The Doomsday Conspiracy

The group from the tour bus was standing around him, staring in horrified silence. The man next to him fainted. Another man turned away and vomited. There was an elderly priest there, clutching his beads and mumbling incoherently.

“My God,” someone said. “It’s a flying saucer!”

And that was when Mothershed had his epiphany. A miracle had fallen into his lap. He – Leslie Mothershed – was on the spot with his cameras to photograph the story of the century! There was not a magazine or newspaper in the world that would reject the photographs he was about to take. A coffee-table book about Switzerland? He almost laughed aloud at the idea. He was about to astonish the whole world. All the television talk shows would be begging for him, but he would do Robin Leach’s show first. He would sell his photographs to the London Times, the Sun, the Mail, the Mirror – all the English newspapers, the foreign papers and magazines. Le Figaro and Paris Match, Oggi and Der Tag. Time and USA Today. The press everywhere would be pleading with him for his photographs. Japan and South America, and Russia and China and – there was no end to it. Mothershed’s heart was fluttering with excitement. I won’t give anyone an exclusive. Each one will have to pay me individually. I’ll start at a hundred thousand pounds a picture, maybe two hundred thousand. And I’ll sell them over and over again. He began feverishly adding up the money he was going to make.

Leslie Mothershed was so busy adding up his fortune that he almost forgot to take the pictures. “Oh, my God! Excuse me,” he said to no one in particular, and raced back across the highway to get his camera equipment.

The mechanic had finished hoisting the disabled vehicle in the air, ready to tow it away.

“What’s going on over there?” he asked.

Mothershed was busy grabbing his camera equipment. “Come and see for yourself.”

The two men moved across the highway to the wooded area, and Mothershed pushed his way through the circle of tourists.

“Excuse me,” he said. “Excuse me.”

He adjusted the focus on his camera and started snapping pictures of the UFO and its eerie passengers. He took pictures in black and white and in colour. As the shutter clicked each time, Mothershed thought, a million pounds … another million pounds … another million pounds.

The priest was crossing himself and saying, “It’s the face of Satan.”

Satan, hell, Mothershed thought exultantly. It’s the face of money. These will be the first pictures that prove that flying saucers really exist. And then suddenly a terrifying thought occurred to him. What if the magazines think these pictures are fake? There have been a lot of faked photographs of UFOs. His euphoria vanished. What if they don’t believe me? And that was when Leslie Mothershed had his second inspiration.

There were nine witnesses gathered around him. Without knowing it, they were about to lend authenticity to his discovery.

Mothershed turned to face the group. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he called out. “If you would all like to have your photographs taken here, just line up and I’ll be happy to send each of you a print, free.”

There were excited exclamations. Within moments, the passengers from the tour bus were standing beside the remains of the UFO, except for the priest.

He was reluctant. “I can’t,” he said. “It’s evil!”

Mothershed needed the priest. He would make the most convincing witness of them all.

“That’s just the point,” Mothershed said persuasively. “Don’t you see? This will be your testimony about the existence of evil spirits.”

And the priest was finally persuaded.

“Spread out a little,” Mothershed ordered, “so we can see the flying saucer.”

The witnesses shifted their positions.

“That’s it. Very good. Excellent. Hold still, now.”

He snapped half a dozen more pictures and took out a pencil and paper.

“If you’ll write down your names and addresses, I’ll see to it that each of you gets a print.”

He had no intention of sending any prints. All he wanted was corroborating witnesses. Let the bloody newspapers and magazines try to get around that!

And then, suddenly, he noticed that several people in the group had cameras. He couldn’t allow any other photographs but his! Only photos that had the credit, “Photograph by Leslie Mother-shed”, could exist.

“Excuse me,” he said to the group. “Those of you who have cameras: if you’ll pass them to me, I’ll take a few pictures of you so that you’ll have some taken with your own cameras.”

The cameras were quickly handed to Leslie Mothershed. As he knelt to frame the first shot, no one noticed that Mothershed clicked open the film compartment with his thumb and held it ajar. There, a little bit of nice bright sunlight will help those photographs no end. Too bad, my friends, but only professionals are allowed to capture historic moments.

Ten minutes later Mothershed had all their names and addresses. He took one last look at the flying saucer and thought, exultantly, Mother was right. I am going to be rich and famous.

He couldn’t wait to return to England to develop his precious photographs.

“What the hell is going on?”

The police stations in the Uetendorf area had been inundated with telephone calls all evening.

“Someone is prowling around my house …”

“There are strange lights outside …”

“My livestock is going crazy. There must be wolves around …”

“Someone drained my watering trough.”