Chapter Eleven: A Decision

A huge sack of post arrived this morning. I upended it onto the desk, envelopes of all colours from brown to white spilling and sliding everywhere.

“I feel like Father Christmas”, I said.

Alfonso, the small grey beetle (or weevil to be precise), who has made his home on my desk, poked his head up between the shifting paper floats.

“Not really”, he said, “you haven’t got enough hair.”

His assumption was further born out by discovering, after a miserable hour of ripping and slitting, that the morning’s delivery contained not one single letter from a child in crayon asking for a new train set or even a plaintive plea for daddy to stop hitting mummy. Instead, there were statements, bills, advance notices, legal warnings, court summonses and death threats of all kinds. From department store credit cards to hired assassins, it seemed that my big spending was finally catching up with me, like a large rat with a net.

All I had was a small weevil with an unhealthy 80’s obsession, and a perfectly restored Queen Anne four bedroom cottage with landscaped garden, excellent transport connections to the city centre, very well serviced by local amenities. There were no prizes for guessing which one was most likely to generate some extra income.

“Alfonso”, I said, “There’s nothing else for it. We’re going to have to enter ‘The Singing Competition’”.

‘The Singing Competition’ was a television show in which people competed by singing songs, and were rewarded with money after being judged on their performances by a mixture of professional experts and the general public.

“Can we do ‘Sussudio’?” exclaimed Alfonso, already turning pink with excitement.

“No!” I brought my fist down on the desk, and another avalanche of agricultural fertiliser bills slid onto the floor. “I will not have your Phil Collins mania making us destitute for a second time!”

I had other ideas. My late wife had left me little of value, only this cottage, and the last surviving copy of a hunting song from our old country. Hand-written in fading cat ink on ancient parchment, the dirge like folk tune could only be accompanied by the solo recorder, and over three hours, told of an unsuccessful turkey hunt conducted in the pouring rain. “It’s perfect!” I said.

Alfonso conceded, but with the compromise that he would be allowed to wear a jacket with rolled up sleeves and other Rick Astley stylings.

We set out for the auditions full of hope… TO BE CONTINUED