CHAPTER TWO
(Written by Joe)
Joe smiles. He looks around, waves to the audience
and for a split second his eyes glow red. Everyone thinks this is some sort of
emotion welling up inside him but actually it’s because the vinegar from the
catering size pickled egg jar had splashed everywhere during the melee and a
goodly amount of it had landed on Joe’s face, dripping into his eyes. There was
another reason why his eyes were watering which was to become obvious later.
Seeing his way to the stage was not going to be easy. He tried to stand upright
but that stupid woman had put some sort of contraption on his leg.
He really didn’t have much of a clue as to what had
been going on. He remembered trying to get into the hall through a very narrow
doorway when he suddenly saw a comely Yalding country lass also trying to get
in. Joe thought she might like to squeeze past him tightly through this tiny
gap so he stood in the doorway for a second to let her in……slowly. Just as he
was wiping the dribble from his chin, which unfortunately made him look like a
lecherous old-time movie villain twirling his moustache, he felt sure that a shadowy
figure he had been following (one of his fellow GITs no doubt) slammed the door
sharply on his foot and then moved off chuckling.
The next thing Joe remembered was waking up with an
immovable leg. Some old woman shoved some horse tablets down his throat “to
kill the pain” and two GITs carried him awkwardly, stretcher-like to a chair.
There was much bumping of his bad foot into tables, chairs, corners of walls,
the bar, the stage, the bar again and finally an unceremonious dumping into a
chair. Each bump was followed by a harrowing howl from Joe and a very loud
chuckle from one of his bearers. Joe noted that this laugh was uncannily
similar to the one he had heard during the doorway incident.
Through the haze caused by whatever was in those
massive tablets, Joe thought that he had permanently lost all movement of his
leg but, looking down, he saw that there was a good reason why he couldn’t move
it. That daft Mrs Flagg, with the help of a dark shadowy figure he couldn’t
quite identify, had roped half of Sherwood Forest to it. The added problem was that the 4 by 2s which
made up the splint had not been cut to length and were causing great distress.
The one on the outside of the leg was a good 18”
longer than the limb itself extending way beyond his foot, making walking
almost impossible, unless Joe could find an 18” high kerb to walk along. The
timber on the inside of the leg was only about 3” longer than the leg but had
been tied cleverly so that the bottom of it was level with the sole of Joe’s
shoe. Mrs Flagg had been pleased at the aforethought which went into this but
she had not thought, afore or after, about the distress which three inches of
timber could cause when pushed into a place where only a bespoke tailor should
venture. It was no wonder that Joe’s eyes were red and watering.
So, standing to make his unexpected way to the stage,
half blind and wonky, he fell over immediately sending another table of drinks
flying into laps.
“Sorry, sorry,” Joe said, just stopping himself from
following up with “I’ll buy you all another round.”
How on earth was he going to get to the stage in this
state? Through his watering, vinegar-soaked sore eyes he saw a familiar shadowy
figure in the dim lit room and it placed a chair under Joe’s unsplinted leg, thus
bringing both legs to almost equal lengths. “Thanks,” said Joe, not really
knowing which of his great GIT mates had helped him, “I much appreciate your
help.” There was a mumbled response from the helper along the lines of “My
pleasure.”
Joe took a step forward. Unfortunately the chair
toppled over immediately, sending Joe sprawling. Once again there was a
familiar chuckle, now bordering onto a cackle. Then Joe saw that the bloody
chair had only got three bloody legs. “Fancy giving me that,” he said from his
horizontal position on the floor and towards the general direction of his
helper, “You must have known that it would send me crashing?” There was muffled
“Yes,” and a cackle from somewhere and Joe began to have a few doubts.
Then there followed a moment of pure delight as the
comely Yalding country lass who Joe had fallen in lust with at the door,
suddenly came to his aid. She bent down over his sprawled body, showing just
that little bit more cleavage, took his hand and held the back of his neck. Joe
began to dribble again, thinking all sorts of things.
“Any minute now,” he thought, “she will start to
examine my poor, broken body. Her hands will run over my leg, starting at my
foot and running up to the bespoke tailor’s end. She will have great pity for
me and will whisk me away to a quiet room where she will tend to me and then,
who knows? She will probably say something like ‘Oh Joe, you’re such a hero I
want to do naughtiness with you.’
Then, joy of joys. The comely Yalding country lass
did speak. She took a deep breath, spat the chewing tobacco out her mouth and
said, “Bloody ‘ell, will someone pick this smelly, fat old fart off the floor
for Gawd’s sake. ‘Ees fallen on me Old Shag baccy tin an’ I fancy a bleeding
roll up.”
“Ah well, another broken dream” thought crestfallen
Joe, but then suddenly he perked up “Ah, if it’s an old shag you want…”
She booted him unmercilessly until he rolled over to
one side and, retrieving a battered tobacco tin from the floor, she gave a last
vicious kick to Joe’s bad leg and effed and blinded all the way to the
exit.
Everyone had been watching this altercation but, when
the comely lass left the room, they all went back to their drinks, ignoring Joe
lying on the floor. The general hubbub of a busy club took over.
Joe realised that he had to help himself if he was to
get his moment of glory on stage.
This time he found a four legged chair himself,
realising that his ‘friends’ were not quite as trustworthy as he at first
thought. Slowly and with great difficulty, scraping along with one foot on the
chair and a lump of wood sticking out 18” longer than the other leg, he made it
to the stage.
In a funny sort of way, by acting as a sort of stilt,
his splint made it easier to get onto the platform, which disappointed certain
of the GIT fraternity as there was a joyful expectation that Joe may have
further difficulties and embarrassments. Joe, with help from some geezer with a
crash helmet, made it triumphantly onto the stage, with the aforethought to
realise that he would need to take his chair as support up with him for his
shorter unsplinted leg if he wasn’t to immediately take an embarrassing tumble
down into the audience again.
As he stood up on the stage, pleased with himself, he
tapped a finger to the side of his nose, looked at the audience and exclaimed
“Aha!” in self acknowledgment of his clever forward planning.
At the same time, as he stood up sharply, his extra
height meant that the top of his head clashed dramatically with the very, very
low lighting gantry smashing several bulbs, none of which, luckily, were
actually working and the “Aha!” turned into “Ahaaaaaggg”.
Joe immediately took an embarrassing tumble into the
audience.
There were loud cacklings from several directions.
Joe started to shake and clenched his fists.
“That’s enough. That’s all I can stands ‘cos I can
stands no more,” said Joe, for some strange reason finding himself quoting
Popeye from the 1940’s era. Mentally, he had taken a tin of spinach from his
pocket, squeezed it until it popped, and holding it above his head, swallowed
it all in one go. Now he was Super
Popeye with pneumatic arms and anchor tattoos, confronting Bluto. Joe scrambled
to a sitting up position and frantically tore at the rope around the wood which
was holding his leg rigid. Sweat poured, trousers were ripped but he finally
got the timbers off his leg and threw them to the ground.
Now he noticed a very peculiar thing. The longer
piece of 4 by 2 seemed to move off along the floor into the audience on its
own. It almost looked as though there
was some sort of cord attached to it.
Almost as if it were being pulled by a member of the
audience in the darkened room…
Almost as if it were being pulled by someone at the
table where all the GITs were sitting…
Almost as if some dark, cackling, shadowy figure
there, had been trying to control the movement of Joe’s leg…
Almost as if that person could perhaps have made
Joe’s leg jerk out just as Marty was passing on his way to the stage…
Almost as if cackling Crawfie, who Joe seemed to
remember was closest, wanted to incriminate Joe claiming that he had tripped
Marty on purpose…
Almost as if every other GIT knew that this was the
plan to unnerve the previous worthy champion.
Joe realised he had definitely uncovered a dastardly
plot and was fuming. They would not get away with it. He was going to confront
them all.
Joe grasped the cord and fed it from one hand to the
other as he followed its trail. This led him directly to Crawfie who was sat at
the table with a drink in one hand and the end of the cord in the other.
“Aha,” said Joe, suddenly looking upwards in case the
gantry was still there, “Caught you red handed Crawfie”
“Wha’ cha mean?” cackled Crawfie.
“Well, it’s quite obvious isn’t it?” said Joe, “You
are responsible for this whole outrage. The evidence is all here. You slammed
the door on my foot, you ‘helped’ Mrs Flagg tie a ludicrously long splint to my
leg which was designed to disable me, you tied a cord to it and pulled it on
purpose so that I inadvertently tripped Marty, then you handed me a dodgy chair
as support and pulled it away from me, then I follow the cord and I find you
still holding it in your hand and still pulling the timber towards you. There’s
no way out for you. The evidence is overwhelming. You are guilty aren’t you
Crawfie. Admit it, go on admit it. Be a man, tell the truth, go on, admit it,
admit it,”
Crawfie looked up slowly, put down his drink and
said, “Nah, tweren’t me. Don’t know
nuffink aabaht it, mate.”
“Oh that’s alright then,” said Joe, relieved that his
great friend obviously hadn’t betrayed him “silly me, my mistake. Let me buy
you drink.”
He looked at all the other GITS and raised his
eyebrows in a silent question looking for an admission of guilt.
“Noooooo,” they all said as one, shaking their heads
and sipping their beers to hide their cackles, which caused a few drops to be
spilt.
The Count added “We know nothing about it either,
dear boy.”
“Oh of course not, I should never have mentioned it.
Please accept my apologies everyone and let me buy you all another round.”
Damn, thought Joe, there I’ve said it.
“Don’t mind if you do,” said The Count and the
cackling grew louder and much beer was spilt as bubbles were blown into
glasses.
Joe opened his wallet, took out a fiver and threw it
onto the table.
“Get the drinks in yourselves lads if you don’t mind,
I’ve still got to get on with this award business.”
That’s not enough, dear boy,” said The Count, “We’ll
need a bit more than that to forget your cruel accusations.”
Joe opened his wallet again and several hands reached
in and grabbed all there was.
“Come on boys, that’s not fair,” said Joe “You’ve
left my wallet empty. I appreciate I have made some grievous accusations
erroneously and have to pay, but let me have some of it back. Come on, play the
game. I’m going to put my empty wallet down on the table here and close my eyes
for 10 seconds. When I open them again, I expect some of it back.”
Joe closed his eyes and counted backwards from 10.
When he opened his eyes, he looked down at the table and his wallet had gone.
“Now that’s enough,” he said, “I want my wallet and
contents back now, come on, let’s be having it.”
There was silence for a few seconds and then the only
movement was the landing on the table from somewhere in the crowd of a very old
condom sachet which had indeed previously been part of the wallet contents. Joe
picked it up quickly before anyone could see that the sell by date was November
1969.
Joe realised that he had to get back on stage to
accept this damn award for this damn silly woman who hardly made any effort and
shouldn’t have even figured in the contest let alone win an award. Why should I
put myself though any other aggro just for her, he thought. But then, there was
a duty to be performed and Joe made his way to the stage. Once again the geezer
with the crash helmet helped him up but this time Joe realised who it was. Why
it was his employer, Mr Ross. It was he, you may remember, who gave Joe a
chance when he ended his year as King Git.
“Hello Mr Ross, thanks for giving me a hand up again
when I needed it most.”
“Wuddy hell, it’s you, my sodding window cleaner,”
said Ross, “You’re the peeping tom twat who keeps appeawing at the bathroom
window evewy time my missus has just climbed into the bath. I’ll swear you are
always there, waiting for her to get in.”
“Of course I’m not Mr Ross,” said Joe, “I wouldn’t
wait there all the time would I? No point. I know she only bathes every
Thursday morning, whether she needs it or not.”
Rossy let go of Joe allowing him to fall onto the
club floor and then he jumped down on top of him and the two tumbled around
shouting and swearing.
At this point Mr Biggins arrived back into the club
having finally found two security people after going off in a search during the
first battle earlier in the evening.
“That’s the man,” he shouted pointing at Joe, “he’s
the one who started it all and he’s still at it.”
The two burly security people, who were actually Miss
Navpotty Roller and Miss Willy Gene Thing from the mixed singles at Yalding
tennis club, grabbed Joe bodily and threw him out into the street. Joe actually
found this quite exciting but didn’t let on.
His arrival on the pavement disturbed the comely
Yalding country lass who was sitting on the kerb and again chewing baccy. She
swore at him, kicked his leg again and spat a black sludge down his shirt.
Joe sat there for a minute, head in hands, thinking
that he must get back to accept that poor women’s award. She is a friend of
Marty’s and he must stand up and sing her praises and graciously receive the
trophy.
Then he thought, “Nah, Sod her,” and asked the
Yalding lass for a roll up.
She swore and kicked his leg again.
It was a while inside the club before anyone noticed
that Joe wasn’t there and that he wasn’t coming back, at least at the moment.
For he was even now planning some sort or revenge, or a least a good reason why
those two beefy women should have to manhandle him again.
But then, inside,
Mr Ross regained his composure and his helmet and climbed back onto the stage.
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