The Coves in Black

 A Sir Desmond Stirling Testimony of the Unearthly

Chapter 1

‘I say, Stirling old chap, there’s supposed be a wizard meteor display in the sky tonight. Fancy taking a butcher’s?’

Piers Felchington-Smythe peered out from behind his copy of The Wrong ‘Un, a luridly-covered magazine about true life criminals. ‘Felcher’ was the disgraced third son of Lord Perivale and currently the MP for somewhere hellish up north, a constituency he proudly claimed he’d never visited. I’d never realised he had an interest in astronomy and said so.

‘Don’t really,’ he admitted, ‘But anything would be more interesting than watching the old farts fall asleep.’

We were in the bar of Abaddon’s, our Gentlemen’s Club. It is my home from home, but there had been a noticeable dearth of the top notch members that night, partly because there had been a three line whip in Parliament. Felcher should’ve been there too, but I doubt he would’ve known what the deuce he was voting for anyway, so it was patently for the best he didn’t take part.

I suggested the best place would be on the roof. This was strictly out of bounds (due to the amount of members who’d leapt from there during various economic downturns or when exposed by the News of The World as a relentless fornicator of one kind or another), but I had previously ‘acquired’ a spare set of keys which would admit us to the roof terrace. 

As you know, I’m always game for an adventure so I required no further encouragement. We ordered a brace of whiskies each and crept out as surreptitiously as two drunks can.

The narrow stairs to the roof proved somewhat trickier than usual, probably due to the vast consumption of booze we had both enjoyed throughout the evening, but neither of us were amateur pisspots, and we eventually reached the door to the terrace. I had to close one eye in order to manoeuvre the key into its hole, but after about 15 minutes I managed it and we found ourselves on the roof. The terrace was narrow, enclosed by a rail topped with barbed wire to prevent the aforementioned self-toppings. I’d often sunbathed up there in the warmer months, but tonight the temperature was not conducive to being starkers, even for a hardened nudist such as yours truly. It was a beautifully clear night, with a myriad stars on view. 

‘Where is the meteor shower expected?’ I asked.

Felcher pointed upwards. ‘In the sky.’

I sighed. ‘Yes, I guessed that, but which bit? There is rather a lot of it.’

Felcher shrugged. ‘No idea, old bean.’ He stared upwards. ‘So what exactly are we looking for?’

I wondered if this was a fool’s errand. It would hardly flabber my gast if Felcher hadn’t even got the correct night.

I shivered. There was already a sheen of frost on the surrounding roofs. I confess that London looked rather winsome in this ice-encrusted state, but I was glad that there was a bunk with a hot water bottle waiting for me downstairs, and that I didn’t have to totter my way home to the Old Rectory tonight.

I looked up. I couldn’t see anything that resembled a meteor shower. The cold night air was making my eyes water; any more and I wouldn’t be able to spot a flying saucer if one flew overhead…

I gasped! A wave of… what’s it called…? deja vu hit me. Had I been here before? I recalled staring at a moonlit sky, watching as… something approached…

I shook my head. I’m a courageous chap as anyone who knows me – or my war record – will testify, hand on Bible, but suddenly I felt unnerved and wanted a ceiling protecting  my head, not this bleak infinity with its unknown worlds, home to who knew what.

‘Bugger this for a game of soldiers, Felcher,’ I managed to gasp. ‘I’d rather be drinking in the warm than freezing the orchestras off gawping at the Milky Way.’

Felcher nodded and followed me down the stairs. My legs were shaky as I descended the staircase, and not just from the booze.

What on Earth had unnerved me so? If it was from Earth…?

Despite having drunk enough to fell a hippo, I had trouble sleeping that night.

Odd images flitted through my brain; lights, large black eyes, weird long fingers getting a tad fresh with one’s unmentionables … nothing coherent, it was as though that rum cove Ken Russell had been let loose on my memories with a pair of scissors.

Finally, much to my relief, I conked out and enjoyed a dream where Raquel Welch, dressed in a  very skimpy space suit, gave me a thorough medical exam – definitely BUPA and not NHS.

The reason I was staying in town that night was that the next day I was due to record an episode of Call My Bluff. I arrived at the BBC Television Centre early; the place may be a roaring hive of unashamed Reds, but the Bar is subsidised and one can get reasonably blotto without breaking the bank. I rather overdid it, and realised I’d better get some nosh inside me before the recording to soak up all the booze so I made my way to the Canteen. I waited for a lift alongside a Black & White Minstrel, a Pan’s Person, and Kenneth Kendall. I flashed my most charming smile at the Pan’s Person; she ignored me. Kendall smiled at me; I ignored him.

The lift door opened and I walked in… only to be confronted with the subject of last night’s nightmare. A tall green thing with huge bulbous black eyes loomed over me.

I gasped and fell backwards onto the lift wall. The creature turned to look at me. My legs buckled and I felt cold sweat erupt from every pore.

The Pan’s Person brushed past me before I could stop her. 

‘Hello Sonny,’ she said to the Thing. The creature nodded at her, lumbered out of the lift, and headed for the Bar. I breathed a sigh of relief when the lift door closed.

The Pan’s Person stared at me with, I’m ashamed to say, pity. ‘He’s doing Doctor Who in TC1. What floor?’

‘Thought you had the DTs, Sir Desmond?’ asked the wretched Kendall with a giggle. I tried to respond but all my facial muscles refused to function. 

I abandoned the lift at the next floor and stood in the corridor, gulping in air. Like most of Television Centre, there were enough booze fumes around to help pacify me. 

I calmed myself down. What on Earth was the matter with me? To have the heebie-jeebies over a thesp in a polystyrene helmet! I – who had wrestled with a crocodile,  marched at the front of Nudist Pride parade down Whitehall in a glacial  February, and parachuted into Germany dressed as a Nun (it wasn’t the War, I’d lost a bet with the Duke of Edinburgh),

I clenched my manly jaw. I’m the last person to have any truck with shrinks: I’m as sane as the next man – just ask any next man whether it’s Aspinall, Lucky Lucan or old Goldsmith – but even I could sense a screw coming loose and I wanted it tightened before anything fell off.

In the absence of a straitjacket or a passing trick cyclist, I did the next best thing and took a swig from my hip flask.

The recording went well. I bamboozled the opposing side – Freddy ‘Parrot-Face’ Davies and Susan Stranks along with the ubiquitous Paddy Campbell – with my false yet plausible definition of Frottage and we coasted to an easy victory. 

Afterwards we congregated in the Bar. Once I’d downed a few brandies, I was able to see the funny side of my experience earlier in the day, and I made my co-panellists roar as I described my ‘Close Encounter’ although I confess that I played down the extent of the unease I’d felt. 

But lingering shreds of my anxiety must have shown through, and darling Sue Lawley mentioned that she’d recently interviewed a ‘hypnotherapist’ whose speciality was putting patients under the ‘fluence’ and rummaging around for any memories that might have got lodged at the back of the brain, fishing them out and chucking them in the bin where they belong. As I said, I’ve had no truck with mentalists in the past, but I was keen to get to the bottom of this enigma.

The next morning, I instructed my secretary Cilla to find out the mesmerist’s number – telling her it was for research for the next novel; I wanted this kept quiet and she’s a terror for flapping her lips – and I phoned to make an appointment. To my surprise he was able to fit me in that afternoon. I would’ve thought free publicity on top TV show Nationwide would’ve filled his books for months. 

It wasn’t quite Harley Street; the mesmerist’s office was situated above a sandwich shop in Weymouth Street, but near enough, I conceded.

I rang the bell. A tinny voice rattled out of the intercom. ‘Who is it?’

‘Sir Desmond Stirling,’ I confidently informed them, albeit with my hand cupped over the mouthpiece so no passers-by might hear. ‘I have an appointment with Professor Tintenfisch.’ 

The door clicked and I entered. Initial impression wasn’t favourable. I once took an ex- wife to a diet clinic around the corner in the actual Harley Street – I thought it was about time she shed some blubber – and the whole set-up had been very deluxe; leggy receptionists, carpet woven from the pubic hair of Tibetan nuns, illuminated tank with bonsai sharks… but this was somewhat downmarket from that. A badly-lit staircase faced me, a carpet which was more hole than actual rug, and a tang reminiscent of school tuck hung about in the air. But I’m not one to shirk a challenge, so I ascended the stairs, hoping that the answer to my paradox awaited me at the summit.

At the top of the stairs I found myself in a small reception room. The pong had dissipated, but there were no other signs of opulence. A filing cabinet, a small desk on which there was a typewriter, and a moth-eaten sofa. A lady of indeterminate age sat behind the desk, tapping away even though there was no paper in the typewriter. She looked up as I walked in, her eyes rather unfocused behind her ferociously winged spectacles. 

I reintroduced myself. 

‘The Professor is expecting you,’ she said and hiccuped from which a whiff of gin escaped. ‘Won’t be two shakes of…’ she faltered. 

‘A donkey’s tail?’ I volunteered.

She looked at me, eyes glazed. ‘Do what?’

‘Nothing,’ I said, kindly.

‘Just take a seat.’

I sat unwillingly on the sofa. I glanced at the magazines on offer on the coffee table. Several old issues of Shrinks & Shrinking, the latest Mesmer Monthly, and a pre-war Health and Efficiency. I was about to grab the last when I heard my name being called. I glanced up.

If I wrote a character such as stood before me, my critics – of whom you will be astonished to know there are many, most of them unredeemed communists – would’ve accused me of cliché. Professor Tintenfisch was a tall man, in his sixties, his grey hair awry as though in shock, his suit – much like his office – had seen better days, the dog’s tooth pattern faded and drenched in all sorts of unsavoury stains. His waistcoat was garish, once glittering with black sequins although a good half had obviously dropped off in the preceding years. I suspected he may once have practiced his art on the boards and this was a final remnant of his stage outfit.

He was vigorously cleaning his small round spectacles and, after peering through them to check if he’d missed any debris, perched them on his nose, which was cushioned by a splendid walrus moustache, suspiciously darker than his shock of hair.

He squinted at me, then held out his hand. I shook it. A surprisingly strong grip. 

‘Guten tag, Sir Ztirling,’ he said in a very broad accent. ‘Please, follow me.’ He led me into his office. 

Hmm, was he a genuine Kraut or was the accent a residue of his stage act?

His office was even more chaotic and dilapidated than the reception; a desk piled high with paper work, bookcases threatening to collapse under the weight of ancient tomes, yellowing certificates framed on the wall. My German used to be pretty top notch for my war work (about which I still keep mum as careless talk etc etc) but the lettering was too faded, even if my vocab hadn’t diminished over the years.

The Professor scooped an elderly cat off a moth-eaten chaise-longue and gestured for me to sit down. I did so and was promptly engulfed in a cloud of dust. 

He sat behind his desk and swept a tottering pile of paperwork out of his way so he could see me.

‘So, Sir Ztirling,’ he said, ‘How can I help you?’

‘Call me Sir Desmond,’ I offered him, generously.

I took a deep breath. I had been dreading this moment. In the cold light of day, surely it was all going to sound pretty ridiculous?

The Professor formed a steeple with his fingers? ‘Juzt start at zer very beginning, it izz avter all, a fair gut place to ztart.’ He leaned forward. ‘You vill tell me all you need to under ze hypnosis, but it izz for ze best for me to know for vot I am looking.’

He smiled at me and I suddenly felt that, for all his oddness, I could trust this man.

And so I blurted it all out: my collywobbles on the roof, the nightmares, the encounter at TV Centre with the mummer in the monster suit… 

The Professor listened to my blathering in silence, then when I finished, he leaned back in his chair.

‘Vair vair interezzting,’ was all he said.

‘Yes, but what’s it all about, Prof?’ I pleaded. ‘Am I going dollally oddsocks or what?’

He faced me, his screwed-up eyes fixing me intently through his tiny glasses.

‘Let uzz find out, shall ve?’

He stood up and approached me. ‘Kindly lie down on ze sofa, Zir Dezmunt. Head zero, feet zere. You may remove your shoes and undo your trousers if it will make you the more comfy.’

I kicked off my shoes , but left my trousers alone. After all, while I’m never happier than when bollocko, the halfway house of trousered but unzipped can make a chap feel very insecure.

The Professor switched off the light and pulled a blind down over the window. The room darkened considerably.

‘How do you do this?’ I asked with a nervous titter. ‘Dangle a watch in front of my eyes?

He shook his head. A cloud of dandruff gently erupted into the air like a dandelion casting its seed to the wind.

‘Nein, hypnozizz has reached ze space age.’ He pointed at the wall opposite me on which there was pinned a circular board adorned with a black and white spiral pattern. He flicked a switch by the board and it started to spin, slowly at first, gradually getting faster. 

The Professor pulled a chair up alongside the chaise-longue and sat by me. ‘Please concentrate on ze centre of ze spinning pattern und empty your mind of all thoughtzz und vorries.’

I focussed on the epicentre of the whirling spiral and tried to clear my mind, not easy with a ferocious intellect like mine. The Professor started to speak quietly, his voice surprisingly soothing for a sausage-muncher.

‘Switch off your muzzels und allow your body to float.’

I was convinced this wasn’t going to work, but I decided that bugger it, at least I’d get a nice afternoon snooze out of it. I began to relax…

I was aware the Professor was still talking but I wasn’t really listening. I had begun to feel that I was wallowing on a bed of marshmallows and jolly comfy it felt too, almost as good as being smashed on whisky. 

‘Zo tell me vot happened zat night…’ I heard the Professor ask…

I let out a gentle snore. 

And then it all flooded back!

Chapter 2

I’d been enjoying a splendid weekend in the country at Brusque Manor, the country seat of Fuzzy, the newly-minted Duke of Isleworth. The Duchess was a lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret and had accompanied her on one of her jaunts to somewhere exotic, so Fuzzy had decided to host a ‘boy’s weekend’ in the country.  Lots of grub, booze, skinny dipping in the pool, a certain amount of slaughter of small animals – the ideal weekend!

Regretfully I had to cut the weekend short and take my leave on the Sunday afternoon as I was due to appear on Pebble Mill at One the following lunchtime. I waved goodbye to all my chums as they lounged starkers by the pool, Martinis in hand, and hopped into my Jensen Interceptor, cursing Bob Langley under my breath. But I had a book on the cusp of publication and every bit of exposure was important. My agent was trying to slot me into Russell Harty Plus the following evening too.

I had barely driven a few miles when dusk fell quickly. The road was quiet with so little traffic that I expected to be at my Chelsea flat much earlier than expected. I was rifling through the address book in my brain to see whether I could drum up some totty for the night!

And this is where things took a turn for the rum.

On one of my rare glimpses into the rear view mirror, I spotted a dazzling light rapidly approaching me from behind. 

‘Blast!’ I thought, ‘is that Plod?’ I had been drinking solidly for the previous 48 hours (48 years to be precise!) and I had no wish to lose my licence yet again. I slowed down, popped a Polo in the mouth, and glanced into the mirror … 

The light had gone! Not only that, the road was empty. How was that possible? Nothing had overtaken me. Perhaps the vehicle in question had swerved off the road and crashed? Small mercies etc…

At this point, my car stopped dead. Engine, lights, 8 track stereo, the lot. It slid to a standstill. I tried the key in the ignition. Nothing. I tried again. Still bugger all.

I swore very loudly, language that would shock a brickie. I hadn’t seen a garage or indeed anything much at all for miles. I was going to have to walk to the nearest phone box. I wasn’t even sure I had a 2p piece. I rarely carried coins.

Bang went my Sunday evening knee-trembler with *REDACTED* who I just knew would be a sure bet.

I was about to disembark from the car when I was dazzled with light. I presumed my headlights had suddenly flashed back on, but I quickly realised the luminescence was originating from above. I unwound the window and peered out and upwards…

I don’t know what I saw, but I was so dazzled I must have lost consciousness…

I swam to the surface of awareness. Everything was blurred as if my sight and hearing were clogged with a layer of Vaseline. All I could hear was a cacophony of bleeps and buzzing as though I was at some wretched concert of avant-garde music by Stockhausen or one of those other antisocial fellows. I blinked. A figure was peering down at me; huge black eyes with no lids, a tuft of wiry beard protruding from its chin, leathery skin oozing a slimy oil…

‘Nanny?’ I gasped, ‘what are you doing here?’

For a moment I had a flashback to my childhood, lying on my back as she changed my nappy, tut-tutting at what I had produced.

‘Dearie me, master Desmond,’ I could still remember her rough Irish brogue. ‘You’ll have to learn to use the potty before starting prep school next week.’

I shook my head. Nanny was long dead, blown up by her own Semtex during a failed attack on a post office, old Fenian rogue that she was. Besides, I hadn’t worn a nappy for a long time, years possibly.

Then why did I think..? 

I realised that I was naked from the waist down and my legs were suspended in the air. I felt a wet cloth between my buttocks, as someone wiped my anal cleft.

I groaned. Had it really been that good a weekend? Was Raven my manservant cleaning me up and putting me to bed again? I really ought to give him a pay rise. It’s rare to find a gentleman’s gentleman so willing to don the Marigolds and scrub away the detritus of one’s bacchanalia. 

‘Oh, Raven, you do spoil me,’ I sighed…

At which point Raven did something he’d never done before!

‘Ow!’ I yelled. ‘I appreciate your thoroughness, Raven, but there’s no need…’

I turned cold as I realised I wasn’t in the gentle yet lubricated hands of Raven. The creature – for creature was the only word that suited – who was approaching my exposed posterior with an unnecessarily bulky gadget was most definitely not human. 

I tried to struggle, but I couldn’t move. I felt the odious appliance start to penetrate me. My old SAS training kicked in. Resisting torture doesn’t help, one had to go along with it. I could almost hear darling Dickie Wattis giving me advice? ‘Dear man, just relax and let down your guard. Once it’s past the ring, the worst is over and you can lie back and enjoy it.’

I had no intention of enjoying it, thank you very much, but neither did I plan to allow myself to succumb. 

‘You fiends!’ I hissed. ‘How dare you violate an Englishman’s arsehole without his or his doctor’s permission.

The grisly utensil continued its journey, bringing tears to my eyes. ‘If you aggravate my Michaels, you’ll hear from my solicitor.’

I realised that darling Dickie was right. The further in the gadget penetrated the less it hurt. I could cope with this, I really could. Perhaps I could even pretend I was finding it enjoyable. That would fox the blighters!

I let out an involuntary moan as the invading object touched something inside. Not sure what, but my brain was interpreting it as a sensation of pleasure. Marvellous the way the mind helps one when under duress. 

The Creature slightly withdrew the contraption, then pressed it further in. 

‘Oh Christ!’ I moaned, instinctively reaching for the Johnson, probably to protect it or maybe rub it gently to reassure it. But my hands were immobile. 

To my horror I realised that The Creature had taken hold of the old chap and was examining it. 

‘Unhand me, Sir!’ I tried to say, but – and I assume this was the drugs they had pumped me with – all I could yell was, ‘Oh yes, oh yes!’

After the usual brief time, I am ashamed to say my toes curled and I came face to face with La Petite Mort.

I lay back, shagged out.

‘Do you have a cigarette?’ I pleaded.

The Creature scooped up my Devil’s Custard and slopped it inside a test tube. He handed it to a colleague – equally repellent – who whisked it away.

‘What are you going to do with that?’ I gasped, worried as most chaps are with the potential havoc that the sinful spoonful could cause.

The Creature withdrew that infernal gadget from Branston Alley, glanced at it, and handed it to his bulbous-headed mucker.

I tried to regain a modicum of dignity. I couldn’t move, but I attempted to convey some typically English bravado with that combination of voice and eyebrows perfected by that old sweetheart Roger Moore.

‘This won’t do,’ I said, firmly. ‘You can’t go around kidnapping chaps and molesting their starfishes without so much as a by your leave.’

The Creature stared at me – I would say impassively, but it’s expression was so hard to read it may have been furious or even doing their equivalent of poking its tongue out.

His chum approached and handed him something. The Creature held it up. It was the most godawfully colossal syringe I’d ever seen in my life.

I’m ashamed to say I gasped.

‘Don’t you dare!’ I wheezed. 

The Creature squirted a drop of liquid out of the top of the syringe then loomed towards me.

I tried to scream, but the Stirling tonsils aren’t used to such girlish noise and so I emitted the merest squeak. I violently shook my head as the syringe got closer and closer…

I yelled… and found myself staring into the startled face of Professor Tintenfisch…. I jerked up from the chaise longue, only for the Prof to hold me down.

I lashed out – and my accomplishments in the various arts of the fisticuffs are well-known – so it was astonishing that the Professor was not only able to dodge my punch, but grab my hands with a firm grip of his own. He pushed me back onto the chaise longue, then produced a hip flask from his pocket which he offered to me. I hurriedly swigged a mouthful, the bitter tang of the second-rate brandy instantly doing what was required.

We stared at each other. ‘Zo now ve know,’ he said softly. He looked as shell-shocked as I felt.

The answer was staring me in the face!

Aliens! I had been abducted by aliens!

Chapter 3

I’ve always been a broad-minded chap, open to most things with the exception of socialism and vegetarianism. But I’d never given much credence to the idea of aliens; not so much their existence per se, but that they would visit this world and, instead of approaching the elite – eg Her Majesty or Patrick Moore or John Junor – they’d waste their time with hillbillies in the arse end of nowhere in the colonies.

But it was now looking as though they had finally made contact with someone worth communicating with (eg Yours Truly) and I’d bally well forgotten about it!

But could anyone blame me, after the diabolical liberties they’d taken with the Stirling balloon knot?

My first port of call was my old school chum Peter ‘Nellie’ Nellington-Dean who’d been a Defence wonk until his penchant for snap inspections of Guardsmen’s barracks got him quietly moved to Agriculture where the cows couldn’t complain if he interfered with them.

Nellie was as dapper as ever, his gleaming white hair swooped into an intricate arrangement to hide his bald spot, a green handkerchief popping up from his breast pocket, shoes so polished one could see his underpants.

We lunched at the Tosspot – a discreet munching hole in Greek Street where Fleet St hacks were too busy gazing longingly into their mistress’s eyes to notice anyone else. I politely asked after his good lady wife, whose name neither of us could recall, then I leaped to the nub of the matter. 

‘What’s the deal with flying saucers, Nellie?’ I asked.

He barked with laughter, spilling some juice from his Devilled Seahorse starter on his old school tie.

I gave him a quelling look. I wanted him to take this seriously; not that I was telling him why I wanted to know, just using research for a forthcoming best-seller as my pretext.

‘What’s the official position of HMG vis a vis the whole little green man situation?’ I repeated, trying to sound nonchalantly professional while suppressing my eager yen for the truth.

Nellie shrugged. ‘As far as I know, Her Majesty’s Government position is that it’s all twaddle. In my time, I didn’t see one document with any shred of proof that UFOs are real.’

‘But what about the people who claim they’ve been abducted?’ I asked.

‘Americans, usually,’ he chuckled. ‘Americans who eat lard by the bucket load and think Jesus was a deadshot with an AK47.’

I stared hard at him. Was he just fobbing me off? I didn’t think so. Lying wasn’t Nellie’s strong point. After all, it was his tendency to inadvisable honesty that got him into deep water when asked by Plod why he’d been standing at that particular urinal for quite so long…

I admit that what he said chimed with what I had always believed. Some banjo-plucking redneck and a chum would get rat-arsed on illicit moonshine; sufficiently soused, they would make the beast with the two hairy backs, and then would justify their red raw posteriors the next day with some guff about Martians and their indiscriminate proctological tendencies.

But then it had happened to me. I had been abducted, I had been probed in the most unseemly fashion, and I can assure, you, dear reader, before a disgraceful vision pops up in your mind, that I had most definitely not been indulging in puddle-jumping!

Nellie changed the subject and started to relate some gossip about ex-schoolchums of ours and the misdemeanours they had got up to recently, resulting in whip-withdrawal or fines, but never, thankfully, prison; although for ex-boarding schoolboys, prison wouldn’t be so very different, although with fewer genuine African princes.

I had stopped listening to Nellie. I had drifted off into a dream world of my own, hypnotised by the clumps of mashed potato congealing on my plate. They reminded me of something, but I couldn’t for the life of me think what exactly. I started pushing it around with my fork trying to manipulate it into the shape I felt it should be. Eventually it was arranged into two large balls of mash, joined at the hip. Finally I poured a little gravy from the boat to cause a trickle from the top to the bottom.

Yes, that was it. That’s exactly what it reminded me of…

But what exactly? 

I became aware that Nellie had stopped talking and was watching me with a bemused expression. 

‘I say, Stirling old thing, why have you made a scrotum out of your mashed potato?’

‘It’s not a scrotum, it’s..,’ I began to splutter. Then stopped and looked at my culinary sculpture again. He was right, you know, it did look just like a chap’s turkey neck. Not that I’ve been that close up with one, although they are hard to miss in Cap D’Agde, particularly when playing snooker.

I recalled Nanny scolding me for ‘playing with my food’ so, much as I did then, I scooped the mash into my mouth and obliterated any remnant of my eccentric behaviour.

I hastily changed the subject and asked whether it was true that that PM had been found *REDACTED* in his office with *REDACTED* while dressed as a *REDACTED* 

Nellie’s eyes lit up and he regaled me with sordid gossip about the latest oik to disgrace that sacred office. He soon forgot about my lapse into oddity, while I brooded about what that potato sculpture signified. Perhaps I should pay another visit to that potty mesmerist?

Shortly after this Nellie excused himself as he had to vote against free school meals for the poor or some other communist threat. I was extremely browned off to find he’d left me the bill when he had a perfectly good taxpayer-funded expense account.

I coughed up the necessary tin and took my leave of the restaurant. I was so distracted I’d left an over-generous tip of a whole half-crown! And the waiter wasn’t even a pretty lass!

I was disappointed. Nellie seemingly knew bugger all. I’d assumed he would’ve been thoroughly debriefed (although not in the way one would’ve been on day one at Big School) and would know all that was needed about the whole UFO shebang. ‘Oh yes,’ I’d hoped he would say, ‘That’s the work of the Hardons from Planet Snargle. Don’t worry, I’ll have a quiet word in the relevant orifice and none of those bug-eyed rotters will dare lay a leathery finger on the Stirling tackle ever again.’

While my mind was digesting all this, and my gut was doing the same to the Tripe Tartare, I felt a warning tingle. My senses, trained to an almost superhuman heightened awareness in the SAS, were telling me that I was being watched. Obviously, as a celebrity, one often attracts the gawps of the Oi Polloi, but it’s simple enough to deter their approaches with a quelling glance. 

But this was different. I sensed mild peril. Not real danger – after all I have fought sharks in the Adriatic while delivering chocolates to a woman who later died from complications with diabetes, and wrestled with elite Ninja bastards in Katmandu. No, this was just the inkling that something nearby was – as the common folk so amusingly say – ‘a bit iffy.’

I lifted the collar of my jacket, lurked in a shop doorway and peered around. Nearly everyone in Soho looks suspicious: the homeless person swigging a bottle of Moët and chatting into his ‘mobile’ phone; a nun swinging her Clone Zone bag; the traffic warden having the audacity to ticket my Roller…

But I clocked my prey almost immediately. Two bizarre coves in black pinstripe suits, black waistcoats, black ties, black bowler hats perched on their heads, and wearing, ludicrously, dark-tinted pince-nez – and it wasn’t even sunny! Both of them were clutching furled umbrellas and briefcases; black, inevitably. They realised I had seen them and they tensed. I sent mental instructions to every fibre of my being to prepare for fisticuffs…

At which point someone collided with me. It was a middle-aged woman. She nearly fell but grabbed my hand to steady herself.

‘Watch where you’re going!’ she barked, shamelessly. My gentlemanly instincts kicked in, preventing me from scolding the clumsy baggage. I was about to remonstrate, but she had marched off. I raised my fist to shake it at her when I sensed I was holding something which I hadn’t been a few seconds earlier.

Surreptitiously, I glanced in my hand. There was a card. It read…

‘Mavis Peebles (Miss)

Ufologist

Truth Seeker

‘Nothing doubted.’

Followed by a telephone number.

Well, wasn’t this a turn-up for the books!

I stared over the road. The black-suited men had gone. Perhaps they were just on their way to a funeral? Had they seen my collision with that woman?

I knew what I had to do. I popped into the Coach and Horses for a stiffener.

That evening, I phoned Miss Peebles. I didn’t want anyone else to hear so I picked the lock of the main office at Abaddon’s, my Club – one of many tricks I learned from a chauffeur who was once in my employ -and used the secretary’s phone which I eventually found under several back issues of People’s Friend (including one which profiled Yours Truly. The reporter was an odd young woman whom I bedded afterwards. She had a morbid fascination with my bathroom; in the printed interview, she kept banging on about my avocado plumbing.).

Clutching the phone with my hanky to avoid fingerprints, I dialled the number on the card.

A gruff voice answered. I said who I was and thanked her for the card. Her reply was simple. 

‘Tomorrow night. 10pm. The Devil’s Ballsack outside the village of Quigley Godfrey. Don’t be followed!’

Chapter 4

On the morrow, I despatched myself to the village of Quigley Godfrey in the unfashionable end of Wiltshire. I’d never heard of the place. It required 5 trains to get there and I wished I’d taken the Rolls, but I wanted to be discreet and I was pretty sure the indigenous rustics would never have seen such a grand specimen of motorhood before, if indeed the miracle of the combustion engine had even reached the sleepy hamlet.

Eventually, after a journey of singular tiresomeness, not to mention British Rail employees of increasing communistic tendencies, a lavatory which resembled the Somme, and a buffet car which didn’t serve caviar, my fifth train of the day pulled into the small station at Quigley Godfrey. I asked the elderly station master, a cove whose decrepitude was matched only by his deafness, if there was a hotel in the vicinity. He stared at me blankly, blew into his ear trumpet, informed me about the terrible state of his lumbago, then pointed out of the station. I found a solitary taxi waiting on the concourse, a humble yet beautifully maintained 1963 Austen Trevor. The driver was a young man with, distressingly, an earring and a tattoo of Che Guevara on his neck, who was, despite the physical evidence, surprisingly polite and attentive. I settled into the passenger seat and asked him to take me hither to the best hostelry in the district. He went straight into first gear, his hand accidentally falling off the gear stick and into my lap. He apologised with a shy smile, and drove me about three hundred yards to a charming old inn called The Little Green Man. He kindly offered to carry my luggage to my bedroom, but as I wasn’t sure they’d be able to squeeze me in, I declined.

The ancient pub sign, creaking slightly in the breeze, depicted a curious figure with cavernous eyes and a bulbous head, not dissimilar to the alien bloke who’d been so unwelcomely familiar with my privates.

To my relief, the inn had a free room which I nabbed for that night. I signed in under my usual pseudonym – Sir Derek Spalding – which seemed prudent. The landlord was a splendid figure, obviously ex-military, neatly trimmed moustache, suitably florid complexion, hair smartly parted and plastered firmly into place with Brylcreem, the buttons on his blazer gleaming like cats’ eyes. The sort of chap which is the backbone of this country. I looked forward to sharing a snifter with him later on. 

It was a charming room, on the top floor, the sloping ceiling revealing its location to be just under the roof. The window – which stretched from the floor to ceiling and would have been described as a French window if it actually led anywhere but a plummet to the ground – revealed a pretty view of the village green. Bars covered the window, presumably to prevent those in an unhappy mood from leaping to oblivion.

I left my overnight bag on the bed and returned downstairs to find the olde worlde bar which I’d spotted from the reception. It was very wood-panelled and horse-brassy, just the sort of place to escape the ghastly modern world with its left-wing ‘comedians’ and ‘charities’ and ‘national health service.’ I ordered a foaming pint of the local beer, Thatcher’s Frothingly Deranged from the landlord who was now behind the bar. He introduced himself as Major Gabriel Hardwick.

‘Call me Gay, he said, ‘Most around here do.’

I explained that I always addressed chaps by their surname, until we had reached a level of intimacy which permitted nicknames. However, we compromised in that I would call him Major.

‘So, Sir Derek, my dear,’ he said, his rumbling voice tinged with a delightfully rural burr. ‘Are you here to see a UFO?’

My pint stopped before it reached my lips.

‘What on earth makes you say that?’ I asked, my wartime training kicking in, my face more neutral than that of a poker player’s.

‘That’s why most visitors come here,’ he said, ‘UFO capital of Great Britain we are.’

This was what I believe the youngsters call ‘a turn-up for the books.’

‘Really?’ I said. ‘In what way?’

‘We see them all the time,’ he answered. ‘Sky here’s like Spaghetti Junction.’

‘And do people get… abducted?’ I asked, nonchalantly.

He barked a laugh. ‘So it’s claimed. I suspect they just get lost from too much local Scrumpy and end up in Somerset.’

‘Have you seen a UFO?’ I asked him.

‘Seen lights in the sky, but they could be anything. But as long as it brings in the tourists, people can believe what they like.’

At this point the cab driver who’d brought me here earlier walked into the bar. The landlord rushed over to him and they greeted each other very enthusiastically. I briefly wondered if they were father and son, although I admit I never kissed my father on the lips. But one mustn’t judge rural ways by sophisticated urban standards.

I contemplated booking the young cabbie to drive me to the Devil’s Ballsack later, but the leaflet I had found earlier advertising local attractions informed me it was only a 30 minute walk away; barely a yomp for an old soldier like myself. 

The Major returned to me, after seeing off the young cabbie with a cheeky slap to his behind, and I ordered a whisky, offering one to himself which he accepted.

‘That young man recommended your hostelry to me,’ I informed mein host. 

 He laughed. ‘Oh yes, he knows which way his bread is buttered.’

‘Ah,’ I said, tapping my finger on my nose, ‘You butter it for him, do you?’

‘Well,’ the landlord leaned closer to me, somewhat conspiratorially, and said, ‘We butter each other’s bread, if you know what I mean.’

I presumed that he meant he recommended the lad’s taxi service to his guests.

We drank a toast to those lucrative tourists. 

‘And Mavis Peebles, God bless her?’

I fixed my innocent expression to the front of my head. ‘Mavis Peebles?’

‘If I have anyone to thank for the influx,’ said the landlord, ‘it’s the barmy Miss Peebles. Local celebrity. Really put Quigley Godfrey on the map with her articles and whatnot, banging on about flying saucers and the like. Some of the locals don’t like her, but I’m very grateful to the daft old bat.’

Trying to remain blasé, I asked further questions. Did she drink in the bar? Did she live locally? 

Apparently she lived in a small cottage the other side of the Devil’s Ballsack. She ran a local UFO group and they occasionally drank in the bar, but she rarely came in on her own. She wasn’t a native, but had moved here several years back for ‘research’ and had never left. 

A noisy group of agrarian peasants appeared in the bar and the landlord moved off to serve them. I needed some peace and quiet to process all I’d learned, so I swigged back the remnants of my glass and left. 

There is nothing which makes one feel more heartwarmingly lucky to be born English than a village green. It was too early in the year for cricket, but spring was beginning to flicker into life, and sundown was resisting winter’s early closing schedule. A maypole teetered forlornly in the breeze, neglected and unloved, but still able to stand upright even in this chilly climate.

I peered into the shops which ringed the green. The usual butcher, baker, but alas no candlestick maker. My mouth watered at the chops on display in the butcher’s window, while I couldn’t resist buying a Custard Tart from the baker as a treat for later on. One shop, obviously aimed at the tourists the Major had talked about, had a window filled with UFO-themed bric-a-brac; toys, books of varying quality, kites, telescopes, slippers, lampshades, even special protective underwear with a ‘no entry’ sign printed on the backside! Guffaw!

I bought a postcard of The Devil’s Ballsack, a pair of large hilly mounds separated by a thin winding stream, claimed in local folklore to be the burial chambers of two rival chieftains from the olden days. It looked so familiar yet I was sure I had never visited this area before. Then it occurred to me… at the lunch with Nellie, when I had somewhat disgraced myself by playing with my food, the shape I had constructed with my mash potato and the trickle of gravy… it was the The Devil’s Ballsack!

I had barely digested this revelatory morsel, when I became aware of something moving in the corner of my vision. I glanced to my right. A car was driving slowly by my side. It was a Ford Zephyr, and not only was it completely black, but the windows were darkened too, so impenetrable it was impossible to see within. My pace became brisker. I glanced back. The chrome of its trimming gleamed wickedly, the front grille greeting me with a sneering grin. Its engine purred like a cat contemplating swiping at some defenceless prey with its paw. It was matching my speed.

While a small part of my brain was thinking that I would like a car like that, the rest of my mind was emanating warning sirens. I automatically stood back from the kerb as the car glided to a halt, and the passenger-side window rolled down. I peered in and was confronted with a brace of the Coves in Black whom I had spotted surveilling me in London the day before. The Cove nearer me doffed his bowler and stared at me through his tinted pince-nez.

‘Greetings, Sir Desmond,’ he said in a clipped voice. 

‘Nice motor,’ I replied nonchalantly.

‘Would you care for a lift?’ the monochromatic fellow offered.

‘To where?’ I asked. 

‘Away from here,’ he answered. ‘Which I thoroughly recommend. For your own good.’

I shook my head. ‘You’re too kind, but I’ve only just arrived. I would consider it extremely churlish to abandon Quigley Godfrey before sampling the delights on offer.’

Rattled I may have been, but I was blasted if I was going to bow to these bowler-hatted ninnies.

Like the man of action I am, I darted to the nub of the biscuit. 

‘Who do you work for?’ I demanded. ‘I wish to complain to your superiors. I am a Knight of the realm and not without influence. In fact,’ I added, ‘I probably went to school with your Guv’nor.’

The Cove merely smiled. ‘I doubt that.’ The smile faded rather quickly. ‘I won’t ask you again, Sir Desmond, leave Quigley Godfrey now and forget this silly quest of yours. Or else…’

‘Or else what?’ I inquired, disingenuously. My exterior may have seemed cool and collected to almost Bond-like levels, but the Stirling noggin was fizzing like a musical box playing the Flight of the Bumble Bee as it whirred and clicked, desperately conniving an escape route from these Coves who were likely more minacious than I’d initially twigged. 

The Cove sighed. ‘Regrets are the last thing one wishes to face at the end of one’s life. Be sensible, Sir Desmond, hop in and let us drive you to a better place.’

The rear door opened. I could see that another figure, also clothed in black, was sitting in the back seat, his face hidden by shadows. And either he was equipped like a blue whale, or he was packing quite some heat in his pin-striped trews. I suspected the latter.

The Stirling brain may be renowned for its spitfire working, faster than any of the so-called ‘computers’ the boffins are so dependent on these day, but I was rapidly calculating the odds on the various escape plans I was devising – and none looked promising. I was contemplating actually getting in the back of the Zephyr and seeing what ensued…

… when I was distracted by the screech of brakes. A car pulled up in front of the Zephyr, sparks flashing from the tyres. The passenger door was flung open, and a figure leaned out from the driver’s side. 

‘Taxi for Sir Desmond!’ the driver called. Without hesitation, I leapt in. I looked to see who was driving. It was the young cabby who’d brought me to the inn earlier. He flashed me a sly grin.

‘Now to lose them,’ he said, stamping his foot down on the accelerator and swerving away from the kerb.

I glanced back. The Zephyr was following!

‘Don’t worry,’ said the young cabby. 

The village was so small that we’d already left it behind and were now traversing narrow country lanes at a frankly reckless alacrity. As a fully qualified pilot in the war, I’m not averse to speed, but even so I quietly buckled my seatbelt. The Austin Trevor, while maintained, was a vintage jalopy, and I feared the passenger door falling off and Yours Truly following it.

The Lane we were now in seemed to be just an extension of a field, bumpy and very muddy. Sunset had fallen quickly and the only light came from our headlights.The Zephyr was catching us up. 

‘Almost there,’ the young cabby said, and just as we reached a small open gate, unnoticeable from the road, he flicked off his headlights, swerved left and through the gateway. The Zephyr went straight on… and plunged into a large marshy puddle. It must’ve been deep as the rear end of the Coves’s car was sticking up in the air, a good foot off the ground.

‘That’ll learn ‘em!’ whooped the cabby, and he slapped his steering wheel with excitement. I felt a moment of elation myself, and briefly wondered if I should kiss the cabby, much like the Major had as it was obviously a custom in these parts. I decided that a manly punch on the upper arm would suffice.

‘That won’t deter them for long,’ I warned.

‘No, but their car is out of action now,’ the cabby replied. ‘They won’t find a local garage who’ll help ‘em. And look…’ he pointed to the left of the cab. An enormous bull, head crowned with lethal horns which could easily penetrate a Sherman tank, a brass ring gleaming in its nostrils, was glowering at us. 

‘Farmer Giles kindly offered to leave Tarquin out a bit longer,’ the cabby said, pointing at the bull. ‘Them lot back there won’t dare try to follow us, not if they want to keep their gizzards on the inside.’

‘Why are you helping me?’ I suddenly asked, a hint of suspicion clouding my relief at escaping the Coves in Black. Mayhaps I had leapt out of the bidet only to land in the lavatory?

The cabby smiled. ‘We’m fed up with those berks in bowlers pestering our tourists.’

‘I’m very grateful for your help,’ I said. ‘I hope I can butter your bread in return someday.’

‘Oh, sir,’ replied the cabby, blushing. ‘You’re making me blush!’

Chapter 5

I trudged up The Devil’s Ballsack, following the little stream so as not to get lost in the dark. The sky was crystal clear, revealing far more stars than we ever see in London. I munched the fish and chips which I’d purchased to sustain me following the excitement of the afternoon. The young cabby had dropped me at the ‘chippie’ and had even volunteered to drive me to my rendezvous with La Peebles, but I wanted to explore the lay of the land – and prepare an escape route if necessary – so declined his kind offer. I instructed him to put his fare on my hotel bill, but I slipped him a few bob as a tip. He seemed very grateful, and said that if I needed warming up when I got back, that I should join him and the Major in their private quarters for a ‘Hot Threesome’ which I presume is the local word for a toddy.

There was a sheen of frost on the ground so spring wasn’t as imminent as I’d previously hoped. I was glad of the chips keeping my hands warm.

I thought I’d never reach the top of The Devil’s Ballbag. The left approach had looked like the shorter climb, but it must have been an optical illusion. By the time I’d completed my ascent – sadly, I’d failed to bring along a Union Jack to plant at the top – I’d finished my supper. I’d been informed that there was little at the summit; merely an ice cream kiosk –  closed at this time of the year obviously – and benches for those who wished to skywatch.

I screwed up my fish-&-chip paper and lobbed it into the bin (idly wondering which luckless plebeian climbed that interminable hill to empty it, particularly in the winter). 

I did a recce of the immediate area. There was a small circular flat area at the top of the hill ringed by a tuft of overgrown bushes. The kiosk as stated was present; boarded up and dark. A circle of four benches, each marked with the point of the compass, all facing outwards in their respective directions. The light from the moon and stars was adequate enough for clarity of vision, but it also caused shadows ample enough in which to lurk.

I took a few deep breaths, enjoying the pristine – albeit chilly – air, and gazed at the vista all around. I could see towns in the distance, twinkling merrily like fairy lights, although I didn’t recognise them. Quigley Godfrey nestled snugly in the valley, gently self-lit by its houses. I thought of that cosy little inn and briefly I wished I was propping up the bar, playing Sir Bountiful with drinks all around while yokels informed me I was a gentleman ‘and that were a fact.’ I was also very tempted by that prospect of the ‘Hot Threesome’ – i do enjoy a toddy on a cold winter’s night.

I stamped my feet to induce some warmth into them. I was definitely on my own. No sign of this legendary Peebles dame.

I glanced up at the sky. Anything untoward moving? I wish I knew more about astronomy, as opposed to basic navigation skills should one find oneself marooned in a desert or at sea.

My hearing, honed by jungle warfare, heard something. My ears pricked up. There was movement in a hedge. Nocturnal fauna of some kind? A breeze? An amatory couple who had fled the village for an illicit encounter? Typical British pluck to brave this temperature for an al fresco knee-trembler.

Cursing myself for neglecting to bring a torch, I cautiously approached the hedge in question. 

‘Who goes there?’ I called. ‘Friend or scoundrel?’ A silly question, I always thought, as a rogue would hardly admit to such. Indeed, some miscreants I’ve encountered don’t actually think of themselves as villains, just ‘misunderstood.’ Harrumph, I’ve learned to spot a rotter a mile off, and can debag one before they’ve even felt the draught.

A light suddenly dazzled me. ‘Put that bloody light out!’ I said, in the manner of the ARPs of yore. No matter the danger, a joke is always useful. It can unnerve a villain, and if they don’t crack a grin at a top notch gag, then you know you’re in the presence of a wrong’un.

‘Desmond Stirling?’ a voice asked.

‘Sir Desmond,’ I automatically corrected, then kicked myself. A rookie mistake, offering intel to the enemy on a plate. The light dipped to the ground, and as my eyes adjusted I caught a glimpse of my Interlocutor.

The creature that stood before me was quite extraordinary. As you know, I am an acclaimed and best-selling novelist, but even a master wordsmith as I would find it difficult to recreate Mavis Peebles (Miss) in words.

She was tall for a woman, ageless in that she was impossible to carbon-date, although her hair,  which erupted from her head in a fizzy explosion, was silvery-grey, It had seen neither brush nor scissor this side of Her Majesty’s Silver Jubilee, and was probably long enough to comfortably keep her knees warm in a power cut. It swirled around her head, seemingly defying the laws of physics, ribbons and beads dangling from it like decorations on a dishevelled Christmas tree.

She didn’t seem to wear clothes as such, but was rather draped in myriad layers of different cloths, many floor-length. Multiple necklaces encircled her, much as chains did Jacob Marley, which meant she rattled every time she moved. She wore sensible boots. 

Her face was strong, not lined, but weather-beaten as though she spent much of her life outside. She didn’t wear any make-up although her eyebrows looked to be etched on in a perpetually quizzical look. Her eyes, lilac and cat-like, stared penetratingly at me.

No one would describe her as beautiful, but she was definitely striking, almost handsome, if one can attribute that description to the fairer sex.

My initial impression was that I liked the cut of her jib.

‘Sir Desmond Stirling?’ She asked again; her mannish voice was clipped and direct.

‘Yes,’ I replied, blowing any hope I’d had of remaining incognito.

She stuck out her hand. ‘Mavis Peebles.’ Her grip was like a steel clamp.

‘We have met briefly,’ she said.

I raised a bemused eyebrow.

‘Who do you think put my card in your hand?’

‘The clumsy cow!’ I exclaimed without thinking, recalling the woman who had bumped into me in Old Compton Street.

She laughed.

‘How did you know that I might be interested?’ I asked her.

She snorted, a noise not unlike the sound a horse makes before refusing a jump.

‘The ufological community, much like the citizens of Tauron VI in the constellation of Uttox Celtic, have tentacles everywhere,’ she explained. ‘We heard on the grapevine you were making inquiries. I was in town to have a meeting with my publishers and I asked around where you might be. I was making my way to your club when I saw you in the street.’

‘Your publishers.’ I asked, intrigued.

‘Oh yes,’ she said, airily. ‘I’m the author of 79 tomes, all on esoteric subjects. UFOs, Yeti, the Loch Ness Monster, poltergeists, Alvin Stardust… the last was a commission and I needed to fund a trip to Roswell.’ She took a breath and eyed me up, waiting for her necklaces to cease rattling.

‘So what happened to you?’ she asked.

With all the powers of the master storyteller at my fingertips, I took a deep breath and related the whole saga as I remembered it, even the embarrassing parts involving my privates. She remained silent, her only response a grunt at the mention of the Coves in Black.

When I finished she just said, ‘Classic abduction scenario.’

‘But why me?’ I asked.

‘Oh nothing personal,’ she replied dismissively. ‘You happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.’ She looked me, a sarcastic smile playing on her face. ‘Did you think they wanted to meet a famous writer?’

‘Perhaps they wished to examine those of us who are… a cut above?’ I tentatively suggested.

She laughed, not altogether unkindly. ‘As their usual targets are half-witted colonial bison-shaggers, you may have a point.’

Then she frowned. ‘I’m more interested in what they did up your arse. And more importantly, did they leave anything up there.’

I gasped, not a prospect that had occurred to me.

‘You need to be examined.’ She retrieved a pair of Marigolds from her voluminous bag.

I automatically crossed my legs. ‘Certainly not, madam!’ 

She let out a sigh. ‘I do own dogs, you know, I’m quite accomplished at rectal examinations and I’m not squeamish.’

I was pretty outraged by now. ‘Miss Peebles, I’m not in the habit of allowing strange women to prod me in the most intimate ways. And not in public.’

‘This is a notorious UFO abduction hotspot,’ she said. ‘Locals don’t come here after dark. No one will see. Besides, I thought you were the proud nudist?’

‘There is a big difference between doffing one’s trousers on a sunny beach,’ I said, ‘and submitting one’s private orifices to a probing by a complete stranger! Frankly, madam, in my experience, handing a woman my arse on a plate is called alimony.’

Mavis Peebles stared at me crossly, her lilac eyes flashing with irritation; then she laughed. Whenever any of my wives laughed at me it was with a brittle sarcastic timbre; this was a nice laugh. I chuckled back and shrugged my shoulders. 

She reluctantly threw her Marigolds back in her bag. ‘Well, I recommend you get yourself examined pronto. You wouldn’t believe what is found up there after an abduction.’ She leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘It’s said that Amelia Earhart’s flying helmet was retrieved from inside a Texan’s lower colon.’

I couldn’t tell if she was joshing me, but I scribbled a mental note to book an appointment with my prostate wallah. I wouldn’t tell him why I wanted to be checked out, but he was always very thorough when having an anal rummage. If there were anything untoward up there, he’d find it.

Another thought occurred to me. ‘Just before you collided with me in London, I spotted two Coves in Black watching me.’

Mavis laughed wryly. ‘Those perishers!

“Who are they?’ I asked. “Government? Military? Are they even ours? Yanks perhaps?’

She looked at me, expressionlessly. “Who knows?’ she answered. ‘They turn up whenever someone has had a sighting or encounter,’ Mavis Peebles continued, ‘and bully the poor so-&-so to keep schtum. But the whys and wherefore are a mystery…’

Inexplicably, I wasn’t sure if I believed her.

‘They’re a frightful bore, best to avoid, as you learned earlier,’ she said.

‘Thanks to that young cabby,’ I replied. ‘Full of spunk he is.’

‘Quite often,’ she agreed. ‘Yours too, if you play your cards right.’

I had half-stopped listening as I had become fascinated by Mavis Peebles. For a woman of her age, she was damned attractive. That bounder Eric Morley might not want to see her in a swimsuit and evening wear,  but there was something out of this world about her, unlike any other lass I’d met on this whole planet. She was no Anne Aston, but then frankly who is. I was beginning to regret turning down La Peebles rectal offer…

I’d had to force myself to stop looking at Mavis Peebles while she was talking as the way her lips moved were doing unnerving things to my loins so I had been staring past her, my attention grasped by a particularly vivid star in the sky; the type of star one wishes upon, probably. I had gradually become aware that the star seemed to be increasing in size – and rapidly too. I blinked. Was it… getting closer?

‘Mavis,’ I interrupted her lecture. ‘You must know something about astronomy, all the gawping at the sky that you do. Is that star supposed to be doing that?’

She spun to look in the direction in which I was pointing. She gasped, a sound one only wishes to hear from a woman during a very specific activity – and we definitely weren’t doing that. She glanced back at me, panic engulfing her face.

Reader, something then happened, so briefly I can’t swear on The Bible or Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys or even Sven Hassell’s The Bloody Road to Death that it wasn’t a trick of the light, but as Mavis Peebles looked at me, her eyes… well, she blinked, but side to side, as opposed to the more usual up and down.

Mavis Peebles rummaged in her bag and produced a pair of binoculars which, to the eyes of this old war-horse, looked military-grade. She held them up to her face, twiddled the focus, stared at the star which had visibly tripled in size in a matter of seconds, and gasped again.

‘Well?’ I demanded.

Mavis Peebles handed me the binoculars. ‘I think, Desmond…’ I forgave her the omission of my title in the circumstances. ‘That you’re about to have another close encounter.’

My muscles tautened in readiness, one in particular. There was no way I was allowing those bug-eyed sods access to my tradesman’s entrance again. After all, an Englishman’s brown-eye is his elephant and castle.

I peered through the binoculars but all I could see was a dazzling light which seared my retinas. I removed the binoculars, and, shading my eyes, I tried to see the object behind the glow.

‘Look!’ I grabbed Mavis Peebles’ arm. ‘Something has just dropped from whatever it is.’

Mavis Peebles snatched the binoculars back and stared avidly.

‘Two of them,’ she said, ‘cylindrical, I think, with something mushroom-like over them. I think they going to land here.’

‘Should we, ahem, take cover, do you think?’

She didn’t respond, just continued to stare through the binoculars. I didn’t wait for a response, I just dragged her into the bushes, something I haven’t done to a lady since the late 1960s at Studland Beach.

By now, the ‘object’ was almost overhead, and far from being silent it was making a roaring noise which seemed familiar.

We peered out from our wholly inadequate hiding place, and instantly it was as though veils were lifted from  our eyes. At exactly the same time, we realised that the ‘unidentified flying object’ was a helicopter and that the items which had dropped from it were a brace of parachutists.

As they landed – gracefully, I conceded – they detached their black parachutes to reveal themselves to be the Coves in Black!

And they were both armed!

‘Who are you bounders?’ I asked with an exasperated sigh. ‘You are beginning to give me the most purple pim.’ 

But I was interrupted by one of the Coves. 

‘Sir Desmond Stirling,’ he barked in a clipped voice, like a Rank Starlet only deeper. ‘You have become too much of a nuisance.’

‘Feeling’s mutual, old bean,’ I replied. ‘So what now, eh? Will I be slapped with a fine. Up before the beak on Monday?’

‘No,’ the Cove snapped, flicking a switch on his very odd-looking weapon. ‘It is time for you to go missing.’

‘What!?’ I was outraged. ‘You can’t do that. Besides, I’m tremendously famous, my absence will be noted. I have friends in high places.’

‘So do we,’ the second Cove said. They both looked up in the sky.

My brain pushed down on its accelerator pedal. ‘You can at least allow Miss Peebles to leave. She has committed no crime.’ Gallantry was always my forte.

‘She too has pushed her luck too far and for too long,’ said the first Cove, although frankly the pair of them were so interchangeable, I wasn’t sure why they bothered to take turns. ‘Mavis Peebles has interfered with our plans once too often. And the price on her head is too high to forego.’

“I say, old thing,’ I turned to face Mavis Peebles. ‘You have ruffled some feathers. When the bounty is that high, it means you’ve been doing something right.’

‘Oh no, boys,’ said Mavis Peebles, ‘you’re not taking me anywhere.’

My reflexes, honed at war and on the cricket field, are usually lightning-paced, but I’m still not sure what then took place. Both Coves had their weapons snatched from them, so rapidly they were still trying to pull their triggers long after their hands were empty. By the time they twigged what had happened, their guns were in our possession, mine and Mavis Peebles. But how?

I have tried to replay that moment in my mind, using slow motion much like they do for the ‘footie’ on the idiot box. But what my brain tells me I saw I simply can’t believe. It happened in the periphery of my vision; the Coves aimed their weapons… and from Mavis Peebles’ mouth erupted a tongue, forked, several yards long, which grabbed the guns from their hands and deposited them in ours – all in the matter of seconds.

I can’t have seen that…

Can I?

I goggled at the strange-looking firearm in my hand. I glanced at La Peebles, and she was already pointing her gun at the Coves.

‘What the deuce?’ I spluttered, my mouth lagging far behind my poor brain which was already trailing like a one-legged man in an arse-kicking competition.

‘Cover them,’ Mavis Peebles demanded, her voice steely, almost metallic.

‘Yes,’ I agreed, ‘and you nip to the village and call Plod.’

‘I think not,’ she laughed, humourlessly, ‘Try explaining this to your police.’

‘Then what’s our next move?’ I asked.

Her finger applied the smallest amount of pressure on the trigger. ‘I’ll take the one on the left, yours is the one on the right.’

“We can’t just gun them down in cold blood!’ I was outraged. ‘Geneva Convention and all that. Not cricket.’

‘They were about to do the same to you,’ she replied.

I’ve cheerfully mowed down both Nazis and Communists in previous skirmishes, but never just an unarmed cove in front of me, and not with such a mysterious weapon. Who knew what it would do?

Mavis Peebles made an extraordinary guttural noise. “Pah! Trust a man to expect a woman to clear up the mess.’ She raised her weapon and aimed it directly at a Cove.

But before she could pull the trigger, we were engulfed in a dazzling white light. A piecing shriek sliced through my head. I staggered, clutched my forehead, dropping the gun, but I’d lost consciousness before I hit the ground…

Chapter 6

I was trapped in a strange dream in which Mavis Peebles, clad in Bacofoil, wobbly antennae protruding from her head, her skin a luscious shade of Mint Aero green, rescued me in her spaceship, and we made mad passionate love floating in the back, as we whizzed through the Milky Way, engulfed in the furs peeled from the skin of Venusian giraffes. The mood was somewhat spoiled as, in the background, a wretched ‘rock’ group accompanied our gravity-defying antics with their usual cacophony, but it seemed a price worth paying for such out of this world hows-yer-father.

I must say that I was more than a tad irked to be forced into consciousness by my back giving me gyp; not, I hasten to add, due to the nefarious activity we were enjoying, but more because I was in reality lying on very hard and frosty grass.

I snapped back into consciousness and immediately regretted it. My head thumped like the long-haired drummer in my dream, and my mouth tasted as though I had, yet again, been forced to eat raw cat.

I opened my eyes. The world seemed to be spinning unnaturally quickly so I shut them again. I took some very deep breaths of icy air, and then gently allowed one lid to tentatively lift. Things appeared to be normal again, so I unlatched the other eye, and delicately sat up. 

I was alone.

‘Mavis?’ I called. ‘Miss Peebles?’

There was no reply. 

I had no idea how long I had been conked out, but it was still dark, even darker than it had seemed earlier. 

Of the Coves in Black there was no sign either. Clinging on to the ground just in case it decided to let go of me and I flew into the sky, I gingerly stood up. By which I mean ‘carefully,’ not like a ginger.

Once I had re-calibrated my internal spirit level, I reconnoitred the immediate area. I was most definitely on my own. The Coves had scarpered. As had Miss Peebles. Together, I wondered?

I contemplated my next move. There seemed little point in hanging about here in the frost waiting for one’s clockweights to snap off. My best plan was to return to Quigley Godfrey and get that young lad to drive me to Mavis’s cottage.

I began the long walk back to the village which was at least downwards so I had gravity to help me along, much like a Boy Scout assisting a blind chap across a busy road.

It really was very dark. There was now a low cloud base and the moon was obviously lurking behind it, probably frightened off by all the strange activity going on in the sky earlier. 

As I descended The Devil’s Ballsack, I suddenly lost my bearings. Was I heading the right way? I should be aiming for the street lamps of Quigley Godfrey, but it seemed to me there were no lights ahead of me? I glanced at the compass on my TuffMan watch as worn by Graham Hill. My route was most definitely correct, but…

The village of Quigley Godfrey was in complete darkness. Admittedly it was the middle of the night, but surely the street lamps should be on? I had noticed them earlier, pretty wrought iron contraptions with baskets of flowers – snowdrops, I think – hanging from them.

I walked across the village green towards the inn. One wouldn’t expect Picadilly Circus, but surely the milkman should be doing his rounds by now? 

I reached The Little Green Man. I didn’t have a key so I was reluctantly going to have to wake up the landlord, but hoteliers keep odd hours, I’ve found. But as I reached the front door, I discovered it ajar. 

I cautiously entered the inn. ‘Hello,’ I called out quietly. No reply. Reception was empty, as was the bar. As indeed was everywhere. I explored the whole of the ground floor, including the dining room and the kitchen. I grabbed my room key from behind the desk and made my way upstairs. 

The corridor leading to my room was in darkness and all the doors were open. I peered in each room, hoping I wouldn’t be spotted and accused of Peeping Tommery. It’s happened before and the hoo-hah can be quite tiresome.

The rooms were all empty. Funny, I hadn’t got the impression earlier that I was their only guest. 

I sat down on my bed, took off my mud-caked shoes, swigged some whisky from my hip flask, and pondered my next move. Before I could come to a decision, the long day took its toll and I conked out…

I was woken by a shaft of sunlight hitting my eye, as accurately as that French bugger with his catapult on Hastings Beach. The amount of winks I’d had were well in excess of the standard 40. I lay on the bed, trying to identify an odd sound, until I twigged it was the Stirling tum gurgling, demanding grub toot sweet.

I cursorily abluted, then made my way downstairs. There is nothing finer than breakfast in an English hotel, and I was salivating at the thought of the sausages and bacon awaiting me.

But the inn was as empty as it had been when I arrived back during the night. 

It was like the blessed Marie Celeste only without the freshly abandoned meals still steaming away on their plates. 

I helped myself to a bowl of Ricicles. I’d pondered exactly how I was going to report that Mavis Peebles had gone missing without sounding like an utter chump, but now it seemED I had an entire inn to declare as AWOL…

I scooped up the last of the Ricicles and rushed out of the inn. The village was eerily absent of… well, everything; people, traffic, sounds… I made a quick reconnaissance of the shops. The butcher, the baker, the fancy undertaker… all shut up and devoid of both customers and Shopkeepers. 

It seemed as though the entire village had scarpered!

Well, this was a rum old do! And frankly, Yours Truly was utterly stumped as to the next move. 

I popped into the phone box – which, thank the Lord, was working! –  and dialled 999. The nasally-twanged lass at the end of the line asked me which service I wanted. ‘Plod,’ I replied, ‘ and the Ministry of Defence while you’re at it.’

I also phoned Nellie, but he was opening a new abattoir in Finchley, so I left a message with his secretary – who would inevitably garble it if I’m any judge of secretarial efficacy (and I jolly well am!). I just said he ought to have word in the Minister for Defence’s shell-like and warn him that events of a potentially global scale had started to kick off in Quigley Godfrey.

A couple of bobbies arrived in their Panda car from the nearest town. They looked at the village with puzzlement and at me with suspicion. I introduced myself as ‘Derek Spalding’ (dropping my title as it can have negative effect on provincial Plod) and gave them a heavily guarded version of events; that I was here to see a friend, we were stargazing on The Devil’s Ballsack (I noted that Bobby One raised an eyebrow at his chum at this), that we were attacked, she was taken and when I got back to the village I found it like this; as empty as a groom’s orchestras by the end of a honeymoon.

They thought I was pulling their flat-footed legs, or was stark-staring doolally, I could see that plainly, and probably thought I’d somehow done anyway with everybody myself. Quite how one chap could have massacred a whole village and buried the bodies in the space of one night… even a best-selling author of improbable fiction as I would have problems resolving that one.

When Lily Law realised that there was nothing with which they could charge me, I was allowed to go, but advised not to leave the country. Bugger that, I had a few days in Cap D’Agde booked and had no intention of foregoing my clobber-doffing hols thanks to some bug-eyed rotters.

By now the two coppers had been joined by other public servants, including some alarming fellows completely encased in white with dark impenetrable windows where their eyes should be.

I suspected that I would be involved in some very protracted questioning if nabbed by these egghead types so I grabbed my overnight bag and made a stealthy retreat. 

I was barely aware of the journey home as my mind was awash with thoughts about the people I’d met over the past 24 hours: Mavis Peebles, the Major, his young cabby friend, the bumpkins… who would milk the local cows? Tend to the fields? Was that randy bull still loose? I made a note to catch the news later, but I suspected that of Quigley Godfrey there would be nary a mention.

The heavens opened as the train pulled into Paddington that evening. I hailed a cab to hither me to Abaddon’s, my gentleman’s club, and claimed my usual room for the night. A large whisky beckoned me, but after a night on The Devil’s Ballsack and an interminable train journey home without a functioning first class buffet and with lavatories that broke most human rights laws, I needed to scrub off the grime of British Rail. I peeled off my togs and hopped in a steaming bath, drawn for me by Scunthorpe, the antediluvian staff member. I sank into the blissful waters and closed my eyes. Within a few minutes, Scunthorpe returned with a large tumbler of Glencampbell whisky on a tray. I gestured to him to place the welcome beverage on the soap dish, but he also brought an unwelcome message.

‘Sir Desmond,’ he began, as always his ill-fitting dentures threatening to fall into my bath water. ‘There’s a gentleman downstairs who is most insistent that he sees you.’

I groaned. ‘Tell him to come back tomorrow, Scunthorpe.’ I had no wish to see anyone tonight; I had thinking to do.

‘He is most tenacious, sir,’ Scunthorpe said.

‘Tell him I am equally tenacious that he buggers off,’ I said angrily. ‘Who is he anyway?’

At which point there was a commotion at the door. Scunthorpe went to see what it was, and I heard him remonstrating with someone. 

‘What the devil is going on?’ I called out, extremely irked that my soothing ablutions were being shattered. 

‘Sir, you can’t go in there…’ I heard Scunthorpe say, before someone barged into my bathroom.

‘How dare you!’ I remonstrated… until I saw whom the intruder was…

Chapter 7

It was the Major. Yes, the landlord of The Little Green Man, the hostelry which I’d left in a deserted state only this morning. His face was flushed a bright scarlet and his clothes were sopping wet, from the rain, I presumed.

‘Hardwick!’ I hooted, leaping up from my bath in astonishment.

Scunthorpe began to apologise. ‘I’m so sorry, sir, he barged past me…’

‘Don’t worry, Scunthorpe,’ I said impatiently. ‘The Major is a chum. Bring us another couple of whiskeys.’

Scunthorpe scuttled off. 

‘I say, Stirling,’ said the Major, ‘don’t let your bath get cold.’

I settled back in my bath. ‘What happened to you?’ I asked. ‘I returned to the inn only to find it completely abandoned.’ 

The Major sat down on the edge of my bath, flustered, his ‘tache twitching like an epileptic mouse.

‘They’ve taken them!’ he said, in despair.

‘Who have? Who are They? Who are Them?’

‘Them!’ He pointed upwards and glanced at the ceiling, his expression a mixture of fear and fury.

‘Aliens?’ I gasped.

The Major nodded. ‘They’ve got my Alvin.’

I shook my head in incomprehension. 

‘My lad. He drove the cab,’ the Major explained.

I nodded, showing my understanding.

‘If they’ve hurt him,’ he said, getting unnecessarily emotional. ‘I can’t live without him.’

‘Well, yes,’ I agreed, ‘a cab service is vital to the hospitality sector.’

A thought occurred to me.

‘But why didn’t they take you, old chap?’ I asked him.

The Major absent-mindedly started stirring my bathwater with his hand. ‘I don’t know. We – that’s Alvin and I – had a had a disagreement about… something, and I couldn’t sleep so I went for a walk. When I got back, they’d all gone. Everyone…’ His lower lip trembled, not something I’d expect from a military man. He retrieved his hand from the bath water

The Major shivered. ‘You’ll catch you death in those wet things,’ I said to him, ‘Get them off and you can have a bath, warm yourself up.’

He nodded and started to divest himself of his clothes.  I was about to ask him to hand me my towel so I could get out when the Major, completely starkers, hopped into the bath with me.

Obviously I’d meant that he could have a bath after I’d finished with it, but the sigh of relief as he sank into the warm water silenced me. After all, I’d enjoyed the same sense of bliss earlier myself. And as a seasoned rugby player, it wasn’t the first time I’d shared a bath with another chap. And at least he was at the tap end.

The Major stretched out. 

‘Careful, old chap,’ I warned him, ‘you nearly booted me in the family jewels just then.’

He shook his head in apology. ‘I just don’t know what to do, Stirling. I have to find Alvin. I can’t even get back into the inn as the science wallahs have taken it over and cordoned the whole village off.’

‘Tell you what,’ I suggested. ‘You can stay here tonight. Tomorrow we’ll go to Whitehall. I have a pal who is in the government. We’ll tell him the whole story. He’ll know exactly whom to contact for the help we need.’

The Major sat up in hope when I’d suggested this. I caught a glimpse of metal near his chest area. Did the fellow have a pierced nipple? Wouldn’t have been acceptable in my military days. 30 days in yankers for a tattoo, never mind ironmongery. Probably the result of a dare or a lost bet. I wondered if I should get one?

‘I can’t thank you enough for all your help, Desmond,’ the Major said.

‘Sir Desmond,’ I pointed out, ‘although I’d rather you called me Stirling. First names when we’re sharing a bath seem unnecessarily intimate.’

He nodded. ‘I knew you were a decent man as soon as you arrived at the inn yesterday.’

Suddenly the Major leaned forward and placed his hands on my shoulder.

‘I say, Stirling, if you help me get my darling Alvin back, I’ll even agree to that threesome he so wanted with us.’

Ah yes, the ‘hot threesome;’ the mysterious nightcap Alvin had mentioned.

‘I’d like that,’ I told him, unsure if I would as, after all, I hadn’t a clue what the ingredients were.

At which there was a knock on the door and Scunthorpe entered carrying a tray with two large whiskeys. He looked somewhat taken aback to see the Major in the bath with me.

‘I’ve had an idea,’ I told the Major as we helped ourselves to our drinks.

‘I say, Scunthorpe,’ I asked, ‘could you help make up a ‘Hot Threesome’ for the Major and myself?

Scunthorpe and the Major looked at each other with horrified expressions. I expect Scunthorpe had no idea how to cook up a ‘Threesome,’ while the Major – an experienced mein host – didn’t relish the idea of a botched ‘Threesome’ from the toothless retainer.

‘Never mind, Scunthorpe,’ I said kindly, ‘just bring us another couple of whiskeys. And top up the hot water, there’s a good chap.’

Over supper that night, at which he picked rather desultorily at his Steak and Kidney Pizza, I had told the Major about my own experiences at the hands (claws?) of these dastardly aliens, in particular of the intimate rectal rummage.

He threw his knife and fork down and said, “Alvin won’t like that, he’s strictly a top.’ After that he didn’t eat another morsel, just contented himself with a regular flow of whisky. I quite understood and helpfully ate both servings of Prune Charlotte. 

There wasn’t a spare room available in the Club that night, so I allowed the Major to kip down on the sofa in my barracks. He had a disturbed night, muttering to himself in his sleep; ‘Did they hurt you, my darling?’ was what I think he said. ‘Let me kiss it better.’

The following day, both of us mildly hungover which even a top-notch Abaddon’s breakfast couldn’t fix, I took the Major to see Nellie. I didn’t make an appointment; I knew I’d be fobbed off by some harridan of a secretary. We would just turn up and demand admittance or else there would be merry hell. I hadn’t decided quite what form the merry hell should take, but I have always had a knack for improvising chaos.

We leaped out of our taxi and marched into Billington House where Nellie’s office was situated. To my astonishment the security wallah at the door just waved us in after I told him our business. He didn’t even frisk us. 

I approached the young girl at the reception desk. ‘Now look here, young lady,’ I said firmly, ‘We need to see Mr Nellington-Dean and it is imperative we do so and I won’t take no for an answer!’

The young lass smiled sweetly and said, ‘Of course, Sir Desmond. Mr Nellington-Dean is expecting you.’ She lifted up a red telephone receiver and spoke quietly into it.

I stared incredulously at the Major. He just shrugged. He’d seemed very calm all morning, unlike his agitated self the previous evening. I hoped he wasn’t going down with something, not after we’d shared a bath. 

‘Would you follow me please?’ The young receptionist said and led us to a door which opened into a small ante room.

“Wait here, please,’ she said, ‘and someone will fetch you as soon as possible.’ She shut the door after her, leaving the Major and I alone. The room was brightly lit and functional, perfectly square; the blank walls were lined with chairs all the way around, like a quack’s waiting room. 

‘This is all too easy,’ I said to the Major. “Nellie’s a top governmental wonk. You don’t just walk in and see him. I had a mental list of places where we might find him if we were refused admittance.’

The Major smiled, and said, ‘You’re obviously under-estimating your importance, Stirling, old chap.’

Harrumph! I was fully aware of my invaluable status as not just a best-selling writer, but also war hero, patriot and chum of the Duke of Edinburgh, but even so I usually had to fight for my rightful stature in these ghastly modern times.

The Major sat down on one of the chairs, and crossed his legs, his relaxed demeanour very at odds with the distraught figure last night. His good night’s sleep – at my expense – had obviously helped, whereas I now was uneasy, every fibre of my being coiled and ready to spring into action, despite the bastard thumping away behind my eyes. It even felt like my whole body was shaking with the tensity of it all. 

No, not shaking, vibrating. I touched the wall. It was definitely quivering.

‘Can you feel that?’ I asked the Major, but before he could answer, the door opened and another – completely different – corridor faced us. 

I made to leave, but the Major stopped me. ‘Should we?’ he asked.

I have no time for milksops – whatever their rank – so shook off his hand and left the room.

The corridor in which I found myself couldn’t have been more different to the wood-panelled entrance to the building. This was gleaming white, illuminated by hidden lighting. I could feel the waft of air conditioning.

A large sign on the wall read in large embossed letters SHAFT! The A was actually a drawing of a small figure, not unlike the alien rotter who had kidnapped me.

‘I say, Major,’ I said to my companion who had followed me out of the room after all, ‘I think we’re underground.’

He said nothing. 

I ventured further, eager to explore more of this strange subterranean world. 

Before I could react, someone walked briskly towards me. It was a lass in the most unusual uniform; a skin-tight light grey catsuit, flecked with small holes, revealing tiny particles of flesh. I tensed, expecting to be challenged, but she just nodded at me coolly and passed by. 

I stopped and watched her. Her outfit may be rum, but it suited her posterior very nicely indeed as I pointed out to the Major; he just shrugged.

We reached a door which was shut. 

‘Let’s see what’s inside here,’ I suggested, and without waiting for the Major’s approval or indeed disapproval, I reached for the handle. But there wasn’t one. Instead, with a whoosh, the door slid open of its own accord.

I stepped in, expecting to find an empty office in darkness. But instead I was confronted with what appeared to be a large conference room, filled with a big round table which could seat about 20 people. What really surprised me  was that there were actually 20 people currently sitting at it, all adorned in the same catsuits as the wench we’d encountered earlier.

‘Ah!’ I said and tried to back out of the room, but the Major was blocking my exit.

‘Shift yourself, Major,’ I hissed at him, but the cove refused to move. Instead, he waved his hand over a gadget by the door which then whooshed to a close.

A door at the further end of the room opened and in stepped Nellie! He too wore the same catsuit, although I can’t honestly say that it suited him as well; it wasn’t designed for a middle-aged man with a paunch.

‘You’ve been a bit of a nuisance, Desmond,’ Nellie said.

And behind him loomed a monstrous figure; 7 foot tall, eyes protruding on slimy stalks, several rows of pin-sharp teeth in its slavering mouth…

Chapter 8

Nellie turned to the frightful apparition behind him and said, ‘That’s all for now, Harold. You can take your tea break.’ The creature lumbered out of the room,  gurgling sounds erupting from it as it left.

‘You’ve been a bit of a nuisance, Desmond,’ Nellie repeated.

I was lost for words, but that’s never stopped me speaking. 

I shrugged. ‘Tell me something several wives haven’t told me already.’

I pointed at Nellie’s gut. ‘Those lunches at the taxpayers’ expense are showing, Nellie.’

He gestured at me to take a seat at the table. I did so. The Major stood behind me. Protectively, I wondered? Or on guard…?

‘You shouldn’t have got involved.’

I leaned forward and thumped the table. ‘I didn’t choose to be abducted by bug-eyed monsters and get the old tradesman’s entrance violated.

There was a hiss from a couple of the people around the table.

Nellie winced. ‘Yes, that was unfortunate; but racist terms won’t get us anywhere.’

I was bemused. ‘Eh? I didn’t call anyone a…’

He interrupted me. ‘Bug-eyed monster. Not an enlightened way to describe our extraterrestrial comrades.’ He gestured at those sitting round the table. ‘Some of whom have joined us today.’

I stared around me. They all looked pretty normal to me. Well, apart from the chap with antenna protruding from his bonce. Which was purple. And the other who was green with one big eye in the middle of its head.

Then I spotted someone familiar.

‘What’s he doing here?’ I pointed at that wretched hypnotist, Professor Tintenfisch, who was sitting at 10 o’clock from me. The Professor wiggled his fingers at me sheepishly.

‘Guten tag, Herr Ztirling,’ he said.

‘The Professor is part of our team,’ explained Nellie. ‘You were directed to visit him by another of our colleagues, Agent Lawley.’ The Nationwide presenter simpered at me.

I was beginning to feel pretty damned riled. Had everyone been laughing at me from day one?

‘Who else is here?’ I barked. ‘That damn Peebles woman, I suppose.’

And lo and behold the bloody woman walked in. ‘Hello Desmond,’ she said. I have to admit that she looked a lot better in her catsuit than Nellie did, and despite everything I was relieved to see she was unharmed, although her hair still looked as though it had just undergone shock treatment.

‘So what the hell is going on here,’ I snapped, my temper – already frayed from the hangover – beginning to crack.

‘You have barged in on a meeting of SHAFT,’ explained Mavis Peebles.

‘Space Headquarters of Alien Friends of Terra,’ Nellie interrupted, not that it left me any the wiser.

Mavis Peebles continued, ‘I am the Ambassador from the planet…’ and here she made a noise like old ‘Chinny’ Chapman does when he’s clearing out his sinuses after being on the shag all evening.

‘And what’s your real name, Miss Peebles?’ I asked, petulantly. I blew a raspberry. ‘Something like that?’ 

Mavis Peebles smiled with a raised eyebrow and replied, ‘Actually, Mavis Peebles is as near as dammit.’

Nellie gestured for Mavis Peebles to sit down. ‘The British Government has made some diplomatic niceties with our interplanetary friends’ he continued. ‘Think of it as a galactic Common Market.’

I harrumphed.

‘However,’ Nellie continued, ‘There is always a fly in the ointment. The alien equivalent of the French, shall we say? The Xyz from… where is it?’ He asked his colleagues.

‘Galactic centre K788DF alpha stroke 993Q,’ replied a minion.

Nellie sniffed. ‘Not very helpful.’ He pointed upwards. ‘Somewhere out there, but annoyingly near enough to make frequent trips here feasible. Harmless, overall, but with some unsavoury habits. A penchant for abduction and – as you found out – uninvited colonic irrigation.’

Mavis Peebles joined in. ‘We’ve asked them not to, but… they take an inordinate pride in their self-styled iconoclasm. At one point we got them to agree to perform these acts exclusively on Americans who, as we know, enjoy the attention. But frankly they can’t tell one human from another.’

Fleet of brain I may be, but I was having problems processing all this new information.

‘And what about the Coves in Black?’ I asked. 

‘Good question,’ replied Nellie. ‘They are a frightful nuisance.’

‘That’s an understatement,’ said Mavis Peebles, crossly. ‘That night on The Devil’s Ballsack they were attempting to bump me off. It was only the last minute intervention of my own people that saved me. I gave my staff quite a ticking-off for leaving you there. Sorry about that.’

I gave a non-committal shrug. I wasn’t yet in the mood for forgiveness.

‘We think they are Earth people who disapprove of our closer ties with other worlds,’ continued Nellie. ‘Earth for the Earthlings and all that. They fear being swamped by alien immigrants.’

‘Why would any self-respecting species want to come here?’ muttered the purple-antennaed occupant of the table. ‘It’s a dump.’

‘And its going to get worse,’ agreed her – its? – one-eyed neighbour whom I belatedly realised had tentacles. ‘They way the humans are treating the place, it’ll be uninhabitable in a few years time. I’ve applied for a transfer to Peladon.’

‘Delegates,’ interrupted Mavis Peebles, holding her hands up. ‘I realise that Earth isn’t perfect, but now is not the time to criticise our hosts.’

‘Particularly as you’ve all enjoyed our wine and television,’ said Nellie, crossly.

‘I love Upstairs Downstairs,’ said the green thing. “I will miss that.’

Another alien I’d somehow missed – a bloke with three blue heads – chirruped up out of one of its mouths. ‘I love that thing… what’s it called? With that man from the adverts?’

‘Leonard Rossiter?’ suggested one of its other heads. The first head shook itself and said, crossly, ‘No, you know who I mean. He used to be in that thing set in a house…’

‘Delegates!’ bellowed Mavis Peebles. ‘Let us not get distracted.’ She turned back to me. 

“Personally, I think the Coves – as you call them – are in cahoots with the Xyz. Mopping up after them. But we won’t know until we capture one.’

‘John Alderton!’ shouted a blue head. The other two blue heads nodded in agreement.

My head was spinning and I longed to get out of this bug-eyed madhouse. I stood and made to leave, but the Major blocked my passage.

‘For God’s sake, man,’ I spluttered, ‘I let you share my bath.’

Mavis Peebles nodded and the Major stood aside. I left the room and stood in the corridor, inhaling deeply. I spotted a sign for the Gents and popped in for a Jimmy Riddle. I was relieved to say that there were just bog-standard urinals; heaven alone knows how our extraterrestrial brethren syphon the python – and I have no wish to know.

When I left the Gents, Mavis Peebles was waiting for me, proffering a glass of water. Not quite what the doctor ordered, but it would have to do. I took a swig; I always forget just how unpleasant undiluted water tastes.

‘I thought you were dead,’ I told her.

‘So did I for a moment,’ she replied.

‘Is that what you actually look like?’ I asked her. ‘Or do you have tentacles or scales underneath there?’

She looked shocked. “I never took you for a racist, Sir Desmond Stirling!’ She laughed. “Although come to think of it, I have read your books…’ She stroked her face. “I’m just as humanoid as you. Well, almost…’  

She leaned forward and whispered something in my ear.

I boggled. ‘What? Two of them?’

‘Side by side,’ she explained.

There is only so much information a fellow can absorb in one day so I felt the urgent need to change the subject.

‘What now?’ I asked.

She shrugged. ‘Up to you. You could join us here. We always need new agents.’

I watched the Major leave the conference room, arm in arm with his young cabby – Alvin, was it? So all his lamentations during the night…  all a bluff, eh? 

The young lad waved at me and called out, ‘That hot threesome is still on offer, Sir Desmond.’

I nodded curtly back. Mavis Peebles raised her eyebrows at me.

’That boy is obsessed with toddies,’ I said. ‘It’s not healthy.’

I have no idea why Mavis Peebles threw back her head and laughed.

‘Why was Quigley Godfrey deserted?’ I asked.

‘It had been compromised by the Coves,’ she explained. ‘The whole village was ours. We’ll reinforce it with new defences and everyone can move back.’

‘How will you explain it to the villagers?’

‘They’re our agents,’ she said.

‘What, all of them?’ I asked, incredulously.

She nodded. ‘Can’t have too many. And there is always room for one more.’ 

She smiled and her eyebrows went even more quizzical than usual.

As has happened to me so many times in my life, while my mind is thinking one thing, my mouth leaps in without even taking its socks off.

‘I’m a busy man,’ I said, ‘Books to write and BBC Radio panel programmes to appear on… and besides I’m too much of an maverick to work in a team. The War Office learned that during the last one. Even my appearance on All-Star It’s a Knockout ended badly and Peter Glaze was never the same man again.’

While this was all true, I must admit I was tempted by her suggestion. After all, what red-blooded chap hasn’t seen themselves as a real-life Flash Gordon?

‘Oh well,’ Mavis Peebles said, trying to hide her sadness.

‘I’ll be off then,’ I said, waiting to be offered more inducements to join in.

‘Just a moment,’ said Nellie, whom I hadn’t noticed was standing beside me. ‘You can’t just leave with all this top secret knowledge.’

‘It’s not the first time I’ve signed the Official Secrets Act,’ I said haughtily.

‘I’m afraid it’s not as simple as that,’ he said. ‘You’ve seen too much. We’ll have to wipe your memory.’

I was outraged. ‘I’ve already had one end of me fiddled with; now you want to do the same to the other end!’

‘It won’t be that bad,’ Nellie laughed. ‘You’ll wake up on your own bed, with no knowledge of the past few days. Be honest, you’ve been on benders worse than that.’

Before I could say anything – eg change my mind and accept their offer – I felt a sharp pain in my neck. I spun around. Mavis Peebles was standing there with a syringe in her hand, looking apologetic. I briefly wondered what her real face looked like and then the world went black…

Epilogue

But, Sir Desmond, I can hear you all clamour, if you had your memory wiped cleaner than a baby’s bottom, how come you have been able to relate this whole saga to us?

I woke up on my bed in my room at the Old Rectory. I had a splitting headache. What had I been drinking? And where? And with whom? Someone had put me to bed in clean pyjamas – and I didn’t even know that I owned any. I have slept au naturel since school days where any form of nightwear was strictly verboten, and the house master would patrol before lights out to make sure the rule was being obeyed. 

I staggered to the khazi, emptied my bladder, examined my reflection in the mirror and noted with surprise that my tongue and eyes were not in their usual catastrophic post-debauchery nick. My mind was an impenetrable fog however and I resolved that a strong coffee might lift the veil; but then a hot shower beckoned so I began to unbutton the pyjama top. I discovered there was something in the breast pocket. It was a small strip of paper which simply read:-

Keep Mum!

M.P.

P.S. Eat this note!

I stared at these words in incomprehension. Who was M.P.? 

And then it all flooded back… from that evening on the roof with Felcher, right up until the moment in that underground base when Mavis Peebles injected me with… what?

Mavis Peebles.

M.P…

She didn’t inject me with the amnesia drug! 

The darling woman – or whatever species she is – granted me the gift of retaining my memory. But what good would it do if I could do nothing with it? I couldn’t contact her without letting the cat out of the bag and then she might be in trouble, perhaps even banished back to her own planet, in whatever distant part of the galaxy that might be.

No, I will have to be patient and wait for her to make the first move.

Meanwhile I am determined to put the whole saga down on paper (or tape) so that I will have it on record should there be another attempt to wipe clean the Stirling noggin.

But I will have to keep it securely under lock and key. One dreads to think what will occur if Nellie and his cronies learn that my memory is intact…

THE END….?

Listen to Sir Desmond narrate this yarn in 8 out of this world instalments here.

Sir Desmond Stirling is written and performed by Anthony Keetch

(c) Anthony Keetch 2023