Anxieties

Nigel said to his doctor, "I've had a very strange dream, and it's been worrying me. I thought I was lying on the ground, naked, reading a book, when up comes this young girl,about nine or ten, and she's naked as well. She snuggles up to me and we cuddle and chat. Nothing much else happens, but then I realise I'm having an enormous erection, which she's bound to notice, and then I woke up. I'm very anxious about it all. Does it mean I'm a potential paedophile? What do you think?
   The doctor said, "Now isn't that strange? I've had much the same sort of dream myself. We'd better go and discuss it, and look at a few pictures to see what stimulates us". 

Fugitive

Ever since Geoffrey was taken, Alex knew it was only a matter of time before they came for him too. In an attempt to stave this off, he left his home, broke off all contact with his friends, and moved into squalid lodgings inthe chaotic household of Lizzie, an unmarried mother of several young boys. He told her nothing about himself, and she was glad to take his rent money without seeking any proof of his identity. In Lizzie's neighbourhood nobody asked too many personal questions.
   But after a while he started to feel insecure even there. Abruptly he decided to up sticks once more, and took a train to Scotland, but the first thing he saw when disembarking at Glasgow Central station was a poster of himself, offering a large reward for his capture. In panic he fled back to Lizzie.
   Now he scarcely dared venture outside at all. His uneasiness was now overwhelming. Would Lizzie be able to resist the money offered for his capture? And what of her boys? Surely they would gossip to their friends about the strange man who never left his room, and eventually this would reach the ears of the authorities. But his will was paralysed, and he could do nothing to help himself.
   Thus it was that when two man came to take him, he accepted it fatalistically and offered no resistance.
   "I suppose it was Lizzie who betrayed me?" he asked as they took him away.
   "Lizzie told us nothing; otherwise we'd have found you much earlier".
   "Well well," he mused, "It shows how wrong you can be! I would have thought she could really have used all that money!"

Typhon

For some weeks past, Udlotwyn the wizard had become increasingly troubled by his dreams. At first these had consisted of no more than obscure shapes, dimly perceived, but which nonetheless caused him a vague disquiet; but then, as night followed night, the vision gradually solidified, until he beheld an ancient city of tall towers and minarets, domes and battlements, strange in form and utterly black in colour, seen in the distance with the foreground shrouded in a strange bluish mist.

   Udlotwyn was disturbed. He was certain that these dreams portended something of great importance, but he could not identify the city, or even ascertain whether or not it had a real existence outside of his mind. He wondered whether anyone else had had similar dreams. As a wizard, he was naturally more sensitive to such things than ordinary people. But there was no-one he could consult: he was the only remaining true wizard in that country; perhaps the only one left in the entire world, for all he knew. For sure, there would be some amateur dabblers in magic, and all he could do was hope that their foolhardy experiments would not create too much damage.

 The dreams continued. Now sounds were heard too: voices chanting in an unfamiliar language and discordant notes of harsh music. Udlotwyn became increasingly worried. Finally he decided he must take action. He read reports that an unfortunate inmate at a mental asylum, who was generally placid and was encouraged to paint pictures as a therapy, had produced a canvas of a fantastic city-scape and then lapsed into violent ravings. In rare moments of coherence he had stated that he had painted what he saw in his dreams.

   Udlotwyn consulted his books of magical lore. What he eventually found there filled him with dread. The city he saw in his dreams could be none other than Typhon, that legendary home of evil warlocks, on the hill overlooking the Blue Marsh. No trace of it had ever been found by archaeologists, and some authorities maintained it was no more than a myth. And one name especially was associated with it: Magathan.

   Magathan! The most terrible of all the black magicians of past aeons! Of course, that was not his real name: no-one would dare pronounce the real name of a great wizard out loud: you never knew what might happen; though doubtless there would be hidden conundrums that allowed you to discover it. According to legend, Magathan had not died (for such a powerful wizard would never die in the way that ordinary mortals did) but was eternally asleep, no-one knew where, waiting to be awoken.

   Udlotwyn wondered whether some foolish dabbler had discovered his name and thus aroused him. For the situation was becoming more and more alarming. Groups of people were now reported to be wandering around, babbling incoherently about searching for a lost city, and in his dreams Udlotwyn could see them, trekking across the Blue Marsh towards the gates of Typhon. After much thought, he decided only one course of action was open to him. He must himself locate Magathan, and if his unquiet soul was indeed stirring, then silence him by banishing him from the world, if such a thing was possible. Udlotwyn sighed, knowing that this could be the final task he would ever undertake as a wizard, and might in every likelihood lead to his own fall and destruction. But what else could he do?

   He concentrated all his powers, in the hope that somehow he could sense the presence of Magathan in some place and make his way towards it. Nothing. Nothing at all. What now? 

(To be continued)

For My Grandfather

I never knew him
he died when I was five
but I have his watch and chain,
silver, made by a local firm 
in Keighley, where he lived his entire life,
inscribed 
"Presented to Thomas Midgley
on his 21st birthday
Oct. 25th 1903"

He was, I'm told
a man of the highest moral standards;
he disapproved of pubs
and scruffy dress;
he played the piccolo in the town orchestra,
he owned some good books
(Dickens, Walter Scott, Dumas),
he was an early member of the
Independent Labour Party,
he knew Philip Snowden,
the first-ever Labour Chancellor,
and he read the "Daily Herald"
the Trades Union paper 
(now defunct)

His wife, my grandmother, was
a mill-worker, very houseproud,
and a vegetarian (unusual in those days).
Before getting married they
saved up for years
in order to buy good furniture.

He would have described himself as
proud to be
working-class, Yorkshire, and respectable.
Do people like him exist today?

I found a picture recently of his house
(terraced, outside loo, near the railway)
It looked sadly run-down.

The watch runs erratically.
Nowadays it would be valued
solely by its bullion content.

Conjugations

Anyone who was taught Latin in the traditional way will remember how to conjugate verbs; thus:-

Amo            I love
Amas          You (sing.) love
Amat           He/ She loves
Amamus     We love
Amatis        You (pl.) love
Amant        They love

Here are a couple of modern conjugations of verbs:-

1. "To hold beliefs"

I am firm
You (sing.) are obstinate
He/She is pig-headed
We stick to our principles
You (pl.) are doctrinaire
They are utterly blind to the true state of affairs

2. "To go on holiday

I am a traveller
You (sing.) are a tourist
He/She is a tripper
We have discovered a marvellous Greek island
You (pl.) have pushed the prices up alarmingly
They have ruined the place conpletely 

An Unwelcome Fellow-Traveller

"I really hate the sea", he was saying. At least, that's what I thought he was saying, because to be perfetly honest I had long since stopped paying attention to him. When you're on a long, slow railway journey you often get chatting to complete strangers, but on occasion it proves to be a bad mistake. This was one of those occasions. He'd wittered on for ages, all about himself, and most of what he'd said was of so little interest that it had entirely washed over me, leaving no trace on my memory. 
   So I replied, "Oh really?" in my most neutral voice, trying to indicate complete lack of interest without being seriously rude. I shuffled with some papers and pretended to be reading them, hoping he'd take the hint and shut up. But that was too much to hope for.
   "The thing is", he continued, "I once had the most dreadful experience at the seaside, and it's haunted me ever since".
   (No, I thought, please don't tell me about it!)
   "In fact, it was so dreadful that I can't bear to speak about it even now".
   (Thank God for that! I told myself)
   "Have you ever felt like that?" he asked, in a tone that implied  he didn't expect me to launch into a similar experience of my own. "It can be a great relief to unburden your soul to a stranger, but somehow you can't bring yourself to do it".
   Really, this was getting intolerable. But I found myself asking, "The seaside, you say? Anywhere I would know? here or abroad?"
   "Oh, I can't travel abroad. It would mean crossing the sea in an aeroplane. I'd know I was crossing it, even though I couldn't see it. No, it was here in England".
   The train slowed down and stopped at a small station. My companion picked up his only bag and rose to his feet.
   "Well", he said, "I'm off to the sea now. I'll just have to try and conquer my fears. Look, I'm most grateful to you for all your help and advice. I've enjoyed meeting you. Goodbye!" I muttered, quite truthfully, that I hadn't done anything to help him at all. And then he was gone. I slumped backin my seat, relieved to be free of him at last.
   It was only later that I realised we were nowhere near the coast. 

Gifts

It was a bright day in October, with the autumn sun glinting off leaves left damp by recent rain, when Jennifer came to visit her aunt in her cottage on the Somerset coast. They had not met for some time. After tea, Jennifer was taken into a small sitting-room looking out onto the sea. The tide was coming in.
"Now", said her aunt, "I've asked you here for a purpose. You're not my nearest relative, of course, but I've followed your life with interest, and I think you're sensible and strong-minded enough for what I'll need you to do. You see, my dear, I'm going to die soon".
Jennifer, caught by surprise, could only utter some kind of gasp.
"Oh, it's all right", said her aunt,"you needn't feel sorry for me. I'm not in pain or anything. But I know these things, you see: I know I'm not going to last much longer. And it's very inconvenient, because I know all sorts of things are likely to happen very soon; probably very unpleasant things; and I won't be here to deal with them. That's where you come in. You'll have to take over from me when I'm gone. Now come over here".
She led a bemused and silent Jennifer to a glass-fronted display cabinet containing a random-looking collection of small objects: just the sort of collection a middle-class maiden lady might be expected to have accumulated during a long life.
"Now take a good look", she said, "You won't be getting anything from my will, but you can have some of these now. Which would you like?"
Jennifer felt an inexplicable sense of dread come over her; so much so that she was hardly conscious of making a rational decision; but finally she said, "The ring. I'd like the ring, please". Why she had chosen that, she wondered. It wasn't a special-looking ring at all. It had a blue stone, but it probably wasn't a genuine sapphire. Her aunt smiled.
That's good", she said, "You shall have the ring. Now for your second gift?"
"The litttle horse", said Jennifer. Again, she couldn't precisely say why she had made the choice. It was a small earthenware animal, Chinese in inspiration, though probably not in manufacture. Once again, her aunt looked pleased.
"Not much to look at, is he? But it's the right choice again. Now just one more to pick".
Jennifer knew what she would have to choose next, but by this time she was feeling positively frightened. She hesitated a long time before finally saying, in no more than a whisper,"The suffbox". Why did it alarm her so? There were peculiar decorations on the lid, and it probably wasn't even real silver.
Her aunt unlocked to cabinet and removed the three small objects. "Actually, it's not a snuffbox, but never mind. There! You've made the right choice three times running: it's a very good sign. I knew I was right to call you down here.
"You can wear the ring if you think you're strong-minded enough, which I think you are; but you must be prepared to see some very strange things if you do; often quite disturbing things". She walked across to the window, where twilight was already descending on Bridgewater Bay, and lights were twinkling away northwards on the Welsh shore. "I've seen a lot of very strange things out there. Some of them I was able to help deal with ....."
Her voice faded, then strengthened again. "The horse will help you. You'll find out how to summon him when you need to.
"As for the box, it must never be opened. I can't stress that too strongly. I'm not precisely sure what's in it, you understand, but I'm certain it's something very nasty indeed. You must think of yourself as the guardian of the box. I've guarded it for more than forty years, and now I'm passing it on to you.
"Now you really must go. I've booked you into a hotel in Taunton for the night, and it wouldn't be at all a good idea for you to be driving along little country roads in the dark with these things on board".
Jennifer was past asking for explanations, but she did say, "Hadn't we better wrap them up?"
Her aunt smiled. "Oh, you needn't worry about them bashing into each other and getting broken: they can look after themselves! But you're quite right: we should treat them with proper respect".
So they wrapped up the three gifts very carefully in tissue paper and put them in a shopping bag.
"Now you can kiss me goodbye", said her aunt, "You won't be seeing me again. It's up to you now".