady, relentless, flowing tide.

### Chapter Thirty Three

### Days of Cholesterol and Roses

### There cannot be a single man or woman amongst us who can sleep through the smell of frying bacon, and Arnold Matson was no exception as he awoke, sniffed and creaked into life before eventually realising where he was. As usual, his dreams had provided a terrific night's entertainment, and as he lay there reassessing and dissecting the vivid, colourful activities provided earlier by his imagination and psyche, he isn't entirely surprised to recall that the vicar he is currently observing preparing mushrooms and turning sizzling rashers, featured quite heavily in a couple of his mind-boggling, sleepy episodes.

### Incidentally, I have always been of the opinion that an individual's dreams should remain the intimate property of the person that dreamt them up in the first place, for I can think of nothing more wearisome than finding oneself in the company of someone who insists on telling me what went on during the night as they flew to Venus on a coffee table or whatever else they may have got up to. With this in mind, I shall spare you the unnecessary details as Arnold finally shakes a leg...

'Blimey, Colin,' Matson managed blearily, 'you're on the case bright and early.'

'Oh, good morning, Arnold,' Wheatsheaf replied chirpily, keeping an eye on the Cumberland sausages, 'sleep alright? Fresh coffee's in the pot when you're ready.' He broke into a melodious bass vocal whose considerable oscillations appeared to be causing a small pan of baked beans to vibrate on the gas stove.

### Arnold, accepting he was superfluous for the nonce, scratched his belly and yawned, then went in search of some reviving water and toothpaste.

### It had been a bitterly cold night and unlike the vivacious reverend, the sun wouldn't be making an appearance for another hour or so, but the morning was shaping up nicely to deliver the ideal conditions for a day on the riverbank.

### The gargantuan breakfast painstakingly prepared by the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, now lay in all its magnificent splendour between the two trenchermen. All washed and shaved, a much sprightlier Arnold Matson thanked the holy man for his marvellous culinary efforts while simultaneously realising why the vicar only partakes of short breaks. If he went away for any longer, pondered Matson, he'd have to buy a bigger camper van to accommodate all the grub.

### Two perfectly formed poached eggs were the only inhabitants on the men's huge white plates pro tem, primarily because Wheatsheaf had presented the rest of the feast on a kind of griddle cum platter, from which they could help themselves. Believe me, Arnold Matson can eat, but he would be hard pushed to remember being faced with this amount of food within his first half-hour of rising. The roll of honour before him included enough sustenance for the village cricket team, and possibly one or two members of the second eleven, but Arnold's juices were undoubtedly coming to life as he ran his disbelieving eyes over a small mountain of bacon, a battalion of sausages, fried tomatoes, a sliced truncheon of black pudding, chestnut mushrooms, devilled kidneys, fried bread and a steaming bowl of baked beans which had mercifully survived Wheatsheaf's singing. A generous rack of toast snuggled next to a jar of home-made marmalade and a pot of tea and coffee completed the banquet. 'Blast,' declared the vicar, 'I forgot the orange juice. Left it in the fridge at home. Sorry, Arnold...' Matson wasn't entirely convinced that there would be any time for fishing by the time the pair had worked their way through this lot, but it should be remembered what a cold night does to the system's storage tanks and in that respect, the reverend had over faced them with the best of intentions. Over light conversation, the two men made substantial inroads into the fare without sheer greed ever entering the equation. Wheatsheaf had pointed out that 'spinning' for fish is unlike conventional angling, where one remains all but stationary for the day. Spinning, he explained, consists of the angler walking along sections of the bank as he casts his lure before winding in slowly, trying, in the scheme of things, to imitate with rod and line, a dead or dying fish which hopefully, will attract a hungry, loitering pike's attention. 'You can get through quite a bit of walking, Arnold,' he said, 'and that's why we need something in the engine to keep us going all day. You'll be glad of this lot by mid-afternoon,' Wheatsheaf concluded, as he picked up a cooling sausage for luck, 'come on; let's get you kitted out with some clobber.'

### Arnold felt as though he had come reasonably well prepared but Wheatsheaf was taking no chances when it came to warmth and comfort. He supplied Matson with two extra thermal vests and another pair of thick thermal leggings to accompany the ones Arnold was already wearing under his trousers, as well as fingerless gloves and a furry hat complete with ear muffs. Once again, the old boy's organisational skills drew nothing but inner-admiration from Matson. Ernest Shackleton couldn't have kitted him out any better. 'You might think you're warm now, Arnold, but once we hit that riverbank...' He was right, of course, and Arnold understood more than enough about nature to know that you ignored it at your peril.

### Not a great deal is said by either man as Wheatsheaf drives them towards his favourite spot on the river some twenty minutes later. The sun is beginning to bless the day in a pale blue, cloudless sky and having arrived in early evening darkness the night before, Arnold Matson now sees for the first time, the stunning natural beauty which draws the reverend to this haven year after year. The vista is incredible and the look of glowing pride on Wheatsheaf's face as he takes his time at the wheel renders conversation surplus to requirements for the moment. As he drives, the reverend peers and bobs his head to various degrees of angle, alternating from the windscreen to Matson's and his own side-windows, as though he is double-checking that everything is still in its place since his previous visit. Occasionally he nods and smiles as he gives his approval to a line of trees, as though he's satisfied after inspecting soldiers on parade.

### He notices Arnold's attention has been arrested by two large hawks circling over pines at the top of the valley and points out to his passenger that there is a pair of binoculars on the dashboard shelf. As Matson lifts up the case containing the field glasses, he is somewhat surprised to reveal a framed photograph of a much younger Wheatsheaf, together with his wife, being showered with confetti on their wedding day. The reverend notices an expression of slight embarrassment on Matson's face and reassures him with a whispered, 'My Martha...she always comes with me.' Arnold smiles compassionately and returns his attention to the hawks in the distance. He slowly adjusts the focus on the binoculars, bringing the birds, which he recognises to be a pair of peregrine falcons, into perfect vision. As he watches their effortless, soaring majesty on thermal winds, his mind flits back to the photograph he had seen moments earlier.

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf and his new bride Martha accounted for most of the space on the black and white print, but there was another face amongst the small crowd of well-wishers that also looked familiar. As the camper van turns off the main road and its tyres begin to crunch on a gravel track that leads to the river, Arnold Matson loses sight of the hawks in the binoculars; but as he places the instrument back in its carrying case, he has no doubt at all who the person in the picture is. It is Edith Moseley, anonymously attending her own son's wedding.

### One occasionally wonders how many of us take rivers for granted. I suspect our mutual lifeblood will never be a topic of conversation on the daily commute to the office or factory; not until, of course, the day arrives when we are left without water. There was absolutely no possibility of such a crisis today, as Arnold Matson and the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf unloaded the fishing tackle and made their way by foot along a riverbank which looked down upon a murky, brimming torrent. In the faster current, weed and bits of floating, wooden debris wrestled and struggled as they spun through tormented eddies. Occasionally they would come to rest as overhanging trees snagged them en-route, only to be dislodged by the next relentless swell. Recent rain and snowfall had undoubtedly taken its toll, and although Wheatsheaf had pointed out to Matson that the water was probably two to three feet higher than he would have liked, he carried on undeterred with Arnold in his wake as they made their way to the holy man's favourite stretch of river.

### If, as a reader, you have always yearned for a dead herring to entice you at the start of a subsection, then you have come to the right place, because the man concentrating in the bitter cold as he threads treble-hooks into the dorsal fin magnificence of said herring is a vicar on a mission. Why cats are partial to tuna fish in their diet is a strange enough conundrum when you consider that most felines tend to run a mile if they come face to face with water, but almost the same could be said of the pike when they are offered a sea dwelling creature in freshwater surroundings. What could possibly appeal? Still, ours is not to reason why and the reverend casts his dead bait towards the far bank with optimism before settling the fluorescent red bobbin he will use as a bite indicator, contentedly in a calm, deep pool, well away from the nuisance of passing flotsam. Once he has placed the rod on its rest he sets to work on tackling-up two other rods for himself and Matson, which they will use for spinning. In layman's terms the spinner itself resembles a twisted silver tea spoon with a large treble-hook attached to the end. One simply casts this object into the river, then slowly rewind and hope that a loitering pike raises an eyebrow and pounces. While the process itself may well strike you as a piece of cake, I should point out that, on certain days, the fisherman trying his luck in freezing conditions stands a better chance of developing pneumonia than he does of acquiring a passing nibble; and yet, in a strange sort of way, that's half the fun of it. Expectation is the name of the game.

### Already, a good ninety minutes have elapsed since Wheatsheaf and Matson first began casting their lures into the waters but apart from an inquisitive stare from a cow in the field opposite, there has been no sign of life, fishy or otherwise. To be fair, much time has been lost to, shall we say basic tutoring, as Wheatsheaf was constantly on call to untangle Arnold's line as it wrapped around his reel time after time, but this is par for the course for the baffled newcomer, and the reverend showed terrific restraint and patience as he repeatedly sorted out the knotted-nightmares and got Matson up and running again. No sooner had he paved the way and issued a fresh set of instructions to Arnold before returning to his own patch, the cry of distress would go up and back he would traipse. Not so easy this fishing lark...

### By ten-thirty, hot coffee and a tactical chin-wag is the order of the day as the two men lay down their rods and reconvene. A fallen tree log provides a suitable seat of office as well as affording them with a fine vantage point from which they can keep an eye on the red bobbin still on duty with the dead herring. Arnold pours the beverages while the reverend tries a fresh cast with the untouched herring rod. The bait splashes into the river a little further downstream from where it has been ignored for well over an hour and Wheatsheaf settles the rig in his chosen spot before clambering up the bank for his warming refreshment. He settles himself on the log and much to Matson's surprise, produces a hipflask from his fleece jacket pocket and sloshes a generous slug of whiskey into both men's drinking vessels. 'Why not, eh, Arnold?' the reverend says mischievously. It was indeed, a glorious morning, and the sensuous palette of trees, river and flecked blue sky, together with the aroma of coffee with whiskey on its vapour trail, paved the way for a tranquil mind-set. 'Don't worry, Arnold,' Wheatsheaf said reassuringly, 'early days. Bags of time.' 'No, I'm enjoying it,' replied Matson, raising his coffee cup to the reverend, 'it's just so peaceful. And besides,' he added, 'you would have probably caught one or two by now if you hadn't been wet nursing me all the time.' It hardly appeared as a brainstorm but nonetheless it occurred to Arnold that the pair of them had seen not a single soul since they arrived here and judging by the remoteness of the reverend's chosen location, they were unlikely to do so. Indeed, the only other face to trouble Matson's memory bank for a while now, was that of the vicar's mother, Edith Moseley, which he had recognised from the wedding photograph back in Wheatsheaf's Dormobile.

### The amount of contemplative silences on this trip were presenting so many opportunities for Matson to share his secret and break the news to the holy man, but each time they reared their irrational head in his imagination, he immediately crushed them beneath a hypothetical size ten boot. He only had to glance at the man beside him on the log to recognise that the world Wheatsheaf has formed for himself; the security blanket he clings to is at the very least, adequate; and who was Arnold Matson to invade the castle of another man's kingdom?

'Hello, hello...' The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf took a long, slow draft of his coffee laced with whiskey, placed the cup on the log and slowly got to his feet.

'Come on, Arnold,' he said gently, but with enough authority to signal it was time for action stations, 'come on my beauty...that's the way.' Arnold realised that the final part of Wheatsheaf's sentence was directed towards the river and as the penny finally dropped inside Matson's mind, he looked towards the red bobbin which contained the dead herring. It was moving.

### There is many a controversial theory pertaining what to do when a pike takes a dead bait and whether it is right or wrong, the reverend is a man who puts his supportive tick firmly in the box of the old school of opinion. Viz. When the fish begins to take and examine the proffered bait in its mouth, do not lift the rod and strike for a good thirty-seconds. With this logic in mind, Wheatsheaf stealthily made his way towards the rod as he kept an eye on the red bobbin which was showing more, encouraging signs of movement as the predator took hold. He waved Matson towards him and beckoned him to get a move on.

### Both men arrived by the rod in its rest on the edge of the river and Wheatsheaf issued his final instructions. 'Now, this is your moment, Arnold,' he whispered firmly, 'when I give the word I want you to take the rod handle in both hands, lift it slowly out of its rest and yank it upwards towards the sky...nice and firm, one movement.'

'Me?' said Matson incredulously.

'No time for arguments, Arnold,' said the reverend, 'ready?'

### Matson's eyes were on stalks and he was shaking with concentration in-case he let the side down.

'Now!' cried the reverend. Matson grabbed the rod and jerked it upwards. To his absolute amazement his action stopped with a jolt and the rod almost bent double.

'Got him!' exclaimed Wheatsheaf, sounding as though he belonged to a tribe that had been tracking buffalo in the Serengeti for days on end. Matson couldn't believe the power that was being generated from the end of his line.

The ratchets on the gears of his reel began to click and whirr as the pike pulled away from him with relentless determination. Calls of 'what do I do, what do I do?' emanated from Arnold as he hung on for dear life. 'Let him have his way but keep the line tight. Don't give him too much slack. You'll not stop him so we've got to tire him out.' Wheatsheaf's instructions were all very well but right now it felt as though Matson was trying to halt a motor cycle. The fish suddenly changed direction and Wheatsheaf could see from the line above the water that the pike was heading towards familiar ground. 'He's trying to take you into the weeds; he's trying to snag you up,' Wheatsheaf assessed, 'keep calm, Arnold, and keep that line tight.' A vicar masquerading as Captain Ahab, thought Matson, although he was enjoying every second of the battle. The struggle settled to a stillness which Wheatsheaf didn't trust. 'Here, let me have him,' he said, taking the rod from Matson, 'I'll put you back in charge once we have him back into the open.' Once Wheatsheaf had taken in all the slack line the tip of the rod bent again considerably and there was no question the pike was still on the other end.

### The whole experience had taken Arnold Matson completely by surprise and he found it almost impossible to believe that four minutes ago he was daydreaming on a log, sipping coffee in the peace and quiet of the countryside. He was shaking from top to toe with adrenalin. 'Now then, where are you going...come on...come on,' Wheatsheaf muttered to himself as he assessed the problem. The pike had taken temporary sanctuary in the shallower water, rocks and weed towards the far bank and while Matson had no idea of the weight of the beast, the swirls it produced when it occasionally disturbed the surface, told him it was a considerable fish. Wheatsheaf was keeping the rod almost vertical as he tried to steer the fish away from the awkward snags. He knew he just had to maintain his patience until the pike panicked and set off once more into the open stream. From there the advantage would lay squarely with the reverend as the exertions took their toll on the creature.

### Without warning, the fish set off once again and Wheatsheaf quickly regained control. Things could still go wrong but the tide, so to speak, had turned and Wheatsheaf handed the rod back to Arnold.

'Now, just keep it tight, keep it steady,' he said, rolling out an unhooking mat on the bank and reaching for the landing net. Matson continued to wind in slowly and the red bobbin edged towards him, shuddering and vibrating as it did so. Since his original encounter, the fish now felt more like a dead weight to Arnold, but the occasional shudder from under the water told him that it had not yet given up the fight completely.

### Almost two- minutes later, Arnold got his first glimpse of the pike's head as it broke the surface of the river. He was too much in awe to say anything other than 'wow,' and Wheatsheaf continued to reassure him before quietly confirming, 'It's a nice fish, Arnold, a nice fish...'

### The reverend realised the pike had given its all and slid the landing net under its body in a slick movement that finally broke the tension. 'Wow' emanated once again from a truly stunned Matson and Wheatsheaf laid the net containing the magnificent creature on the unhooking mat for the removal of the treble-hooks and the remnants of the demolished herring. He took the small forceps from his waistband and donned the stainless steel gauze glove as a safety precaution; although he could see that the hooks were at the front of the fish's mouth. Wheatsheaf removed the hooks and apart from one lively flap of the tail fin, the pike gave no resistance. The creature would be fine on dry land for a few minutes and no doubt, be grateful of the rest in a strange way. Wheatsheaf weighed the fish while it still lay in the landing net and it was a tad less than seventeen pounds. Three-feet of streamlined power.

### For a few moments Arnold Matson just stood admiring in wonderment at the beautiful beast that had given him the thrill of a lifetime.

### Wheatsheaf said little and smiled to his friend. The reverend edged his way towards the water and gently lowered the landing net into the river, enabling the pike to slowly acclimatise in the place it belongs. It remained almost static for a few moments and then began to take in the gentle flow through its mouth and gills.

### Suddenly its whole body sparked back into life and it shot from the net like a majestic bullet.

### Chapter Thirty Four

### An Unforeseen Picture

### The hour which followed the catch and release of a seventeen-pound specimen was always unlikely to scale the previous heights, and so it proved. Unannounced, a large bank of cloud had gathered and Wheatsheaf wisely decided they should take cover in the Dormobile until the heavens had had their say. Rain was steadily falling as they approached the camper van and within minutes of them putting their gear inside and clambering aboard, the cloudburst was upon them and beating on the roof and windscreen of their cosy shelter.

### The two men removed the waterproofed top layers of their clothing and got comfortable. It was still only late morning and the reverend was confident of resumption within the hour. In the meantime there was much to reflect upon and Arnold Matson was still visibly glowing from the earlier excitement.

'I still can't believe how powerful it was,' said Arnold, unwrapping the foil on a couple of sandwiches and offering one to Wheatsheaf.

'It was a female,' said the vicar, taking up Arnold's offer, 'they're always much bigger than male fish. It's the eggs, you see. Not many people catch anything of that size on their first trip, Arnold, I'll tell you.'

'What's the biggest you've ever caught, Colin?' he asked.

'Not much bigger than that one and I've been fishing for a long time,' said Wheatsheaf, 'just over twenty-two pounds is the best I ever managed. You're a lucky man, Arnold...'

### There it is again, thought Arnold. The characteristic, melancholic twist to the end of the holy man's sentence. It's almost as though Wheatsheaf grudgingly accepts that happiness will always remain fleeting, so why linger on the pleasure any longer than is necessary? It isn't as though the man is miserable by nature; far from it.

### Arnold pictures Wheatsheaf as a child, perhaps playing with one of those simple soap bubble kits. There were always two kinds of players; one who enjoyed blowing the bubbles through the loop and seeing the wonderment of the transient globules as they floated away with the breeze; and the other kids who were never happy unless they clapped their hands around each and every minor-miracle as it appeared and so ruining the simple pleasure for everyone else. There's no two ways about it; The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf is a complex, loveable hybrid. 'Oh, thanks, Arnold.' Wheatsheaf gratefully acknowledges the tea Matson pours for him and his persona lifts once again. He takes a sizeable bite from his corned beef sandwich and carefully cogitates. Arnold inwardly smiles, tucks into his own sandwich and awaits the delayed arrival of the vicar's inevitable question, the subject of which is anyone's guess. Wheatsheaf prolongs the excitement for a few more seconds as he meticulously dislodges an awkward morsel of meat from his front teeth with a probing tongue. 'What would you say,' he began, closely inspecting the captured, annoying particle between thumb and index finger, before flicking it nonchalantly into an empty crisp packet, 'what would you say,' he repeated, 'would be the one creature, animal, call it what you will; the one creature,' he emphasized again, 'that we, as human beings, could all learn the most from?'

### Blimey, thought Arnold, as his fond memories of the pike waved bye-bye for the moment. 'Well,' he began. 'The reason I ask,' continued Wheatsheaf, halting Matson's reply before it had a chance to breathe, 'is because I know how fond you are of insects and birds and things; but I just wondered if you, you know...' He petered out and returned to his sandwich. Arnold thought for a few moments before offering, 'Well, it's such a big subject, Colin. We could sit here for six-months and I wouldn't have even scratched the surface.'

'I'm not asking you to sort the world out, Arnold,' said Wheatsheaf, rummaging for a pot of coleslaw, 'I just wondered that's all.' He realised his question must have sounded heavy-handed and reassured his friend. 'It's alright, Arnold,' he said quietly, 'we'll be fishing again soon.'

### Heavy rain continued to fall as Matson considered the myriad of options at his disposal. He still wasn't entirely sure where the reverend was intending to go with all this and knowing Wheatsheaf's butterfly mind, it was more than likely he had merely asked the question to pass the time. He poured himself a drop more tea and launched a mini-hand grenade to get things underway. 'The thing is, Colin,' Arnold began, 'there is no charity in nature. Self-interest is what matters. Evolution has no commonwealth.'

### Wheatsheaf helped himself to a forkful of coleslaw and nodded thoughtfully.

'But going back to your original question,' Arnold continued, 'not that this answers it anyway,' he said, losing himself along the way, 'the one creature that human beings have a lot in common with is the ant.' Matson let Wheatsheaf stew for a moment as he licked the back of his fork. 'Any idea why, Colin?' prompted Arnold.

'Well...' said the reverend eventually,' they work hard.'

'That's a very good answer, Colin,' said Matson, in a manner which almost had the vicar back in short trousers in infant school. 'But the main reason,' Arnold concluded, 'is because ants, like humans, are absolutely dependent on slaves.'

### Wheatsheaf emitted a slow, agreeable groan which collided with a burp provoked by the coleslaw. 'We're all working for somebody, is that what you're saying?' Wheatsheaf asked reasonably. Matson nodded.

'No matter how small, how miniscule,' said Arnold, 'we are all of us, every single one of us...feeding off somebody or something.'

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf struggled in vain to unscrew the stubborn lid from a jar of pickled onions and asked Matson if he would be so kind.

'Touché,' said the vicar, ever so meekly.

### The rain persisted for over an hour before the pair decided it was time to head back to the river. As usual, the combination of two very different minds entrenched in a confined space had made for interesting, not to say diversionary entertainment, as Matson and Wheatsheaf sheltered from the elements. The vicar had certainly tuned-in to Matson's philosophy about the similarities of ants and humans, and as Arnold expanded his theory with anecdotes regarding how some ants enslave their own kind and how, in particular, honeypot ants often attack their neighbours and carry off their workers, it inspired the vicar to draw allusions to modern-day call centres, where clearly slaves and their owners have obvious conflicts of interest but both parties simply keep mum and take the money and run. Arnold suggested to Wheatsheaf that it was possibly a bit more complicated than that but the vicar offered him a slice of Madeira cake and they settled for a truce.

### With regard to the angling and after due consideration, Wheatsheaf thought it best if they spread their wings a little for the next port of call. He knew of a lovely stretch not fifteen minutes' drive away which would not only be a bit easier to fish after the latest downpour, it would also be convenient for their travel plans when it came to hitting the road for home later in the day. Matson had no complaints on either score and was pleasantly surprised when Wheatsheaf asked him if he would like to drive the old Dormobile to the next spot. The reverend had gone on to say that the short journey they were about to embark on held some special memories from way back when, but Arnold had politely interrupted him and said there was absolutely no need to explain.

### As the winter sunshine once more got the better of the clouds above their heads, the tyres of the camper van scrunched slowly over the gravel track, before the wheels finally welcomed the smoothness of the road before them...

### Once again their vehicle finds itself tootling along on an almost deserted country road, which inspires Matson to drive even slower than is necessary, thus enabling the reverend to delve further into his box of fond memories as he takes in the splendour of the scenery unfolding before him. As he smiles and recalls times that will never be erased from his heart and soul, he holds his arms across his midriff, so that the palms of his hands each clasp the opposite bicep, which gives the impression that he is caressing a dancing partner who has somehow slipped through his arms forever. Occasionally he glances at his wedding photograph on the dashboard shelf and clutches himself just that little bit tighter as he sees the face of his bride on the happiest day of his life.

### The rare sight of an overtaking truck momentarily startles Wheatsheaf back to reality, but no sooner has the vehicle interrupted his daydream and disappeared into the distance, the reverend's expression and demeanour have returned to the cocoon within which he feels safest, and one that the outside world can never penetrate or possibly understand.

### Less than three-hours of daylight remain as Arnold Matson pulls on the hand brake of the vicar's trusty old Dormobile, and as the two men survey the river from the warmth of the vehicle, they also observe that the sun has finally deserted them once and for all; replaced, as it is, by a thin valley mist and a general air of murkiness. Apocalyptic is, perhaps, stretching a point to exaggeration when it comes to describing weather conditions, but it was the sort of early afternoon we have all experienced and one which makes us feel as though we are the only person on earth.

### The visibility remained good, but there was a feeling in Arnold Matson's unconscious mind which had altered; in the way, one would suspect, a mountaineer cogitates with a seed of doubt as to whether he should try for the summit by nightfall or simply make base camp and await the relative safety of a new morning. Matson had even suggested as much to the reverend, who appreciated Arnold's concerns, before he finally quashed the notion with boyish enthusiasm and bullish remarks about how he hated being dictated to by the elements. Now, there is a subject which Matson could have taken issue with the vicar on, for there can only ever be one winner if a man is foolish enough to pick a fight with the mighty power of nature.

### For the sake of amicability Arnold had kept his unquestionable thoughts and theories to himself, and the two men now find themselves squelching down the gentle gradient of a saturated footpath towards a river that has no more regard for sentiment than does the mist which is currently descending from the low cloud and threatening to envelop them.

### The first hour of their reacquaintance with the river proved fruitless and Wheatsheaf experimented with numerous tactical changes as his quest grew more and more frustrating. The strategy of dead-baiting, which had succeeded earlier in the day, has now been abandoned altogether by the scheming, meticulous Wheatsheaf, and he has equipped both Matson and himself with lures which are known as pike plugs. Plugs are artificial bait that resemble a relatively large, injured fish, and they are designed in such a way that they give off vibrations and make side-to-side movements as the angler winds them back towards the bank, and it is the combination of those two actions which should, in theory, awaken the hungry inquisitiveness of the predator. They are fairly luminous, which will count for very little in the soup-coloured river Wheatsheaf and Matson currently find themselves tackling, and there are fearsome looking hooks attached to their underside, which would take some escaping from should the pike find itself unable to resist. In summary, a formidable bait...should there be any interested fish within the vicinity.

### I have touched upon the fact that this style of angling involves the inevitability of walking, albeit very slowly and methodically, a considerable distance. One casts the lure and winds in gently, but all the while, almost without thinking, the participant is taking a few strides along the bank and, as is the case of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, those strides become a little more frequent as his frustrations become more apparent. What starts out as a couple of friends chatting amicably a few yards apart from each other can, and invariably does, end with one of the party, no matter how large or small, wandering off as he is led by the collar, so to speak, by grim determination to catch what he came all this way for before the fading light ends his hopes and makes the decision for him.

### Daylight was not going to be an issue for Wheatsheaf and Matson for another two hours, but the cold stillness and the mist were now very much a prominent feature, so much so that, in his own concentrated efforts, Arnold Matson had lost sight of the reverend as he had ventured further and further along the riverbank.

### Matson finished winding in his lure following another futile dunking and was about to cast in once again. Instead, he maintained his stance in the chill and listened intently. Apart from his own occasional sniffle and the slight brushing effect of the fabric on his waterproof jacket, the river, not two-yards away from his feet, was the only other sound he could hear.

### He cocked an ear and listened closer.

### Nothing.

'Colin?'

### His call seemed to travel nowhere.

'Colin...?' he tried again with more emphasis, 'Are you alright?'

### Once more, the river at his feet was all he heard. Matson clambered up the bank and began to walk hurriedly along the main track, which was treacherous enough to affect his progress. He checked his stride and called out once more, but barely had the cry left his lips when another voice collided with his own.

'Bring the landing net, Arnold!' it exclaimed, 'Get yourself down here!'

### The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf has finally hooked what he came for.

### Despite his best efforts, Matson was finding it difficult to make headway along the saturated track, and the ankle-high bramble combined with overgrown wild grass, repeatedly clawing at the lower part of his leggings and boots, both hampered his progress and increased his frustration. He could hear Wheatsheaf's calls and frequently answered that he was on his way, but the combination of boots splashing through puddles, the sound of his own deep breathing and the noise of the undergrowth, rendered the two men's communications futile. In the confusion of the past couple of minutes, Matson wasn't entirely sure if the path he was awkwardly navigating was actually taking him further away from Wheatsheaf's location, and his relief was palpable when he finally came to a clearing which brought the reverend into his line of vision.

### However, Matson's doubts regarding his own wayward navigations became fully justified as he suddenly found himself towering some twenty feet above the holy man and confronting a treacherous gradient of river bank. Still, at least they could see one another and Wheatsheaf witnessed and acknowledged Matson's predicament.

'This is some fish, Arnold,' Wheatsheaf called over his shoulder, 'for heaven's sake don't try and drop down that bank. There's another gap to your right. It's about twenty yards further along. I'll edge him that way and you can get down and land him for me.'

### The pike set off on another powerful run which prompted Wheatsheaf to add, 'No rush, Arnold...I think he's just found his second wind.' The comment lightened the mood slightly and Matson returned a wholehearted, 'Hang on in there, Colin,' before turning away to reconnoitre the alternative pathway which hopefully, would give him access to the waterside.

### As Wheatsheaf continued to skilfully play the fish and manoeuvre it towards a friendlier shelf in the river for landing, a major obstacle he had not previously considered suddenly became apparent. So far during the struggle, the reverend had the freedom of the river bank in his favour, thus allowing him room to dictate proceedings at his own pace. He now realises that the luxury of sure-footing is about to be removed from the equation in approximately twelve-yards as the riverbank he is currently relying on comes to an end; only to be replaced by a steeper promontory which, so far as Wheatsheaf can ascertain, will act as an insurmountable obstacle between himself and Arnold Matson. The impossibility of the situation plants an awful, inescapable seed into the mind of the holy man. He has literally run out of road, so to speak, and arrived at a dead end.

### Time, unfolding as it does under this kind of dilemma and surging adrenalin, takes on the magnitude of an eternity, but the fact of the matter is it is only ten-minutes since Wheatsheaf hooked the monster he is determined to land and he now has to take stock of his options if he is to succeed with the challenge. He knows the simplest solution would be for him to return via the way he came and in so doing he would simply eliminate the obstacle that lies before him, for he knows he cannot overcome the gradient of the promontory.

### However, it is here we arrive at the real crux of the matter...

### Whatever is hooked and is currently doing all it can to escape from the determination of the reverend, and by all accounts we are considering a battle with a fish which conservatively weighs-in at around twenty pounds is presently being 'played' downstream. That is to say, Wheatsheaf is working the pike as it goes with the flow way over to his right-hand side. Should the reverend now decide to go back whence the way he came, he would not only find himself playing the fish upstream, he would also be pitting himself against the strength of nature as the river's current would literally be turned against him and thus stop doing him any favours whatsoever. In simple terms, he would be seriously up against it and the odds of him landing his dream fish would all but disappear. The man is no fool and he knows only too well that a twenty-pound weight is an altogether different proposition when you are, in every respect, pulling against the tide, and that is exactly what he would be doing if he retraced his steps now.

### Unbeknown to Wheatsheaf, the arrival of the one-man cavalry, in the shape of Arnold Matson, had discovered that the same problem of access also applies on the top footpath and he had been forced to double-back on himself. It was something of a relief to both men when the ruddy face and mud-splattered shape of Arnold appeared once more at the top of the grassy ravine. His vantage point was good enough to allow the pair to communicate but any assistance so far as the landing net was concerned was out of the question. Matson's plight was helpless when it came to negotiating the bank which lay beneath him. The tension of the rod's line emitted an eerie, high-pitched whining sound in the cold stillness, and while the thin, ghostly resonance is familiar to any angler who has hooked into a decent fish, it was not a sound which sits easily with Arnold Matson; it seemed to exaggerate an air of surreal uneasiness to what was already an uncomfortable situation. Indeed, the sound seemed to represent an invisible thread between himself and the lonely fisherman below. Matson had never felt more helpless in his life.

### He was so physically disconnected from the scene he was witnessing that it was as though the whole scenario was unfolding on a giant cinema screen, and no matter what he thought or imagined as he stood powerlessly in the freezing cold, could affect the outcome of this absurd situation. He was watching a stubborn vicar trying to land a stupid fish in the middle of winter in the middle of nowhere. And slowly it began to dawn on Arnold Matson that this was a crazy, pointless exercise which he no longer wanted any part of. Look around you, he told himself...down below is a sixty-three-year-old clergyman who is risking his life against the elements, and his sheer pig-headedness is taking him further into the mire.

### The calmness of Matson's announcement and suggestion came as a surprise as it left his lips. 'Look, Colin,' he said, and he knew immediately there wasn't nearly enough projection in his voice for it to have any impact. He tried again.

'Colin!' He made sure this time and the vicar responded as he half turned his head over his left shoulder. 'What is it?' he called, still concentrating on the job in hand. Matson considered for a moment before delivering...'Look...why don't you just leave it, eh?'

'What?' resonated back up the ravine.

'Why don't you just leave it...just cut the line for God sake...let it go.' Arnold Matson may as well have been talking to himself and the silence from the riverbank below him told him as much. He could see Wheatsheaf producing the stainless steel gauze glove from the small bag of equipment which hung by his waist and he immediately knew that the vicar had decided to land the fish himself by edging it to the bank before grabbing it by its gill cover.

### Wheatsheaf had talked Matson through the procedure back at the camper van and he had no reason to doubt that the old man knew what he was doing.

'She's tiring, Arnold, she's tiring,' came the respectful victory cry from the reverend, as the magnificent specimen came to the surface and was expertly guided towards the shore, like some exhausted, finned torpedo.

### For the pike, the struggle was finally over and Wheatsheaf crouched on his haunches before expertly sliding his left-hand into the edge of the water and lifting the fish onto the bank with his protected hand.

### He removed the lure which contained the hooks from the side of the pike's gaping mouth and slowly rose from the ground with the trophy of a lifetime cradled lovingly in his arms. The glowing pride of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf's face and the defeated giant across his chest presented the perfect photo opportunity and Arnold Matson delved desperately amongst his layers of clothing to find the camera he was searching for before Wheatsheaf returned the pike to its natural home.

### As the camera emerged from Matson's fleece jacket pocket, elation and excitement were instantly replaced by disbelief and horror. The powerful fish suddenly jerked once in Wheatsheaf's arms and as the clergyman tried desperately to cling to his pride and joy, he lost his footing in the struggle.

### From the top of the ridge, Arnold Matson was now finally prepared to photograph a special memento. His heart almost stopped as he looked below him once more only to see the struggling, screaming shape of his friend as he was being swept away by a relentless and fearsome current.

### Chapter Thirty Five

### A Forgiving Silence

A solitary candle, strategically placed in the centre of a table, sputters and stammers in the natural draught of an unsettled evening, as a reliable, old Dormobile fends off the elements to the best of its ability. The flickering silhouette on the inside of the vehicle portrays the shadow of a man who is numb with shock, and every variation of the flame into which he stares, twists and distorts to form an emotional dance which corresponds with the inside of his confused mind.

### The brilliance of the candle's beam highlights the golden nectar of the whiskey in his tumbler before it temporarily disappears behind his clasping hand as he raises the vessel to his lips once again. He replaces the glass to its previous resting place, as though he were an automaton, before meticulously adding more from an already half-empty bottle. For now, the tears lay in an empty well in the bottom of Arnold Matson's disbelieving heart, but they will arrive, as surely as the headlights on the police car had arrived earlier in the evening, before the confirmation of the discovery of the body of the reverend was delivered to him in a statement which landed with the inevitability of a Christmas present one has discovered under the parental bed two weeks before it is actually placed beneath the tree as a surprise.

### Matson knew full well that his friend Wheatsheaf couldn't possibly survive the unforgiving conditions into which he had slipped and fallen, but the mental image of the man being swept away while he himself stood marooned like a petrified statue on the hill above the catastrophe; so helpless to the cause that he may as well have not been there at all; that agonising freeze-frame nightmare which remains fixed and vivid in the forefront of Matson's mind...

### The occasional buffeting from the wind outside and the pattern of his own breathing, as he inhales methodically before exhaling with a mixture of shock and anguish, are the only sounds in Matson's world right now, though the agonising cries of a man being taken and carried by a merciless torrent like some kind of children's toy, keep on returning at unbearable, regular intervals and reverberate through his psyche.

### Arnold has returned to the same spot they stayed barely twenty-four hours earlier. Indeed, it is impossible to believe that this time yesterday the two men were basking in the glory of an almighty supper, prepared and cooked by an individual whose boyish enthusiasm and anticipation of the next day was positively brimming over. But as Matson fingers and contemplates over the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf's black and white wedding photograph, as its shiny surface is brought to life by the flame of the flickering candle, the mixture of last night's memories and the horror of today's reality collide, and the dam inside Arnold Matson finally bursts. At first the tears are intermittent and the tightness in Matson's throat combines with the act of swallowing, almost as though the body is trying to help him overcome the inevitable breakdown, or at least, suppress every emotion until they are all in place and ready to surface.

### Moments later, Arnold Matson has broken down completely and his emotional coordination is such that it is all he can do to extinguish the dripping candle and fall into exhausted sleep in the clothes he is wearing.

### Brilliant sunshine had penetrated the Dormobile's windscreen and teased Arnold Matson into a new day. Somewhat surprisingly, his night's sleep had been mercifully dreamless, although he was now paying the penalty for the posture of his alcohol-induced sleeping position. Hot coffee and the fresh morning air through the gaping sliding-door of the camper van are the only remedies available to his hangover and aching muscles. He massages the crick in his neck as he sips his second cup of comforting java and looks out across the valley. It is as stunningly beautiful as it was and always will be, but the vast array of shades and colours contained amongst the trees and contours of the hillsides now blend to evoke an emotional melancholy rather than the uplifting splendour of two days ago.

### The horrific images from yesterday are, of course, impossible to subdue and will doubtless spasmodically return to haunt Matson for the rest of his days, but prolonging his stay at this location was not going to help matters.

### A lonesome hawk, perhaps one of the pair Arnold had observed when he first arrived here, soars in the distance, as if it is keeping an interested eye on Matson's movements down below. He takes a huge draught of his coffee as he admires the wonderment. He watches the bird for a few seconds longer then casts the remaining dregs of his cup into the bitter cold before turning his back on the scenery and firmly slamming the vehicle's side-door shut on the outside world.

### Some thirty-minutes later, and having enjoyed a decent wash and a basic breakfast to sustain himself, Arnold feels a noticeable improvement in his demeanour as the inevitable, mundane routine of motorway traffic begins to unfold around him. After all that he has witnessed in the last twenty-four hours, the normality of real life, with its preordained sprinkling of careless drivers, road signs and traffic cones, his unhurried journey in the inside lane is proving to be the ideal antidote for his racing mind. The concentration required when driving temporarily eclipses his undeniable heartbreak, and as he checks his unshaven face in the Dormobile's wing mirror, a philosophical expression of acceptance plays across his tired features. Two car horns clash and remonstrate in the outside lane as the speeding drivers blame one another for nothing more futile than wanting to get from A to B as quickly as possible and Arnold Matson accepts he is slowly returning to the land of so-called reality.

### Almost one-hundred miles remained between Arnold Matson's trundling motorway vehicle and that of his homestead as his mind returned once more to the devastating matter in hand. The secret he could never divulge to the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf about his natural mother was one thing, and whichever way you spun the coin that particular dilemma had fatefully taken care of itself; but how does a man return to his village with the burden and responsibility of notifying the doting mother about the tragic course of events which led to her orphaned son being swept to his death?

### If Arnold Matson could see the old lady who is currently kneeling by the altar of his local parish church, as she gently lifts a black veil to enable her to dry her eyes, he would not be preoccupied by any such concerns.

### To Arnold Matson, the remainder of his slow drive homewards seemed to unfold as some sort of human dreamscape. His mind is undoubtedly in a state of shock and his thoughts criss-crossed and raced as they hurtled around his head, but there are only so many hypothetical points of view the mind will tolerate before it automatically flicks a cooler switch and forces you to calm down. His mind has been tossing and turning in the inside lane of a motorway for a little over ninety minutes and it is high time he turned off from the monotony of traffic whistling past him and took a short break.

### Matson had no intention of entering the chaotic world of the roadside cafeteria, which, as far as he was concerned, is all these places ever are no matter how you dress them up, but as luck would have it he found himself parked in a bay which afforded him the perfect vantage point from which to observe both the dining area and the convenience shop which adjoins it. He pours himself a cup of steaming hot coffee from a thermos flask he had prepared earlier and clumsily scratches around in the bottom of a tired looking carrier bag before finally producing a dog-eared cheese sandwich.

Simple food and the warmth of the Dormobile's heater provide Arnold Matson with the comfiest seat in this human auditorium and it is all taking place on the other side of his mud-spattered windscreen. He settles back in the driving seat and observes the world going about its daily business and you can almost hear his brain thanking him for the short sabbatical. As he sips his coffee and takes the odd nibble of his sorry sandwich, Arnold Matson is reminded of something he has mulled over on numerous occasions in the past. It is hardly earthshattering as far as observations are concerned, but nonetheless, there is something richly rewarding about this standard behaviour when you observe it as an outsider which, as he dunks a chocolate digestive into his hot coffee, Arnold undoubtedly is at this precise moment in time. Matson's enjoyable little quirk is simply this... Observe a room full of individuals at the venue of your choice and you will, without a shadow of a doubt, see an overwhelming number of people nodding their heads in agreement and understanding as opposed to shaking them in doubt and disbelief, and yet, as Arnold clumsily loses half his biscuit to the hidden depths of his coffee cup, how come every time we switch on the television news, all we are ever faced with is people arguing until they are blue in the face? Arnold tests the theory for a few moments longer and takes his usual consolation from the fact that there has to be more good than bad before finally abandoning his fruitless search for the escaped prisoner of his dissolved digestive. He wearily places the remainder of the coffee and its sunken wreckage in the plastic cup holder and willingly accepts the oncoming rush of forty winks.

### As it transpired, his motorway siesta led him by the hand into the realms of a good old-fashioned solid kip and snoozing session and once again his visit to dreamland hadn't uncovered any unpleasant nightmare scenarios. Some eighty minutes later, as he stirs from sleep, his actions are painfully slow, which gives the impression as he comes to life, that he is some kind of newly hatched human larva in the transitional stage of metamorphosis. His brown woolly hat, pulled down over his eyes for extra comfort and seclusion for the duration of his repose, is slowly rolled back by gloved hands to reveal bleary eyes and an unshaven face. The insect, in the form of Arnold Matson, is suitably refreshed and ready to fly.

### The remainder of his steady drive back home was delightfully uneventful. The sleep had worked its wonders and had calmed his nervous system and thought process to an altogether more stable barometer. To an extent he had continued to ask himself more and more pointless and putative questions, but an air of rationality was now seeping into the equation as his intelligent mind compartmentalised the problems and encouraged him to walk the path of common sense.

### It felt more than a little peculiar as Arnold Matson slowly steered a deceased holy man's vehicle through his home streets, and as with all trips away from what one is familiar, the village gave the impression that it had shrunk in the wash in Arnold's absence. The explanation was, of course, a simple one, and Matson knew the scale of the scenery to which his mind had been accustomed to on his mini-break, was now being replaced in his consciousness by the equivalent of toy town. Because of the fragile state of his mind and grieving heart, all of the instantly recognisable shops and houses he was slowly driving past, suddenly appeared to Arnold as though they were all so vulnerable; as though a huge hand could emerge at any moment and simply lift a cosy home and its inhabitants into the clouds and thus extinguish life within in the blink of an eye. The Dormobile was now the trundling equivalent of the Space Shuttle. It had returned to land from an altogether different atmosphere and orbit, and its exhausted one-man crew was struggling to come to terms with the loss of his co-pilot.

### The winter sun was just beginning to set as Arnold Matson rummaged for the three keys which will gain him access to his empty public house.

### Three separate keys, and for what purpose? Do they stop the world from entering or do they merely allow Arnold Matson admission to his own solitary cell, where he suddenly feels as though he has become both the jailer and prisoner.

### Chapter Thirty Six

### A Soul for Sale

### Immersed, as he was, in so much reflection, Arnold Matson's winter had melted and merged into the optimism of early spring as though the transition of the seasons had taken pity on his emotions and paved the way especially for him. The transparently blatant commerciality of the festive season hadn't been as painful as he had envisaged and Matson had somewhat taken himself by surprise by keeping the pub open for the locals to drop in as and when they pleased. Harold Garstang needed no second invitation to such generosity but Arnold was grateful of the old man's ramblings and idiosyncrasies as he resumed his rightful position on a stool at the bar; the twin companions of his brimming tankard and his faithful three-legged cocker spaniel dozing at his feet amply fulfilling the simple requirements of his disposition and bailiwick.

### The sad news of the passing of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf had, at first, filtered among the inhabitants before spreading like the proverbial forest fire, but the way in which the news had reached the vicar's natural mother, Edith Moseley, had not only taken Arnold Matson so completely by surprise, it had the incredible double effect of restoring his lapsed faith and mending his grieving heart at the same time.

### On the afternoon he had returned from the fateful fishing trip which claimed the life of her orphaned son, Arnold did little else other than fret and ruminate long into the evening as to how he was going to break the awful news to Miss Moseley the following morning. He had eaten a light supper and wisely opted for a relatively early night to properly prepare both mind and body for the duty of messenger boy once the sun had risen on a new day.

### Fortified by a decent breakfast and strong coffee, he was absentmindedly rinsing one or two things in the kitchen sink as he plucked up the courage to call at Miss Moseley's bungalow and inform her of the tragic events, when the old lady's face suddenly appeared on the other side of his kitchen window. Matson was so startled by the vision that he immediately leaped and fumbled and managed to break a dinner plate as it collided with the underside of the hot tap. Edith Moseley remained perfectly motionless before methodically raising her right hand and pointing her index finger towards Matson's back door. As soon as she had beckoned the motion, she moved slowly out of vision and headed for the entrance.

### Arnold hurriedly wiped his hands on a tea towel and went to let her in.

### His hands were noticeably shaking as he fumbled with the various bolts and locks and every one of the comforting anecdotes he had prepared deserted him as he struggled to get the door open. He unfastened an awkward last bolt, took a deep breath and prepared to welcome the old lady on his door step.

'Edith, lovely to see you. Come in, come in,' he managed.

### Dressed in a smart black outfit, she stood stock-still in vivid winter sunshine for a few moments before composedly thanking Arnold and stepping into the hallway. Still feeling curiously nervous, Matson led the way up to his living room and by way of a diversion, tossed in a couple of bits of small talk about the weather, which were met by monosyllabic, though not unfriendly, responses from Edith Moseley. While he was tackling the fourteen stairs which lead to his cosy living quarters, Arnold had been frantically choosing his opening narrative which would break the awful news he possessed.

### He was just about to take a seat and had invited the old lady to do the same and make herself comfortable, when he felt Miss Moseley's hands clasp him just above his elbows. The action caused Arnold to stop in his tracks and he slowly turned to face her. She now held him surprisingly tightly at the top of his forearms and stared directly into his eyes.

### The few moments of silence and understanding were so incredibly powerful and bonding that Matson felt tears beginning to well up until they became pools in his eyes which the next single blink would automatically set free to roll down his cheeks.

### Edith Moseley continued to hold the man and stare into the face of the heartbroken soul she had come to visit and from whom she was about to relieve of his burden.

### The words, when they arrived, were delivered with such a loving quality and intonation that not only did Arnold Matson realise this is where his broken heart no longer remains a secret, he also recognised that he is in the presence of a remarkable old lady who is blessed with extraordinary preternatural strengths and energies. Every apprehension he had stored up were simply removed from the situation as she spoke.

'I know,' she whispered, as she moved closer to Matson, 'you don't have to say anything, Arnold,' she comforted, 'because I already know.'

### Matson's tears finally arrived and no more words were necessary.

### He clung on like a sobbing statue, as though Edith's tiny but deceptively strong frame was the only rock which could save him from being swept back into an ocean he was so afraid to return to.

### In the space of a minute, Edith Moseley's undoubted spiritual understanding and reassurance had transformed Arnold Matson's hurt and disillusionment into one of an unstated but unmistakeable connection with something so magnificent and incredible, and something which had been missing in his life for way too long.

### Chapter Thirty Seven

### The Simplest Horizon

### Immoveable lifestyles and immoveable objects have, as far as Arnold Matson can ever remember, always amounted to the same thing. In much the same way as you can try and convince yourself that you are happy in a job which you know you frankly hate, you can also choose to knock a brick wall down with your head. The bottom line is there will only be one winner. As his fifty-second birthday was fast approaching and threatening to charge, Arnold recognised the fact that a total U-turn in his lifestyle would be more than a little irresponsible, for he was no spring chicken. Conversely, he was not yet ready to be put out to pasture and he was certainly no fool.

### With his deep love of nature, Arnold Matson is no stranger to theology, but the revelation, not to say epiphany which had transformed his whole spirit regarding the passing of his friend, the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf, now had the effect of a sort of armour of comfort and confidence as his spiritual batteries finally connected with the engine of his very being.

### It was difficult to comprehend that the void in his personality and the uncertainties in his character had been soothed and alleviated by an early morning visit from an old lady who is in-tune with a greater being, but as far as Arnold Matson is concerned, these are the facts of the matter, and what is more, he was there to witness it. This was no story which had been watered down and distorted through the grapevine; it had unfolded before his very eyes. The Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf's natural mother had held Matson in her arms and told him that she knew her son was dead, and she had dispensed the sentence in such an assured, loving whisper that Arnold felt as though he had received the news from an angel on earth.

### Springtime this year would not only be observed as a new beginning by Arnold Matson, it would also be lived as a fresh start in life. However, this is one pub landlord who is not delusional enough to think that as soon as he drives away from the village this time, the world and its everyday confusions suddenly becomes his own personal nirvana.

### Indeed, he still doesn't have the confidence to embrace the wilderness for more than a month's sabbatical, after which he will return to his hostelry, problems and all, and make a decision regarding the bigger picture.

### He may decide to sell, he may decide to stay. The way he feels at this moment in time he may well decide not to decide anything at all, for surely it is fate which brought him to this backwater in the first place and his sense of connection and enlightenment right now convinces Arnold Matson beyond a shadow of a doubt, that fate will have a say in his, and all of our futures.

### Climbing aboard a vehicle he acquired through the most tragic of circumstances, Arnold refuses to allow his heart to be overrun by sadness at this fiercely poignant moment and instead, gently pats the empty passenger seat with one hand as he simultaneously winks at the sky.

### He slowly pulls out of the pub car park and two minutes later he is passing the churchyard which contains a headstone in memory of the Reverend Colin Wheatsheaf. Arnold Matson acknowledges the black, marble monument as he drives past and is not the least bit surprised when a beam of sunlight is reflected and winks back from the head of the grave.

### The road map which currently rests in the centre of his steering wheel is placed to one side and Arnold Matson makes a silent request to the open road to take him where it will.

###  Copyright

### John Mayfield

### 2011

