Peg had upped and awayed it with her pressman stud, never to be heard of again. Norman simply shrugged his shoulders and remarked, “A rolling stone gathers no moss yet many hands make light work.” These proverbial cosmic truths meant little to the scores of creditors who daily besieged his paper shop, but as Norman had no legal responsibility, his wife having signed all the contracts, little could be done.

A few pennies were made by others than Peg and her paramour; Jim Pooley had successfully rattled his tin under enough noses to buy Omally several pints of consolation upon his return.

Neville had a hard job of it to sell the Wader’s Jubilee Ale, which was only purchased by those of perverse humour and loud voice. It was only a chance event, that of a night of heavy rain, which saved the day, washing as it did the Jubilee labels from the bottles to reveal that they contained nothing more than standard brown ale.

Norman seemed strangely unmoved by the whole business, considering that his wife had left him penniless. Perhaps the fact that his wife had also left him wifeless had something to do with it. Possibly he still secretly harboured the wish to wade to France, but principle alone would have forbidden him to relay this information to another soul. Still, as Jim Pooley said, “Time and tide wait for Norman.”

4

If there were one ideal spot in Brentford for the poet to stand whilst seeking inspiration, or for the artist to set up his three-legged easel, then it would certainly not be the Canal Bridge on the Hounslow Road, which marks the lower left-hand point of the mysterious Brentford Triangle. Even potential suicides shun the place, feeling that an unsuccessful attempt might result in all sorts of nasty poisonings and unsavoury disease.

Leo Felix, Brentonian and Rastafarian, runs a used car business from the canal’s western shore. Here the cream of the snips come to stand wing to wing, gleaming with touch-up spray and plastic filler, their mileometers professionally readjusted and their “only one owner’s” inevitably proving to be either members of the clergy or little old ladies.

Norman had never owned a motor car, although there had been times when he had considered building one or even constructing a more efficient substitute for the internal combustion engine possibly fuelled upon beer-bottle tops or defunct filtertips. His wife had viewed these flights of fancy with her traditional cynicism, guffawing hideously and slapping her preposterous thighs with hands like one-pound packets of pork sausages.

Norman squinted thoughtfully down into the murky waters, finding in the rainbow swirls a dark beauty; he was well rid of that one, and that was a fact. He was at least his own master now, and with his wife gone he had left his job at the Rubber Factory to work full time in the paper shop. It’s not a bad old life if you don’t weaken, he thought to himself. A trouble shared is a trouble halved.

“And it is a long straight road that has no turning,” said a voice at Norman’s elbow.

Norman nodded. “The thought had recently crossed my mind,” he said dreamily. Suddenly he turned to stare full into the face of a shabby-looking tramp of dreadful aspect and sorry footwear.

“Sorry, did I startle you?” asked the creature with what seemed to be a voice of genuine concern. “It’s a bad habit of mine and I really must control it.”

“Oh no,” said Norman, “it is just that on a Wednesday afternoon which is my early closing day I often come down here for an hour or two of quiet solitude and rarely expect to see another soul.”

The tramp smiled respectfully. “There are times when a man must be alone,” he said.

“Exactly,” said Norman. The two gazed reflectively into the filthy waters for a moment or two. Norman’s thoughts were soft, wavering things, whose limits were easily containable within the acceptable norms of local behaviour.

The tramp’s, however, hovered in a spectrum that encompassed such dark and unfathomable colours that even to briefly contemplate their grim hues would be to trespass upon territories so ghastly and macabre that the very prospect would spell doom in any one of a dozen popular dialects.

“Can I treat you to a cup of tea along at the Plume?” the tramp asked.

Norman felt no affinity towards the tramp, but he felt strangely compelled to nod at this unexpected invitation. The two left the canal bridge and strolled up the Brentford High Street towards the Plume Café. This establishment, which stands at a point not twenty yards from the junction of Ealing Road and the High Street, can be said at times to play host to as many Brentonians as the Flying Swan itself. Those times being, of course, those when the Swan is closed.

The Plume is presided over by an enormous blonde of Peg-like proportions known to all Brentford as Lily Marlene. Why Lily Marlene is uncertain, since the sign above the door says “Proprietor Mrs Veronica Smith”. Lily presides over all with the air of a brothel madam, her expansive bosoms moving in and out of the shadows behind the counter like twin dirigibles. Whatever happened to Mrs Veronica Smith no-one has ever dared ask.

Norman swung open the shattered glass door and entered the Plume Café followed by a sinister tramp. In the gloom behind the counter, unseen by human eye, Lily Marlene made a shadowy sign of the cross.

“What will it be?” Norman asked the tramp, who had seated himself beside the window and showed no inclination whatever to do any buying.

“I shall have one of Lily’s surprising coffees I think,” the creature replied.

Norman strode to the counter. “Two coffees please, Lil,” he requested of the hovering bosoms, which withdrew into the darkness of their hangar and returned in the company of a pair of arms. These generous appendages bore at their fingers’ end a brace of coffees in the traditional glass cups. Norman paid up and carried the steaming cups back to the table.

“Cheers,” said the tramp, holding his cup up to the light and peering into its bottom.

“What are you looking for?” queried Norman.

“Aha,” the tramp said, tapping his nose significantly. “Now you are asking me a question.”

“I am,” said Norman.

“And I shall answer you,” said the tramp, “with a short tale which although brief is informative and morally satisfying.”

Norman said, “Many a mickle makes a muckle,” and it was clear that his thoughts were elsewhere.

“A friend of mine used to drink coffee, I say used to, for all I know he still does, but as I have heard neither hide nor hair of him for five years I must remain uncertain upon this point.”

Norman yawned. “Sorry,” he said, “I had a rough night.”

The tramp continued unabashed. “This friend of mine used to drink coffee in a glass cup not dissimilar to this and one day as he finished a cup do you know what he found had been slipped into it?”

“The King’s Shilling,” said Norman. “I’ve heard this story.”

“The King’s Shilling,” said the tramp, who was plainly ignoring Norman’s remarks, “He tipped it into his hand and said the fatal ‘Look at this lads’, and within a trice the pressmen were upon him.”

“I’ve had some dealings with the press myself,” said Norman.

“The pressmen were upon him and he was dragged away screaming to a waiting bungboat and thence to who knows where.”

The tramp made this last statement with such an air of sombre authenticity that his voice echoed as if coming from some dark and evil dungeon. Norman, who was lining up another sarcastic comment, held his counsel.

“You said just now that you had heard the story,” said the tramp in a leaden tone.

“Did I?” said Norman, perspiring freely about the brow. “I don’t think I did.”

“You did.”

“Oh.”

“Then let me put you straight on this, Norman.” Norman did not recall telling the tramp his name, and this added to his growing unease. “Let it be known to you that this story, which although brief was in its way informative and morally satisfying, was a true and authentic tale involving a personal acquaintance of mine and let no other man, be he living, dead or whatever say otherwise!”