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And though I really trusted Dad

  I thought about those pointed teeth

  And how those sailors came to grief

  And I am still inclined to think

  That what he said was true.

  3

  THE ALPHA MAN

  ‘Caricature is the tribute that mediocrity pays genius.’

  OSCAR WILDE

  When you are young and foolish you believe the things you are told. And why should you not? You have yet to learn the terrible truth that most adults lie a lot of the time.

  Whether the captive tribesman who lived in our shed told all of the truth, I do not know. Certainly the tinker I sold him to, in exchange for five magic beans, was not being altogether honest with me.

  I recall my dad saying that the tribesman was easily worth six.

  My Uncle Felix told all of the truth. And it got him in trouble. He wasn’t my real uncle, because his surname was Lemon. And ours wasn’t (or isn’t). But we called him Uncle, because those were the days when children were polite and called adults Mr or Mrs or Uncle or Aunty, and would no more have thought of using their Christian names, than telling a lie.

  Uncle Felix, or just plain Felix, was a much-copied man.

  ‘Look at that,’ he would cry, as he stared through the window of some fashionable boutique. ‘Ripped off again.’

  The troubled passer-by to whom this cry was addressed would turn to Felix and reply, ‘How so?’ or ‘What do you mean?’

  Felix would then point to some article of clothing on display and ask, ‘Now who do you think originally designed that then?’

  And the passer-by, with the words “Better humour this one” flashing up on the old mental warning-board, would then say, ‘Your good self, might it be?’

  And Felix would nod and answer, ‘Just so.’

  Exactly why it was that Felix only managed to reveal that he was the progenitor of such an item shortly after it had become the current fashion, was a mystery not only to others, but also to himself.

  The phrases, ‘I thought of that first’ and ‘another of my ideas’ were never very far from his lips.

  The story I am about to relate begins shortly after the Second World War (an event which Felix had foreseen, but kept to himself for fear of spreading panic). Felix was at that time occupied as a clerk in a government building, Gaumont House on the Uxbridge Road. It was ten of the morning clock, the time when plugs are pulled from government switchboards up and down the land and her majesty’s servants ease their stiffened collars and put their spats up for a well-earned ten minutes of tea and Bourbon biscuits.

  Felix was thoughtfully stirring his Earl Grey and running his eye across the front page of The Daily Sketch.

  The news was bleak, but then the news was always bleak, always had been bleak and always would be. It is a recognized fact that the paper with the bleakest news has the largest circulation and in those days every household in the Empire subscribed to The Daily Sketch. Except for those that didn’t.

  Once, and I mention this only in passing, there was a newspaper in America that called itself The Good News and printed nothing other. It ran to three editions before closing.

  ‘I see that the Prime Minister has finally taken my advice over this Spanish thing,’ said Felix, dunking his biscuit.

  Norman Crombie (for indeed it was he) looked up from his copy of Tit Bits. ‘What advice was that, Felix?’ he asked.

  ‘Withdrawal, my boy, withdrawal.’

  Norman, whose tastes in literature at that time were limited to ‘the sensational novel’ and ‘naturists’ publications’, knew only one meaning for the word ‘withdrawal’.

  ‘Good Lord, Felix. You told him that?’

  ‘I had been meaning to,’ said Felix.

  The door opened and Mrs Molloy entered the office.

  Mrs Molloy was short and stout and smelt of Parma violets. One day (and this was a fact known only to Felix Lemon), she would give birth to a son. He would be christened Ernest and grow up to be a serial killer of unparalleled ferocity.

  ‘There’s a letter for you, Mr Lemon,’ said Mrs Molloy, adding in a tone of undisguised glee. ‘It’s an OHMS.’

  Felix accepted the brown, windowed envelope and held it up to the light. ‘I’ve been expecting this,’ he said.

  Norman, who greatly feared all things official and only worked at Gaumont House because of the luncheon vouchers and his unrequited love for a switchboard girl called Joyce, took to the crossing of himself. ‘I would much prefer it if you opened that elsewhere,’ he told Felix.

  Felix Lemon thrust the envelope into a pocket of his pin-striped suit. ‘I will read it later,’ he said, promptly forgetting its existence.

  The day followed its regular format. A memo came down from the higher-ups regarding a new filing system which Felix assured Norman had been on his mind for quite some time. Lunch-hour found Felix pleasantly surprised that the snack bar opposite had taken the advice he’d been meaning to give and had its windows cleaned. And the afternoon turned up three more incidents where Felix’s uncanny powers of second (hind?) sight proved once more infallible.

  That night Norman returned home praying that a bus, which Felix had foreseen but failed to mention, might mount the pavement and flatten Mr Lemon for good and all.

  ‘That Felix is becoming utterly unbearable,’ Norman told his small wife, who sadly (for had Felix chosen to mention it, the accident need never have happened), would later trip upon the torn piece of limo in the hall and break her leg.

  ‘Never mind, Norman,’ said the ill-fated Mrs Crombie. ‘We both know that when it comes to having ideas stolen by ungrateful ne’er-do-wells, you are top of the list.’

  Norman nodded thoughtfully at this ambiguous statement. ‘I think she knows what I’m on about,’ he said.

  Norman’s wife went out to the kitchen, tripped on a piece of torn limo in the hall and broke her leg.

  On Saturday morning Felix took his pin-striped suit to The Blue Bird Cleaners. This was not a company that specialized in avian hygiene, but an early form of dry-cleaners. At that time a wet-cleaners.

  Felix placed his suit upon the counter. Had he remembered to mention it, he would have told the cleaner not to over-iron the trousers. But he did not and the suit would later return with a ventilated rear end.

  ‘Anything in the pockets, guy?’ asked the careful cleaner, recalling how Felix always remembered afterwards that he’d left a five-pound note in his pocket, caused a stink and got his dry-cleaning done for nothing.

  A thorough search turned up a brown, windowed envelope. ‘Oh and oh,’ said Felix. And then regaining his composure. ‘I will take this envelope with me, rather than leave it here, thank you.’

  The cleaner nodded politely, gave Felix a little blue slip (with a bird logo on it), and went off to perform his heinous work on Felix’s doomed trousers.

  Felix took the envelope and himself off to a secluded bench in Walpole Park. Here he opened the envelope at arm’s length.

  The words MINISTRY OF SERENDIPITY caught his eye. ‘Aha,’ said Felix, as he read through the text, ‘exactly as I would have predicted. I wonder what serendipity means,’ he wondered.

  The missive was short to the point of abruptness.

  As you will know (it ran),

  Your name has been put before us regarding your special gift. Please report at once to the address below:

  Department 23

  Ministry of Serendipity

  Mornington Crescent

  (take train from South Ealing Station)

  Felix scratched at his head, which now had the dandruff he’d been expecting, and rose to the dizzying height of five feet eight and a half. He opened his mouth to speak, but as there was no-one present to listen, he closed it again. And he took himself off to the station.

  Felix stood shuffling his feet for quite some time before he could buck up enough courage to purchase the ticket. Some inner something advised caution, but just what this was Felix couldn’t qu
ite say.

  ‘A return to Mornington Crescent,’ he said at last.

  The ticket office clerk eyed Felix up and down. ‘Are you quite sure about that?’ he asked.

  ‘Quite,’ said Felix.

  ‘Five pounds,’ said the ticket office clerk.

  ‘Five pounds?’ Felix took a step backwards. ‘But I can get a Red Rover that will take me anywhere in London, train and bus, for five shillings.’

  ‘That’s nothing,’ said the ticket office clerk. ‘In communist Russia you can ride on any train for nothing. You could get on the Trans-Siberian Express at, say, Grymsk, which is in the province of Scrovenia, and travel more than one thousand miles across the Russian steppes to Kroskow in Morovia, which is near to the Black Sea and it wouldn’t cost you a penny, or in their case a rouble.’

  ‘Is that really true?’ Felix asked.

  ‘No,’ said the ticket office clerk, ‘I made it all up.’

  ‘Why?’ Felix asked.

  The ticket office clerk shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I suppose I’m a bit of an anarchist really. You know how it is, square peg in a round hole, free spirit trapped in a ticket office. I’m thinking of chucking it all in and taking the hippie trail to Kathmandu.’

  Felix flipped back a couple of pages. ‘I think this story is set in the late nineteen-forties,’ he said. ‘Hippies don’t come along until the Sixties.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know about that,’ said the ticket office clerk. ‘You see I was just lying again.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Felix. ‘Well, can I have a ticket to Mornington Crescent, please?’

  ‘No you can’t. Sorry.’

  ‘Why can’t I?’

  ‘Because there’s no such station.’

  ‘Of course there is.’

  ‘There isn’t.’

  ‘Is.’

  ‘Is not.’ The ticket office clerk pointed a long slim finger, the shape of an asparagus tip, towards the Underground map on the wall. ‘See for yourself.’

  Felix saw for himself ‘It’s been crossed out,’ he said.

  ‘It’s always been crossed out. No-one has ever been to Mornington Crescent.’

  ‘But I have to get there. I’ve got an appointment at the Ministry of Serendipity.’

  ‘Ooh!’ said the ticket office clerk. ‘Well, that’s another matter entirely.’ He dug about in some cubby hole beneath his little window and drew out a strip of aluminium foil embossed with runic symbols, odd ciphers and the like. ‘Here you go then, there’s no charge.’

  ‘No charge?’

  ‘Well, call it five pounds.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ And Felix paid up.

  He wandered down to the platform to await the train. Normally on a Saturday morning such as this, the platform would be a carnival of colour, Exotic Ealingites, togged up in their finery, setting off ‘up West’. But today, not a soul. The platform was deserted but for Felix, which meant it wasn’t really deserted at all, but it almost was. As near as makes no odds.

  ‘I wonder where everyone is,’ Felix wondered. And then the train came in.

  It was a very odd train, of a design quite new to Felix, although one he had considered drawing up and sending off to London Transport. It was sleek and black and there didn’t seem to be any windows. A door hissed open and Felix peered in. The carriage was empty.

  Felix sighed. ‘This might appear strange to someone who wasn’t in the know,’ he told himself.

  ‘Please enter the carriage, Mr Lemon,’ came a mechanized voice. Mr Lemon entered the carriage, with some degree of uncertainty. The door hissed shut and the train sped off.

  Felix sat down on the only seat. It was spot-lit. It was very comfortable, but there was nothing much to look at. There not being any windows, or anything.

  Presently the train drew to a halt and the door hissed open. ‘Kindly disembark, Mr Lemon,’ said the voice. So Felix did so.

  He now stood upon the platform of Mornington Crescent. And a very smart platform it was too, all litter free and no graffiti. There were posters advertising seaside resorts such as Skegness and Scarborough. These were printed in those soft pastel colours, that say 1930s to anyone who cares to listen.

  ‘Up the stairs please, Mr Lemon.’

  Felix found the stairs and trudged up them. At the top a door blocked further progress, so Felix knocked upon it with his knuckle. The door went hiss and slid back. Felix poked his head through the opening and then followed it with his body. The door hissed shut again.

  Felix now stood in one of those rooms. You know the ones. The ones with the leather Chesterfields and the Victorian busts and the picture of Her Majesty on the wall and the tall window that looks out onto Big Ben and the great big desk with the leather desk set and brass trough lamp and the man from the ministry who sits behind it with his back to the window. We’ve been here before, we know this room.

  ‘Glad you could make it, Mr Lemon,’ said the man behind the desk. It was the ticket office clerk from South Ealing Station.

  ‘How did you do that?’ asked Felix.

  ‘I just opened my mouth,’ said the man, ‘and the words came out.’

  ‘No,’ said Felix. ‘I mean how did you get here before me?’

  ‘I was driving the train.’

  ‘Oh I see.’ Felix didn’t.

  ‘Well, come and sit down, we have much to discuss.’

  ‘We do? I mean, yes, we do.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Felix seated himself on one of the leather Chesterfields.

  ‘Now,’ said the man, ‘as you are no doubt aware, we at the Ministry of Serendipity have had our eye on you for quite some time.’

  ‘I thought as much,’ said Felix. ‘Although of course I never said anything, because I realized that it’s all very hush-hush.’ He tapped at his nose in the approved manner.

  ‘Quite,’ said the man, tapping his. ‘So, as you must also know, we have a very good reason for having our eye upon you.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Felix, stroking his chin. ‘Indeed, but would you care to refresh my memory?’

  ‘Most amusing,’ said the man. ‘But why not. It is no doubt clear to you, Mr Lemon, that you are not as other men.’

  Felix nodded vigorously.

  ‘You are different,’ said the man. ‘You are special. You see, all fads and fashions, inventions, innovations, thoughts and theories have their origins somewhere. People take a hint from others who have previously taken a hint from others still, but somewhere at the back of it all there is an originator. What we have come to recognize as the Alpha Man. He is the last, or rather the first, in the line. The average man-in-the-street doesn’t really have any ideas of his own. He merely reflects upon ideas that are given to him, through television, through other media. Ideas which come from the few. The few control the many, thus it was ever so.’

  ‘Thus it was ever so what?’ asked Felix.

  ‘Most amusing,’ said the man once more. ‘The Alpha Man is the first in the line of idea-to-creation-of-form. And our researches tell us that for the most part the Alpha Man is unaware of what he is. He is constantly plagued by seeing his original ideas being exploited by others.’

  ‘Quite true,’ said Felix. ‘I was just going to say the very same thing. Said it plenty of times before, also.’

  ‘Quite. Well our researches lead us to believe that you are such an Alpha Man. We have so far found only one other.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Felix, adding, for good measure, ‘I know.’

  ‘You do know. Splendid, splendid.’ The man leaned back in his chair and twiddled his thumbs. ‘What a relief that is. We have made the occasional slip up, as you can imagine.’

  ‘Indeed I can.’

  ‘Poor Larry.’

  ‘Larry?’

  ‘Our first Alpha Man. But let us not speak of such horrors, let us concentrate on your good self.’

  ‘Are you offering me a job?’ Felix asked.

  ‘The job,’ said the man. ‘The job.’

  ‘L
arry’s job?’

  ‘Got it in one.

  ‘And what exactly would this job entail?’

  ‘Just sitting mostly. Sitting and thinking.’

  ‘Thinking about what?’

  ‘All manner of things. It’s your thoughts we want. Just yours and nobody else’s. You love your country, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Felix. ‘But what has that got to do with it?’

  ‘It has everything to do with it. It is the whole point of it. To be very brief, those who run our country do not always run it well. The public’s view, the view of the-man-in-the-street, is that politicians are all careerists, out for what they can get at the expense of the general population. But this is not the case. Politicians are, for the most part, sincere individuals. It’s just that when they get into power they realize that they’re not actually any good at running the country. All they were ever any good at was being politicians. And it’s not quite the same thing.’

  ‘You want me to be Prime Minister,’ said Felix, warming to the idea.

  ‘Not exactly. We want you to be more “the power behind the throne”.’

  ‘Does the Prime Minister have a throne?’

  ‘Most amusing. Your job will be to apply your special gift to affairs of state. Problems that baffle the average cabinet minister will be as nothing to you. With an Alpha Man at the helm, the Empire will flourish. Jobs for all, prosperity for all. An end to sorrow and deprivation, the dawn of a new tomorrow. Why, we’ll have an Englishman on the moon by nineteen sixty and a queen who’ll rule the whole wide world. Will you do it, Felix? Will you do it?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Felix. ‘I will.’

  And so he did. And the rest, as they say, is history.

  THE END

  Oh no.

  Sorry.

  There were two pages stuck together. And some crossings out.

  That is not the end of the story.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Felix, ‘I will.’ He didn’t mean to say it, but it just came out. The truth of the matter was that Felix was becoming very very uncomfortable. It now occurred to him that he was getting in well over his head on this one. But old habits do die very hard, so Felix went on to say, ‘I just knew you were going to say that.’