Nostradamus Ate My Hamster

1 Oh Little Town of Brentford

All along the Ealing Road the snow fell and within The Flying Swan a broad fire roared away in the hearth.

Neville the part-time barman whistled a pre-Celtic ditty as he draped the last tired length of tinsel about the lopsided Christmas tree. Climbing down from his chair, he rooted about in the battered biscuit tin which stood upon the bar counter. Herein lay the musty collection of once-decorations and the wingless fairy that had served The Swan well enough for some fifteen Christmas-times past. Neville considered that the jaded pixie still had plenty of life left in it, should The Swan’s Yuletide revellers be persuaded to keep their malicious mitts off her.

Drawing the elfin relic into the light, Neville gently stroked the velvet dust away. She was a sad and sorry specimen, but tradition dictated that for the next two weeks she should perch upon her treetop eyrie and watch the folk of Brentford making the holy shows of themselves. Being a practising pagan, Neville always left dressing the tree until the very last night before Christmas.

That its magic should work to maximum effect.

Clambering once more onto his chair, the barman rammed the thing onto the treetop, thinking to discern an expression of startled surprise, and evident pleasure, flicker momentarily across the wee dolly’s countenance. Climbing carefully down, Neville stepped back to peruse his handiwork through his good eye.

“Blessed be,” said he, repairing to the whisky optic for a large measure of Christmas cheer.

The Guinness clock above the bar struck a silent five-thirty of the p.m. persuasion and an urgent rattling at the saloon bar door informed the barman that at least two of the aforementioned revellers, evicted a scant two hours before, had now returned to continue their merry-making. Neville drained his glass and smacked his lips and sauntered to the door.

Click-clack went the big brass bolts, but silently the hinges.

Upon the doorstep stood two snowmen.

“Looks like filling up out,” said one.

“God save all here,” said the other.

“Evening, Jim, John,” said Neville, stepping aside to allow The Swan’s most famous drinking partnership entry. Jim Pooley and John Omally (both bachelors of the parish) shook the snow drifts from their shoulders, rubbed their palms together and made towards the bar.

Neville shambled after, eased his way behind the counter, swung down the hinged flap, straightened his dicky-bow and assumed the professional position.[1]

With stooped-shoulders back and head held high, he enquired, “Your pleasure, gentlemen?”

“Two pints of Large please, Neville,” said Pooley, slapping down the exact change. Neville drew off two pints of the finest.

Jim raised his glass to his lips. “Yo ho ho,” said he, taking sup.

John took sup also and account of the tree.

“Our good woman the fairy has made her yearly phoenix rise from the biscuit tin, I see.”

“Christmas,” said Neville in a voice without tone. “Who can odds it, eh?”

John and Jim drew upon their pints, the snow crystallizing on their shoulders to steam away by the heat of the blazing fire. “You have The Act booked, Neville?” Omally asked.

Neville gave his slender nose a tap. “The Johnny G Band. Northfield lads. Oldies but goodies and things of that nature.”

Omally made a face. “I’ve heard of these fellows. Buffoons to a man.”

“The brewery,” said Neville. And that was that.

Outside the snow continued to fall and a stagecoach-load of travellers enquired the route to Dingly Dell.

The saloon bar door swung open to admit a flurry of white, an ancient gentleman and a snow-covered dog. “Good-evening, Neville,” said Old Pete, hobbling to the bar. “A dark rum, if you please, and something warming for young Chips here.”

The barman thrust a glass beneath the optic and with his free hand decanted a ladle of mulled wine into the dog’s personal bowl. Old Pete pushed the exact change across the polished bar top and accepted the drinks.

“Deepening out?” asked Neville.

The ancient gave a surly grunt. “Christmas,” he said. “Who can odds it? Norman not here yet?”

The part-time barman shook his brylcremed bonce and took up a glass to polish. “He’ll be along.”

Christmas Eve at The Flying Swan always had about it an almost religious significance. It fell somewhere near to the ritual of the high mass. There was the arrival, the blessing, the hymns, the taking up of the offering, the communion of souls and the big goodbye. You had to have your wits about you to pick up on all the subtle nuances though.

Pooley, having made his arrival, now made the first blessing. “To Christmas,” he suggested, raising his glass. “Another Christmas, nothing more, nothing less.”

Omally clinked his glass against his fellow’s and drained it with feeling. “Nothing more, nothing less,” he agreed. “Two more of similar please, Neville.”

Old Pete hefted a colourfully wrapped parcel onto the countertop as the barman did the business. “It’s a goody this year,” he confided to the drinkers.

Regarding the offering part of the high mass, it had become something of a tradition amongst The Swan’s patrons to reward, upon this special night, the year-long endeavours of their barman. That Neville should actually have survived intact another year behind the counter of The Flying Swan was a meritorious something in itself. And with the passing of time the unhealthy spirit of competition had entered this tradition and the drinking populace now vied with one another to produce the most original, exotic or extraordinary gift.

Using Christmas as a theme (it being available and everything), the plucky Brentonians chose to bombard their pagan barkeep with trinkets of a Christian nature. The irony of this was never lost upon Neville, although it had others bewildered.

Last year he had received, amongst other things, a full-length bath towel, printed with the image of The Turin Shroud, which did little to enhance the post-tub rub down; several more nails from the true cross, that didn’t match any of the others he already had in his drawer; an aftershave bottle containing The Virgin’s tears and a genuine piece of Mother Kelly’s Doorstep (this from a dyslexic).

Every gift, however, was inevitably overshadowed by that borne in by Norman Hartnell[2] of the corner shop. Norman’s present was usually the high point of the evening.

Pooley and Omally made nods and winks towards Old Pete and patted at bulges in their jackets.

Neville presented further pints and the patrons sat, took in their cups and discoursed upon the doings of the day.

Overhead, a heavily laden sleigh, jingling with bells, drawn by six reindeer and bearing a Shaman clad in the red and white of the sacred mushroom, swept off in search of good children’s stockings. The snow fell in cotton wool balls and crept up towards the bench mark on the Memorial Library wall. Several more revellers blew in from the blizzard.

Roger de Courcey de Courcey, production buyer for a great metropolitan television company, staggered towards the bar, bearing upon his arms a brace of evil-looking hags. These had displayed themselves at the Christmas bash (with him half gone on Pol Roget), as a veritable deuce of Cindy Crawfords. But the snow had been sobering him up.

“G and Ts,” said Roger, his Oxford tones raising hives and bouncing off the baubles.

“Doing it for a bet then, Roger?” Neville asked. “Care for a couple of paper bags, while you’re about it?”

Roger winced, but went “haw, haw,” said “typing pool,” and “well away.”

“And the sooner the better,” said Omally. “I hope you have a licence for them.”

The two hags tittered. One said, “I fink I need the toilet.”

Old Pete moved away to a side table, taking his dog with him. The Memorial Library clock struck six.

In dribs and drabs the Yuletide celebrants appeared, patting snow from their duffle-coats and discarding their fisherman’s waders beside the roaring fire.

At length Johnny G made his arrival. He was small, dark and wiry. But he walked without the aid of a stick and appeared to have all his own teeth. Small details, but none the less encouraging to Neville.

Booking an Act is a bit like buying a used Cortina from Leo Felix. You never quite get what you think you have got but it’s hard to tell just how you haven’t.

Publicans accept that when they book a band to begin at eight and play until eleven, they have entered into an agreement which is, for the most part, largely symbolic in nature. If, by half-past eight, even one of these professional players has turned up and actually possesses his own PA system and a full complement of strings to his guitar, the publican considers himself one bless’d of the gods. Should two or more musicians arrive and commence to play before another hour is up, then the publican will probably contemplate suicide, reasoning that he has now seen everything that a man might ever hope to see in a single lifetime. Or possibly more.

Johnny G strode manfully from the three-foot snow fall, bearing an aged guitar and a thirty-watt practice amp. “Corner all right, guvnor?” he asked.

Neville nodded bleakly. “And slacken your strings. We have an opera singer comes in here and the door still has its original glass.”

Johnny nodded his small dark head as if he understood. “‘Blueberry Hill’, ‘Jack to a King’, that kind of business?”

“That kind of business.” Neville looked on as Johnny braved the elements once more to dig his equipment from the rear of the GPO van he had “borrowed” for the evening.

Much ink could be wasted and paper spoiled in writing of Johnny’s equipment. Of its history and ancestry and disasters that nightly befell it. But not here and not on such a night as this. Suffice it to be said, that some thirty-five minutes and three near-fatal electrocutions later, he had completed its elaborate construction. He seated himself behind an obsolete Premier drum kit, slung a war-torn Rickenbacker across his shoulders and a harmonica harness about his neck and was definitely ready for lift off.

“Johnny G Band?” asked Neville, suspiciously.

“Five piece,” said John. “Vocals, guitar, drums, harmonica and kazoo.” He called a hasty, “One-two,” into the mic and a scream of feedback tore about the bar, rattling the optics and putting the wind up young Chips.

Neville gave his head another shake. “Christmas,” said he. “Who can odds it?”

In four feet of snow and a little way up the road, Tiny Tim pressed his small blue nose against the window of Norman’s corner shop and took to blessing the Woodbine advertisements.

Each and every one.

Within The Swan, Christmas Eve was now very much on the go. The cash register rang musically, if anything somewhat more musically than the Johnny G Band, and the patrons were already in full song.

There appeared to be some debate regarding exactly which songs they were fully singing and it was generally left to those of loudest voice and soundest memory to lead the way.

Old Pete had turned his back upon the young strummer and now applied himself to The Swan’s aged piano. Those who favoured Yuletide selections from the Somme joined him in rowdy chorus. Johnny strummed on regardless, oblivious to the fact that the jack plug had fallen out of his guitar and that no-one was really listening anyway.

A merry time was being had by all.

Omally was doing the rounds of the local womenfolk, smiling handsomely and pointing to the mistletoe sewn into the brim of his flat cap. He gave Roger’s hags a bit of a wide berth though.

Young Roger had already phoned for a minicab, donned a disguise and repaired to The Swan’s bog. Here he was apparently conversing with God down the great white china speaking tube. Pooley stood beneath the tree, miming The Wreck of The Hesperus.[3]

Neville moved up and down the bar, dealing with all-comers, as the roaring voices of the various singing factions ebbed and welled according to who had been called to the bar or caught short. The Johnny G brigade, composed mostly of those to whom drunkenness brought charity, came greatly into its own during periods when Old Pete, whose bladder was not what it used to be, took himself off to the bog. But it fell into disarray upon his reinvigorated returns. The Guinness clock ate up the hours and crept towards ten, the traditional time for Neville’s present openings.

Outside, in answer to a thousand schoolboy prayers (Christmas being, as all drunkards will knowledgeably inform you, a time for children), local transvestite, Will Shepherd, washed his frocks by night.

A minicab driver fought his way in from the cold, togged out in heavy furs and snow shoes of the type once favoured by Nanook of the North (he of the “yellow snow” fame). He enquired after a certain Mr de Courcey de Courcey, but none felt inclined to arouse the lad who now lay snoring peacefully beneath the Christmas tree.

The short-sighted driver, who had had his fill of Christmas anyway, ordered himself a triple Scotch and soon fell into conversation with two hags, who appeared to his limited vision as nothing less than a deuce of Cindy Crawfords.

Old Pete, who had exhausted his repertoire, was now downing a yard of rum at the expense of a well-heeled punter. Omally was braving the elements in the rear yard with The Shrunken Head’s temporary barmaid, who had lost her way in the snow. And it was toward this direction that Jim Pooley danced at the head of an inebriated conga line, composed for the most part of under-age females.

Johnny G had given up the unequal struggle against both the spirited opposition and the ranks of free pints lined up on his amp. He lay slumped across his drum kit, mouthing the words to a song his mother had taught him back in Poona and blowing half-heartedly into a crisp-muffled kazoo. The holly and the ivy were doing all that was expected of them and it certainly did have all the makings of a most memorable night.

Neville stacked another tray-load of drinks and wiped away a bead of perspiration which had unprofessionally appeared upon his professional brow. He looked up towards the Guinness clock. Nearly ten, the counter gay with gifts, but where was Norman?

“Pints over here, please,” called Old Pete, proffering a bundle of newly acquired money notes.

The second hand on the Guinness clock completed another circuit and the hour was struck. Although no-one actually heard it, the signal echoed mystically about the saloon bar, halting the singers and drinkers and talkers and revellers in mid-swing and silencing them to a man. Or a woman. Or Will Shepherd.

“Merry Christmas to you all,” called Neville the part-time barman. And the folk of The Swan, with their drinks in their hands took to flocking about him at the bar.

Omally excused himself from his near-naked and frostbitten unofficial bride-to-be and stumbled in through the rear door, gathering up Jim Pooley, whose women had deserted him and whose keyhole eye had snow blindness.

“Three cheers for Neville,” quoth Omally, and the cry went up.

Neville cleared his throat, made a brief speech of thanks, blissfully devoid of time-wasting and sentiment, rubbed his hands together and to much applause applied himself to the nearest parcel. It contained an elegant set of cufflinks with matching tie clip, wrought from discarded beer bottle tops. It was a present from Wally Woods, Brentford’s foremost purveyor of wet fish.

“Nice one,” roared the crowd. “Very tasteful.”

Wally accepted these ovations modestly. “It was nothing,” he said.

“Correct,” agreed the crowd. “We were being sarcastic”

The second gift was something of an enigma, being an item which appeared to be neither animal not vegetable nor mineral. There was much of the mythical beast to it, but even more to suggest that its antecedents lay with the sprout family. Neville held it at arm’s length and ogled it with his good eye. He rattled it against his ear and cocked his head on one side.

The crowd took to murmuring.

The bearer of this gift stepped hurriedly up to the bar and whispered words into Neville’s ear. Neville’s good eye widened. “Does it, be damned?” said he, rapidly removing the thing to below counter level. “Most unexpected,” adding, “just what I always wanted.”

Pooley’s present proved to be of extraordinary interest. Once naked of its newspaper wrappings it displayed itself as a square black metal box, approximately six inches to a side, with a slot at the top and bottom.

Neville shook it suspiciously.

“It’s a thing patented by my grandaddy,” said Jim, “called Pooley’s Improver. It converts base metal into gold.”

“Well now,” said Neville, making what is known as an “old-fashioned face”. “That’s useful.”

“And fully practical.” Jim popped a copper coin into the top slot. Grinding sounds, suggestive of gears meshing, issued from the box and within but a moment or two, something which had every appearance of a golden sovereign dropped into Neville’s outstretched palm.

Neville held it between thumb and forefinger and then took a little bite at it. “Tis genuine,” said he. “My thanks, Jim. Here, hang about, what is that funky smell?”

The beer-steeped air of The Flying Swan had suddenly become permeated by a ghastly odour, suggestive of rotting eggs or the-morning-after-the-big-Vindaloo bathroom.

“My goddess!” Neville drew back in alarm. “It’s this coin!”

The Swan’s patrons dragged themselves into a broad crescent, amid much nose-holding, drink-covering, coughing and gagging. “Get that thing out of here, mister,” shouted someone. A kindly soul, eager to help, swung wide The Swan’s door, only to vanish beneath an avalanche of snow. Neville hurled the stinking object into the street and a rescue team of helpers dug out their companion and rammed home the door.

Neville gave Pooley the coldest of all fish eyes.

“There are certain flaws in the process,” Jim explained. “The grandaddy never did get around to ironing them all out.”

Neville folded his brow, fanned his nose with a beer mat and pushed the offensive black box aside.

The crowd moved in once more.

Neville unwrapped a Santa’s grotto composed of used pipe cleaners. “Mine,” said Old Pete, patting his Fair Isled chest. A Miss Magic Mouth inflatable love doll, that no-one would own up to, a flagon of sprout gin, which many did, and all bar John Omally wished to sample. A hand-painted facsimile of The Flying Swan. Beaten “pewter” tankards, bearing incongruous words such as Heinz upon their planished brims. Boxes of cabbage leaf cigars and several objects of evident antiquity which would have had the late and legendary Arthur Negus reaching for his reference books.

Someone had even created an extraordinary likeness of Neville from the thermostat and components of a 1963 Morris Minor.

Neville opened each parcel in turn and beamed hugely at every disclosure. He was, as the alchemists of old would have it, in his element.

“Next round on the house and supper is served,” he called, as The Swan’s Christmas catering staff appeared from the kitchen bearing the traditional groaning trays.[4]

These were loaded to the gunwales with rugged mountains of baked potatoes, chorus lines of turkey legs and passing-out parades of mince pies.

Old Pete availed himself of the barman’s hospitality and returned to the clapped-out piano, striking up a rousing “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”.

Those capable of joining him between chewings and swallowings did so as and when.

In the midst of all this feasting and merrification, the saloon bar door suddenly flew open to reveal a stunning figure in black. Black hat. Black coat. Black strides. Black boots. Black sunspecs also. He bore an enormous parcel (black wrapped), and stood in the doorway, dramatically silhouetted against the all-white back drop.

Many of the uninformed instantly recognized this apparition to be none other than the angel of death himself. A miserly fellow, who knew the ghost of Christmas past when he saw it, hastily took a dive for the Gents.

“Merry Christmas,” called Norman Hartnell. For it was he.

The crowd cleaved apart as the shopkeeper stepped forward, struggling manfully beneath the weight of his burden. Pooley and Omally offered assistance and the parcel was conveyed with difficulty to the countertop.

“For me?” Neville asked.

Norman nodded. “Compliments of the season,” said he.

The part-time barman plucked at the swarthy wrappings, which fell away to reveal a gilded casket of such magnificence that all present were cowed into awe-struck silence.

The thing was wondrous and that was a fact, wrought with cunning arabesques of gemstones and inlaid with many precious metals. A corona of golden light surrounded it and this bathed the faces of the assembled multitude to a nicety. By gosh.

Neville ran a hand gently over the fantastic object. “Incredible,” he whispered. “Incredible, Norman. Whatever is it?”

Norman flicked a snowflake from a Bible-black lapel. “I believe it to be nothing less than the now legendary lost ark of the covenant. I dug it up on my allotment. I thought it might amuse you.”

“Amuse me?” Neville nodded numbly. “I don’t know what to say, Norman. I mean it’s … it’s well … it’s …”

“Nifty,” said Norman. “And not at all Christmassy.”

“No indeed.” Neville viewed the casket. “How does it open? Does it open? Have you opened it?”

“Handles. Don’t know, and no,” said Norman, answering each question in turn. “Two little handles, on the side there. On the little doors. You could give them a pull, Neville. Just to see what might happen.”

“Yes,” said Neville, taking hold of the handles. “Just to see what might happen.”

Away in the distance and high upon the Chiswick flyover, three wise men on camels, who had been following a star, took sudden account of a blinding beam of golden light that rose from the Brentford area.

“Now, whatever do you take that to be?” asked one.

“Looks like a pub,” said another. “Sort of atomizing and being sucked into the sky.”

The third wise man blew into his frozen mittens. “Christmas,” he said, “who can odds it, eh?”

And who could?