“Sounds too wacky to make much of a difference to anything,” Dennis said. “Could be fun, though. You up for it Jeremy, are you?”
Jeremy laughed. “Couldn’t get myself into much more trouble, could I?”
Julie was even more enthusiastic. “I wasn’t born when John got shot but my dad told me all about him. Drove my mam nuts singing his songs in the bath all the time. That’s how I learned the words,” she said, dabbing at the tear dribbling down her cheek. “Dad also told me about the fuss he caused with god freaks over in the US by saying The Beatles were more popular than Jesus. Took some guts that did, but the way Dad told it, John was just speaking the truth like he always did. Maybe that’s what got him shot.”
Barry hoisted both eyebrows. “Mmm,” he said after a moment’s thought. “One wonders, doesn’t one, whether our little game might not have an equally affective impact on the mood of our cousins across the pond as in Ruskieland? Nothing like a reminder of times past to re-open some eyes, is there? I gather Mister Spielberg’s Watergate film has been rather well received. With luck pigs still might fly,” he was saying at the very moment Maggie beeped his horn and, before fainting, Jeremy peered through the window to see Pete apparently driving a motor scooter.
As noted, it was OO17 Maurice Moffat who took charge of the situation.
“May I be of assistance?” he said, watching on as Maggie and Pete got in each other’s way while struggling to disembark from the Lambretta, which, unaccustomed to such ineptitude, keeled over, tossing both passengers onto the mulchy ground.
“OINK,” Pete protested, rolling about with all four legs pointing in different directions as Maggie climbed to his feet and did his best to appear in control of the situation.
“Ah, um, hello there,” he said, dusting himself down.
“And you might be?” said Maurice, fingering the little .22 Glock he kept in a secret pocket in case of emergencies.
In his other life, Maggie would have said, “Sir Magnus Montague, who are you?” But this was new man Maggie, who apologised for the disturbance of his unusual arrival before requesting the chance to explain.
“You have two minutes,” said Maurice, OO17-ishly. The bloke didn’t look like he intended mischief, but in these dark days one could never be too sure. In all his years on the spook circuit, Maurice was yet to confront a counter-agent riding pillion on a pig-driven motor scooter, but who knew what new sorts of camouflage they might have adopted. Maurice kept his finger on the mini-Glock’s trigger just in case.
“Two minutes, eh,” said Maggie. “A tall order.”
“Go for it.”
So Maggie did, clocking one minute and forty-eight seconds by Maurice’s watch.
“Blimey,” he said, relaxing his trigger finger. In Maurice’s world, concision was a rare virtue and a key tell. Liars waffled endlessly off the point.
“So it’s Jeremy Crawford you seek?” he added as Pete clambered to his feet and peered accusingly at the fallen Lambretta.
“As I said, in light of my conversion to his view of things, I should be honoured to meet him again,” said Maggie. “Always assuming the pig brought me to the right place, of course. To be honest, I had no way of knowing. Simply trusted to blind instinct.”
Maurice liked that too. Real life spooks never admitted to blind instinct unless they were triple bluffing. Which remained a possibility but, looking into Maggie’s eyes, Maurice discounted the likelihood. Call it intuition. Call it anything you want, but the bloke’s highly compacted explanation for his visit had rung true, so…”
“Okay,” he said. “Anything in your pockets I should see before we step inside? A smartphone? Any little wires leading to…?”
Maggie took off his Hells Angels jacket and tossed it over.
“Help yourself. You’ll find no bombs, though. And there’s not much else of me that could hide anything. Unless you’re going to frisk me, of course.”
“Sorry, but actually I am,” said Maurice, checking the biker’s jacket pockets and linings before asking Maggie to spreadeagle himself against the Shepherd’s Hut garden railings. “I just need to be sure, that’s all. As you will be aware, Jeremy is a much sought after person these days.”
“Understandable,” said Maggie over his shoulder while Maurice patted him down. “And may I be allowed to know exactly your connection to him?”
In one minute and forty-six seconds, beating his previous personal explanation record by a whole second, Maurice introduced himself.
“So that’s how important Jeremy has become?” said Maggie.
“Indeed,” said Maurice, satisfied the stranger was clean. “Now if you would care to step this way. Sir Magnus, is it?”
“Maggie.”
“Apologies. Maggie.”
“Oink,” said Pete.
Despite his born again hippy/Hells Angel appearance, Jeremy and Julie recognised Sir Magnus aka Maggie straight away and exchanged disturbed glances. Barry and Dennis just stared and raised eyebrows at Maurice, who palmed air and nodded reassurance.
“A friend,” he said, while Shirley, Hans and Colin checked out their new visitor with leg and bum sniffs before wagging their tails in approval.
“Jeremy and Julie over there I’m sure you already know,” he added. “The other two gentlemen are: Barry, the owner of this fine establishment…”
Barry smiled unreadably.
“And Dennis, who used to be a Fanbury policeman until he saw the light.”
“Hi,” said Maggie with a little wave. “As Barry indicated,” he added, acknowledging Jeremy’s and Julie’s suspicious eyeballing, “some of you will know well enough who I am. As for you other chaps, explanations are clearly in order. May I sit?”
“Feel free,” said Barry, wafting an arm at a battered old piano stool. “Looking a tad wobbly on your pins. A stiffener help at all?”
“I’d be obliged,” said Maggie. “Non-alcoholic if you have it. On the wagon, these days, but a caffeine hit would be appreciated. No milk and just the one sugar,”
Jeremy and Julie exchanged frowns and puzzled glances while Barry fixed the coffee. The Sir Magnus they’d known had always been at least half cut and chewing on one of his absurd cigars.
“This time you have more than two minutes,” said Maurice with a grin.
And so it was, sipping at Barry’s fine brew, that Maggie offloaded his recent change of heart to perfect strangers, with the exception of Jeremy and Julie that was. But, along with Dennis and Barry, they listened in amazement and even chuckled along with Maggie when he told of the cardiac arrest, which had threatened an actual change of heart.
“Managed with just a bit of a bypass and a couple of stents as it happened,” he explained, “as things turned out it wasn’t the ticker that needed the transplant so much as the bally brain. Clearly needed a good clean out and some new nuts and bolts that little fella did.”
“Is he for real?” Julie whispered behind her hand to Jeremy, who looked as perplexed as his new inamorata.
It was Pete, sitting with Hilary, Hans, and Colin who answered her question.
“Oink!” he said. Appropriately because this was the point in Maggie’s narrative at which he was moving on from his epiphanic comprehension of Jeremy’s motives in “leaving his life” to the need he felt to seek out his ex-HAA and compliment him on his decision. And how helpful Jeremy’s pig pal had been in this quest.
“Couldn’t have done without him,” he said, leaning over to stroke Pete’s head. “Much maligned chaps, pigs. Sorry about the arrival, of course. Must have looked a tad bizarre.”
“Oink,” Pete agreed.
“Sir Magnus,” said Jeremy. “Are we really to understand…?”
“Maggie. The name’s Maggie now.”
“Sorry, Maggie. But are you telling us…?”
“That I’m a new man? Yes, and not ashamed to say so. And for all my past misdeeds I full-heartedly apologise. To both of you, but especially to Miss Mackintosh, the best PA I ever had and the most maltreated.”
Julie blinked.
“And to you, Jeremy, I offer not only my most humble apologies but also my thanks for having presented me with the model upon which to reassess my own paltry existence and do something about it before it was too late. Which, of course, it almost was, what with the ticker problem and everything.”
“And you really had to sluice out lavatories?” said Jeremy.
“As I said, the beak required it for biffing the copper on his schnoz, poor chap. Got rather good at it, even if I say so myself. Cleanest lavs in town, they are. And the stint’s not finished yet. Still a few weeks to go. Just took a little break on the off chance of finding you, then I’ll be back at it.”
Barry smiled. “More coffee, Maggie?” he said. “Unless you’re sure you wouldn’t fancy a drop of something stronger? I do a rather nifty raspberry champagne. Can’t imagine a drop or two would see you back in the A&E.”
“Well put that way, I don’t see why not. A&E more likely to kill me than raspberry champers these days, eh, so I’ll take my chances.”
“Tell you what,” said Barry, who admired anyone who could clean toilets and be proud of the results, “why don’t we all share a glass and perhaps indulge in a small toast to our new friend? Be up for that, would you, Jeremy?”
Maggie waited with some apprehension, but was glad to see his ex-HAA first nod then rise from his seat and then amble over with a hand outthrust.
“It would be a pleasure,” he said, dropping the hand at the last moment and instead taking Maggie in a man hug. Which surprised and confused Maggie who, new man though he was, had no prior experience of man hugging, which he had always assumed to be only for the gay boys.
“Oooofff,” he said, as Jeremy enveloped him. But he was smiling.
He smiled a lot more when Julie crossed the room to join the hug fest, although he was very careful not to touch her bottom.
Dennis, Barry and Maurice watched on and clapped.
“I like it when stuff comes together,” said Dennis.
“Me too,” Maurice was saying only moments before his phone took to trilling in his pocket and he headed to the door apologising for the call “he just had to take.”
“That corny old line again?” Barry called after him, but Maurice ignored it and headed for the door.