Something Rotten (Thursday Next 4)

'Thanks,' I replied without enthusiasm, slumping into a large 'tvicker chair. 'I have no idea why I volunteered to run the Mallets – I don't know the first thing about running a croquet team!'

'Perhaps,' replied Gran, reaching forward to dead-head a rose, 'all that is required is faith and conviction – two areas in which, I might add, I think you excel.'

'Faith isn't going to conjure up five world-class croquet players, now, is it?'

'You'd be surprised what faith can do, my dear. You have St Zvlkx's Revealment on your side, after all.'

'The future isn't fixed, Gran. We can lose, and probably will.'

She tut-tutted.

'Well! Aren't you the moaning minnie today! What does it matter if we do lose? It's only a game, after all!'

I slumped even lower.

'If it was only a game I wouldn't be worried. This is how my father sees it: Kaine proclaims himself dictator as soon as President Formby dies next Monday. Once he wields ultimate executive power he will embark on a course of warfare that results in an armageddon of Level III life-extinguishing capability. We can't stop the President from dying but we can, my father insists, avoid the world war by simply winning the Superhoop.'

Gran sat down in a wicker chair next to me.

'And then there's Hamlet,' I continued, rubbing my temples. 'His play has been subjected to a hostile takeover from The Merry Wives of Windsor and if I don't find a Shakespeare clone pronto there won't be a Hamlet for Hamlet to return to. Goliath tricked me yet again. I don't know what they did but it felt as though my free will was being sucked out through my eyeballs. They said they'd get Landen back but quite frankly I have my doubts. And I have to illegally smuggle ten truckloads of banned books out of England.'

Tirade over, I sighed and was silent. Gran had been thoughtful for a while, and after appearing to come to some sort of a momentous decision announced:

'You know what you should do?'

'What?'

'Take Smudger off defence and make him the mid-hoop wingman. Jambe should be the striker as usual, but Biffo—'

'Gran! You haven't listened to a word I've said, have you?'

She patted my hand.

'Of course I have. Hamlet was having his merry wives smuggled out of England by sucking out his eyeballs which leads to an armageddon and the death of the President. Right?'

'Never mind. How are things with you? Found the ten most boring books?'

'Indeed I have,' she replied, 'but I am loath to finish reading them as I feel there is one last epiphanic moment to my life that will be revealed just before I die.'

'What sort of epiphanic moment?'

'I don't know. Do you want to play Scrabble?'

So Gran and I played Scrabble. I thought I was winning until she got 'cazique' on a triple word score and it was downhill from there. I lost by 503 points to 319.

24

Home Again

DENMARK BLAMED FOR DUTCH ELM DISEASE

'Dutch Elm Disease was nothing of the sort' was the shock claim from leading arboreahsb last week. 'For many years we had blamed Dutch Elm Disease on the Dutch.' declared Jeremy Acorn, head spokesman of the Knotty Pine Arboreal Research Facility. 'So-called Dutch Elm Disease, a tree virus that killed off nearly all England's elms in the mid-seventies, was thought to have originated in Holland – hence the name.' But new research has cast doubt on this long-held hypothesis. 'Using techniques unavailable to us in the seventies we have uncovered new evidence to suggest that Dutch Elm Disease originated in Denmark.' Mr Acorn went on to say: 'We have no direct evidence to suggest that Denmark is engaged in the design and proliferation of arborealogical weapons, but we have to maintain an open mind. There are many oaks and silver birches in England at present unprotected against attack.' Arboreal Warfare – should we be worried? Full report, page nine.

Article in the Arb

oreal Times, 17 July 1988

I hurried home to get there before my mother as I wasn't sure how she'd react to finding that Friday was being looked after by a gorilla. It was possible that she might not have any problems with this but I didn't really want to put it to the test.