AUNT'S LEGACY

When Blakelock’s aunt is cremated, she goes out with a bang. Not one of her friends or relatives know that she has been fitted with a pacemaker and the loud report that it makes when the furnace fires up isn’t quite drowned out by the electric organ. The few who have come to see her off are trying to sing along to its music in the crematorium chapel. The half hearted nature of the congregation’s effort is more to do with the choice of hymn rather than unwillingness to partake. “Onward Christian Soldiers” or “Fight The Good Fight” would both have diluted the bang. “What Our Father Does Is Well”, a rather obscure harvest hymn with a difficult to follow tune, does not promote a natural harmony or the vocal gusto to muffle the unexpected sound. The undertakers from the Co-op are given the blame for the pacemaker oversight and its resultant small explosion but no mention is made to the bereaved about the unfortunate incident and how it interferes with Blakelock’s aunt. The operator of the fiery furnace, the guy at the coal face so to speak, gets a nasty shock when the lid of Blakelock’s aunt’s coffin takes flight and the dead aunt herself tries to vacate her last resting place by suddenly sitting up just as the flames are taking hold. The operator needs a cup of sweet black tea to help restore his equilibrium and he is allowed to go home early entrusting the rest in line that day to one of his colleagues. Some say he will never be quite the same again. The explosion of Blakelock’s aunt’s pacemaker is attributed by the congregation to a coincidental vehicle backfire on the busy road outside, where life carries on as normal as Mohammad, the driver of the A1Lawn At Bargain Price van (“green shoots r us”) speeds past the crematorium gates unaware that Blakelock’s aunt is being burnt to a cinder and her pacemaker is about to explode. The six year old green van is long overdue its service and as Mohammad pushes his booted foot to the floor, the tired engine responds with a noisy and fume fuelled hick-up that sounds like an old blunderbuss being fired. Mohammad curses as Blakelock pretends to sing the words, “Though nor milk nor honey flow, in our barren Canaan now,” and the Good Lord takes the exclamations from both men in His stride as Blakelock’s dead aunt briefly sits up, shocked in her tracks, on her way to meet Him herself.


Blakelock hasn’t really bothered with his aunt and so it is a surprise to discover that she has left him a bequest of £100,000. Blakelock decides that his inheritance, his aunt’s gift, should be marked in some appropriate way. The old lady would probably have liked that. So Blakelock thinks about the various options that are now open to him. He could purchase some rather fancy piece of antique furniture or a work of art with which to commemorate his aunt. He could invest in some fine wine, something he thinks that would have been close to and given succour to his aunt’s heart. It was said that she had enjoyed the better part of a half bottle of red Burgundy every day and that had, together with the pacemaker and the pills, kept her heart condition on the right side of wrong until the very end. Blakelock considers the leg of a racehorse but agrees that this might lead to bad money after good no matter if the leg he invests in decides to be the fastest leg there is. If the other three or just one of the other three is slow then the whole project is doomed from the start or indeed collecting ring.

After about two and half weeks after receipt of his late aunt’s money Blakelock decides on a Hummer. Of nearly all the things he might have chosen to spend his aunt’s money on, a Hummer is not the most obvious. The Hummer is not just an ordinary vehicle but a rugged statement that tells everyone who sees it that here is a car that is much more than a car. Blakelock is not concerned about miles per gallon. He jokes that it is more a case of gallons per mile. The Hummer wags two rude fingers to the carbon footprint and on the basis that Blakelock’s aunt hadn’t apparently shown any signs of believing in the existence of global warming, Blakelock justifies to himself that his aunt would be pleased with his choice of how he should spend her money. Blakelock’s aunt had lived in an old house without the benefit of many modern trappings. Insulation and double glazing were just words as mysterious to Blakelock’s aunt as Higgs Boson or Quantitative Easing. Her old radiators were left to rumble on, Winter, Spring, Summer and Autumn, at a steady sweltering eighty degrees and the coal fires that burnt furiously in her various grates added their considerable pollution to Blakelock’s aunt’s personal volume of greenhouse gasses.

As if to add further arrogance to the Hummer statement, Blakelock chooses a brand new red vehicle which is in marked contrast to the old green van driven by Mohammad of the A1Lawn At Bargain Price franchise (“green shoots r us”), a vehicle which doesn’t let the grass grow under its wheels because Mohammad (Mo the lawn to those that know him from the local Mosque) runs a busy business assuring weed free lush swards for his satisfied clients whilst trying to fulfil the increasing demands of his more fundamentalist brethren. The green van is being used to stock pile a dangerous amount of fertiliser without attracting any undue speculation from nosey neighbours, lawns and fertiliser being natural bed fellows.

The thing about a red Hummer is that it does attract attention, some of it unwanted, a lot angry, some of it jealous and quite a lot based on envy. Blakelock secretly likes the more favourable attention, the head turning looks he can see in the vast wing mirrors as he hums passed. He particularly likes it when the swivelling heads are pretty and female. Blakelock hasn’t enjoyed so much attention from the fairer sex and his new red Hummer brings him a ticket, a ring side seat, to a whole new experience that he finds difficult to resist. Sophie is one such but not content with just looking, she wants to touch and in getting closer to the rugged vehicle, she could become closer to its owner.

"Would you like a go in it?” Blakelock says to the young woman when he returns to the new shopping centre car park and sees her stroking the bonnet of his big machine.

"If that’s OK, yeah I would,” says Sophie very excited at the prospect of being let into this brash new world of petrol head heaven. She has enjoyed a Truck Fest or two and the Battle of the Monster Machines at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff sent her into an unusual trance for several of the following days. Blakelock takes her for a spin and enjoys showing off around the car park. It is as though the Hummer is patrolling the lines of parked vehicles inspecting them rather like a general might review his troops. The Hummer looks down on most of them, is the king of the lot, loud and proud and majestically red as it rides through the rank and file.

"Wow,” says Sophie when after having cruised most of the lanes Blakelock brings the big machine to a screeching and rocking halt in one of the parent with child parking bays.

"You should see it off road,” says Blakelock and immediately Sophie wants to. She agrees to meet Blakelock again the following Saturday when Blakelock promises to take her for a decent run with a bit of off-roading thrown in as well. Reversing out of the parent with child parking space Blakelock doesn’t see the A1Lawn At Bargain Price van and the red Hummer slams into the side of it with the sort of force a fast rhino might employ when hitting a slow poacher. There isn’t a big smash but more of a dull crunch and the sound of thin metal being bent and torn. The A1Lawn At Bargain Price van suddenly has a new tattered logo. Several of the letters have disappeared into the gaping holes in the van’s punctured side. The strap line is distorted and doesn’t read any better and the new message seems to be saying something it shouldn’t. Mohammad looks like a wild rabbit caught in the headlights as he springs from his assaulted van to confront what ever it is that has interrupted his progress through the big shopping centre car park.

"What in god’s name are you doing?” Mohammad shouts at Blakelock who is already inspecting the rear end of his Hummer. The damage to the big machine is minimal and it does seem incredible that Mohammad’s van has sustained such scars without as much as a scratch on the Hummer.

"You’ve buggered my van right up.” Mohammad protests loudly.

Sophie is full of mirth. She has seen the whole thing and is probably the cause and distraction for the incident. Blakelock was showing off in front of the new admirer by revving the several horsepower under his foot’s control into a fever pitch before de-clutching and sending the red vehicle lurching backwards into the passing van.

"Ha, ha,” laughs Sophie as she reads the new description on the damaged vehicle.

"Alla at Bar.” She pronounces the strange new words as they have been arranged. She reads them out slowly, in an uncertain childlike manner with no understanding of their meaning. Mohammad spins around as though he’s been hit by lightening. He cannot believe what he is seeing.

“It’s Alla ak bar. Not Alla at bar,” he exclaims incensed at the female’s ignorance. He squints at the letters, takes in the full meaning of the battered new inscription. The letter K could be a letter T, but there is no doubt in his mind about the new message. He looks as though he has seen God and certainly feels as though God is at this very moment speaking to him.

“Shoot us.” Sophie sings out rather more positively, relaying the only two words in the new strap line on the green van.

Quick as a bird with a worm Mohammed wrenches open the rear door and pulls out a twelve bore shot gun which he levels and fires at Blakelock and Sophie in such a casual manner that it looks for all the world as though Mo the lawn is about to perform some top dressing rather than simply comply with his treacherous training.

“Allah ak Bar,” he shouts his battle cry as the little balls of lead shot start their hurried journey towards their unfortunate quarry.

The two blasts at such close quarters splatter into the recipients like sugar on pancakes and they dance and spin like bleeding puppets in an extraordinary enactment. The sound of the first shot is, thinks Blakelock, similar to the noise he heard at his aunt’s cremation. He doesn’t hear the second, but as his and the young woman’s dying blood drips almost unseen down the red paintwork of the peppered Hummer, Blakelock thinks that he really should have gone for the antique, the wine or even the leg of a horse rather than the big American beast.

IN FLAMIN' JUNE

What a hoot

to be oot

and a boot

in flamin' June.



(Although it's not

my lot

to be a Scot

in flamin' June.)



What a shame

playin'

in the rain

in flamin' June.



You got

a new waistcot

for Ascot

in flamin' June.



As black

as a cat

a natty top hat

in flamin' June.



And Flora

looks adora

in her fedora

in flamin' June.



Hugh

has to queue

for his view

in flamin' June.



Too discreet

with his seat

he sends a tweet

in flamin' June.



The leaves

off the trees

shellin' like peas

in flamin' June.



Tee Hee

what glee to see

the Diamond Jubilee

in flamin' June.



Damp crown jewels

pearls

and high heels

in flamin' June.



No matter

wet crowds chatter

at the regatta

in flamin' June



The Pimms

and the gins

drownin' their sins

in flamin' June.



The hearty

street party

kicks off at twelve thirty

in flamin' June.



Someone makes

cakes

or should we say bakes

in flamin' June.



There's ringing

and singing

and even more wringing

in flamin' June.



Such a shame

rain

down the drain

in flamin' June.



Suppose

everyone knows

it's no to the hose

in flamin' June.



And they all know

the euro

is a no go

in flamin' June.



But with stiff upper lip

and a royal Hip

Hip

in flamin' June.



Great Britain

is smitten

and we do love it rotten

in flamin' June.

ROYAL BARGE

"Bugger this weather," said Philip his gloved hand twitching angrily on the handle of his sword.

"It can't be helped," said his wife as she smiled and waved yet again at what she thought might be another passing vessel.

"If it gets much worse we won't be able to see a bloody thing." Philip wasn't going to be consoled.

"They must have called off the fly past," said Harry with a look of relief on his face. His pink beret was wet through and felt like a soggy cow pat.

"You warm enough love?" William looked at Kate and even the glow from her warm red outfit looked damp.

"I put some thermals on thank goodness," she replied.

"So did I," cut in the Duchess of Cornwall. "Nicked them out of your father-in-law's sock drawer."

The two Duchesses laughed and waved.

"Bloody ridiculous," It was Philip again. "Can't tell if it's a stink pot, a cutter or a bloody dragon boat."

"Why don't you go below Philip?" suggested the Queen.

"Slip downstairs for a Chinky you mean. Looks like a bloody floating Chinese restaurant." The Duke had said as much when he'd first boarded the red velvet and gold floating palace with its two absurd thrones. "Red velvet arm chairs like something out of the back row of the local flea pit," he said to one of his grandsons as they explored the deck.

"They've worked very hard and it's not their fault the weather has turned a little inclement," said the Queen.

"Inclement you call it. Good god woman, if this is inclement then my cock's a kipper."

Prince Charles laughed. "We're not far from Billingsgate fish market father," he added without thinking.

"You know I don't like that sort of talk, " said the Queen looking at her eldest son over her misty spectacles.

The royal party issued another wave and the rain responded cruelly.

"I've been standing here for over ninety bloody minutes, freezing my admiral's pip's off and if this bloody pageant doesn't come to an end soon I'm going to ......"

"Oh do shut up Philip. Stop complaining and wave." The queen was being the boss.

"Wave after bloody wave", said Philip under his cold breath.

"The Princess Royal drew the long straw on this parade. Tucked up in the dry with a stiff drink no doubt," Philip just wasn't giving up.

Another burst of damp music hit the deck.

"I think it's the Royal Philharmonic mummy," said the Prince of Wales.

"Bloody Water Music is all we need," said Philip as he gazed into the swirling mists, a wet drip or two running in time to the music off his peaked cap.

"Lovely," said the Queen.

"If you like that sort of thing", said Philip. "Bloody Handel."

"Well it's better that Elton John", said the Queen.

"We've got that dubious pleasure to look forward to tomorrow night," said the Prince.

"Well let's hope and pray it pisses on his parade", said the Duke unkindly.

"Philip!" said the Queen abruptly. "I must insist!" and she raised another gloved hand and shook it in the direction of the music.

The newspapers had a field day. Of course they did. "Long to rain over us" was the firm favourite until the very last minute when somehow the Duke of Edinburgh slipped as he was moving off the deck. It looked as though her Majesty had almost nudged him out of her way but what ever happened his Royal Highness took a tumble into Old Father Thames and was eventually fished out by the inflatable police launch once it had forced the excited Italian gondola out of the way. It was, so one of the river police men later reported, the first time an admiral of the fleet had set foot inside their dirigible. One red top's searching head line quite simply read , "Royal Barge?" and most of her loyal subjects knew what it meant.

WAITING FOR THE GREEK FLAME

We waited on the pavements edge

Costa coffee opposite and Subway to our rear

and the sunshine played on to the growing numbers

as the trick cyclist whistled his way up and down the street

while his mate, the sweaty guy on his spring loaded stilts, bounced between us

shouting encouragement and gesturing wildly to those that caught his eye.

Ordinary cars that passed looked out of place

uncomfortable at being there stared at by so many sets of eyes,

not the shiny brand new BMW's dressed up in the Olympic colours

but the shabby rusty red Peugeot with "Driven by fairy dust" the message on the back

and the Frome Reclamation truck full of reclaimed tiles

on their way to be reclaimed again.

The unlicensed sellers of the union flags took two pounds for something to wave,

"Just a couple left son," but we knew they had plenty more stock

hidden in their van parked in the free car park behind Argos.

We needed something red white and blue and we shook them at yet another empty bus

(why there are so many empty buses in Frome remains a mystery)

School children filed in up the hill in their bright flack jackets a colourful crocodile

so they too could be seen as bright as any flame

their home made torches in their hands wondering what all the fuss was about.

At long last the wiry, weary promotional girls from Coke and Lloyds

and a phone company that has helped to sponsor the coming games

rev us up into our market town frenzy from the lofty perches of their tailor-made tour buses

with music and dancing and razzamatazz and promises of a brighter tomorrow and things that will go better

and gold for all or those that cross the line first. Shake that pompom Miss, shake that pompom do.

You're a long way from Greece and quite a stretch to London.

The girl behind me wants to "Evacuate London" or so her stencil proclaims

and she talks to the teenage copper on crowd control, shows him her message.

He's one of a team rarely seen in these parts and he just smiles and sends her back to where she has come from.

Pointless trying to piss on this parade Luv, I hope he said under his helmet.

The sun shone into the eyes of those on the opposite side, Somerset squinters,

and the toddler let her balloon slip and it blew across the road to be rescued by another and returned

to the anxious child with everyone happy and united just standing on the side of the road waiting for the Greek flame.

From their high vantage point on top of Barclays Bank a few heads nodded in the sunshine

a real banker's bonus and the girl in the open window above Boots had a good eyeful too.

The police outriders on their motor bikes waved at us as they never have before.

Some of us waved back which seemed strange to be befriending the traffic cop who on another day

would be throwing the book at us for speeding or talking on the mobile phone.

Cameras everywhere and one on a tripod being worked by a girl in a green and white spotty summer frock.

She should have been going to a picnic or off to nearby Babington for lunch not dressed like that for Points West.

And still we waited for the Greek flame.

Would it infect us and turn our decimal coinage back into pounds, shillings and pence?

Could its flicking be carrying a message of despair, a real Greek tragedy waiting to unfold?

Someone had an umbrella with the union flag on it just in case of rain but this was no longer wet April

but sunny mid May and long to reign over us we all hoped. No Greek drama here please.

The ice-cream van doing a roaring trade and the Cornish pasties from Gregg's the Baker

warm but not as hot as the midday sun.

Will they remember this in years to come? Will the children say yes I was there

when the Greek flame came through our market town

on its way from Taunton to Bristol?

Maybe they will and maybe they won't.

They won't remember the beaming white haired man

who held the silver meshed torch aloft and proudly jogged down the hill passed the Crown (up for rent) and on past Card Factory

looking colourful and smug surrounded by the bunting that had escaped and spread like a victorious spider's web above us all.

Who he was matters little. What he stood for matters lots. Will I Am did it the previous day down the road

and the children will probably remember Will for all the wrong reasons. Famous for his moon walk and the Voice

rather than what it all really means.

But It did bring a tear to my eye. Call me sentimental but I thought the whole extravaganza was wonderful.

Even the Postie who right at the end peddled hard to get through the closing throng before the street was clogged

delivering his mail without fuss or applause as he does nearly every day.

Waiting in the Somerset sunshine.

Waiting for the Greek flame.

WATCHING MINNIE CHASING CROWS

The spring time walk through dripping fields

where dandelions roar and shake their glistening cobwebbed manes

and buttercups blaze their yellow streaks

between the sodden green blades,

the teaming, steaming sward.



Black birds hop and flap like competing teams of lazy ballroom dancers

and off she goes after them with little hope

prancing through the meadow, leapfrogging damp tufts

in a headlong dash to catch one unaware,

the preening, scheming bird.



She never does, never comes close, but always runs back to heel

as though she had and gets the nod, the look of approval

and a smile or a laugh out loud that sets her off again

on another wild goose chase to try for murder in the murder,

the bird's collective word.



Watching Minnie chasing crows knowing that she'll never catch one.

What simple fun it is, what a glorious past time

not a moment wasted so I could spend all day, a life long quest

watching Minnie chasing crows,

Nothing more absurd.

FISH & TIPS.

If you can't find a fellow
to share your umbrella
or even remark on your tits
get down to the aquarium
cause the inmates will stare at them
and the dolphin will love them to bits

Love has a purpose
but when you're a porpoise
you have but one simple wish
it's not the high heels
but meals on wheels
and tons of slippery fish.

DULCET TONE

When Dolcie's head hit the pillow, her torso slid on to the bedroom floor and ended up alongside the old tallboy, the one she'd inherited from her uncle. Her violent killer had despatched her and her partner with such ferocity that it would take the very best that Mr Dulcet's cleaning company could come up with to remove all the traces of the dreadful event and make the bedroom once again habitable. Mr Dulcet had become an expert in such things. What he didn't know about the removal of those tricky blood stains from the skirting boards was no bodies business. Well no live bodies business.

Founded in 1942 by Reggie Dulcet senior and fairly quickly given a rather useful business leg up by the Luftwaffe, Mr Dulcet's cleaning company cleaned up in the East End. It's next big break came in December 1951 with the Gillingham bus disaster. The sixties saw a lot of tidying up after the Cray twins and the seventies bought the IRA to London and more work for the third generation of Dulcets. The eighties provided, as history and Companies House would show, rather thin pickings for the specialist business but thanks to frugal management, fastidious Jewish accountants and an unorthodox approach to supplementing the income, Mr Dulcet's cleaning company survived right through to the present day. Given, as they were, the key to the door, temptation to bolster turnover by plundering the goods and chattels of the unfortunate was too much to bare. The light fingered habit first experienced by Reggie Dulcet senior became an ingrained and inevitable sideline shamelessly passed down through the generations. What the several Mr Dulcets lacked in take home pay they more than made up for in take away booty.

Mr Dulcet always liked to quote for the main jobs himself. So he was first on the crime scene when the police, photographers and forensics had done their digging. Dressed in the regulation white body suit with its built in hood and wrap around foot wear, Mr Dulcet entered the house looking rather like those that had just left it, but nothing like any one who had crossed the threshold since Dolcie and her late husband had acquired the place in the nineteen eighties. He left the same premises looking a few sizes bigger and the white protective suit had filled out to protect far more than its wearer.

Dolcie kept a tidy house. She was what some would term a house-proud person. She liked a place for everything and everything in its place. Her dusted collection of musical instruments stood as good testimony to her willingness to be openly judged as a woman of taste. When she said comfortable or vegetable she always prolonged the sound so that every vowel was pronounced as it was written. "Very com-fort-able," she'd declare as though she was speaking in time to a metronome. Her precision and attention to detail were just two facets that made her an accomplished music teacher. Music however was not the only food of love as far as Dolcie was concerned. Since her husband's passing and after a respectable interlude, she discovered that she needed the involvement of a good man or indeed two. Thus it was that unwittingly she stumbled into the path of her murderer. Jealousy, it seems, was a dangerous and unwelcome bed fellow and one that sadly lost Dolcie her organised head.

"I'm sure that mother kept it there," said Megan when it was her turn to enter and inspect the cleaned property. Mr Dulcet couldn't throw any light on the missing possession and didn't say a word as he showed the daughter his handiwork. Megan couldn't see anything different in her late mother's tidy home which of course was why Mr Dulcet's cleaning company had the reputation it did. From a slaughter house to an ordered house, that was Mr Dulcet's unwritten slogan.

But there was no doubt about it. Dolcie's violin wasn't there. More to the point it wasn't anywhere in the house and so was reported as missing, presumably stolen by the perpetrator of her murder. When in the process of their investigations the police eventually charged a local man with the double killing it became clear that he only had one thing on his deranged mind. He wanted Dolcie and her partner dead because, as the arresting officer put it, the detained suspect was involved in a complicated and intimate relationship that involved both of the victims of the crime. The local hack would have put it more colourfully had his editor let him loose on the front page. "Music teacher plays love triangle."

The case of the missing violin or more correctly the missing violin and its case was puzzling. Megan knew that her mother had thought quite highly of the old stringed instrument. She had called it her "you-hou-dee" after Yehudi Menuhin and no one was quite sure where it had come from other than from the same uncle next to whose tallboy Dolcie's torso had finally come to rest.

In stuffing the instrument down the front of his white all-in-ones Mr Dulcet emerged from the home looking even more like the Michelin Man than when he had entered the building. He grabbed the case on his way out almost like a busy mum at a check out snatching a bar of chocolate just because it was there. There was something else too that made him go for the neat black leather case. He thought he recognised it, was almost positive that he'd seen it somewhere before. The faded rose emblem embossed onto the surface seem very familiar. So he scooped up the prize almost with a feeling that if it didn't, it certainly should belong to him. Once safely in the van he extracted the case from out of his uniform and threw it in the back along with the tools of his trade and the paraphernalia of the professional forensic cleaner.

"Should be worth fifty quid," he thought when he finally opened the case in the safety of his own home and pulled out the handsome fiddle. He added it to the small pile of assorted loot he had acquired nearly every day that week. Little and often was what his father had told him. "A good man puts a little into kitty each day." That's what he had learnt from his grandfather. Not one to upset the family code of practice Mr Dulcet did as he was told. An old violin with cat gut strings would, Mr Dulcet smiled to himself, be most apt in satisfying kitty that particular day. And then he glanced at the photographs he had displayed in their assorted frames. His family looked out at him from the past. His father and mother with him on his father's knee. His proud grandfather surrounded by a rag tag gaggle of smiling children. He was wearing his flat cap and standing next to the horse and cart and in his hand a violin case. Mr Dulcet picked up the old photo frame and peered into its image.There it was.The same instrument case he had brought home. The rose emblem just visible in the black and white image. What an extraordinary coincidence he thought. By pure chance he'd stumbled upon something that his grandfather had owned or perhaps borrowed back in the forties. He took another look at the case and decided that he'd hang on to this particular prize. If it was once in the family then it should become an heirloom. He'd keep it.

Nearly every Saturday he took his week's collection along to his usual and willing contact and exchanged the stolen goods for cash. That particular week the contact was asked to pick up the goods because Mr Dulcet was otherwise engaged. Had he been at home when the contact called, Mr Dulcet would probably have hung on to his violin. But he wasn't and because it looked like part of the week's haul stacked up with the other bits and pieces, it was included at £45 as a part of the £649 tax free payment left in the envelope in folding with no questions asked. Actually Mr Dulcet wasn't that bothered. It would have been nice to keep something his grandfather had once had but never mind. Mr Dulcet went to bed and slept.

It was the same local news paper (it also made the nationals) that had reported on Dolcie's murder and the arrest of her killer that broke the news about the Stradivarius. There was little doubt about it and the insurance company confirmed as much, namely that Dolcie had indeed been the owner of a rare instrument. Much was made in the tabloids about the sale at the Tarisio Auctions of the Lady Blunt, a 1721 exquisite example of the master's craftsmanship which made $15.9 million to an anonymous bidder in 2011. The Nippon Foundation had sold the instrument to raise funds to help the Japanese tsunami appeal.

"Fuck-me-gently!" said Mr Dulcet which was quite a thing for a man who rarely swore. He was beside himself. Forty-five quid for something worth millions. How could he have been so dumb? He hurried off to find his contact and to retrieve his instrument. He felt sick. He felt angry. He felt confused.

The damp open air market in the East End was no place to create a scene. Mr Dulcet was determined that he wouldn't accost his contact in an aggressive way but so pumped up was he with anxious emotion that he leapt at the poor fellow and dragged him to the ground by his faded lapels.

"Where is it? Where is it?" was all Mr Dulcet kept saying to the terrified contact across whose chest the trembling Mr Dulcet sat like someone trying to cling on to a mechanical bucking bull. Obviously the prone contact didn't have the faintest idea of what his assailant was talking about. But Mr Dulcet was persistent. "Where is it? Where's the violin?" The garbled answer hit him like a tsunami.

"Who the fuck bought it?"

From the description he eventually got, Mr Dulcet realised that the purchaser of the priceless instrument was Megan, Dolcie's daughter. It all made perfect sense. She had obviously been trawling the markets and such like for her mother's stolen violin and had struck lucky. Mr Dulcet decided to go and see her. He took with him the photograph of his grandfather holding the violin case.

"Yes Mr Dulcet", said Megan. "I was very lucky. Found it as I thought I might at that big market, you know, in the East End. Got it back for sixty pounds."

Mr Dulcet's mouth was as dry as it had ever been. He perhaps shouldn't have offered Megan a hundred pounds for the violin. Mr Dulcet had shown Megan the faded photo and she had studied the picture with a broad grim. She pointed to one of the children in the picture, a little girl with pig tails and long white socks up to her bare knees and below her tatty drab dress. Apparently her name was Dolcie.

"How much?" said Mr Dulcet as if he didn't know.

"You know it's a Stradivarius and probably worth at least five million pounds . If not more." Megan let the words trip casually, cruelly. "You Dulcets," she went on. "You might be good at cleaning up but you're not very bright when it comes to priceless violins. Fancy loosing the thing twice. I don't know." And she laughed as she shut the door on the crest fallen man.

Mr Dulcet sat down heavily on the door step and felt his feelings welling up from inside. With his head in his hands he started to nod from side to side and very quietly at first a wail could be discerned and increasingly pumped by his leaden lungs, the sound grew into something primeval, the sound of despair, an alarm, a lament, a cry for help, a summons, a warning, a siren.

Nothing like a dulcet tone thought Megan as she put the kettle on.