25 July 08 - 18:14Gone Ahead
Published 'Lateral Moves' 1997
I came into it about halfway through, so what had gone before was a complete mystery to me. And I feared the rest of it must turn out to be pretty frightening.
Don Astaire had entered the waiting-room in a tailspin, greeting me as if I were an old friend.
"Hiya, Pinchbottom, how yer diddling?"
"Fine, I think," I answered staring him straight into the eyes, to call his bluff, if not my own. I was intrigued, after all, how I knew his name was Don Astaire in the first place.
"When the others come, I'll cut loose with all the info," he whispered.
I now looked quizzically at him, or so I thought. I had only come into the ...
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11 July 08 - 14:55Office Block
(published 'Purple Patch' 1990)
“London is a big, big city with big, big men,
Who sit in offices and count to ten!”
The options were poles apart, the possible repercussions incalculable. Therefore, Fred Tyrrel decided to simplify everything down to the bone, ascertain the bottom line and logically remove any shreds of doubt.
Fred took a piece of clean paper, much as I have just done before attempting to set out this record of his ruminations, then shaped it neatly upon hia desk and measured it thoughtfully with the span of hir hands. Just the job, he said to himself, turning to me et the other desk with a smirk of triumph travelling diagonally across his pinched face. I tried to appear as if I were ignoring his manoeuvres with the office stationery, by bending over my own with mock-intensity. ...
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