Omally excused himself from his near-naked and frostbitten unofficial bride-to-be and stumbled in through the rear door, gathering up Jim Pooley, whose women had deserted him and whose keyhole eye had snow blindness.
“Three cheers for Neville,” quoth Omally, and the cry went up.
Neville cleared his throat, made a brief speech of thanks, blissfully devoid of time-wasting and sentiment, rubbed his hands together and to much applause applied himself to the nearest parcel. It contained an elegant set of cufflinks with matching tie clip, wrought from discarded beer bottle tops. It was a present from Wally Woods, Brentford’s foremost purveyor of wet fish.
“Nice one,” roared the crowd. “Very tasteful.”
Wally accepted these ovations modestly. “It was nothing,” he said.
“Correct,” agreed the crowd. “We were being sarcastic”
The second gift was something of an enigma, being an item which appeared to be neither animal not vegetable nor mineral. There was much of the mythical beast to it, but even more to suggest that its antecedents lay with the sprout family. Neville held it at arm’s length and ogled it with his good eye. He rattled it against his ear and cocked his head on one side.
The crowd took to murmuring.
The bearer of this gift stepped hurriedly up to the bar and whispered words into Neville’s ear. Neville’s good eye widened. “Does it, be damned?” said he, rapidly removing the thing to below counter level. “Most unexpected,” adding, “just what I always wanted.”
Pooley’s present proved to be of extraordinary interest. Once naked of its newspaper wrappings it displayed itself as a square black metal box, approximately six inches to a side, with a slot at the top and bottom.
Neville shook it suspiciously.
“It’s a thing patented by my grandaddy,” said Jim, “called Pooley’s Improver. It converts base metal into gold.”
“Well now,” said Neville, making what is known as an “old-fashioned face”. “That’s useful.”
“And fully practical.” Jim popped a copper coin into the top slot. Grinding sounds, suggestive of gears meshing, issued from the box and within but a moment or two, something which had every appearance of a golden sovereign dropped into Neville’s outstretched palm.
Neville held it between thumb and forefinger and then took a little bite at it. “Tis genuine,” said he. “My thanks, Jim. Here, hang about, what is that funky smell?”
The beer-steeped air of The Flying Swan had suddenly become permeated by a ghastly odour, suggestive of rotting eggs or the-morning-after-the-big-Vindaloo bathroom.
“My goddess!” Neville drew back in alarm. “It’s this coin!”
The Swan’s patrons dragged themselves into a broad crescent, amid much nose-holding, drink-covering, coughing and gagging. “Get that thing out of here, mister,” shouted someone. A kindly soul, eager to help, swung wide The Swan’s door, only to vanish beneath an avalanche of snow. Neville hurled the stinking object into the street and a rescue team of helpers dug out their companion and rammed home the door.
Neville gave Pooley the coldest of all fish eyes.
“There are certain flaws in the process,” Jim explained. “The grandaddy never did get around to ironing them all out.”
Neville folded his brow, fanned his nose with a beer mat and pushed the offensive black box aside.
The crowd moved in once more.
Neville unwrapped a Santa’s grotto composed of used pipe cleaners. “Mine,” said Old Pete, patting his Fair Isled chest. A Miss Magic Mouth inflatable love doll, that no-one would own up to, a flagon of sprout gin, which many did, and all bar John Omally wished to sample. A hand-painted facsimile of The Flying Swan. Beaten “pewter” tankards, bearing incongruous words such as Heinz upon their planished brims. Boxes of cabbage leaf cigars and several objects of evident antiquity which would have had the late and legendary Arthur Negus reaching for his reference books.
Someone had even created an extraordinary likeness of Neville from the thermostat and components of a 1963 Morris Minor.
Neville opened each parcel in turn and beamed hugely at every disclosure. He was, as the alchemists of old would have it, in his element.
“Next round on the house and supper is served,” he called, as The Swan’s Christmas catering staff appeared from the kitchen bearing the traditional groaning trays.[4]
These were loaded to the gunwales with rugged mountains of baked potatoes, chorus lines of turkey legs and passing-out parades of mince pies.
Old Pete availed himself of the barman’s hospitality and returned to the clapped-out piano, striking up a rousing “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”.
Those capable of joining him between chewings and swallowings did so as and when.
In the midst of all this feasting and merrification, the saloon bar door suddenly flew open to reveal a stunning figure in black. Black hat. Black coat. Black strides. Black boots. Black sunspecs also. He bore an enormous parcel (black wrapped), and stood in the doorway, dramatically silhouetted against the all-white back drop.
Many of the uninformed instantly recognized this apparition to be none other than the angel of death himself. A miserly fellow, who knew the ghost of Christmas past when he saw it, hastily took a dive for the Gents.
“Merry Christmas,” called Norman Hartnell. For it was he.
The crowd cleaved apart as the shopkeeper stepped forward, struggling manfully beneath the weight of his burden. Pooley and Omally offered assistance and the parcel was conveyed with difficulty to the countertop.
“For me?” Neville asked.
Norman nodded. “Compliments of the season,” said he.
The part-time barman plucked at the swarthy wrappings, which fell away to reveal a gilded casket of such magnificence that all present were cowed into awe-struck silence.
The thing was wondrous and that was a fact, wrought with cunning arabesques of gemstones and inlaid with many precious metals. A corona of golden light surrounded it and this bathed the faces of the assembled multitude to a nicety. By gosh.
Neville ran a hand gently over the fantastic object. “Incredible,” he whispered. “Incredible, Norman. Whatever is it?”
Norman flicked a snowflake from a Bible-black lapel. “I believe it to be nothing less than the now legendary lost ark of the covenant. I dug it up on my allotment. I thought it might amuse you.”
“Amuse me?” Neville nodded numbly. “I don’t know what to say, Norman. I mean it’s … it’s well … it’s …”
“Nifty,” said Norman. “And not at all Christmassy.”
“No indeed.” Neville viewed the casket. “How does it open? Does it open? Have you opened it?”
“Handles. Don’t know, and no,” said Norman, answering each question in turn. “Two little handles, on the side there. On the little doors. You could give them a pull, Neville. Just to see what might happen.”
“Yes,” said Neville, taking hold of the handles. “Just to see what might happen.”
Away in the distance and high upon the Chiswick flyover, three wise men on camels, who had been following a star, took sudden account of a blinding beam of golden light that rose from the Brentford area.
“Now, whatever do you take that to be?” asked one.
“Looks like a pub,” said another. “Sort of atomizing and being sucked into the sky.”
The third wise man blew into his frozen mittens. “Christmas,” he said, “who can odds it, eh?”
And who could?
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