Author: Alby Stone

Copyright © Alby Stone 2020

Old Alf brushed against the Christmas tree on his way back from the bar. Only the slightest of touches, but it went flying, tinsel, baubles and fairy lights all over the place. A woman started at the noise and stepped back, crushing the little plaster angel underfoot. Miraculously, not a drop was spilled from the three pints Alf was carrying, tripod-style, to their table, seemingly oblivious to the chaos left in his wake.

‘Looks like some idiot’s knocked the tree over,’ he said, glancing over his shoulder. ‘There you go, lads. Three pints of Doom Bar.’

‘I asked for London Pride,’ said George.

‘Pride’s off,’ Alf replied.

‘And I wanted a Stella,’ said Joe, frowning.

‘They’ve stopped selling it. Something to do with Brexit and tariffs, Eric at the bar reckons. The brewery getting its retaliation in first.’

‘Bloody EU,’ Joe muttered.

‘This is because we’ve nearly left the EU,’ Alf pointed out. ‘There won’t actually be any tariffs on imported beer until the new year. Not that tariffs would apply to beers brewed in the UK anyway. And don’t you start moaning, Joe. You voted Leave, remember.’

‘I thought we were supposed to be taking back control,’ Joe sighed. ‘Seems like we didn’t.’

‘Daft sod. When they said we’ll take back control, they didn’t mean the likes of us. They meant toffs, hedge fund managers and currency speculators. And that posh twat who moved all his money to a bank in Dublin. Profiteers and spivs. Anyway, it’s Christmas. Shut up and drink up.’

The three old men drank in companionable silence for a few minutes. Then Joe cleared his throat. ‘You see that strip of cardboard behind the bar, the one with the packets of peanuts stuck on it? It looks just like an Advent calendar.’

Alf raised his eyebrows. ‘A peanut Advent calendar? Daft sod.’ He raised his glass, sipped, smacked his lips. ‘Lovely. You can’t beat a good pint.’

One of the bar staff and two customers were gathering scattered ornaments and reassembling the Christmas tree. Alf, George and Joe watched with interest. ‘Those lights are pathetic,’ said George. ‘You’d think they’d have splashed out on something decent. And I think that angel’s properly knackered now.’

Joe frowned. ‘I thought it was a fairy.’

‘No, that one’s got wings and a halo. It’s an angel. A pretty crap one, mind. As crap as the tree.’

‘Maybe they got a crap tree because they knew Alf would be knocking the bloody thing over,’ said George. ‘God, I hate Christmas.’

‘You would. Tight as Scrooge and as miserable as the Grinch.’

‘Fuck off, Joe.’

‘I didn’t touch that bloody tree,’ said Alf, a fraction too late for credibility.

Chilled air blasted through the bar as a gaggle of young women arrived, giggling and gaudy with Christmas hats and jumpers, micro-skirts and alarmingly high stiletto heels. Each had a sprig of mistletoe Sellotaped to her forehead. All had evidently imbibed a seasonal livener before setting out. They ordered a double round – Jaegerbombs and tequila shots – then set about snogging every man in the bar, taken or otherwise, though they studiously avoided the table where the three old men sat.

There was a ragged cheer when the tree lit up again. This signalled a rise in noise levels. The tipsy girls giggled more loudly, and a squabble erupted between one of them and a women who objected to her going back for a second snog with her husband. Then the music started.

Alf groaned. ‘I knew it. Bloody Slade. Everybody’s having fun, my arse. And this is only the beginning. It’ll be bloody Roy Wood next, mark my words.’

‘I like this stuff,’ said Joe. ‘Reminds me of when I was young.’

Alf snorted. ‘Daft sod. You must have been too old for this glam rock rubbish when it came out. I know I was and you’re a year older than me.’

‘Bollocks. I’m only seventy. Anyway, I’m youthful on the inside. You’re only as old as you feel, mate.’

‘Bugger me, in that case I must be due a telegram from the Queen. Victoria.’

‘Miserable bastard.’ George drained his glass. ‘My round, boys. Same again?’ His friends nodded so he went to the bar, steering a hopeful course among the Christmas girls. Roy Wood wished it could be Christmas every day.

At the bar, George was multitasking, ordering beer and exchanging words with one of the festive females. Alf shook his head. George was well out of his depth. As if any of those young things would snog a scruffy old man with a ratty comb-over and a personal miasma of Old Spice, mothballs and beer breath. He turned to Joe. ‘So what are you doing tomorrow? The usual?’

‘Yep. Round to my daughter’s place for an early dinner, open my Christmas socks, get ignored by the grandkids, then turfed out before it’s time to break out the serious booze and her bloke gets too pissed to drive me home. You?’

‘The same. Why do they always give us bloody socks? I wouldn’t mind an Amazon voucher. Maybe a bottle of rum.’

Joe shrugged. ‘They don’t know what to get old boys like us. They think all we do is sit around thinking about the old days, like Clive bloody Dunn. No interest in anything else. Hence the socks. Practical, and they know we’ll wear them. Saves them having to use their brains. Anyway, we’re lucky. Poor old George doesn’t have anyone.’

‘True. Mind you, he says he’s happy on his own. Netflix and that project he’s working on.’

‘Yeah, whatever that is.’

‘His memoirs, he reckons,’ said Alf. ‘Told me in the White Horse last week. What he got up to in the Sixties.’

‘Well, if he reckons he can remember them you can be sure it’ll be a work of fiction.’  

Alf’s face softened. ‘Christ, the Sixties. A brilliant time, especially the second half. Great music. Woodstock and Monterey, the Stones in Hyde Park. The World Cup.’

‘It had its dark side, Alf. Vietnam and Enoch Powell. Aberfan and Prague. As much war and hate and fear as there was peace and love and happiness. Just like any other time in history.’

‘You always were a bit of a philosopher,’ said Alf affectionately. ‘Daft sod.’

‘That’s “daft sod, man” to you,’ Joe quipped. They chuckled quietly.

George returned gripping a tripod of pints. ‘Old Speckled Hen,’ he informed them. ‘Doom Bar’s off.’

Alf glared suspiciously at his beer before having a taste. ‘Lovely,’ he pronounced. ‘So what have you got planned for Christmas Day, George?’

‘A lie-in, big roast with all the trimmings, a few beers, Netflix, off to bed with a full belly and a fuzzy head. Might work on the you-know-what. Just like any other day, only with mince pies and a turkey crown. I’ll share that with the cat.’

Alf raised his eyebrows. ‘I didn’t know you had a cat.’

‘I don’t. It lives next door but it always kips at mine when they have their grandkids round. Can’t say I blame it. That place is like a sociopaths’ convention when those brats are there. I’d do the same if I was in its shoes.’

‘Cats don’t wear shoes,’ Joe pointed out.

‘They’re metaphorical shoes, Joe. Like the cat’s whiskers. Or the dog’s bollocks.’

‘But cats have got whiskers,’ Joe objected. ‘And dogs definitely have bollocks, unless they’re female or they’ve had the old chop.’

They collectively winced at the thought.

Another cheer went up as a pint of lager hit the floor and shattered. ‘That was your bloody fault,’ the owner of the former pint complained to one of one of the young women, whose only response was to extend her middle finger. The barman who had been involved in putting the Christmas tree back together emerged from behind the bar with a dustpan and brush in one hand, a mop and bucket in the other, and set about cleaning up the mess. Then a woman in a Salvation Army uniform entered the pub and commenced the annual ritual of attempting to shame a bunch of drinkers into buying The War Cry. ‘Geronimo!’ someone dutifully shouted above the increasing din. Mud took up the musical slack, Les Gray announcing it would be lonely this Christmas.

George mimed sticking his fingers down his throat. ‘Christ alive, I wish they’d play something decent. The Small Faces or the Kinks. The Beatles or the Stones. Even the Who. Anything but this horrible festive shite. Oh well, there’s always beer. My shout, lads. Same again?’

‘We can but hope,’ sighed Alf as Joe left the table.

‘Poor old George,’ said Joe. ‘He’s never been the same since his missus died.’

‘Eh? She didn’t die, you daft sod. She ran off with her toy boy. Mind you, she might be dead by now. Nearly thirty years ago, that was.’

‘Are you sure?’ Joe frowned. ‘I distinctly remember the funeral.’

‘No, that was just George making a big production out of it. Must admit, it seemed like a bloody funeral. If I’d been married to that sour-faced ratbag I’d have put the bunting up and hired a band.’

‘I don’t remember her having a toy boy.’

It was the bloke who ran that plumbing business in the high street. Bill something, with the tattoos and the quiff. Quite sad really. They found out George was firing blanks so she took up with someone who had live rounds in his magazine. And a bigger weapon, by all accounts. Not so much with the old brain cells, though, or he’d never have taken up with her.’

‘Women,’ said Joe bitterly.

‘That’s no way to talk, Joey boy. Sexist, that’s what it is. I don’t want to hear that kind of misogynistic claptrap. Get with the feminism, mate. My missus was a fine woman, rest her soul. Kept our house sparkling and always had my dinner ready on the table when I got home from work.’

Joe nodded. ‘Mine was the same. They don’t make ‘em like that anymore.’

‘The Hen’s off,’ said George, returning with another tripod. ‘This is Greene King IPA.’

Alf took a sip, nodded approvingly. ‘Lovely.’

‘Pricey,’ said George gloomily. ‘Nearly a fiver a pint. Our pensions don’t go far nowadays, eh? Not that they ever did.’

‘George, you’ve got mistletoe taped to your forehead,’ Alf observed.

‘Really? No idea how that got there.’ George glanced shiftily at the giggling girls, now on their fourth double round and getting louder and more unsteady by the minute. One of them looked over and blew George a kiss.

Alf exhaled noisily. ‘You bloody did, didn’t you? You got them drinks in exchange for a snog. That must have cost a bloody fortune. Daft sod. I hope you’ve got enough money for your next shout.’

‘Not an opportunity you turn down at our age, Alf.’

‘Sexual harassment, that is. You could get nicked for that.’

It’s none of your business. Anyway, it was her idea. And for your information I’ve got plenty of cash on me. Be prepared, and all that.’

‘Be prepared for what?’

‘Eventualities. Emergencies.’

Alf laughed. ‘Bugger me, you only live a hundred yards up the road. What’s likely to happen to you between here and there?’

‘Well, I might get mugged.’

‘So you’ve laid in some cash for the muggers? A Christmas box for some low-life?’ Joe sneered. ‘Now that’s what I call a random act of kindness. You need your head examined.’

‘That’s not what I mean. I read somewhere that if you get mugged you’re less likely to get hurt if you have money on you. Give them what they want and they’ll leave you alone.’

‘If they left you alone in the first place you wouldn’t need to have any money to give them.’

Alf drained his glass. ‘JMy thoughts exactly, Joe. Almost. Anyway, you’re on the way to our places so you never go home on your own. Nobody’s going to try it on with the three of us, even if we could give Methuselah a run for his shekels. Same again? If at all possible?’

George and Joe nodded. Alf headed to the bar while Greg Lake informed the merrymakers that he believed in Father Christmas.

‘I think Alf’s in a bad mood this evening,’ said Joe.

‘No worse than usual,’ George replied. ‘He’s always a cantankerous, opinionated old git. He’s the Groucho to my Chico and your Dumbo.’

‘You mean Harpo.’

‘I know what I meant, Joe. No, you’re right. He is a bit down in the dumps this evening. Let’s face it, so are we. I’ll be alone tomorrow and you and Alf will be unwanted guests. Like Harpo’s ghost.’

‘You mean Banquo.’

‘No, I mean your voices will not be heard. You’ll be there but not-there, because you’re not really wanted and you both know it. They’ll be gladder when you leave than when you arrive. Only relief follows tolerance.’

‘But you haven’t got kids. What do you know about it?’

‘I listen to you and Alf moaning every bloody year.’

Joe thought about that. George had a point. All those family conversations that had gone on around him but rarely included him. The Christmas Days planned without his views being sought. The expectation that he would go along with whatever they wanted, without objection or argument. Being all but ignored by the in-laws, forgotten by the kids as better distractions beckoned. The booze strictly rationed. The fucking socks. His daughter invited him out of duty, not because his participation was desired, his presence cherished. He guessed it was much the same for Alf.

Alf chose that moment to return with the evening’s fourth tripod. ‘IPA’s off. This is called Proper Job. Cornish. Never had it before.’ He sat and took a cautious sip, smiled crookedly. ‘Lovely. So what were you two talking about while I was away?’

‘Harpo’s ghost,’ said Joe gloomily.

‘Is that one of those doom metal bands George likes?’

‘No, it’s what we are at our family Christmases, Alf. Fifth wheels. Gooseberries in the nuclear family relationships. Propped up in a corner to vegetate while the fun goes on around us. If we died they wouldn’t notice until we refused to leave.’

‘Well, you speak for yourself,’ said Alf. ‘But yeah, it is pretty shite. They know I hate sprouts and Christmas pudding but I get them every bloody year. Not to mention cranberry bloody sauce. Never get to see what I’d like on the telly. Always get driven home at six because at my age I need my rest. They’re pretty firm about that. And as for the fucking socks…’

George nodded sagely. ‘Socks come under the category “things you give people when you can’t be arsed to think what to get them”. You can bet your life they’re the very last presents they buy. Afterthoughts. I don’t know how you put up with it.’

‘Well, it’s family. That’s important.’

‘Of course it is, Alf. But so is your dignity and independence – and your status as a person. Me and Joe were just talking about this. The older you get, the less you’re seen as a human being. You become something to be endured, until you pop your clogs and they get to breathe a huge sigh of relief, grab your savings, put your house on the market while rigor mortis is still setting in, and go in search of the life insurance paperwork. You’re a totem with no inner life they can imagine, a symbol they can manipulate to suit themselves. It’s always at their convenience, isn’t it? Always what they want, when they want, how they want. After feeding and clothing them and wiping their arses for years, your kids still expect you to build your lives around them. Sure, they might believe it’s their duty, but really it’s just an excuse to play the martyr with the least possible effort. Virtue signalling that gets more pronounced as the years go by. Christmas is just the tip of the iceberg.’

‘Bugger me,’ said Alf, unusually impressed. ‘That’s bloody deep. And here I was thinking Joe was the philosopher.’

‘You only have to stop and think for a moment. Isn’t it more fun to get pissed and have a laugh with your mates than spend a day with people who can’t spare you a minute because they’ve got too much else on? Why, just once, don’t you have a Christmas built around what you want? ‘

Alf pulled a face. ‘There’s no way my daughter would agree to that.’

‘Nor mine,’ Joe agreed.

‘It isn’t their decision, lads. Just stay at home and do whatever you want.’ George’s face lit up. ‘Or you could come round to my place, make a day of it. I’m cooking anyway, so it’s no hardship to make a few more roast potatoes or whatever. I’ve got plenty of beer in, including a dozen bottles of Shepherd Neame Christmas Ale. Very nice beer. We could have a sprout-free dinner, a good drink, listen to some decent sounds, and watch something on Netflix when we’re pissed enough. You can stay as long as you like. All you have to do is phone your daughters in the morning and tell them you have new plans. They won’t care. Sure, they’ll pretend to be disappointed but really they’ll be bloody relieved.’

There was a scream as one of the giggling girls – the one George had snogged – caught a stiletto heel in the carpet and lost her balance. As she toppled toward the Christmas tree, she flung her shot glass into the air to free both hands to cushion the fall. The glass hit the ceiling, dislodging a paper chain that dropped gracefully down to hang in front of the bar like a liana. A flailing leg knocked over a table laden with full glasses and empties. Then she fell bodily onto the tree, destroying it completely and sending baubles, lights and pine needles in all directions. An object arced across the bar and plopped into Alf’s Proper Job. More drinks were spilled as people jostled to keep clear of the carnage. There was a second of utter silence, and the bar erupted into laughter, jeers, screeches, complaints and angry shouts as two fights broke out, while John and Yoko advised the participants that war was over. The barman shook his head and reached for the dustpan and brush.

The three friends reverently surveyed the chaos. Alf gazed down at the broken-winged and now halo-free angel as it slowly sank into his beer. ‘That’s got to be better than burial at sea.’

‘Amen to that,’ said George. ‘Gentlemen, we should take this as an omen. Our cue to leave the premises before the pub collapses around us?’

‘And we’ve got to get to our beds early because we’re old,’ added Joe bitterly.

Alf shrugged. ‘Yeah, might as well clear off before they’re down to Foster’s.’

They drank up, picked their way through the wreckage and arguments, visited the toilet, and left the pub. Outside, snow was falling.

‘Nice,’ said George, extending both hands to catch a few flakes. ‘Just like the ones we used to know but never really happened.’

‘It’s pretty heavy. Probably going to settle. It’ll be much too dangerous for old men like me and Joe to go anywhere. I reckon it’d probably be best if we phoned our daughters and told them we’ll be staying put tomorrow.’

‘Or not going too far, Alf.’ Joe breathed a misty plume into the night air. ‘We could make it as far as George’s place, though.’

‘That’s that, then. A sock-free and sproutless Christmas at mine.’ George smiled happily. ‘With lots of beer. We can let our hair down.’

‘You don’t have any.’

‘Fuck off, Alf.’

‘I think me and Joe should bring a few bottles along tomorrow. You can never have too much beer in the house. Hey, did you really buy those girls a round just so you could get a snog?’

‘It was their idea. And fair exchange is no robbery, my son. Anyway, these days you mustn’t call women girls. It’s sexist and patronising.’

Alf snorted. ‘Bugger me, at our age most women under seventy look like girls.’

Leaving three wavy lines of footprints in the thickening snow, they walked toward their homes, with George’s bungalow the first port of call. As they reached his gate, Joe pointed to a light dead ahead on the horizon. ‘That’s a really bright star. Or is it Venus?’

‘Nah,’ said George. ‘It’s a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn or something. I read about it on the internet.’

Alf rolled his eyes. ‘It’s a bloody police helicopter, you daft sods.’ He belched contentedly. ‘Christ, I love beer.’

Copyright © Alby Stone 2020

It was musical mayhem up on the Pyramid Stage. The Hellraisers Redux, second on the bill, always first to the bar. A rare two-drummer line-up, John Bonham and Keith Moon flailing away at their respective kits, not so much keeping time as competing for arrhythmia. Phil Lynott doing the worst-ever impersonation of a bass guitarist, held together by nothing more than a sleepy smile. Jim Morrison swaying unsteadily at the microphone stand, alternating between incoherent mumble and indecipherable scream. Rory Gallagher seemingly playing a different set entirely. A symphony of bum notes and missed beats. Several sheets to the wind, every one of them. Guys whose idea of the twelve-bar blues was the absence of a thirteenth pub to crawl to. The stage was littered with evidence. I’d never seen so many empty JD and tequila bottles in one place. In their prime, sober or even lightly pickled, the Hellraisers Redux would have been magnificent; but the punters only wanted to see a drunken, edgy shambles that would conform to the popular lack of imagination and nostalgic tabloid stereotype. Nobody could tell what they were playing and nobody cared, least of all the band, just as long as the bottles kept coming and the wheels continued to fall off.

Disgusted with that disrespectful bread-and-circuses spectacle, I wandered through the muddy field, skirting the flags and young men with tipsy girls perched on their skinny shoulders until I found the John Peel Stage, where the great man himself was introducing a combo of wizened undead folkies fronted by Sandy Denny and Nick Drake. Not my cup of tea at all. I stayed for the first number – an eerie but predictable rendition of ‘She Moved Through The Fair’, with Denny in admittedly fine voice – but left when Drake took the mic for ‘Streets Of London’. Voters’ choice again, of course. You can’t trust people to get anything right online. Too many chemical variables, too few functional brain cells. Democracy? Even the body politic can’t sustain that many arseholes without ending up drowning in the inevitable.

Now I had a choice. Look for a beer tent or endure the remainder of the Hellraisers Redux set? Definitely not the beer tent. A fiver for a pint of pixels? No thanks. As for the Hellraisers Redux – fuck, I couldn’t bear another minute of that awful shambles. So what else was on offer? What could I do to while away the hour or so until the Shades came onstage? Well, there was an alternative. On a whim I had paid extra for a backstage pass. It meant going back out into the mud, but…

The VIP Lounge – actually a seemingly limitless marquee decked out like the interior of the Palace of Versailles, with waiter service and air conditioning – was a Who’s Who of several golden ages of popular music. Like everything else in this world where pleasing a whimsically perverse public was where the money was made, it was all a bit off-kilter. Sinatra in a ripped t-shirt and bondage trousers holding court at a table where Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse hung on his every word. Elvis Presley trading jokes with Syd Barrett and Leonard Cohen at a table stacked with insubstantial cheeseburgers. Dusty Springfield playing cards with Des O’Connor and Bob Marley. Ian Curtis in a zoot suit, in earnest discussion with John Lennon and Jacques Brel. Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochrane dressed as hippies. Brian Jones and George Harrison talking about the good old days. Mick Ronson complaining to a martini-sipping Dean Martin that he hadn’t been invited to join his old mate Dave in the Shades, much as he respected Jimi. Inscrutable old bluesmen jamming in a corner with Jerry Garcia and Pigpen. Van Vliet declaiming weird poetry to assorted acid casualties. Aretha demonstrating a complicated dance to Ella, Billie and Bessie. Marley, Toots and Joe Strummer sharing the biggest spliff I’d ever seen. Scott Walker trying to read a book while being harangued by Mark E. Smith. Joey Ramone playing pool with Steve Peregrine Took. Lemmy, Mick Farren and Larry Wallis plotting to tear down the fences and make it a free festival. Bolan and Pete Shelley comparing guitars.  McCartney strobing in and out of view, the jury evidently some way from a majority decision. A dizzying array of stars. A galaxy of reclaimed black holes. But so detailed, so real.

So wrong.

A waiter handed me a cocktail but I couldn’t drink it. There would have been no point trying. And anyway, I felt sick. Giving people what they wanted was all very well – but this?

Outside, the mud was worse than ever, now a gruel-like liquid that trickled into my shoes and splattered up my trouser legs. I might have been wading ankle-deep in brown paint. It wasn’t quite the full Glastonbury experience – for that I’d need to lose my tent, get my sleeping bag stolen and have my stomach pumped – but it felt eerily authentic. Worth enduring, hopefully. Back at the Pyramid Stage, Viv Stanshall was at long last introducing the Shades. This was what I’d been waiting for. The Glasto vrMix supergroup to make anyone with a soul salivate. Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce, Dave Greenfield, John Coltrane, Hendrix and Bowie. I wasn’t too sure about having the Andrews Sisters on backing vocals, but what the hell. This was going to be great.

And it was, for a short time. The Shades started their set with ‘Heroes’, sounding all the better for the muscular bass, soaring synth and a wall of undulating left-hand fuzz distortion, then Bowie took a back seat while Hendrix drawled through ‘The Wind Cries Mary’ and Bruce belted out an apocalyptic ‘White Room’. Then… Eh? A twitchy, Young Americans-style souled-up version of ‘The Laughing Gnome’. Hendrix aping Ziggy Stardust-era Mick Ronson as the Shades ploughed through a medley of ‘Agadoo’, ‘Funky Gibbon’ and ‘Shudupa Your Face’. I stared incredulously. This couldn’t be happening. Surely not. Normal service would be resumed, wouldn’t it? But when Bowie started crooning ‘Ernie (The Fastest Milkman In The West)’, I could take no more and angrily tore off the VR headset.

Glasto vrMix, my arse. Another triumph of so-called democracy over reason and good taste. I’d paid a hundred quid for this fiasco. Really, I should have known better. Deepfake events like this were all very well, but dependent on viewer votes which were always at the mercy of pranksters, drunks and trolls. And sometimes hackers substituted ‘refakes’ for advertised genuine films and shows. Why, only the week before I’d sat through an online double bill of Casablanca with Tommy Cooper instead of Bogart and a Citizen Kane featuring Peter Cook and Dudley Moore in their Derek and Clive incarnation rather than Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles. That had been interesting, if mildly disconcerting.

‘Play it, Sam. Just like that.’

‘If the headline is big enough, it makes the news big enough. This bloke came up to me…’

Still, everyone wanted to see the dead stars they’d missed first time around, or the ones they simply missed. Offering an opportunity to see, in glorious virtual reality, deepfaked appearances on the Glastonbury stages by the greats whose bodies were sadly less immortal than their works had been a stroke of genius, both lucrative and crowd-pleasing. And nothing pisses off some people like blameless folk enjoying innocent pleasures. Personally, I’ve never understood how anyone could get their kicks from sabotaging someone else’s fun just because they can. The tech is just so easy to use. And it’s potentially dangerous. Remember when that guy in Manchester faked Linda Lovelace and scenes from Deep Throat into Bedknobs and Broomsticks on Netflix? Or his version of The Railway Children, featuring Jimmy Savile, which traumatised kids and outraged adults up and down the country when switched for the original on BBC1. The sickest of sick shit. Sure, that character was too stupid to cover his tracks and is now justly serving time for offences ranging from copyright infringement to making and distributing kiddie porn, but that only goes to show that any idiot can do it.

It isn’t all bad, of course, and the deepfaked insertions are not all dead stars. There was the first Glasto vrMix, with the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Queen and Oasis; the Bootleg Monterey Pop with the Sex Pistols and the Clash, something for almost everyone. And even some of the prank fake movies are a pleasant surprise. Raiders of the Lost Ark with Larry Grayson as Indy was hilarious. And who in their right mind would want to forget Alien with Joanna Lumley as Patsy Stone as Ripley?

It got me thinking, though. I mean, when you get right down to it, any film or TV drama is wholly fake. Made-up stories, actors playing parts, special effects, liberties with historical fact, improbable science… We get used to the fantasies we know and don’t like deviation. Does it actually matter if different actors play familiar roles, or whether dialogue or storyline are altered? Or if a long-dead singer releases post-mortem recordings, as long it sounds like them and the music fits the expected image? On my iPod there’s a fake Frank Sinatra singing a swinging ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’, backed by what I would swear is Nelson Riddle and his orchestra; a plastic Plastic Ono Band recording of the title theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, complete with reverb, feedback and extended primal scream workouts from John and Yoko; and a Joe Strummer facsimile raucously belting out a song composed by a so-called AI, with lyrics that are authentic-sounding but undoubtedly gibberish. It raises that awkward question, of course. If a fake is so good as to be indistinguishable from the real thing, then is it truly a fake? What is the ‘real thing’ anyway, and is it any better than a brilliant forgery? According to Kant, we never experience ‘the thing itself’, only a simulation of it created by our minds from what our crude, limited senses convey and our limited brains interpret.

But I’m waffling, and approaching maudlin self-indulgence. Sorry, but I do a lot of that. Well, either I do or it’s whoever is really writing this – to be honest, I’m not entirely sure what this is. A story? A memoir? A parable? Damned if I know, assuming there is an actual me doing the knowing. Some scientists say we’re probably living in a computer simulation, in which case the whole universe is fake and it doesn’t matter a damn whether I exist or not, or if I’m a true representation of myself. Not that I believe for one moment that I’m not real. Cogito, ergo sum and all that. But Descartes takes us back to Kant again. There’s no logical reason why my perception of self shouldn’t be subject to the immutable law of das Ding an sich. Algorithms permitting, of course.

Whatever. Enough of this recursive philosophising, if only to avoid getting me started on Baudrillard and Lacan, and reasoning myself wholly out of independent biological and intellectual existence. Let’s get back on track and finish this factual/fictional story/memory or whatever the hell it is, if it’s anything at all.

Right, so I was furious. A hundred pounds down the drain, an evening ruined. If I could have got my hands on the faker who ruined my Glasto vrMix, I’d have throttled the bugger. Oh well, the almost certainly vain attempt to get my money back could wait. I had the night to myself, with plenty of booze and snacks laid in. I kicked the VR headset to one side and settled back on the sofa, opened a bottle of beer and a packet of salt and vinegar crisps, and switched the television on. It was just before nine on a Saturday night, so there was bound to be some Scandi-noir on BBC4, unless the Beeb was yet again saving money by filling the airwaves with carefully Savile-free Top of the Pops repeats. It was only when I put my bare feet up on the coffee table that I noticed they were muddy. Wet mud. Real mud? Maybe.

Copyright (c) 2020 Alby Stone    

Another midnight, another bloody crossroads. Humans are so unimaginative, always choosing tradition over comfort, or even common sense. It would be nice, once in a while, to be summoned to a table in a well-appointed bar, or perhaps a lounger by a swimming pool in the Algarve on a warm, sunny day, a tray of ice-cold cocktails and a bikini-clad beauty or two to enhance the sea view. But no, there I was yet again on a wet, chilly night in the middle of nowhere, dragged to discomfort by another nobody who wanted to be somebody. Early June in Buckinghamshire, if the airborne tsunami, poorly-maintained road and ambient smugness were any guide.

But where was the client? I squinted but couldn’t see a damned thing through the water streaming down the Perspex visor, which was also misting over on the inside thanks to that absurd surgical mask.

I like to set a good example, and Christ knows humans need one. They certainly haven’t done too well in that department themselves, preferring to imprison, execute or assassinate anyone born with an ounce of compassion, decency and common sense. The present situation only underlined just how fucking stupid so many of them are. As, to be fair, did most of their history. But I digress. I needed to see who I was dealing with, so I removed the visor and mask and threw them into the air, where they vanished with a barely-audible pop.

My heart sank when he emerged from the shadows. Not him again. We already had a meeting scheduled a few years down the line but no, that wasn’t enough for him. I’d never met anyone who needed so much attention. He would try the patience of a saint, and I’m certainly not one of those. ‘What the hell do you want now?’ I growled testily. There was a strangled squawk as a parakeet fell from a nearby tree, stone dead. And another from the creature he was holding by its feet, upside down and very angry. ‘What did I tell you about poultry? And put down that stupid machete before you have someone’s eye out.’

Smith – let’s maintain the pretence, as it’s more fun to work it out yourself and besides, I am bound by strict rules of confidentiality – replied with one of those looks the British public seem to adore: sheepish, furtive and arrogant in equal measure. The effect was somewhat undermined by the chicken shit on his suit and a stray tail feather sticking up on the crown of his head. ‘Well, ah, I, I…’ he extemporised.

‘Come on,’ I sighed. ‘Out with it. I haven’t got all bloody night. But I should warn you that you have everything you asked for and, frankly, nothing left to pay me for anything else. And for heaven’s sake close your mouth when you do that. You look like a parson’s nose sticking out of a haystack.’

‘Look here,’ he blustered. ‘You can’t talk to me like that. Do you know who I am?’

I stared at him. Did he really think that line would impress me? ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And you know exactly who I am.’ I grinned, extended my height by six inches and my pointed beard by twelve, and gave him a little whiff of brimstone. He flinched and took a step back. ‘So piss or get off the pot. I don’t have time for self-serving timewasters like you. I was playing darts with a bishop when you brought me here, and later I’m booked for snooker with Jimmy Savile and Jeffrey Epstein.’

His face fell. For a moment he seemed exhausted and vulnerable, an honest man who’d given his all, beaten the disease, yet still faced insurmountable odds. For a whole nanosecond I was perilously close to a billion miles away from feeling sorry for him. Fortunately I’ve always been exceptionally good at resisting temptation. ‘Spit it out,’ I commanded.

‘It’s this bloody virus,’ he blurted. ‘It’s playing havoc with the economy. The nation is facing bankruptcy, utter ruin. Companies going bust, my chums losing dosh like there’s no tomorrow. My popularity is plummeting. People are even dying, though thankfully no one important has popped their clogs yet. Can’t you do something about it?’

‘Me? What makes you think I can do anything? I don’t control viruses. Or anything else. I’m strictly a crime and punishment guy. This is his work.’ I jerked a thumb in the direction of the waterlogged night sky, making several points simultaneously. ‘You’d be better off nipping into a church and getting down on your knees. Though with your background there’s no way you’ll be heard. Not without deep, loud, celestial laughter by way of reply.’

‘But what about the Bible? It’s you, isn’t it> Four horsemen and all that. Plague is one of them, right? Or is it Pestilence? Or Poverty?’ He shuddered at the last.

‘Nothing to do with me,’ I told him. ‘The book you are referring to was written by a bloke who was completely off his head on infections caused by excessive mortification of the flesh, plus dodgy mushrooms and the odd slice of mouldy bread. We’ve all tried to figure it out over the past two thousand years but neither we nor the guys upstairs have the faintest idea what Mad John was going on about. My old mate Mingscum reckons it was written as a satire on contemporary socio-religious values in the context of cultural upheaval caused by rapid expansion of the Roman Empire. Says it’s hilarious. But Mingscum does have a very strange sense of humour. The more ruthless he is, the more he laughs. A law unto himself.’

‘Sounds like somebody I know,’ said Smith uneasily.

‘I’m sure it does,’ I replied.

‘Can’t you do anything?’

‘All I can do is offer advice that would solve all your problems.’

He leaned forward eagerly. I lengthened my right arm by a metre or so – yes, along with the visor and mask I like to set a good example by maintaining social distancing – and tickled the chicken under her beak. She was a fine specimen and I knew a male of her species who was pining for company. ‘Yes, all I can do is offer advice. Trouble is, it’s way too late for that. This one’s down to you, Smith. Good luck, because you’ve fucked up royally so far.’

‘But it isn’t my fault,’ he groaned.

‘Not entirely, no. Part of it is the collective responsibility of you and anyone else who served in your party’s governments over the last decade. And anyone who voted for you, really. Maybe if you’d been less fixated on austerity and that dreadful European business you’d have been more willing to ensure the PPE stockpiles set aside for this very situation were audited and kept up to date. Maybe if your lot had spent less time and effort shafting the NHS and running it on a shoestring there would have been more critical care beds, nurses and ventilators when they were needed, like now. Maybe if you’d spent less time and energy shagging around and positioning yourself for personal glory you would have paid attention to what your country really needed.’

‘But it needs me.’ He puffed himself up and assumed that now-familiar expression he thinks makes him resemble Winston Churchill but actually makes him look like a sheepdog with its bollocks caught in a mousetrap. ‘I’m the man with vision and plans. I’m in charge.’

‘You keep telling yourself that. Not that your plans amount to much more than getting your leg over, avoiding difficult conversations in public, and repeating cheesy slogans ad nauseam as a poor substitute for substance. But I’d watch my back if I were you. As soon as this is over and your mates need someone to blame, the knives will be out. Look what they did to Thatcher – and they worshipped her like a goddess. Okay, it was that scary Hindu one with the skulls and bloody swords and all the arms, but even so.’

‘Well, if you can’t stop the virus, how about doing something about my image? The public already think I’m an entertaining sort of chap, even lovable – but I need to be seen as a statesman, a stable and reliable chap with the interests of the hoi polloi at heart. Champion of the Great Unwashed. A man of the people, eh? Why should I be remembered by the oiks as the man who presided over the pandemic disaster? Shouldn’t be too difficult. You are the Father of Lies, after all.’

‘Actually, that’s Mingscum – though to be honest his current favourite human protégé isn’t too far behind. Me? I never lie. That would make me no better than one of you, and that would defeat the whole point of my existence. My function is essentially juridical and I am, and must be seen to be, beyond reproach. Though that doesn’t stop you mortals blaming me for your own character flaws. Read my lips, Smith: I gave you what you wanted, admittedly for a handsome price, but what you do with it is up to you.’

‘Ouch – look here, will you take this bloody bird? He keeps biting me.’

I rolled my eyes so that the irises disappeared upward and reappeared from my lower eyelids. I love doing that. Guaranteed to put the willies up anyone from small children to the Pope. Just ask him. ‘He’s a she and chickens don’t bite, they peck.’ I took the fowl in my extended arms and patted it on the head. She nestled contentedly against my chest.

It’s not generally known that I’m an animal lover. A few thousand years ago, when I was only a kid, some halfwit humans saw me out and about in a Greek forest frolicking with the local wildlife, and a myth was born. Horns, tail, cloven hoofs – I don’t often manifest like that now, usually only when I’m communing with nature, but I suppose it is quite a potent image. Back then it scared the yokels shitless. And the name they gave me that day has seeped into human consciousness, directly through etymology or by homonymy, an explosion of lexical associations culminated in the here and now. Pan. Panic. Panorama. Pandemonium. Pangolin. Pandemic. Spooky, eh? All because a bunch of ignorant foragers thought I was some sort of zoological deity. And now here I was bickering with a fool who couldn’t even orchestrate a pantomime properly and who’s been caught with his pants down more often that Brian Rix. But that’s evolution for you.

I decided to call the hen Pandora. My mouth watered at the prospect of scrambled new-laid eggs for breakfast. They’d go down a treat with devilled kidneys.

As far as I was concerned, my business with Smith was concluded. It was time to get back to the bishop. I had some excellent ideas for that triple-six finish. And I needed to check that the cues were sharp enough for my stint on the green baize with Jim and Jeff. There was also the future to consider. What games would suit Smith? I shrugged. I had a few years to think of new entertainments. An eternity to dream up many, many more.

Smith’s lower lip quivered as I began to emanate the sulphurous mist that has become a trademark component of my departure routine. ‘So you’re just going to leave us to get on with it? Sink or swim? Have you no compassion?’

I laughed in his shifty face. ‘It wasn’t me who failed to ensure that the pandemic PPE stockpiles were audited, checked and updated. It wasn’t me who ignored early warning signs and fucked off on holiday instead of getting my arse in gear and making plans. It wasn’t me who delayed, downplayed, prevaricated and acted the fucking goat while the virus spread and people began to die by the truckload. Compassion? That’s what I am, mate. I’m the one who sees what you horrible bastards do to one another and tries to mete out justice for your crimes of selfishness, stupidity, hubris, laziness and greed. I’m the one who cannot ignore the suffering of innocents, who is unable to turn his face from human brutality, cruelty and treachery. I’ll let you into a little secret. Do you know what an egregore is? Well, that’s me. The embodiment of your species’ need for justice and punishment, for retribution, restitution and redress. For balance. You humans made me to keep your baser instincts and desires in check – then had the bloody cheek to turn me into the cause of all your sins.’

He gave that some thought, about thirty seconds worth, which is quite a long time for him if it doesn’t involve getting his leg over. ‘So, if you’re not the embodiment of evil, who is?’

‘Have you read the Bible? I expect not, as it contains no pithy Latin soundbites likely to impress posh totty and facilitate the swift removal of lingerie. Well, here’s your starter for ten. Which Biblical character is the most greedy, jealous, narcissistic, controlling and vengeful? Who has serious problems with anger management? Who commanded the Israelites to commit genocide, enslave women, and mutilate their son’s penises? Who impregnated a twelve year-old girl without her knowledge or consent? Who arranged his own son’s torture and execution? Who gave the Israelites a weapon of mass destruction? Who destroyed whole cities because they didn’t follow his instructions? I won’t even mention poor old Job. So who was it? I’ll give you a clue – it wasn’t me.’

‘You mean…?’

This is the big problem with egregores. The more solid and realised we become, the more we are thought of as gods. And, being essentially constructed from human nature ourselves, we all too often get too big for our boots and start acting the part, throwing our weight around. We become dictators, every bit as bad as Mugabe, Pol Pot, Hitler, Ceausescu, Stalin… Of course, there are those like me who detest authoritarianism and try to promote freedom of thought. We have some successes – polytheistic religions tend to have inbuilt checks and balances – but monotheistic systems give full rein to spiritual totalitarianism. And the bigger they become, the more permanent they are, and the more they will absorb of humanity’s dark side. Believe me, if there ever comes a time when everyone believes in only one god, Homo sapiens is screwed. Because the sole remaining egregore will be an Adolf Hitler, not a Jesus Christ.

‘Believe me, Smith. You’d be worse off upstairs. Nothing but worshipping that vicious egomaniac and singing his praises for eternity. It’s a place fit only for the mindless. At least my people offer variety.’ Yes, a million and one different torments, all adopted from the ever-expanding repertoire of good old Homo sapiens. We learn from the best. And why reinvent the wheel?

‘Well, thanks very much for the theology lesson,’ Smith said huffily. ‘But if you can’t help with the pandemic and put the shine back on my popularity, it leaves me on a very sticky wicket. What am I to do?’

‘That’s your business, sunshine. According to my calculations I won’t take delivery of your soul until – well, let’s leave that as a surprise. But until then you are responsible for your own actions and must accept the consequences, which for you should be a novel experience. You could make use of that good solid British common sense, if you’re ever lucky enough to encounter some.’

‘Common sense? That’s no use to me.’

Well, I never thought it would be, but I had to make the effort. Four years earlier, Smith had taken advantage of a legal loophole to offer me the souls of the entire population of the United Kingdom in exchange for the political bagatelle that would kick-start his ascension. Obviously, I didn’t do a damned thing to help him achieve that – in my experience stupidity tends to take care of itself – but what humans always fail to realise is that the deal is meaningless, mere window-dressing. Sure, there’s a contract, but it’s the desire for that which completes the sale. Once you decide to do it, that’s it. You’re mine, permanently. Oh, I don’t own you, but that same subconscious desire for justice which created me dictates that sin must be punished. In other words, as is so often the case with you jumped-up apes, you do it to yourself. The same goes if you allow someone else to do commit heinous crimes on your behalf. And, Mr and Mrs British Voter, and all those encompassed by your votes, you have done it. It’s what happens when you accept a political system that makes you government property. With any luck your descendants will push for a formal constitution that makes government subservient to the will and needs of the people and which makes its institutions less important than the wellbeing of the masses. Frankly, I’m not optimistic about that either. I mean, have you seen the United States of America lately? There’s not much point in a constitution if you encourage some deranged fuckwit to defecate all over it simply because he tells you that all the stupid things you believe and fear are true, and that none of it is your fault, especially when it is.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘this virus is out of my hands. It’s a natural phenomenon. It must run its course, make people ill, take lives. It’s what viruses do. Human intervention can slow the spread, find palliatives and care for the sick, perhaps find a vaccine. All governments can do is make sure your doctors and nurses have everything they need, follow scientific advice, set clear guidance on how people can keep themselves and others safe, and ensure workable plans are in place to look after the old, the vulnerable and those left without money. Popularity should be the very least of your concerns. But if that’s what you want, just have a think about what will make you popular again.’

Smith frowned. ‘Well, we did the main thing we were elected to do. Other than that…’ He shrugged.

He really was hard work. ‘Well, what do the people want?’

‘Oh, that’s easy. They want the pubs open. They want to go to the beach in this nice weather. They want their children back at school. They want to be able to travel on crowded trains and buses again. They want to have parties and get drunk and have sex. Barbecues and shopping. Visiting their families and friends. Ordinary, safe stuff.’

‘Unfortunately, that’s exactly what they shouldn’t be doing when there’s a lethal and highly contagious virus doing the rounds.’

‘But it’s what people want.’ His face now bore that optimistic but slightly guilty expression that usually means he’s thinking. And suddenly I knew exactly what sort of plan was hatching within that unruly nest perched on the top of his head. A really stupid one.

‘You can’t,’ I said, horrified. ‘It’s too soon.’

He waved that away. ‘Poppycock and fiddlesticks. The British people know what’s best for them. Common sense, remember?’

He stared into space. I had ceased to exist for him. He saw only that approval rating, climbing and climbing. Another term in office. A reputation repaired. Posterity smiling upon his memory. Casualties irrelevant if he could only pull off the unthinkable and give people what they want. They’d love him for it of course they would. It was only common sense, right? Good solid British common sense. No doubt Smith meant the kind of common sense that in recent weeks had been the prerogative of politicians, government advisers, footballers, and other complete and utter fucking idiots who think they can get away with it. Common sense? Why, only yesterday fools were jumping off cliffs for a lark and burning down mobile phone masts because even bigger fools had told them the virus could be transmitted electronically.

But I digress yet again. Blame the lockdown. It’s been weeks since I had a decent face-to-face conversation. As I said, I like to set a good example. That’s why I introduced darts and snooker as torments – the space between the oche and the bishop’s arse or face is perfect for social distancing, as are the width and length of a snooker table – and insisted upon two-metre pitchforks and red-hot pokers. I’ve even been communicating with my hellish but frankly dull minions by Skype and Zoom. I had no idea so many of them had cats.

I sighed yet again and began the manifestation reversal process. Glowing sulphurous mist, dimming of ambient light, eerie silence, a vague suggestion of manic laughter. I’m not what you’d call a stickler for tradition but I know what works.

The hen clucked nervously but cheered up when I stroked her feathers. She and Johnson the cock would make a fine pair. I put Smith and his follies to the back of my mind and thought about eggs and their uses. ‘Tell me, Pandora,’ I said. ‘Have you ever seen Alien?’

Copyright © 2019 Alby Stone

My heart sank as soon as he shambled into view. I don’t know who he thought he was fooling in that get-up. A school blazer and cap, grey flannel shorts with a catapult protruding from one pocket, a skewed Old Etonian tie, a prosthetic scab on his right knee and an artful smear of mud on the left – he looked utterly ridiculous and still instantly recognisable. You know, that deliberately unruly thatch of hair, the furtive expression, the round-shouldered stoop… Did he really think he could get away it? Well, probably. After all, he’s made a career out of appearing to be what he’s not. But he didn’t recognise me. My disguise was a far superior affair.

Allow me to explain. My usual occupation is rather different. But at this time of year there is far less demand for my normal services. Peace on earth and goodwill to all men, women too in these otherwise unenlightened times. Yes, people might not mean it, but by convention they say it and generally do it. Happy this and merry that, presents for colleagues and relatives they can’t stand, wishes of health and prosperity to people they’d rather see dead in a ditch. It’s mild stuff. Hypocrisy of the most mundane kind, barely registering on the old Sin-O-Meter. Not worth the candle. So for a couple of weeks in midwinter I tend to be at a bit of a loose end. Besides, I have to keep my employees busy. It doesn’t take much effort to repurpose a demon and make a Krampus or a Turoń or whatever. Only a change of name, really. Quite a few of us extra-human types work more than one job. You know what they say, a change is as good as a rest. For me, the change is effected by bleaching my hair and beard, temporarily deactivating my brimstone glands, and stuffing my face for a few weeks in the run-up to Christmas so that my usual svelte six-pack loses definition and is enlarged appropriately. Hadn’t you realised? Those appalling office parties, awkward team lunches, the vile socks and inappropriate ‘fun’ gifts, the anodyne carols, Seventies Christmas hits on an endless loop in the supermarket, indigestion and hangovers, the debt and regret – yep, that’s all down to me. Sideswipe punishments for poor self-control, petty envy, and not treating your elderly aunt well. Only a thin line separates Saint Nick from Old Nick. A costume, the belly and beard colour, when you get right down to it. Mind you, getting the weight off after the Yuletide blow-out is a bugger.

So there I was, parked in a tacky Christmas display in an equally tacky shopping mall, bouncing small kids on my knee and listening to their Christmas wish-lists. I was rather enjoying myself. Kids are alright, in the main. They haven’t grown into the worst adult vices and the vast majority haven’t yet done anything bad enough to warrant my alter-ego’s attention. None of them tell the whole truth, but their little white lies are charming rather than alarming. Sure, I’ll see quite a few of them later in their lives, or after, but in childhood they get the benefit of the doubt. Besides, this is a holiday for me too, you know. I like to get into the festive spirit. A plate of mince pies, a box of chocolates, the odd nip from a hip flask of Glenmorangie with a splash of Highland Spring, the company of innocents, the joy of bringing joy for the sheer hell of it – my idea of heaven. Better than the real thing, in fact. I have a long memory.

And I certainly remembered the oafish creature swaying in my direction, spearheading a small army of shades-and-shoulder-holster minders who were clearing the punters out, sealing entrances and even casting suspicious glances in my direction. But what was he doing there, and why was he dressed as a schoolboy? No – he couldn’t be. Surely not, not even a shameless chancer like him. Could he? Really? Oh yes, of course he bloody well could. He barged into my grotto like a dyspraxic bull in a cluttered china shop and plonked his overfed arse squarely on my knee, which nearly buckled under the strain, then grabbed hold of my beard to steady himself. I have no idea how I managed to stay in character. Nor, indeed, how I refrained from summoning a brace of strapping Krampusse to stuff him in a sack and drag him down to that place where he’ll end up one day anyway. Or what possessed me to play along with his pathetic ruse.

‘Ho, ho, ho,’ I said. ‘Hello, little boy. What’s your name?’

‘Oh – um – ah,’ he replied. ‘It’s – er – Bo… er, Bob. Bob, um, Smith. Yes, that’s right. Bob. Bob Smith.’

 ‘Well, is it Bob or Bob-Bob?’

His eyes shifted rapidly from side to side. ‘Bob-Bob.’ He can never resist over-egging anything. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d called himself Rex Mundi.

‘Yes,’ I said, with a sage nod. ‘You strike me as a two-bob kind of boy. Tell me, have you been good this year?’

The eyes oscillated wildly. ‘Gosh, I, I, I, I, I, er, um, well, you know. I may have slipped once or twice, in a microscopic way. Nemo mortalium omnibus horis sapit, and all that.’

‘Acta deos numquam mortalia fallunt,’ I replied. That’s not actually Latin for ‘don’t bullshit a bullshitter’, but in the context it amounted to the same thing, though with a much sharper edge. Bob-Bob blanched, which was the response required of a man who’d built a glittering career out of not entirely fake gaucheness, lies, cheap publicity stunts and Latin quotations to signal the quality of his education and membership of the ruling class, but he retained his composure. Credit where it’s due. The man had been born with more brass neck than a steampunk robot giraffe. ‘Have you told any lies?’ I asked.

He puffed out his chest. ‘I have never lied,’ he lied.

I raised my impressively back-combed white eyebrows. ‘Never? What about the stuff on the side of the bus? And that letter to your boss? And, unless I’ve dreamed the last couple of decades, just about every public utterance you’ve ever made?’

‘Fake news. Humbug, balderdash, tommyrot and fiddlesticks. Nonsense propagated by envious gnashgabs and malicious snollygosters.’

‘You mean honest journalists and the people you’ve shafted over the years. Who, one assumes, have some awareness of the law with regard to libel and slander.’

‘Disagreeable fustilarians to a man. And woman.’ He frowned. ‘I say, have we met before? You seem awfully familiar.’

‘We have indeed met prior to today,’ I told him. ‘Just before that rather entertainingly destructive referendum. You wanted to be Prime Minister and I made it happen, even if it was against my better judgement. We made a deal, remember? You signed a contract and paid top dollar for my services. Sixty-five million, if memory serves. Plus one. I wonder who that particular one could be?’

Naturally, he’d failed to fully grasp the implications of our contract, and I daresay the inevitable consequences will come as a complete surprise. I’d bet good money that he believed he was destined for the Other Place, and I don’t mean the House of Lords. It takes more than an obsolete vocabulary and a smattering of Latin to make a man clever, even if it does impress the plebs. Bob-Bob was the worst kind of fool, the sort who thinks he’s a genius because he’s somehow managed to con people even thicker than himself to vote him into office. And he was the epitome of an even worse type of scoundrel, those who think the circumstances of their birth and membership of particular clubs entitle them to power, irrespective of their stupidity, incompetence and moral bankruptcy.

‘But you were less – and now you say you’re more – and why are you dressed up like that?’

‘I could ask you the same question. But as I already know the answer, I won’t. As for me, I have two jobs, this one being strictly seasonal. A bit like you with your political career and the newspaper columns. Anyway, let’s get down to business. What would you like for Christmas?’

He shuffled about on my knee, clearly in some discomfort. I hoped it was haemorrhoids. They always go well with a nice hot poker, I think. Or those eye-watering barbed butt-plugs invented by one of my more creative lieutenants, which come with a matching spiked ball-gag and optional gimp suit lined with razor wire. Not that it would a one-time choice between the fire-iron or the BDSM gear, obviously. Eternity is a long time, and that’s an awful lot of hours to fill, so flexibility and innovation are essential. Really, the most vexatious problem was deciding where Bob-Bob would be quartered. He was equally qualified for the Second, Fourth, Eighth and Ninth Circles of my realm. Maybe I could literally quarter him? That might be amusing. I may be an old hellhound but I’m open-minded and always up for a new trick.

‘I, ah, would like to be Prime Minister.’

‘You’re already Prime Minister,’ I pointed out. ‘That one’s done and dusted. A one-shot deal, no repeats, in accordance with the rules. You have it, now it’s up to you to hold on to it. Wouldn’t you rather have a train set or a set of carved wooden soldiers? An orange? A compendium of games? An X-Box or something similar?’

‘But there’s a General Election coming up. I might lose to that terrorist-hugging Marxist vegetarian surrender-monkey crank with the beard. The country would be ruined. Taking back control might be delayed. Or worse. So I want to be re-elected.’

Nothing to do with him losing the limelight or getting pushed off the gravy train, of course. ‘Let me get this straight. You turned to Satan – now you’re turning to Santa?’ Same difference, you might say, now that you know the facts; but there is a distinction, to me at any rate. And it involves another kind of contract. One deal depends on bad intent – the other requires basic goodness. ‘Let me repeat the question,’ I went on, stifling a sigh. ‘Have you been a good boy?’

He took off his generic school cap and tousled his hair just a fraction more. ‘Of course I have.’

I shook my head. ‘No you haven’t. You’ve been bad so often I’ve lost count. Lied to everybody about pretty much everything. Not just little fibs but whopping great porkies. You’ve betrayed your friends and supposedly loved ones. You’ve shown a distinct lack of compassion. You’ve shifted blame onto the innocent. And that’s just in the last few months. Going further back, you have a frankly jaw-dropping record of elitism, arrogance, hypocrisy, cronyism, self-promotion, venality, bullying, treachery, borderline bigotry, dishonesty, evasiveness, insensitivity, laziness, poor judgement and incompetence. The only surprise – except for the fact that a lot of people have been stupid enough to vote for you – is that you haven’t ended up behind bars. And I don’t mean pulling pints and short-changing drunks. Do you really think you deserve such an expensive Christmas present? Because I bloody well don’t, and you wouldn’t have it even if it was within my remit.’

‘But my country needs me. Only I can make Britain great again,’ he proclaimed, adopting a facial expression that he presumably thought noble and heroic, though it actually made him look like he’d been caught with his hand down his trousers outside a girls’ school.

‘You’re the last person your country needs. You’ve never grasped the fundamental point of democracy – that government exists to serve all the people, not just to bolster the interests of bankers and big business and your posh chums. You don’t understand the responsibility of leadership. Salus populi suprema lex, as Cicero said to me shortly before his execution. You see ordinary people as serfs and cannon-fodder at best, and those who don’t or won’t or can’t serve your purposes are just vermin.’

‘Well, yes,’ he said. ‘But is that really an obstacle? That’s the natural order, isn’t it? Some are born to rule, and others to do all the tiresome menial stuff. Hierarchy is a historical constant. The people need to be ruled. Semper idem. Everyone accepts that we can’t all wear the top hat.’

Thinking about it, history was liberally peppered with leaders who were indubitably much worse specimens of humanity than Bob-Bob. And if not him, there were certainly those in his party I would hesitate, on humanitarian grounds, to employ as tormentors of the damned, let alone lead a nation. Let’s be honest, even the most vile dictators were either elected to office or had, initially at least, popular support. It’s how they got there. In my experience, turkeys tend to vote for Christmas with great enthusiasm.

‘Fair point. But look here, in my other professional capacity I made sure you became nicely positioned to take over the reins when your predecessor cocked up. Remember the referendum? I sent one of my top operatives to ensure that went your way.’

‘You did? I don’t remember anyone with, er, you know.’ He raised his hands to his head and made index-finger horns.

‘You wouldn’t have noticed him, but he was there. Gone freelance now. I suggest you give him a try. But I can’t give you what you want.’

‘Why on earth not?’

‘What I did for you before was a contractual obligation. A one-off, as I said. This is a different kettle of fish. Everyone knows that Santa doesn’t actually provide Christmas presents. They come from family and friends, not the North Pole.’

He was dismayed. For a moment I thought he was going to burst into tears. ‘You mean Santa isn’t real?’

‘Don’t be obtuse. Of course I’m bloody real. You’re here talking to me now, aren’t you? No, my midwinter role is more ceremonial, a kind of semi-formal test of a child’s good behaviour, even if nobody takes it seriously nowadays. In my main job I’m a stick, in this one I’m the carrot. Or do you really think I zoom around the world in a sleigh hauled by flying reindeer and somehow manage to deliver presents to children everywhere in one night? Get real. Reindeer can’t fly and even if they could there’s only so much stuff you can pack into a bloody sleigh.’

‘So you can’t grant me the keys to Number Ten for another five years.’

‘That’s right. But cheer up, Bob-Bob. As a favour to you, I’ll make the call to that fellow I mentioned. He’ll see you right.’ And he would. Mingscum, my former henchman, is utterly ruthless, no scruples whatsoever. Great technique, simply find a like-minded human and sit on his shoulder, day and night, invisible, whispering and whispering and whispering until they get the message. He’s insanely creative and works like a hyperactive Trojan. Spin, smears, fake news, hoaxes, contract killers – it’s all in a day’s work. Okay, he’s as mad as a box of psychotic frogs on acid, and in his human form – which he only uses when he fancies a beer – looks only marginally like an example of Homo sapiens. But if he can’t get someone elected, no one can. Our client lists overlap considerably.

‘What kind of money are we talking about?’

‘Not a penny in mundane dosh. He deals in the same currency as me. Special dispensation because he’s a mate. I expect he’ll want all those souls that have arrived in the UK since you became PM back in July, when I fulfilled my side of our bargain. The rest are mine, don’t forget.’

He was, surprisingly, shocked. ‘But… but… Babies. You’re talking about babies.’ The glimmer of conscience was unexpected, but even the worst of people have one or two lines they are reluctant to cross. This was going to be a stern test of his moral limits.

I shrugged. ‘Even a demon has to earn a crust. It’s your decision.’

Bob-Bob failed the test miserably. In ordinary circumstances, I would have thought there was a flicker of hope for him yet, but predictably ambition and lust for power got the better of him. It didn’t really matter anyway, not for Bob-Bob. His ticket to the Inferno had been irrevocably punched. But he was unable to see that far ahead. Chancers seize the moment and are blind to consequences. They don’t plan for the future. ‘It’s rather tempting,’ he mused, eyes brightening as the tiny spark of compunction was extinguished by a mudslide of ego and ambition. ‘Are you sure he’ll be able to deliver?’

‘There are no certainties, Bob-Bob. A gift can only be from the giver, and this one is in the hands of the British people. But I’m sure he’ll be able to loosen their grip.’

He removed his rump from my knee and drew himself to his full, unimpressive height. He’s not as tall as he looks on television. ‘Well, thanks for that,’ he said. ‘Must be off, tempus fugit and carpe diem and what have you. Cow to milk for the cameras in Somerset this evening. Or is it a bull?’

‘Oh, I’m sure it’ll be all bull,’ I told him.

*

It was a breathtakingly audacious election campaign. Bob-Bob and his pals told enormous, easily discredited lies and were often caught out. Bob-Bob engaged in numerous risible publicity stunts and resorted to the most appalling behaviour under pressure. He was by turns evasive and shifty, offensive and callous. He and his cronies insulted, smeared and slandered the opposition. He demonstrated at every turn just how out of touch with ordinary people he really was. The television cameras captured each and every dirty, shabby moment of what by rights should have been a complete and utter car-crash of an election campaign.

And the public gobbled it up. They chose to believe things they knew to be untrue. They turned a blind eye to his cock-ups and gaffes, were deaf to the truth. They ignored all the bad things that had happened to them because of his party’s policies in the preceding years, and somehow forgot that his party not only comprised the very same rabid ideologues responsible for the very worst, but had wilfully purged itself of anyone with even the tiniest streak of compassion and empathy. The turkeys not only voted for Christmas – they clamoured for cranberry sauce and begged for the carving knife. His party’s rejoicing was a sight to behold, somewhere between VE Day and a poorly-orchestrated Nuremburg rally.

That New Year’s Eve, my annual month of Saint Nick performances over, I had an afternoon drink with Mingscum in an uncharacteristically subdued corner of the Westminster Arms. It’s one of my favourite pubs, a good place to size up potential future acquisitions. I never have trouble getting served there, or finding a free table. Nothing wrong with my mojo. I was my old dapper self, in a cutting-edge black suit – let out at the waist by my ex-papal tailor to accommodate that stubborn festive paunch. The hair, beard and eyebrows were mercifully trimmed and back to black. Mingscum, as usual when he took on a mortal coil, was dressed like a tramp who’s just purloined a set of ill-fitting clothes from a suburban washing line. He also wore his trademark facial expression, that of a vaguely depressed homicidal maniac.

I congratulated him on another job well done. Hats off to the master craftsman, the undisputable centrifuge of spin. ‘How do you do it?’ I asked.

Mingscum’s grin would have curdled milk and terrified small animals, had any been present. ‘The trick lies in keeping it simple,’ he said. ‘Humans like to be told that nothing bad that happens is their fault – especially when it is. All you need is someone to blame. Jews, Muslims, black people, communists, the EU…’ He necked half a pint of Spitfire, belched contentedly. ‘It doesn’t matter, so long as they’re “not like us” in one way or another. And you can spin that any way you want. Don’t have a job? Okay, it’s not because you’re a lazy sod who can’t be arsed to get out of bed for anything less than a thousand quid a day and a free unicorn, it’s because some lousy foreigner has stolen it. Don’t own your own home? That’s not because you don’t have a job, it’s because the luxury twelve-bedroom mansion with a swimming pool that should have been yours by birthright has been given to some refugee terrorist. Tell people what they want to hear. Emphasise that their prejudices and anxieties are more reliable than the opinions of people who actually know what they’re talking about. Have one great big slogan and repeat it at every opportunity. Humans love a vapid illusion of certainty. You can leave the rest to unenlightened self-interest, confirmation bias and collective narcissism. And, of course, our reliable old friends hate, ignorance and stupidity.’

‘But what about all the dishonesty? Every time I turned on the telly old Bob-Bob was standing there with his metaphorical trousers down because yet another of his lies had been soundly refuted. Surely you can’t spin that kind of blunder.’

Mingscum laughed. ‘Actually, the fact that he’s been caught out so often worked in his favour. All those people who’d become convinced that someone was doing them down – I’d laid that groundwork during the referendum campaign – they saw him as one of them, a fellow victim of the liberal metropolitan elite. They rooted for him, and every fuck-up he made only cemented their sympathy. Good old Bob-Bob, they thought. Laugh at him but don’t get serious because that’ll make us think and we don’t like that.’

I shook my head in wonder and admiration. Mingscum really understood these ridiculous creatures. Alright, I knew the theory, but he totally got them, what made them tick, all the weak spots, every quirk and phobia and folly. If I ever decided to retire, I’d certainly recommend him for my job. ‘So many of them,’ I said. ‘Are they really so uncritical? I mean, his track record is seriously crap and it’s out there for anyone to see. Five minutes on the internet should be enough to put anyone off.’

‘Fooling them has always been easy, and it’s even easier now than it used to be. Most humans get their information from their social media feeds, and hardly any of them can bear to tear themselves away from all those posts and tweets. They simply don’t have time to think or research. Why spend five minutes looking up a politician’s voting record when you could be posting a selfie with puppy ears, whiskers and a cute wet nose? Why bother checking the truth of a news story when it tells you exactly what you already know to be “true” – even when it’s a fucking outrageous and obvious falsehood? Shit, I wish smartphones had been around when I was putting young Goebbels through his paces. Nazism would have gone viral within six months of the Munich Putsch. World domination by emoji and status update.’

‘I take it you were involved in the last US election?’ I’d watched the TV coverage with admiration, and thought it had Mingscum’s sulphurous fingerprints all over it, but this was our first opportunity to catch up.

‘Yeah, that was one of mine. Smartphones again. Brilliant invention. Mind you, that ungrateful bastard fired me as soon as he’d won. Said I’d violated the terms of our deal by not getting him a bigger share of the vote. Refused to pay, impugned my demonic honour. I’m going to do a little pro bono work for his opponent next year. That’ll teach him a lesson. Anyway, I daresay you’ll be seeing him soon enough.’

‘Yes, I have a nice spot on a bookshelf lined up for his head. Mussolini at one end, him on the other.’

‘I can see the resemblance,’ said Mingscum approvingly. ‘A nicely balanced tableau. Maybe you should go into interior design.’

‘Who do you think gave them the idea for the Big Brother house? And don’t forget Crinkly Bottom. That was fun. You got Pestilence drunk and persuaded him to audition for Mr Blobby. I couldn’t believe it when they gave him the job.’

He sighed wistfully. ‘Ah, the good old days. I do miss working with you, Nick. The camaraderie. The screams and groans echoing through the smoky caverns. The delicious aroma of roasting flesh and red-hot iron. The free healthcare package, which is more than these poor buggers will have in a couple of years.’

‘Never mind. Look to the future. I expect Bob-Bob will be in need of your services again when the next General Election comes round.’

‘Oh, I think he will. I mean, can you see all those rabid right-wingers in his cabinet allowing him to actually make life better for ordinary people? I should fucking cocoa. No, I reckon by then things will be so bad in this country that even I won’t be able to swing it. Even humans aren’t that stupid. Mind you, I’m always up for a challenge.’

I finished my pint of Bishop’s Finger – which reminded me, I had another soiled clergyman of that rank to attend to when I got home – wished him a happy new year, and ambled toward Westminster tube station and the Circle Line, spotting a number of clients, both present and future, as I crossed Parliament Square and passed the seat of government. I thought of what Mingscum had just said. He was right, of course. Most humans are incredibly, unbelievably stupid, not to mention greedy and selfish. Intellectual laziness seems to be hard-wired. The majority care about nothing but themselves and instant gratification of base desires, unto oblivion. All those literary novels dealing with the human condition talk about things like angst and happiness and fulfilment, but it’s all rot. The human condition is simply terminal. And they’ll be taking the rest of the planetary life with them, which is a shame. Meanwhile, their leaders do nothing but wring their hands, shed crocodile tears and watch the cash pile up while the oceans rise and forests burn, and species wink out of existence one by one. Global warming? I’ll give those presidents and prime ministers and corporate walking piggy-banks a bloody warming, one they will literally never forget.

And that brought to mind Bob-Bob’s final utterance as he left my grotto and stomped awkwardly toward his minders. He looked at the jars of sweets I keep handy as a treat for my normal child-sized customers and said ‘I say, have you got any gobstoppers?’

Why not? Smiling through the white beard, I opened a jar and gave him the biggest gobstopper I could find. It would do until it was time for the ball-gag, not forgetting the butt plug and gimp suit. In perpetuum.

Copyright © 2018 Alby Stone

Ahead, the Pole Star and a horizon hidden in darkness. Behind him, a long, meandering trail of furrowed footprints in the snow. Back further still, among trees and rocks, the shredded remains of his blue Cessna 185. Escaping that with only small cuts and a few bruises had been a miracle worthy of the time of year. But he was lost and cold and alone. His winter clothes wouldn’t keep him alive for long in the Alaskan night.

It had been a routine flight, right up until the storm hit. One last job before the holiday. Anchorage to Kodiak and back, returning home from a charter – scientists one way, cargo the other, he’d done it a hundred times without incident, could do it in his sleep. But not this time. First the lightning, then the wind, instrument failure followed by loss of power and a near-blind descent through dense snow and hailstones the size of his fist. A freak, completely outside his experience, impossible to predict. Not even time to send a distress call before the radio died and the plane slipped into its downward rollercoaster glide. Now he was in deep trouble.

The cargo – cardboard cartons filled with Inuit and Yup’ik handcrafted goods, small wooden carvings, necklaces and amulets made for tourists – had some minor cultural significance and maybe monetary worth but no survival value. Blankets would have been useful, maybe even a pair of snowshoes. Nor had there been anything in the plane. No weapons, no cigarette lighter or matches to make a fire, no food. All he had was an empty flare gun – fired and unanswered – and what he stood up in, a red anorak and lined cargo pants, Timberlands; thermal underwear, shirt and sweater. Dressed for cold, but not this kind of cold. This was Shit Creek, and he had no paddle. At least the grizzly bears would be fat and asleep at this time of year. But there were other predators. Not that he’d have to worry about them, not the way the temperature was falling.

He trudged on, the Pole Star his only target. There was nothing else to aim at. Hopefully, if he went north he would still be roughly on course for Anchorage. A long, hard trek, though he might just make it or strike lucky by stumbling across a road with traffic. A slim chance, but not wholly impossible. But if he’d overshot Anchorage completely and ended up in the Denali National Park, well, he might as well lie down and die right now. Six million acres of mountains, trees and snow might look beautiful on a postcard, but to a man in his position it meant only a cruel and sad death from exposure. Or worse.

What a shitty way to spend the last few hours of Christmas Eve. By now he should be in the Blue Fox or – his favoured hangout when a job paid out – Darwin’s Theory, knocking back a beer or two before going home to his apartment, then in the morning driving over to spend Christmas Day with his folks. Roast turkey and mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie. Giving and opening presents. His mother fussing over him as if he was still her little boy, his father smiling easily and spinning bourbon-lubricated yarns late into the evening. Would he ever see them again? It was looking doubtful.

He was tired but had to keep moving. Shivering was good, so was feeling cold. It was when you stopped feeling the cold that the real problems began. Hypothermia caused disorientation and hallucinations, and gave rise to irrational behaviour. Paradoxical undressing, a desperate shedding of clothes as blood vessels constricted to cause an unbearable and treacherous hot flash. Terminal burrowing, where you dug into the snow like an animal, a crazed last bid to keep warm, forgetting that human beings just weren’t designed to do that. Frostbite was another danger. His hands and feet were already numb, as were his nose and ears. Even if he was rescued, even if he somehow made it to safety, it was likely that not all of him would be going home.

A movement caught his eye, then another, just ahead and to his right, something slinking silently from tree to tree, little more than a shadow, hard to identify in the gloom. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem large enough to be a threat. A fox, probably – perhaps a lynx or wolverine. Animals that wouldn’t attack a grown human, though they wouldn’t think twice about feasting on his corpse. Not a wolf, at any rate. He was fairly sure of that. In this neck of the woods they travelled in packs. Please God, no wolves.

Or maybe he was suffering from that delusion he’d read about when he was a kid, where travellers in snowy wastelands think there is an additional member of their party, a phantom who vanishes when a count is made. Not a ghost, of course. He didn’t believe in ghosts. But surely it was only wise to be afraid of whatever out here might be mistaken for one?

Sometimes the very thought of fear brings the thing itself, a blind and unreasoning dread that may sometimes propel but more often than not simply petrifies. And now, by admitting its existence, he’d let it in. It filled his soul with an inner chill that matched his surroundings and threatened to overflow, to burst out as a scream. He fought it down and forced his feet to keep moving. One after another, striving to maintain pace length. Eyes fixed firmly ahead, no sideways glances. Swing that leg, half a yard and ram it forward, make another bone-wearying trough of a footprint. Then another, and another. Wishing he was shorter and less bulky, the belly smaller, less to carry around. So hard with the snow so deep, with freezing muscles and blood screaming for sugar, exposed skin yearning for honest warmth.

Keep going. You’ll soon be there.

Be where?

You’ll see. Soon.

*

‘You’re a tough bastard, I’ll give you that. When your plane came down I gave you an hour, maybe two, assuming the crash hadn’t killed you outright. But six straight hours of walking in these conditions? By rights you should be very dead by now. I’m impressed.’

He opened his eyes and slowly sat up, surprised to find that he was indeed alive, lying on a bed and covered with thick blankets, the inner chill banished. Welcome heat from a fire he could not see. Something smelled good and cheering.

She spoke again. ‘Here, drink this. It’s not too hot, but take it slowly.’

He took the cup gratefully, sipped the extra-sweet coffee, the warm liquid soothing his chapped lips. The caffeine and sugar quickly hit the spot, quickening the blood and clearing some of the fog from his mind. His limbs and fingers were still stiff and his limbs ached, and his vision was slightly blurred. He examined his fingertips, gently touched his ears and nose. He wiggled his toes. Everything felt normal, no pain or numbness, nothing missing. He was alive and had astonishingly escaped even frostbite.

The woman came back into view. She was, he guessed, around thirty – pretty in a homely kind of way. Light brown hair worn long and loose, greying a little. Striking amber eyes. A grey dress from neck to ankle, long sleeves. Thin but lithe. Hands that spoke of hard work. Toothy, friendly smile. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘Tired and a little achy. Picked up a bruise or two in the crash. I feel good, though, considering the alternative. Where am I?’ His voice sounded strange, hoarse and wheezy. Obviously he wasn’t yet completely unfrozen. He drank more coffee. It tasted like fiery nectar.

‘My home. Found you lying in the snow nearby when I went out to look for rabbits a while ago. You were wet through, near-frozen on the outside. Had to take most of your clothes off. Hope you don’t mind.’

He realised that beneath the blankets he was only wearing his thermal vest and shorts, and laughed weakly. ‘Mind? You saved my life. I can’t thank you enough. You live out here on your own?’

‘Not at first. There were others.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s hard out here. They were old, got sick, accidents. Just me and the kids now. They’re in the other room now, sleeping.’

‘You have kids here?’

‘Boy and a girl, still pretty small.’ She looked away. ‘Their father passed just a month ago. Went hunting, never came back.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that. I guess it must be quite a way from the nearest town. Seems a strange place to live. I don’t mean to be rude.’

‘That’s okay. We came here just because it’s so isolated. Away from people, you know. It’s a good place to live, even in winter. Beautiful in sun or snow. It provides all I need, usually. It’s home.’

There was, he sensed, a story behind her words. The solitude, the simple clothes – he guessed maybe she belonged to some religious sect or back-to-nature movement. But there was also something strange about the cabin, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. It was square, maybe twenty feet by twenty, the walls hung with plain ochre and green blankets, no windows, just the hearth and the bed. He couldn’t see a stove or cooking range, chairs or cupboards. Maybe this was just one room of several – this must be a bedroom and that door must lead to a larger living area. But there was a white carpet, and in one corner was a Christmas tree, shrouded in tinsel, multicoloured baubles gleaming in the firelight, so tall its top was lost somewhere in that high, shadowed ceiling. It looked gorgeous.

‘Did you see my plane come down?’

She shook her head. ‘Heard it crash, that’s all. Nothing else out here to make a noise like that. I figured you’d be on your own. Light aircraft, late on Christmas Eve? Only working planes would be up there, and in these parts that usually means a one-man operation. Didn’t know exactly where it came down, or how far it was, so there wasn’t much point in going out to look. I guessed whoever was in it was heading for home. Roast turkey and mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie. Presents. Family. Mom and dad.’

‘How long have I been asleep?’

‘A few hours.’

‘It must be Christmas Day by now, damn it. I’m going to miss Christmas dinner.’

‘Don’t worry, there’s food here. Enough for a feast. Not that you need building up. Plenty of meat on those bones.’

His teeth began to chatter. ‘I’m feeling cold again,’ he said drowsily.

‘You should get some more sleep,’ the woman said. ‘You’re exhausted. Here, I’ll lie alongside you to keep you warm. Christmas dinner can wait a while.’

‘You’re so kind. Thank you.’ He closed his eyes, slept deeply.

He dreamed he was in a forest clearing, supine in a deep bed of snow that covered his body from the navel down. Scattered around him were a red anorak, black cargo pants, Timberland boots, a sweater, a green plaid shirt,a thermal vest. His mouth was filled with barely melted snow. The clearing was roughly square, walled with spruce and larch. Above him rose the majestic Milky Way, a sparkling curve of silvery dust set with stars that blazed like jewels in the cloudless night sky. But his eyes were dimming, the picture fading back into a slumber that would be deep and eternal.

The wolf rose from his side and licked her grey chops. This was her home and tonight it had provided. The human was bigger than most of the few she’d seen in her time. Enough for a feast, enough to keep them alive for another few days until something else came along. Survival was all that mattered. Her belly rumbled. She called to her hungry pups.

 

Copyright © 2018 Alby Stone

Like most people, I hadn’t really noticed how far the aberration had gone. Too busy worrying about the important things in life – the kids’ education, our health, my job, making a decent home for my family, the turbulent and usually depressing fortunes of Charlton Athletic – I’d been more or less deaf to the clamour and hadn’t seen how radically it had changed perceptions and affected our institutions. At least, not until the day of my son’s seventh birthday. The day had begun brightly in every sense – waking up to glorious sunshine, the profound joy of seeing the excitement on his face, watching as he wolfed down his breakfast before opening his presents. In the afternoon, the party. A dozen or so of his friends eating cake and trifle, then playing raucously in the garden. My wife and I were enjoying it as much as the kids, sneaking the occasional gin and tonic and chatting with other parents, lazily chewing the fat while the little boys and girls entertained themselves.

Then came the knock at the door. I opened it to a man in a brown suit and a woman wearing a drab, smock-like dress that appeared to be cut from the same bolt of cloth as her companion’s attire. He was short and skinny, she was even smaller, and I towered over them. They brandished identity cards with photographs in the favoured passport style – unadorned faces staring straight ahead, emotionless and mildly disturbing. I squinted but without my spectacles the accompanying script was too small to read, and in any case they were returned to their pockets of origin before I would have had a chance to read them even if I could have. The woman spoke. ‘Mr Campbell? Tyrone Campbell?’

That was my name, as it had been my grandfather’s. I answered in the affirmative and waited for them to state their business. Like so many people with my background, and despite my respectable occupation and impeccable citizenship credentials, I was wary of white people with official ID cards. The Windrush scandal was many years in the past, and though I had been unaffected in one sense, in another I was as involved as any other descendant of those who had arrived on ships to answer Britain’s call. The Home Office ‘hostile environment’ policy and changes to immigration law had been designed to foster fear and uncertainty, to make immigrants and their children ill at ease – for which read ‘not wanted here’ – and that job had been done all too well. Irrespective of documentation, reputation or occupation, none of us was unscathed, especially we who had been children at the time. The worries of adults are easily transmitted to their children. And anxiety is both contagious and transformative. Fear of the knock on the door was now hard-wired.

They exchanged glances, the kind of look government officials wear when they are about to deliver bad news of the hugely gratifying kind. I should know. I’d worn it myself often enough when interviewing tax evaders and their less savoury kin, the avoiders. ‘May we come in?’

‘Not until you tell me who you are and what you want,’ I said, smiling politely.

The man shook his head. ‘Very well, if that’s how you want to play it. My name is Ronald Buckland, and this is my colleague, Julie Pullen, Ms Pullen. We are from the Office of Cultural Identity, Enforcement Division.’

‘Never heard of it,’ I told them. ‘Which Department?’

‘Culture, Media and Sport,’ said the woman. ‘Though technically we are a cross-departmental team, so we are also subject to oversight by the Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Among others. Until last year we were part of the Department for Rejoining the European Union, now defunct.’ she sighed. ‘Well, let’s be honest – after Davies and Fox they were never going to have us back.’

‘Well, I work for HMRC, and I’ve never heard of you. What do you do?’

‘We investigate complaints, Mr Campbell.’ The woman’s smile was wholly insincere. ‘And a complaint has been made against you. That is why we are here.’

‘A complaint? About what?’

‘A matter of cultural inappropriateness. In your garden, as we speak.’

I was mystified. ‘What, a child’s birthday party?’

They exchanged glances once more. ‘I think we’d better come in,’ said the man.

‘And if I refuse to let you in?’

‘We have power of entry,’ the woman told me. ‘You’ll leave us no choice but to summon police assistance. If necessary, they will break down your door. And you will be arrested and charged with obstruction.’

And the nightmare began.

Really, I should have known. I’m a well-educated and not unintelligent man. I work for the government, and even with all those other important things to distract me, I ought to have taken note. All those training courses and awareness events – yes, I should have known. But I’d treated it all as a joke. We all had. Surely nothing that stupid could ever become law? Yet clearly it had. The scene unfolding in my back garden proved it.

The woman spoke, the man made notes on the kind of pad I recognised from work, cheap stationery supplied by the inadequate contractor du jour. My wife and our friends looked on from the kitchen window, the children continued to play, though they were less confident and lively than before. They all knew something was wrong. I still didn’t have a clue what it might be.

Eventually, the man and woman came over to where I stood. ‘It’s got to go, I’m afraid.’ Pullen handed me a form. ‘This is a compliance order. You have one hour to remove and dispose of the item, in a respectful manner as prescribed by law. Failure to do so within the specified time will result in prosecution.’ She emphasised the point by forcefully extending a digit in the direction of the offending item, which occupied pride of place in the centre of the lawn.

I stared uncomprehendingly at the form, then my eyes followed her finger. ‘The wigwam? This is about a bloody wigwam?’

Pullen frowned. ‘There’s no need for that kind of language,’ she said. ‘We’re only doing our jobs.’

Buckland made a note, cleared his throat and spoke. ‘As it says on the form, this is an order made in accordance with the Cultural Identity Enforcement Act 2057, section 3, paragraph 2(c)(7). Items and imagery reserved for Native American use only.’ He looked around, leaned toward me. Artificially confidential, conspiratorial. ‘A word to the wise, Mr Campbell. That framed bullfight poster in your hall. Souvenir from Spain, right? Well, you really ought to get rid of it. Paragraph (2)(c)(17), items and imagery reserved for European nations. And that woman in your kitchen, the one wearing the sari? She doesn’t look Indian.’

‘Hindu convert,’ I explained. ‘Married to an Indian man. That’s their daughter.’ I pointed to a small brown-skinned girl with trifle on her grinning face.

‘That’s acceptable,’ the man allowed. ‘And that woman wearing a cross…?’

‘She’s the vicar. That’s her son over there, the one in the Batman suit.’

‘Religious items appropriate to faith, good. Superhero costumes are acceptable, as long as they fall within guidelines.’

‘Guidelines? For kids’ superhero outfits?’

He seemed surprised. ‘Of course. It wouldn’t do to have white or Asian children dressed as Black Panther, would it? Black Lightning and Luke Cage? They are classed as reserved characters. Surely a man of your ethnicity would appreciate that.’

Frankly, I didn’t give a toss which kids wore what superhero get-ups, but sneakily justifying this bullshit by invoking my race was well out of order. ‘Don’t pretend this is about me. My family’s been in this country for a century, and I’m as British as you, despite the colour of my skin. Frankly, I’m disappointed that you’d even mention it.’

‘I’m sorry – I merely thought you would have a greater appreciation of the importance of cultural identity.’

‘Rubbish. You were playing the race card. And I never thought I’d be saying that to a white man. Look, isn’t this cultural appropriation nonsense going just a little too far?’

Buckland made a face. ‘Between you and me, some of it is a little silly. Presumably you’ve been following the Pasta Trial in the High Court.’

‘Pasta Trial? What’s that?’

‘Exceptions to the Enforcement Act can be made upon contractual payment of royalties to a bona fide representative of a source culture. The Italian government has requested compensatory payment for pasta, pizza and other foods traditionally associated with the Italian peninsula. The big supermarkets and restaurant chains have formed an alliance to fight the move, but they won’t win, as the legislation is watertight. However, there has been a complication. China is claiming a share of any royalties for spaghetti, as noodles were invented by the Chinese. Marco Polo, you know. Unfortunately Taiwan is also claiming those royalties, so it’s getting a little nasty. And Mexico is claiming a share of royalties on tomato-based sauces and similar products. The Italians are spitting feathers. Sourced locally from Leghorns, one presumes.’

‘That sounds pretty complicated. It seems to me that this legislation is a rod for our own backs.’

‘It gets worse, believe me. The Mexicans are also claiming royalties on avocados, chilli, maize, potatoes and tobacco. But so are various Native American tribes. India is demanding payment for curries and other foodstuffs deriving from the subcontinent, including tea, as are Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. China, inevitably, is demanding money for dishes originating or copied from there. But that isn’t the worst of it. Behind the scenes, China is also claiming exclusive use of paper money, printed matter, and fireworks – that or a huge compensatory payment, and we’re talking billions. Meanwhile, Jamaica wants a one-off two billion pounds for reggae. This is strictly entre nous, naturally.’ He smiled. ‘French grandmother, so I can say that.’

‘I’m not surprised the government’s keeping quiet about that. This will drive up prices to an unaffordable level. It could bankrupt the country. People could starve.’

‘I agree. It’s political correctness gone not so much mad as totally insane and drooling in a straitjacket. Quite honestly, I don’t think it would ever have gone that far here in the UK – but you know the trouble we had securing international trade deals after Brexit. Every agreement came with multiple strings attached, and as we’ve become more dependent on – ah – sensitive countries, the strong-arm tactics have worsened. But we’re hitting back. The Foreign Secretary is in talks to offset these financial impositions. After all, no matter what the Chinese say, we gave the world cricket, rugby, football and golf. There’s a good chance of some success with the quid pro quo approach, however. Japan has agreed to keep origami, karate and judo off the table as long as we do the same with whisky and pinstripe suits.’

‘That sounds hopeful.’

 ‘Well, we’re also stuck with karaoke. And greater problems are looming, unfortunately. Everyone is claiming to have invented beer, trousers and agriculture. In fact, the Chinese are claiming to have invented everything, and the Hindu nationalists in India aren’t far behind. Then there’s religion. The Israelis are demanding payment for Christianity, and word is that they’re putting the squeeze on Islamic countries, claiming that the Prophet got the idea of monotheism from Jews, which for all I know may be true, even if the Iranians are saying Zoroaster started it all and Egypt reckons Akhenaten invented it. And various Arab states are claiming payment for algebra and chemistry – and coffee, which is bad news for much of South and Central America. Whole countries are having to find alternative names for the stars and planets, and atlases around the world are being revised and reprinted. It’s a mess, no question.’

I was pondering this when I noticed his colleague was no longer present. ‘Oh,’ Buckland said airily, ‘she’s probably just having a look round your house.’

‘Can she do that?’

‘Power of entry gives power of inspection. Don’t worry. It’s just routine. I’m sure you have nothing more to hide.’

‘I wasn’t hiding the wigwam or the bullfight poster,’ I pointed out. ‘I wasn’t even aware they were illegal.’

‘Oh, they’re not illegal as such. Merely reserved. If you were Native American then you’d have a perfect right to owning and displaying the wigwam.’

A thought struck me. ‘Where does this leave the museums?’

‘Potentially rather empty. For instance, the British Museum has already agreed to return the Elgin Marbles, and many lesser items will be going back to their place of origin. Arrangements have been made to secure some exhibits on a permanent loan basis, but for exorbitant fees that may make the place financially unviable. That was in the news only last week, as it happens. Big demonstrations, Farage and Johnson doddering down the Strand with a bunch of equally decrepit UKIP, Tory and BNP veterans. Mind you, I’d thought Farage died years ago. Must be in his nineties now. Surprised he could still walk, let alone keep hold of his pint and fag at the same time. He made a speech about how it was vital for us to leave the EU and made snide remarks about Belgians no one could remember. Johnson’s now so obese he can barely move. He was wearing one of those new lightweight solar-powered exoskeletons. He fell out of it in Trafalgar Square. Into a fountain, of course.’

‘Did he drown?’

‘Sadly, no.’

At that moment Ms Pullen came storming out through the back door, waving a book. ‘You failed to declare this, Mr Campbell,’ she cried.

I peered at the book. ‘Oh, come on. Even books?’

‘Not just any book. I can overlook the Cervantes, Dumas, Tolstoy and others, in accordance with Schedule II of the Act, Permitted Exemptions (Literary)(2)(a), Translations Promoting Positive Images of Nation or Culture – but not this, as it is an instruction manual specific to a particular culture and promotes activities included in section 4, paragraph 2(7) of the Act – intellectual property with practical applications, in this case practices reserved for use by Indian nationals or their direct lineal descendants.’

I laughed incredulously. ‘The Kama Sutra? You mean to tell me this nonsense even covers our sex lives?’

‘This is no laughing matter, Mr Campbell. That section of the Act can have very serious consequences. Tell me, were you utilising any of the – er – techniques described in this book when your son was conceived?’

‘Well, it’s none of you damned business, but he’s seven. We only got the book two years ago, to spice things up a bit. I’m pretty sure it’s the 2056 edition. Do the sums.’

She looked at the edition date and relaxed. ‘I’m pleased to hear it, though we will require a written deposition signed by both you and your wife, along with an undertaking that you will discontinue any – um – techniques you may have previously employed or are still using.’

‘Oh, for… Hang on a minute. What serious consequences did you mean?’

She reddened. ‘If your son had been conceived while using a… technique from this book, he would have been confiscated. And he would have become the property of the Indian government, unless they were prepared to waive their claim. On payment of a small fee, as provided for in the legislation and separate reciprocal arrangements, for use of their cultural property as a service.’

‘What do you call a small fee?’

‘Fifty thousand pounds. A small price to pay for a child.’

‘Not if you haven’t got fifty grand kicking about. What happens to the kids if their parents can’t afford to pay?’

‘As far as I am aware, that has yet to happen. But they would be re-educated as Indian nationals, taught to speak Hindi, and given a place to live and employment appropriate to their caste.’

‘But my son doesn’t have a caste. And I thought the caste system had been outlawed in the twentieth century?’

‘You really should keep up to date, Mr Campbell. It was reinstated five years ago in line with India’s current cultural policies. It’s all those claims they’re making for the historical veracity of the Mahabharata. They say if the caste system was good enough for the people who invented aeroplanes, the internet, atomic warfare and beer, then it should serve them as well today.’

‘Christ, this just gets better and better. Why hasn’t all this been publicised?’

‘It’s been on the news, and has been debated in Parliament.’

‘But nobody watches the news if there’s something better on and nobody pays attention to Parliament unless the party leaders are insulting each other or someone’s apologising for a sex scandal.’

‘It’s a moot point anyway,’ Buckland put in. ‘And I mean that literally. France has objected to our use of the word “Parliament”, so it’s going to be renamed. “Folkmoot” has a bit of a ring to it, don’t you think?’

‘It sounds like something out of Tolkien. Horrible.’

‘Get used to it,’ said Buckland. ‘Do you know just how much of out legal and political terminology is French? It’s all got to be translated into Old English, to make it sound a bit grander than modern English words. Luckily, the Italians are fine with the Latin, as we used to be part of the Roman Empire. It makes them feel that they’re still relevant.’

‘This is insanity,’ I groaned.

‘It’s necessary,’ said Pullen. ‘People’s culture is part of their identity and should be inviolate. Take your own culture, for example.’

‘My own culture? Me and Buckland have been through this. I’m British.’

‘No, you’re legally a Briton of Afro-Caribbean Heritage. That means you have a distinct identity which is protected in law. Just think – you won’t have to put up with seeing white youths with dreadlocks or playing reggae – that will be banned under the forthcoming deal with Jamaica – or speaking in fake Jamaican accents, not unless they want three months in prison.’

‘But I don’t have dreadlocks, and I don’t even like reggae. I’m a bald jazz fan. As for kids speaking Jafaikan, I really couldn’t give a damn.’

‘Jazz is a tricky one,’ said Buckland. ‘It’s like beer. Everyone’s claiming it – West African nations, Jews, the Irish and Scots… And the Chinese, of course. In fact, there are quite a few troublesome grey areas in this field. You remember all that fuss about the cheomsang back in 2018?’

‘I was just a toddler in 2018. Remind me.’

‘A white American girl posted a picture of herself online. She was wearing a prom dress based on the traditional qipao or cheomsang associated with Chinese women. A man self-identifying as Chinese took exception to what he called “cultural appropriation”, and he sparked an internet campaign. The poor girl was vilified in social media. Then, just as all the fuss was dying down, someone pointed out that the cheomsang had actually been imposed on Chinese women by the Manchurians when they took control of China. So this traditional Chinese garment wasn’t Chinese at all, except by enforced adoption. Naturally, the Chinese soon claimed to have invented Manchuria. It stopped the rioting in Beijing and Shanghai.’

‘But doesn’t all this prove that the idea of cultural appropriation is complete and utter rubbish? Ideas, artistic styles, styles of clothing, technological developments – these are not things that respect national or ethnic boundaries. I can’t think of any culture that’s grown up in isolation and never taken anything from another. Cultural exchange is necessary. Without it we’d still be hunting bloody mammoths and wearing their skins.’

‘I think everyone recognises that,’ said Pullen, with a nod to Buckland, who made a note of my mild profanity. ‘This is only partly about giving credit where it’s due. The main thrust is identity – retaining ownership and control of particular aspects of a culture that make it unique and so confer uniqueness on its people, while at the same time preventing other cultures from making use of those aspects to reinforce lazy cultural stereotypes.’

‘Like dreadlocks and reggae?’

Pullen bridled. ‘There’s no need to be sarcastic, Mr Campbell.’

‘Yeah, well. All I see is a whole lot of people wanting to be unique because they think their culture makes them better than all others. And a whole lot more wanting to make money out of it.’

Buckland grinned and nudged Pullen. ‘Wait for it…’

‘I mean,’ I went on, warming to the subject, ‘isn’t that what the Nazis were all about? Reclaiming ideas and images from their so-called Aryan past and shouting about how it made them superior? Hitler would have loved all this rubbish.’

‘Bingo,’ said Buckland. ‘That’s a fiver you owe me. No banknotes, just in case.’

‘Reductio ad Hitlerum,’ sighed Pullen, handing Buckland five pound coins. ‘Better known as Godwin’s law. If a discussion goes on long enough, sooner or later somebody will compare someone else to Hitler or the Nazis.’

‘Well, much as I hate to point out the blindingly obvious, what you’re doing is exactly the kind of thing the Gestapo used to do. Anyway, how the hell did you know about the wigwam? It only arrived this morning and it wasn’t put up until a couple of hours ago.’

‘A tip-off from a concerned citizen, Mr Campbell,’ Pullen smirked. ‘And I’d thank you to refer to it as a tipi, as Native American custom requires. It is a portable habitation of poles and cloth associated with indigenous peoples of the North American plains and prairies. The wigwam, wickiup or wetu is actually a dome-shaped structure built from whatever materials come to hand, and is typical of tribes associated with forested regions. This is clearly a tipi. Schedule 3 of the Act – concerning the protection of cultures through strict use of correct terminology – provides that the proper words must be used for all items, ideas and persons.’

My temperature was rising. ‘It was that miserable old git from number twenty-eight, wasn’t it? He’s had it in for me ever since the kids put a football through his window. I offered to pay but he still insisted on taking me to court over it. Bloody lawyers.’

Pullen again muttered something about offensive language. Buckland made a note of it, then looked up at the sky. ‘Spitting with rain,’ he observed. ‘The forecast said it would be turning wet, cold and windy. Good job you’re taking the tipi down anyway.’

‘Wigwam,’ I growled and turned to go indoors.

‘Where are you going?’ Pullen asked, as the raindrops grew fatter and more frequent.

‘I’m going in to get my parka. It’s going to be chucking it down in a minute.’

They looked at each other. Pullen smiled blissfully. Buckland at least had the good grace to look embarrassed. ‘Parkas are an Inuit creation,’ said Pullen. ‘Well, actually they and anoraks are claimed by several peoples. The Inuit, the Kallalit in Greenland, the Nenets of Siberia…’

‘And the Yupik,’ added Buckland. ‘The Yupik are often classed as Inuit but they are linguistically and culturally distinct. The word Inuit doesn’t even occur in their languages, and they don’t like being called it. Anyway, the disagreement over origins means that in this case it will probably be impossible to allocate royalties and the clothing may simply be subject to a banning order. Oh, and I hope you don’t have any willow pattern crockery. The Chinese, you know.’

I mentally took a quick inventory. Shoes and socks, trousers and jeans, boxer shorts, shirts, coats and scarves. Most of my wardrobe was good, plain generic clothing with equally good, plain English names. My wife’s, though – lingerie, negligees and brassieres; espadrilles, culottes and camisoles; kimonos, pashminas and stilettos… She would need a lengthy shopping trip and a downwardly-revised fashion sense if she was to avoid either public nudity or penury by pay-off. And all because sundry collections of rabid nationalists wanted to feel superior to all the others.

‘What about learning languages?’

‘Approved and licensed individuals only.’

‘Foreign travel?’ It had been a fair while since I’d travelled abroad.

‘No problem there, Mr Campbell. Though you must now be proficient in that nation’s main language, to at least a conversational level.’

‘And to do that I’d need a license and approval. How much?’

‘An internationally-agreed standard rate of one hundred US dollars for the license, and five hundred to pay for the approval process. Oh, and the fixed ten per cent tariff for handling foreign currency.’

‘So it’s all a racket,’ I scoffed. ‘This whole thing is a trade-off between nationalist lunatics and money-grabbing con artists. It’s always the same. Cui bono?’

‘Latin,’ said Buckland approvingly. ‘I think you’re getting the hang of it. Should save you a few quid in the long term.’

‘Ah yes,’ said Pullen. ‘That reminds me. There is a five hundred pound charge for our services, payable immediately. Inability or refusal to pay will result in a fine of one thousand pounds and three months imprisonment. Card payments only.’ She looked at her wristwatch. ‘I must also point out that you now have just under ten minutes left in which to dismantle and dispose of the tipi. Otherwise…’ A shrug. ‘But you can pay when you’ve done that. Mr Buckland will give you a receipt.’

I almost panicked, wondering how the hell I was going to dispose of the wigwam – okay, the tipi – in such a short time. Those wooden poles were long and would never fit in the dustbin. I eyed Buckland and Pullen nervously. Then I became angry, the rage building up to a point at which I could no longer control myself. How dare these unthinking bureaucrats come to my home, disrupt my son’s birthday party and start laying down what I was sure would turn out to be a wholly unworkable law? How dare they threaten an honest working man, a man who had never before committed a crime of any kind, who didn’t have so much as a parking ticket to his name? The bastards were going to pay.

Almost rigid with fury, I called to the kids, telling them to go indoors. But it wasn’t because of my anger, or even the rain. I grinned at Buckland and Pullen, watching me from the shelter of an umbrella, as first I removed the cloth from the tipi, then set about rearranging the poles, setting two of them sharp end upward in the existing holes. I only needed the two. At that moment I didn’t care that Vlad the Impaler was Romanian. Bucharest could sue me for payment when it was all over. So could Beijing.

Copyright © 2017 Alby Stone

‘Of course, you understand the need for secrecy.’ Ted MacBride stared at the document once again, wishing the conference table would open up and swallow it – that he would wake up from this bad dream and find it was a Sunday and he could look forward to a nice, relaxing round of golf. ‘There’s no way the public can know this. The first major lunar mission for more than sixty years, a symbol of restored international harmony after the horrors of twenty years ago, and it’s a total fuck-up. Billions of dollars and this is what we get? The American people will go crazy.’

‘We are all in the same boat,’ said Fangzhou. ‘The People’s Republic of China has also invested heavily in this project.’ He swept a hand through the air, describing a circle that took in everyone present. ‘As have the governments of Japan, India, South Korea, Australia, the European Union and Russia. None of us want this. No one could have predicted what was found. But we must try to be positive.’

‘Agreed,’ said Kawasaki, the Japanese representative. He nodded toward Malinov, his Russian counterpart. ‘I believe Nikolai has a suggestion that may be helpful.’

The craggy Russian stood, groaning under his breath and yearning for a glass or two of vodka. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, the International Lunar Survey Expedition has, from most of our points of view, been a disaster. The expected minerals and metallic ores do not exist. So from that perspective, our nations’ investments have been wasted. But all is not lost.’

‘Not lost? Are you fucking joking?’ Amy Holloway, the Australian, shook her head incredulously. ‘As Ted said, billions of US dollars and roughly the same from every government represented here. It’s a fucking catastrophe.’

‘Perhaps not,’ said Malinov. ‘ Let us review the findings. The Survey Team excavated at six points on the moon’s surface – north and south poles and four equidistant points on the lunar equator, as planned. They followed this with sixteen further excavations at sites roughly equidistant from the first set of tests. After consultation with Mission Control in Almaty, Houston and Beijing, another ten excavations were undertaken at sites selected at random. The results were consistent and conclusive. All previous lunar surveys, from earth or space, have been mistaken. The new survey conclusively shows the surface of the moon was originally an even layer of regolith, loose dust and rock about three metres deep, covering a non-lithic core. The visible features we see now – craters, so-called mountains, ridges and so on – are the result of displacement of that surface layer caused by meteor impacts over thousands of years. What we found beneath the regolith was wholly unexpected – something that has never shown up in any scientific study, though somehow it does seem to have been enshrined in terrestrial folklore.’

‘But how is that possible?’ Sondrine Menard, the EU representative, was practically tearing her immaculately coiffed brown hair out by the roots. ‘We have used radar, infrared and laser scanning, mass spectroscopy, all the tools of modern technology. And they all show the moon to be a solid mass of rock. They cannot have been fooled. It is impossible.’

‘Evidently, it is possible,’ said the Indian representative, who insisted upon being called Mrs Patel. ‘Instruments may lie but excavation does not. What we need to worry about is not that it happened – or what was being concealed – but how and why.’

‘We don’t know why, but we do know how it has gone undetected for so long,’ said Malinov. ‘The team drilled furher beneath the surface and found evidence of a transmitter, a device possibly thousands of years more advanced than anything we have. Somehow, it intercepts any beams or waves attempting to scan the moon and sends a fake return signal. It’s an automated defence mechanism, presumably placed there by an advanced non-human civilisation.’

‘What?’ Kawasaki was stunned. ‘Aliens? Why am I hearing this only now?’

Malinov and MacBride exchanged uneasy glances with Fangzhou. ‘The Presidents of Russia, China and the United States thought best to keep it under wraps. Temporarily.’

‘Permanently, you mean,’ said Holloway, folding her arms and wrinkling her nose in disgust. ‘You are only telling us now because you need our help in putting a positive spin on this fucking fiasco. What else have you bastards strong-armed the survey team into keeping it from us? Is that why they are still being held incommunicado in Houston?’

‘They’ve been able to talk to their families,’ said MacBride.

‘But they haven’t been allowed to discuss the mission,’ said Mrs Patel. ‘And there’s always a security officer present.’

‘Look, we don’t want mass panic,’ said MacBride. ‘You know what would happen if people found out aliens had visited thousands, maybe millions of years ago. Rioting, looting, lawlessness. All the world’s religions would be in serious trouble. Everyone would assume all that Roswell and Area 51 bullshit was true and they’d no longer trust our governments. We can’t admit the problem until we have a solution.’

‘A solution to what, exactly?’ asked Menard.

‘We need a way to exploit what the survey found,’ said Malinov. ‘If handled properly, this discovery could change the world for the better. We’ve all seen the same data, but I don’t think we’re not all reading it the same way. There’s a fantastic opportunity here. Just think about it. We could eliminate global suffering virtually overnight. We are open to ideas.’ 

‘Bring in the English,’ said Holloway.

Silence fell. Eye contact was avoided. The only sounds were those of shuffled papers and shifting bottoms. ‘Impossible,’ said Menard eventually. ‘Since it left the European Union, England has been…’ She searched for the right words.

‘Unstable, unpleasant and ungovernable,’ Holloway said. ‘Human rights abuses, crime rate through the roof, widespread racism and homophobia, administrative corruption, no investment, unemployment on a previously unimaginable scale, a dying economy. The whole country’s been sucked dry and asset-stripped by the very people who bankrolled the campaign to leave the EU. The English haven’t got a pot to piss in. And while they were cutting off their nose to spite their face, they also left the European Space Agency. No money and no involvement. But from what I’ve read today, they’ve got the know-how we need.’

Menard bristled. ‘The ESA also has the “know-how”, as you put it. In France we have experts who could resolve this.’

‘From what I’ve read today,’ Holloway repeated slowly, ‘only the English can provide the specialised expertise we need.’

‘They won’t go for it,’ said Mrs Patel. ‘It would wipe out their economy.’

‘Their economy is already wiped out,’ said Kawasaki. ‘Since the European finance centre switched to Frankfurt and international investors pulled out, even their service industries have collapsed. With Northern Ireland joining the Republic, and Scotland gaining independence and de facto control of North Sea oil, they have nothing the rest of the world wants, except cheap sex for sleazy tourists and the chance of a selfie at Stonehenge or outside Buckingham Palace. All the rich people have left for good except the Royal Family and the politicians, and they spend most of their time out of the country anyway. We know from the last UNICEF report that the only children not living in abject poverty are the ones selling themselves in the sex trade. Malnutrition is rife, and so are diseases associated with it. I never thought I’d say this, but in the year 2037 England is as bad as North Korea was before the revolution thirteen years ago. They may be impoverished international pariahs but we need them. If necessary we can fund the follow-up mission between us. Look upon it as an investment.’

‘I still don’t understand, said Park, the South Korean. ‘How can the English help?’

‘They can help,’ said Holloway, ‘because there is one man in the United Kingdom of England and Wales with an intimate knowledge of what was found beneath the lunar surface. One man who knows how to exploit it. One man who can save his people, and solve the world’s most pressing problem. And help us keep our jobs, of course.’

MacBride shrugged. ‘Okay, as long as our governments agree.’

‘We have no choice,’ said Holloway.

‘I agree,’ said Mrs Patel. ‘And if the governments of the United States, China and Russia are unwilling to do so, then the Indian government will make sure the world knows what is going on. As, I believe, will the governments of Japan, South Korea and Australia. Madame Menard?’

The Frenchwoman gave a traditional Gallic shrug. ‘I still think this is a matter best handled by the European Union, and specifically France, but I will abide by the majority decision. Reluctantly.’

‘Okay,’ said MacBride with a relieved sigh. ‘Let’s do it.’

*

The unusually large landing module touched down. After a while, the airlock door opened and a spacesuited man emerged clutching a spade, which he used to gauge the consistency of the regolith. The man gazed excitedly at the grey moonscape. Then he turned to the landing module and gave a thumbs-up. A few minutes later, a platform descended from the belly of the craft and when that met the ground a diminutive figure drove a small caterpillar-tracked vehicle from it to where the man stood. The smaller figure operated the digging mechanism, rolling his eyes occasionally as the standing man inexpertly supervised the excavation. After a while, the man held up a hand and the digger was moved back. He carefully studied the substance they had exposed, and nodded thoughtfully.

The man took a spoon from a pouch on his suit and gouged out a small sample, which he placed in a complicated airlock on his helmet’s faceplate. A tiny conveyor belt extended inward from the airlock and delivered the sample to his waiting mouth. He bit and chewed thoughtfully, then smiled delightedly and turned to his companion.

‘They were right – it is Wensleydale! Nicely matured, too. Now let’s get the ship loaded. Job well done, lad.’

Copyright © 2018 Alby Stone

Interior – the Oval Office of the White House. POTUS has his feet on desk and is ‘reading’ the latest issue of Playboy. An aide enters.

AIDE [urgently]: ‘Mr President, the aliens are invading!’

PRESIDENT[reluctantly removing his feet from the desk and his gaze from the centrefold]: ‘Whoa there! Whoa, I say! We talking about wetbacks, boy?’

AIDE: ‘Not the Mexicans this time, sir. These are real aliens, from outer space.’

PRESIDENT [slams fist on desk]: ‘Hot damn. Have the little green bastards landed in this once-again Great Nation yet?’

AIDE: ‘Not yet but they’re on their way. Shall I tell the hospitals to be prepared for mass casualties?’

PRESIDENT: ‘Only for the ones that got insurance, boy. Hey, are you sure about this? What does NASA say?’

AIDE: ‘Er – there’s nobody left at NASA, sir. They couldn’t afford hardware and staff after you cut their funding. I did call them but the janitor was on his break.’

PRESIDENT: ‘Fire the disrespectful asshole. He had it coming. So how come we know about this alien invasion?’

AIDE: ‘Routine interrogation of a suspected Muslim, sir.’

PRESIDENT: ‘Hey, I thought I’d thrown all those bastards out of this once-again Great Nation?’

AIDE: ‘You did, sir. But you didn’t rescind the executive order quotas for tort…  – I mean, enhanced interrogation of suspected Muslims. And others. The CIA has been rounding up anyone with a beard, just to make up the numbers for those reports you never read. There’s only ZZ Top and Ted Nugent left.’

PRESIDENT: ‘I always said the CIA are our greatest weapon in the war on terror. Those boys are keen, I’ll give them that.’

AIDE: ‘Erring on the side of caution, as you told the British Prime Minister.’

PRESIDENT [sighing]: ‘Was that ever a disappointment. When they told me Mrs May was gonna be paying me a visit, I thought they meant Brook Power. Instead I get an old broad who looked like she’d just won a lemon-sucking contest. And why the fuck was she wearing a Guantanamo Bay jumpsuit? I’ll never understand women. Or the Brits. Anyway, what did this terrorist guy say about the aliens?’

AIDE: ‘It only took a few sessions of waterboarding to make him spill the beans, Mr President. He told us all we need to know. The aliens are gonna land on the White House lawn with a big silver robot. Seems they sent spies here years ago to check us out, a little fat guy with a long neck and a bunch of others up at Devil’s Tower in Wyoming.’

PRESIDENT [slams fist on desk]: ‘Devil’s Tower? Shit, they must be Satanist aliens. That silver robot sounds pretty cool, though. What else did he say?’

AIDE: ‘He told us everything, sir. Sang like Dolly at the Grand Ol’ Opry. Thanks to him we now know there’s going to be a robot rebellion and a plague of zombies, and a big war in some place called Westeros. I think that’s near Switzerland. He also told us where Elvis is hiding out.’

PRESIDENT: ‘You see? I always said torture works. Say, I got an idea. I’m gonna build a wall around our Great Planet. And I’m gonna make the aliens pay for it, one hundred per cent.’

AIDE: ‘Might be a problem there, Mr President. Since you cut funding to all government agencies and deported all the foreign workers, the construction industry has collapsed.’

PRESIDENT: ‘What about good old American know-how?’

AIDE: ‘You fired all the scientists because they disputed your alternative facts about alleged global warming and – well, pretty much everything.’

PRESIDENT [slams fist on desk]: ‘Those assholes had it coming. Damn. If the American people get wind of this there will be mass panic. My popularity rating might even go down. We’d better have a news blackout.’

AIDE: ‘No problem there, sir. Since you closed down most of the lying fake news agencies and pissed off Rightfart there’s only Fuchs left. And right now they’re busy covering the Clinton trial.’

PRESIDENT: ‘Is the Pentagon on standby?’

AIDE: ‘Mr President, the Pentagon is always on standby. But the military is thin on the ground since you cut the defence budget to pay for the total abolition of federal taxes and the alterations to Mount Rushmore.’

PRESIDENT: ‘One gold-plated Dump has got to be better than four outdated chumps. Well, I’m sure the NRA will step up to the plate. What about the nukes?’

AIDE: ‘Still aimed at North Korea, China and Mexico City, as per your instructions. We can’t change that because the new eyes-only target codes were in that last security report.’

PRESIDENT: ‘You mean…?’

AIDE: ‘Yes, sir. The one you wiped your butt with.’

President [slams fist on desk]: ‘Screw those CIA assholes! They shoulda warned me!’

AIDE: ‘They did try, Mr President. You fired the Director because he disagreed with the alternative facts, remember? And the one after him. And the one after…’

PRESIDENT: ‘The assholes had it coming. And only an asshole would believe fake news over alternative facts.’

AIDE: ‘Of course, sir. But the codes were the next item on the agenda.’

PRESIDENT: ‘Agenda? There was an agenda?’

AIDE: ‘You wiped your butt with that too, sir.’

PRESIDENT [slams fist on desk]: ‘Fuck it, I’m gonna fire the nukes anyway. That’ll make those Satanist alien wetbacks sit up and take notice. I’ll show those tentacled liberal fuckers I mean business. Who cares about a few dead commies and a bunch of radioactive Mexicans? The assholes had it coming. Nobody dumps on Dump. And we’ll be just fine in the bunker. Okay, now tell me. When’s the comeback concert?’

AIDE: ‘Sir? Comeback?’

PRESIDENT: ‘Elvis, of course. I want a front table.’

AIDE: ‘I’ll get right on to it. But sir, what about the response?’

PRESIDENT: ‘Response? What response?’

AIDE: ‘Nuclear response from China, sir. If we nuke ‘em, they won’t just let it go.’

PRESIDENT [slams fist on desk]: ‘I don’t give a flying fuck what the Chinese think. The only opinions I value are those of the people of this once-again Great Nation.’

AIDE: ‘Er, that’s because you’ve deported, executed or jailed anyone who doesn’t agree with you. Rightly so, of course.’

PRESIDENT: ‘The assholes had it coming. Damn. There’s only one thing for it. We have to go to Retcon 1.’

AIDE: ‘Um – don’t you mean Defcon 1?’

PRESIDENT: ‘I know what I mean. We need some backdated alternative facts, pronto. And the backdated alternative facts are that the feminazis, commies, liberals, Obama, Hillary Clinton, Muslims and Mexicans are responsible for this alien invasion shit storm and the coming nuclear catastrophe. Call the Pooch. This is his territory.’

AIDE: ‘Uh, you fired the Pooch, sir.’

PRESIDENT: ‘I did? Well, I guess the asshole must have had it coming. Right, get somebody else onto it. See if that guy from The West Wing is available. Meanwhile, I’ll go on Twitter and tell the people of our once-again Great Nation the reason the aliens are coming is the deal Obama made with that Australian motherfucker, and we can work up a story about the aliens being responsible for the Burning Man massacre.’

AIDE [shocked]: ‘There’s been a massacre at Burning Man?’

PRESIDENT: ‘Watch this space, son. The assholes had it coming. Rich people should play golf and make deals, not dick around in the desert like a bunch of fucking hippies. Okay, problem solved. Now what I was I doing?’

AIDE: ‘You were looking at the Playboy centrefold, sir.’

PRESIDENT: ‘Bullshit. I was reading the features. Hey, can you get me a coffee and a cheeseburger? And while you’re out, head down to the National Archives and bring me the Constitution.’

AIDE: ‘The Constitution? The original?’

PRESIDENT: ‘Yeah. I need a crap and I’ve run out of reports.’

Copyright © 2017 Alby Stone

Fortification was required. He unscrewed the cap and took a large mouthful of vodka, exhaling gratefully as the liquid warmed his tongue and made its leisurely way down his throat, then one last drag on the cigarette before it was flushed away. He closed the lavatory window and exited the cubicle, then placed the bottle in his locker and attempted to camouflage the smoke and vapour lingering on his breath with an extra-strong mint. It would see him through until the morning break, by which time he would be in dire need of a repeat dose. By lunchtime – well, there was a pub just across the road.

He drew a deep breath and left the changing room, making his way through the sparse knots of early risers, eventually arriving at what he was beginning to think of as his Golgotha. Even though it was entirely the wrong season for that sort of spectacle, public torture and execution would surely be a fitting end to what, on the whole, had turned out to be a thoroughly crap life spent struggling to rise above the circumstances of his birth but failing miserably to improve the lousy hand he’d been dealt. He’d tried hard, nobody could deny that – except the Department for Work and Pensions, whose default position appeared to be that he was a lazy, feckless sponger to be treated as a potential criminal and patronised at every opportunity – but he had no influence upon global events or financial trends, no control over the actions or fortunes of others. His efforts led only to decline, a spiral of diminishing returns. At his age, the latest redundancy left him with nowhere to go. Until he found himself here.

The working day began with a cursory inspection of his work station – health and safety regulations bought him a few minutes’ breathing space each day. Then he refreshed his memory with a quick read through the script, really a decision tree of mandatory responses carefully drafted so as to avoid offending children or parents of any NRS, BAME, NS-SEC or LGBTQIA persuasion. It seemed everyone had rights except him. As prepared for the forthcoming ordeal as he would ever be, he took his seat, an uncomfortable plastic chair poorly disguised as an Arctic snowdrift. Alright, so the old dust sheet glazed with a spot of white spray paint wouldn’t fool anyone with functioning eyes and more than three brain cells, but it seemed to keep most of his customers happy, as did the plastic reindeer and the improbably cute cardboard cut-out polar bear. It didn’t really take much.

This wasn’t exactly what he imagined when that sour-faced old bat at the Job Centre asked him if he’d ever pictured himself in uniform. Yeah, he said, who hasn’t? Everyone’s entitled to a fantasy or two. Despite his advancing years, and a nagging suspicion that she was taking the piss, he was thinking Royal Navy, RAF, Grenadier Guards, SAS – even the police or fire brigade, paramedic or security guard at a pinch. But not this. Never this. It was unfair, inhuman. But what could he do? They were poised to stop his benefit, which meant he was waiting at the threshold of yet another last-chance saloon. He’d protested, of course, but it was a stark choice: take the job or be completely skint at the very worst time of year to be without money. So he swallowed his pride and chased it down with the bitter medicine. The pay was rubbish, only a couple of pence above minimum wage, but at least it was only for twenty-four days, excluding a few days off, and it wasn’t physically demanding. He could do it. No problem, apart from the obvious.

Famous last words. At the interview they told him he would be paid a month in arrears, on the last working day of the month. The second piece of bad news was learning that his Universal Credit would stop as soon as he started work, because that too was paid a month in arrears, and technically at the start of the next month he would be earning money. He would, they said, just have to learn to budget, like everyone else. The housing element of his benefit would also stop and he would be liable to pay that, and a month’s worth of council tax, from his distinctly unimpressive pay packet. The only glimmer of hope was that his benefit claim would be restarted when this temporary job ended – though it would take at least six weeks to come through, probably longer. He was caught between a rock and a hard place, and being squeezed mercilessly. The only course of action was to carry on with what he’d started. This way he had a small chance of making it to the resumption of his benefit relatively unscathed and still with a roof over his head. In the meantime, he would spend his dwindling funds on booze. It got him through the day.

He stared down at his ‘uniform’. Red and white – red and bloody white. The ultimate humiliation. No self-respecting Spurs supporter should be seen dead wearing these colours. And it was too sodding hot. And the damned beard itched like hell. And the stupid fluffy eyebrows kept falling off. The grotto still stank from the previous evening, when the last customer had thrown up a vast load of well-churned burger, chips, ice cream, chocolate and cola, along with a pint or so of gastric juices. The kid had demanded, in flagrant contravention of the clearly signposted terms and conditions parents were supposed to read before letting their offspring loose in the grotto, to sit on his knee. In the end he’d compromised and placed the designated customer chair over the joint in question – he was damned if he was going to be accused of some monstrous act by a snotty-nosed brat with an attitude problem – and listened impatiently as the boy recited an inordinately long list of preferred options, none of which cost less than a three-figure sum, before emptying his stomach without so much as a hiccup as advance warning. How he had escaped the child’s spectacular projectile vomiting was a complete mystery. If he didn’t know better he would have put it down to divine intervention.

Every day brought a fresh horror. He’d been draped with beer-stained Arsenal scarves by drunken Gooners, threatened with violent retribution by smartphone-eyed brats severely disappointed by last year’s presents, and scrutinised with suspicion by hatchet-faced young mothers convinced that any man who would do this job must surely have perverse intentions toward their sticky, rodent-like offspring. Last Saturday afternoon had been the worst so far. Parked in the grotto with only half an hour to go before knocking-off time, mouth watering at the prospect of a few pints in the Coach and Horses, followed by a good, long lie-in the next morning, he was thinking maybe things weren’t quite so bad after all – though that rosy hue may have been a side-effect of those regular nips of vodka and a couple of beers where others might have placed a sandwich. Then they appeared, marching haphazardly through the mall and squawking like flock of mad parakeets, antlered, festooned with tinsel and strings of flashing lights, hats that matched his own, swaying precariously on heels little more than long needles. A bloody hen party. His prayer for invisibility fell on deaf ears. When that first fake fingernail pointed in his direction, simultaneous with a screech that brought the rest of them to heel, he knew there would be no escape.

I bet we could make you come more than once a year.

Show us your red-nosed reindeer.

Was that you up my chimney last night?

Let’s see your sack.

And so it went. A stream of unoriginal innuendo. Mistletoe from somewhere. A cocktail of wet, mocking kisses. A drunken, gin-scented tongue squirming in his ear like a huge, panicked tadpole. Clammy hands roaming inside his costume. Interminable selfies, all trout-pouts and lewd gestures. When they eventually tottered off to the next unsuspecting bar, they’d stolen his hat and beard, broken the reindeer, drawn a moustache and spectacles on the polar bear, and one of them had taken a crafty leak inside the grotto, ruining the white bargain-basement nylon carpet that passed for snow. And he was sure their barrage of high-decibel squeals and chirrups had permanently damaged his hearing. Next time a hen party appeared he would up sticks and run for it, wages and benefits be buggered.

If all that wasn’t bad enough, there was the music blasted out by the mall PA system, a ceaseless loop of seasonal schmaltz and banality, the same ninety-minute compilation repeated eight times a day. One of the speakers was directly behind him, no more than twenty feet away. Put bars around the grotto, lighten his costume by a couple of shades of yellow, and he could be in Guantanamo Bay, though he suspected Camp X-Ray would be less degrading and not quite as brutal.

Now the first customer of the day was approaching, a stunted creature of indeterminate age, gender, ethnicity and species, swathed in acrylic wool and bulked out with quilting as insulation from the festive rain and freezing wind haunting the streets outside. Its head was partly concealed by an over-large mob cap. One of its hands grasped an unwrapped, half-eaten chocolate bar dripping with thick, brown saliva; the other terminated in an attractive young woman who was presumably its mother, though she could equally have been its older and better-dressed sister.

What followed was uncomfortably familiar, like being forced to watch an old home movie.

’Look, Santa,’ the child gurgled, dense brown liquid oozing from its mouth and down the little round chin. Its eyes lit up in wonder, a pair of muddy LEDs.

‘Santa can fuckin’ wait,’ snapped the probable mother. ‘I’m goin’ to the fuckin’ nail bar, an’ I gotta top up me phone, then we gotta get yer nan’s present an’ me fags.’

‘Santa,’ the kid repeated, its mouth turning down at the corners, leaking two small drops of brown goo.

‘For fuck’s sake, I told you, we ain’t got time. I’m meetin’ Wayne at two an’ I gotta drop you off at yer nan’s before I get ready to go out.’

The little eyes screwed tightly shut. ‘I want to see Santa,’ the tot grizzled, its mouth opening wide and letting loose a cascade that could have passed for diluted tar.

‘Now look what you fuckin’ done,’ the semi-adult growled. ‘It’s gone all down yer fuckin’ front. Fuckin’ showin’ me up in front of everyone.’ She delved into her bag, a Louis Vuiton knock-off if ever there was, and dredged up a wad of paper napkins emblazoned with the familiar golden arches. A quick wipe of the child’s quilted front, a stained, crumbled tissue dropped uncaringly on the mall floor.

‘Santa,’ the youngster sobbed, a bubble of snot inflating at her right nostril. Another wipe, more litter. The kid emitted a low, keening wail.

‘I can’t fuckin’ take you nowhere,’ the grown-up grumbled.

The smaller entity responded with a barely audible whisper. ‘Santa? Please?’

‘Pack it in, you little sod. Oh, fuck it. Go on then. Five minutes an’ that’s yer lot. As long as it fuckin’ shuts you up.’

The child scampered eagerly into the grotto, snatching off its headgear to reveal a mop of curly brown hair. A little girl – though obviously, as stated in the terms and conditions of his employment, in these days of alphabet soup fluidity it was wrong to make binary assumptions based on mere biology. Wary as this Santa was of very small children of any sexual orientation or self-identified gender, his heart went out to this one. Where her larger companion was dressed to the nines in clean, pressed and seemingly brand-new threads with fake designer labels, the kid’s grubby clothes had seen better days, probably on someone else’s back, and she needed a bath. The girl was an inconvenience, the barely tolerated by-product of a selfish existence. He’d seen it before, at very close quarters. Her infancy was, he suspected, the same as his had been – a disappeared father, a mother whose attention and resources were focused wholly upon herself. It had not been an ideal preparation for life. Hence his present situation: a man for whom low self-esteem and failure were self-fulfilling prophecies, dressed in the cheap costume of an imaginary being and paid peanuts to give others the sense of wonder and hope that had long ago vanished from his own heart.

‘Is that your mum?’ he asked, keeping his voice low.

The girl nodded shyly, gazing it him with big brown eyes that had never seen much worth seeing and probably never would. At best, he thought, she would grow up to be just like her mother. At worst, one of the world’s doormats, neglected and bereft of self-esteem, destined to be a combined domestic servant and punch-bag. But he would stick to the script.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Janie Smith. J-A-N-I-E. Nan taught me to spell it. My mum’s name is Chelsea, but I don’t know how to spell that. She works in a club. She’s got a boyfriend called Wayne. They went to America in the summer. I stayed with Nan. Mum’s got a Honda Civet. It’s red an’ shiny. But I’m not allowed in it in case I’m sick, like I was in her old car.’

‘How old are you?’

‘Six.’

‘Have you been good this year?’

She nodded, then glanced at her mother, who was standing a few yards away, arms folded and face like curdled milk. The girl sighed and shook her head, casting her eyes down.

‘That’s alright,’ he said, reciting Option 2 of the set responses. ‘Nobody can be good all the time, can they? And it doesn’t matter, as long as you haven’t done anything really bad. What would you like for Christmas or whichever midwinter festival you celebrate?’

‘A puppy,’ she said quietly. ‘But mum won’t let me have one. Vet bills an’ food costs too much. She won’t be able to buy fags an’ Processo.’

Bugger the script. ‘You mean Prosecco. Horrible stuff. I think I’d rather have a dog. What sort of things do you like to do?’

A shrug. ‘Drawing an’ painting best. An’ playing. An’ stories. An’ choc’late. Mum gets me choc’late from Poundland. She says it keeps me quiet. It’s cheap.’

‘Have you got lots of pencils and crayons, paints and paper?’

She shook her head. ‘Mum says it’s a waste of money, cos it’ll only get used up or thrown out.’

 ‘If you had a puppy, would you take good care of it? Make sure it has enough to eat and drink?’

A firm nod, serious eyes. ‘My friend Ibiza’s got a Staffie but he bites. Nan’s got a Yorkie called Freddie. I go with her when she takes him for a walk. She lets me hold his lead, an’ I like giving him his baths an’ brushin’ him, an’ playin’ with him in the garden. I want a cockatoo.’

‘I think you mean a cockerpoo. Do you live near here?’

Another nod. ‘We live in Grant Avenue. There’s a shop on the corner. It smells funny.’

That would be Pongo, the no doubt ironically-named ‘artisan’ toiletries store. He’d been in there once, just out of curiosity, in more affluent times. Their products did have some unusual scents, predominantly horse manure and rancid cat piss. The organic liquorice soap he’d bought as a novelty looked like a freshly-released dog turd when he unwrapped it, and didn’t smell much better. It went straight in the bin. No wonder the hipster behind the counter had smiled liked that when he handed over that tenner. ‘I know it.’

The girl reached out and stroked his beard. ‘It feels like cotton wool,’ she said, smiling. ‘Are you really Santa?’

‘Yes, of course I am. And I can prove it.’ He reached down to the small sack filled with packets of sweets that were supposed to be dished out to customers as they departed, a token down-payment on festive treats to come. The kids were not to leave empty-handed, that was the rule – number 47, if he remembered correctly. ‘Here,’ he said, handing her the whole sack. ‘All yours, Janie. Merry Christmas. Now you wait here a minute. I’m just going to have a quick word with your mother.’

By this time the woman was busy with her iPhone, perhaps checking for messages from Wayne, more probably admiring her selfies on Facebook. Her eyes widened with surprise when Santa suddenly appeared before her.

‘Chelsea Smith?’ He took his employee ID card from his pocket and flashed it quickly, before she could notice the mall logo. ‘Richard Hannay, Child Protection Agency,’ he lied. ‘I’m working undercover. We’ve had our eye on you for some time.’

The woman blanched. ‘Child Protection? What am I supposed to’ve fuckin’ done?’

He exhaled a sigh and shook his head sadly. ‘It’s more what you haven’t done. You haven’t taken care of her, for one thing. I mean, just look at her. Charity shop clothes that need cleaning as badly as she does. And she’s as unhappy as any kid I’ve ever seen. You don’t beat her, and she appears adequately fed, I’ll give you that. But otherwise it’s a clear case of neglect, physical and emotional. Are you aware of the penalties for that? Do you know she could be placed in care?’

She gasped, slumped, then rallied, reflex indignation. ‘Who fuckin’ grassed me up? Was it that fuckin’ old bitch at number seventeen?’

‘A concerned citizen, that’s all you need to know. Someone who is genuinely interested in Janie’s welfare. But that’s the least of your worries. I’m not impressed by what I’ve seen today, Ms Smith. My report will reflect that. However, I am prepared to give you a chance to make things better.’

Like most people, Chelsea Smith had only a dim idea of what the law could or could not do. And an inbred fear of people in authority, which in her bubble of a world meant anyone with a laminated photo ID card, a reasonable vocabulary and diction, and a stern attitude, even if they had bloodshot eyes and were dressed as Father Christmas with one fluffy white eyebrow hanging loose. ‘Yer fuckin’ jokin’ me, right?’ she queried, her voice quavering.

He frowned. ‘This is anything but a joke, Ms Smith. You have until the end of February to turn things around. Our officers will be keeping a close watch on Grant Avenue, and if they do not see the expected improvements – well, I’m sure I don’t need to spell it out. The courts do not look kindly upon those convicted of neglecting their children.’

She nodded frantically, no doubt envisaging money draining from her hands, perhaps even picturing herself behind bars, vilified in the press and on social media. ‘End of Feb, right. What’ve I gotta do?’

He could have screamed. This young woman was bloody clueless. ‘Well, for starters you can give her a good bath, clean the clothes she has, and get her some new ones. Spend more time with her, preferably without shouting or swearing. Read to her. Take her out, not just when you go shopping but for herself – a film, the zoo, a walk in the park, feed the ducks. Buy her some paints, coloured pencils, a sketch book, something like that. Kids like to draw, don’t they? I know I did when I was her age. Little things like that can make a big difference.’

‘I can’t afford all that.’

‘But you can afford a brand new Honda Civic. A nice red one, I believe. You can afford those expensive clothes. You can afford to smoke. You can afford to jet off on holiday to the USA with your boyfriend. All things considered, I would say you could also afford to cut down just a little on your personal luxuries so that your child can have a proper upbringing. You can make a start by getting her something nice for Christmas, something that shows you care about her. I suggest a puppy. Normally I would be against giving pets as Christmas presents. My friend in the Animal Welfare Unit has told me some very sad tales of puppies and kittens abandoned after Christmas. But I think a dog would be ideal for Janie. Pet ownership can teach people a great deal about responsibility. We would be monitoring the dog’s progress along with Janie’s, of course. A cockerpoo would be an excellent choice, as they’re good with children. In fact, I strongly recommend it. As my report will show.’

‘A fuckin’ dog? Yer havin’ a laugh. It’ll need feedin’ – an’ I’ll get hairs all over me bleedin’ clothes,’ she protested.

‘You can feed a dog for a day for less than it costs to buy a bottle of Prosecco or a pint of lager. And you appear to be able-bodied, so I’m sure you can brush your clothes without too much trouble.’

She attempted another rally. ‘I’ve got rights, you know. I’ve got the right to – er…’ That was as far as she got. Everyone knew they had rights, but only a few people seemed to know what they were, or that other people also had rights. Their best guess was usually that they had the right to do as they damned well pleased, which was probably why so many morons ended up behind bars for doing really stupid things.

‘Your child also has rights,’ he said sternly. ‘And you have responsibilities, legally and morally. It’s a simple choice. What’s more important to you – your fun and ego, or your child’s welfare and happiness?’

The real answer to that question was written all over her face, but she knew she was cornered. ‘Me kid, innit?’

He glared at her. ‘We’ll hold you to that, Ms Smith. Just remember, we know where you live. You’re on our list, and we’ll be checking, so you’d better watch out. Now take your child somewhere and give her a treat. Buy her some crayons and paper, something decent. And remember, cut out the bad language. Children are impressionable.’

Chelsea Smith scuttled away, pausing only to collect Janie from the grotto. He watched with grim satisfaction as they entered the nearby toyshop. Giving that self-obsessed young mother a dressing-down – not to mention posing as an official from a fictitious council department and making threats he had no authority to make – had not made him feel good. The woman was merely a product of her time, hypnotised by the sight of her face on a screen, learning to be the way she was by following the televised misadventures of a growing army of accidental celebrities who revelled in their shallowness and vanity, and who believed a pretty face and a six-pack or fake tits excused all ignorance, stupidity and poor behaviour.

No, he didn’t feel good about what he had just done. He had no sense of pride. But he felt righteous. Maybe he had made a small difference to one child’s life, if only for a few weeks or months. It was, he thought, probably the best thing he had ever done. Perhaps this good deed would change his luck – assuming, of course, that Somebody Up There had been paying attention, which he very much doubted.

He looked at his watch. Fifteen minutes until his break. He needed a cigarette and a good snort of vodka after that performance. Maybe he should have taken up acting. Too late now, of course. He shook his head wearily and resumed his position in the grotto, trying unsuccessfully to stick the errant eyebrow back on. The music changed, from ‘Jingle Bells’ to ‘Santa Claus is Coming to Town’.

The exultant screech made him look up, though for some reason he saw the pointing fingernail before the sound registered. Then they were heading straight for him, a tottering nightmare phalanx of heels, squeals, tinsel and antlers. His heart sank. Another bloody hen party? At this time of the morning?

‘Oh, for – ’