|
Back to First Page Military Aid By David Gardiner This story may be reproduced in whole or in part for any non-commercial purpose provided that authorship is acknowledged and credited. The copyright remains the property of the author
Elridge K. Mackintosh, known to his associates as "Prof" by reason of a post he had once
held in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Reading, stepped over the
sleeping body of his companion Bats O'Shaughnessy, so named because of his somewhat
eccentric behaviour when under the influence of alcohol (which was most of the time),
and pushed open the door of the little beach-hut. A chill breeze drifted in that made Bats
shift in his sleep, but he did not fully waken until the Prof politely prodded him in the ribs
with what remained of the heel of his left shoe. "Bug off Prof. I'm feckin freezin'. Can't
ye let a man have a night's sleep?"
"They're back, Bats. Two of them this time. Have a look."
Bats pulled himself into a sitting position, felt around for his bottle, confirmed that it was
totally empty, and carefully focused his eyes out over the long expanse of sand, cut
across by curving lines of pebbles and of wrack, towards the thin far away ribbon of
shimmering luminescent white and reddish grey that was the ocean, filling the space
between the sand and the dawn sky. Silhouetted against the watery pink of the sky, just
where the land gave way to the incoming tide, he could see the outlines of two figures
manoeuvring something resembling a short squat sweeping-brush just above the sand's
surface.
"Bloody cheek, Prof. Stealing the food out of our mouths. Mine sweepers! what are they
going to do next, that's what I want to know? Lift the beach up with bulldozers and put it
through a big sieve'? It's a feckin' nerve, but, isn't it?"
'Metal detectors, Bats. Mine sweepers are something slightly different. But you are quite
correct. The salient point is that our source of income is under attack. We must give the
matter consideration. Intervention is called for."
"I'll get a big feckin brick and brain them two, that's what I'll do...!"
"I disagree, Bats. That would be an unsophisticated and counter-productive reaction."
"Counterwhatsit my ass. I'll kick their...."
The Prof touched his finger to his lips in a silencing gesture. "Calm down, Bats. Collect
your thoughts. We need to come up with a permanent solution. Disposing of this
particular two is insignificant. Others will follow in their footsteps."
Bats twisted his face into a quizzical expression, checked one more time to confirm that
his bottle really was completely empty, and toyed with the newspapers that he had stuffed
down his trousers the previous night. "Ye have a plan, then, have ye, Prof?"
"Not as yet. But I believe that a brisk constitutional may assist me in coming up with
something. Will you accompany me to the waste bins at the rear of the Alvemo Hotel? I
think we should discuss the problem over a little breakfast."
Refreshed by a selection of only slightly stale bread rolls and a quantity of perfectly fine
cold vegetables, Bats and the Prof sat on a pair of little silver metal beer-barrels at the
rear of the Alvemo while the latter recounted what he took to be the essential elements of
the problem.
"Consider, to begin with, why it is that we go digging around the beach in the first place.
It is in the hopes of uncovering money and valuables, is it not?"
"Well we don't do it for the feckin’ exercise!"
"Precisely. And I should imagine that the motivation of our friends with the metal
detectors is similar, infinitely smaller though their true needs must be. Now, consider
with me if you will, Bats. Under what circumstances would we choose to discontinue this
activity?"
"Ye mean, if we stopped finding anything worth having?"
"Yes, that would constitute a sufficient condition for our giving up the practice. But can
you think of another circumstance that would be equally destructive of our motivation?"
"Eh? I think ye've lost me."
The Prof resented having to simplify his thought processes for the consumption of the
intellectually less gifted but could see that in this particular instance he had no
alternative. "We would stop if we couldn't find anything we wanted to find, that seems
clear. But we might similarly stop if we did find something that we didn't want to find."
Bats brow became furrowed. "What kind of thing....? Like a dead body, do you mean?"
"Well, I'm not sure yet. As for that example, a dead body, being non-metallic, would not
in fact trigger the device in question. But it has to be something equally embarrassing.”
To the Prof's annoyance Bats started to giggle, interrupting the flow of his thoughts. The
worst aspect of finding ones self in reduced circumstances, he reflected, was the
restrictions that it placed on ones social circle.
"May I inquire as to what it is that you find so amusing, Bats?” he asked coldly.
"I was just lookin' over there, Prof."
"Over there? What about over there?" The corner in question contained nothing but a
disorganised heap of small metal beer-barrels similar to the ones they were sitting on, and
a number of dome-topped gas cylinders, used to pressurise the bar's dispensing system so
as to produce the illusion of freshness in the flat, lifeless and mass-produced beverage.
"Well, Prof, if ye look at them three little barrels, laid out end to end like, and that gas
cylinder up against the end one... if ye look at all four of them together like... it could
nearly be... well, kind of like a rocket, don't ye think?"
The Prof's eyes widened. "Kind of like a rocket, Bats? No, my dear fellow. Kind of like
something else, I fancy. Kind of like a torpedo! Bats, I have underestimated you. I
apologise. You are in fact possessed of the faintest residue of some kind of functioning
central nervous system, despite the previous massive evidence to the contrary."
"Oh.... That's very kind of you, Prof!"
That day and the night that followed it saw an exceptional level of activity in and around
the beach-hut occupied by the two men. The Prof busied himself with a little tin of motor
vehicle touch-up paint that he had liberated together with some other items from the boot
of a parked car the previous week. He carefully wrote some German inscriptions on the
sides of the barrels and on the gas cylinder, reproducing as faithfully as he could the
lettering style of the 1940s military era. When he had run out of ideas with regard to
technical matters such as "Fuse Compartment" and "Insert in Torpedo-Tube This Way
Up" he resorted to a few pithy quotations from 18th and 19th Century German
philosophers, concluding with the current advertising slogan of a well-known German car
company. Finally he painstakingly crowned the masterpiece with a large and beautifully
crafted German military cross and a few small German eagles, artistically positioned over
the little blocks of writing. When he had finished he looked on what he had created and
saw that it was good.
By the light of the stars the two men were to be found digging a deep elongated trench,
reminiscent of a latrine, half way out along the beach. By morning the waves were gently
lapping over the spot, and there was no way to distinguish it from any other part of the
foreshore.
Bats and the Prof slept late that morning, the contented sleep of those who have laboured
long and hard in the cause of righteousness. They were awoken in the late afternoon by
the distorted squawk of a loudspeaker, which was attached to the roof of a white-and-red
police car that drove solemnly back and forth along the beach. "Ladies and gentlemen,"
the voice repeated with an official air of enforced calm, "we must ask you to leave the
beach at once in an orderly manner. We regret that a potentially dangerous object has
been discovered on the beach and it will be necessary for you to make your way back to
the road until you are told that it is safe to return. There is absolutely no cause for alarm.
We repeat, this is a temporary measure and there is absolutely no cause for alarm."
"I agree with him there," the Prof mumbled, "absolutely no cause for alarm." He pulled
the coat that he was using as a pillow up over his ears and tried to get back to sleep.
The antics of the Bomb Disposal Squad continued well into the evening and Bats and the
Prof eventually gave in to the temptation to open the door of the beach-hut a small crack
so that they could see and listen. The commanding officer was intrigued by the device,
which he said was of an advanced design that he hadn't come across before. A satellite
link with the London headquarters was established so that a prominent expert in Second
World War submarine warfare could give an opinion. Re stated that it was an uncommon
design, but he was pretty certain that he had come across it before and he would be back
in touch when he had consulted some textbooks. In the meantime the inscriptions on the
sides were noted down and a German language expert asked to give a translation. When
this was radioed back to the Bomb Disposal people they became even more excited. The
device was a mass of Second World War coded military information! Perhaps it had been
intended for some secret spy mission whose purpose defied all speculation.
The Prof, however, had included amongst his philosophical quotations a cryptic clue
which in the end sowed the seed of enlightenment regarding the (composite) object's true
nature. He had included his own German translation of a statement attributed to
Alexander the Great: "If I had not been Alexander, I would have been Diogenes". The
one thing that most educated people, including the Commanding Officer, had heard about
Diogenes was that he had lived in a barrel. And the concept of a barrel was all that was
required for everything to fall into place.
The unexploded beer-barrels were loaded into the rear of a military three-ton transport
vehicle and removed very quietly shortly after dusk. An official report was issued to the
effect that the object had been made safe and the beach was once again open to
holidaymakers.
In the days that followed there was a lot of threshing around in official circles to find
someone to blame, but of course the necessity to keep the details of the operation under
wraps took precedence. The only convenient scapegoats were the two amateur metal-
detector enthusiasts who had reported the find in the first place, but the evidence for their
having originated the prank was flimsy to say the least. In the end, the military authorities
agreed, in exchange for their silence, that the matter would be pursued no further.
One piece of action was however taken. A large and impressive notice was erected at the
entrance to the beach, bearing the stark words: THE USE OF METAL DETECTORS ON
THIS BEACH IS STRICTLY PROHIBITED.
The Prof was quite touched by the spirit of official co-operation that his actions had
evoked. "The authorities are basically there to assist the private citizen, Bats," he
expounded. "Even those as humble as ourselves. The trick is to know the best approach
by which to enlist that assistance."
TO READ OR SIGN THE GUEST BOOK JUST CLICK ON THE
|
