THE NIGHT CALLER
by Richard Banks
The
knock at the door was polite but insistent and would have caused no uneasiness
had it not occurred at a quarter to three in the morning. If asleep, or only
half asleep, I might have missed it or taken it into whatever dream was in my
head. But I was awake, most definitely awake. Had I not just visited the
bathroom and on my return to bed checked the time on my alarm clock. Even so, I
was inclined to think that it was nothing, or at least nothing of consequence.
The night was windy, something had blown over, or maybe... The knock was
followed by a second knock, a little louder this time but no less polite. There
was no mistaking it this time. The knocker I sensed was a person of
discernment, of sensibility, but nevertheless an unexpected caller at a time of
day when the usual sort of callers were yet to venture out.
A third knock, scarcely more insistent
than the first two, had me reaching for my dressing gown. Halfway down the
stairs, my mind was in panic mode. This could only be bad news, an emergency,
someone we knew had died or been injured in an accident. It was the police, who
else could it be? Pausing only to turn on the hall light I flung open the door
to reveal something that was definitely not a policeman, or any other type of
man.
The large green face that looked up at
me smiled ruefully, revealing several rows of red incisors. A long yellow
tongue flickered in and out of its mouth as the creature spoke. What its first
words were I do not recall; I only remember that they were expressed in a
version of the English language last uttered by BBC newsreaders in the early
days of television. I attempted to reply with the same immaculate enunciation
only to find that I had totally failed to take in what it had said. The voice that spoke had done so in a
middling baritone - 'it' was most definitely a 'he'. His upwards gaze
took on a look of bemused anxiety as my mouth opened and closed several times
without speaking. The creature tried again, possibly repeating his first words
that now became the most famous second words in human history.
“Sorry to intrude. Rank bad form and
all that, but could I possibly bother you for a recharge.” He held up an object
of similar size and dimensions to a portable radio. He again smiled but this
time in a way that did not reveal his teeth. I wondered what the dinner jacketed
newsreaders might have said and, while wondering, heard myself invite him in.
Well, it would have been impolite not to, a curt refusal might have blighted
interplanetary relations for decades to come, and all he wanted was a recharge.
I ushered him into the sitting room. It
was my best room and had recently been re-carpeted. Regretfully the new sofa I
had ordered was yet to arrive.
“Do you have a three pin adapter?” I
asked, pointing at the socket in the wall.
He assured me that he had a “universal”
and that my socket would do very nicely. He plugged in his radio or whatever it
was and in the awkward silence that followed I invited him to sit down on the
more comfortable of my two armchairs.
“Would you like a cup of tea while we
wait?” Utilising my talent for charades I mimed the raising of a cup from saucer to mouth.
“Tea?” he repeated. The pause that
followed suggested that he was somehow consulting a search engine. “Oh yes, a
refreshing plant leaf infusion. Why not indeed. Let’s have some tea.”
He fidgeted nervously as I explained
that I would have to leave him for a few minutes. “The tea,” I explained, “is
made in the kitchen.” I pointed towards the serving hatch between the sitting room
and kitchen.
“Through there?” he said, as though
expecting me to crawl through it.
Deciding that any further words of
explanation might well have the opposite effect I left the room via the door.
On my return I found him communing with my lemon plant in a series of odd,
little sighs which the plant was reciprocating with sighs of its own. The
creature broke off in mid-conversation and accepted the cup and saucer I
offered him with a dexterity that suggested he had been practising. Raising the
cup in accordance with my mime he poured the contents into an orifice that I
had hitherto supposed to be an ear. The expression on his face suggested that
the experience had not been an altogether pleasurable one, but determined to be
the model guest he effected what I think was meant to be a sign of approval.
“Are you not giving Lini one?”
“Lini,” I replied, wondering if he had
brought in an invisible friend.
“Yes, Lini, your companion plant. She
has not drunk for three days. A tea, I think, would be very much to her
liking.”
I disappeared back into the kitchen and
on my return emptied the teapot into Lini’s container. He smiled, evidently
satisfied that Lini was now a happier plant.
“By the way, I haven’t introduced
myself, I do beg your pardon, my name is Kogiwinnalottadosh, second son of the
third family order of Magnus Vaniturnum. Call me Kog, everybody does.”
I informed him that I was Kev of
Fairway Avenue.
Introductions over he volunteered the
further information that he had come from a planet with a very long name that
might have started with a Z, and that he had gone travelling with his second
best wife, who also had a very long name.
“Oh, I said.” I hope she’s not waiting
outside. She’s most welcome to come in.” By no means convinced that I did want
another extra-terrestrial in my sitting room I was relieved when Kog declined
my offer with civility that fully acknowledged my kind intentions. His wife,
he explained, was busy in their spaceship where she was making much needed
repairs to a device called a gurgoblaster. This, he hastened to tell me, was
the most important part of the ship and the reason why she was on-board instead
of his number one wife. No one could fix a gurgoblaster like she could. Indeed,
give her any piece of mechanical equipment she would not only repair it but
make it work better than before.
“How many wives do you have, Kev?”
I replied that I had one and that she
was presently asleep on our bed upstairs.
“Only one?” he said, evidently puzzled
by my reply but holding back on the questions he was surely thinking.
I replied that most Earth countries had
a one wife at a time policy and that very few of the said wives could change a car
wheel, never mind repair a gurgoblaster. There is, I added, in a spontaneous
moment of interplanetary diplomacy, “much we might learn from you.”
“And we from you,” said Kog. Indeed, I
wish to know where I can find George Formby?”
“George Formby?”
“Yes, George Formby. You know, the
cheeky chappy with the ukulele.”
It transpired that Kog’s planet had
been receiving radio and TV signals from Earth that first began their journey
through space in the 1920s. Of those relating to light entertainment, none were
more popular than the songs and films of George Formby which had acquired a
cult following only rivalled by the more recent arrival of ‘The Lone Ranger’.
“Do you have a ukulele, Kev?”
His disappointment at my reply was only
too evident. I hastened to assure him that although I was not a practising
musician I was fully aware and appreciative of Mr Formby’s undoubted musical
talents. Indeed, I claimed his song about the Brighton Rock to be a personal
favourite. This was, of course, far from the truth although in the
circumstances pertaining it seemed impolite to say otherwise. I attempted to
maintain this fiction by singing the only two lines of the song I could
remember. He instantly joined in and, with both of us feigning the playing of a
ukulele, we sang, or rather he sang and I hummed until it was over. Kog
clearly elated by our performance attempted to slap me on the back but had to
settle for somewhere lower.
“So Kev, where is he? Not far I hope.”
I imparted the sad news that the great
George had, “passed over.”
The untroubled expression on Kog’s face
indicated that I had not made myself clear.
“You mean, passed over in a flying
machine, no doubt going to America or Europe or one of your other Earth places.
No matter, Kev, just give me the coordinates of his present location and I
will be there in two shakes of a lamb’s tail, or maybe even one. By the way,
what is a lamb?”
Ignoring his last question I abandoned
genteel euphemisms and in plain language informed him that poor George was dead.
The cry of anguish that erupted from Kog was notable not only for the shaking
of the ceiling but also the waking of her upstairs who having been thrown from
her bed was now standing at the top of the stairs bellowing her displeasure. As
Kog’s grief subsided into sobs I moved swiftly into the hall determined to
prevent, at all costs, an encounter that was unlikely to go well. Fortunately
having advanced no further than the first step down she showed no inclination
to venture further.
“What the hell’s going on down there?
Don’t you know I’m trying to sleep?”
I explained that a bereaved friend had
called and was understandably upset.
“Upset! I’ll give him upset if he makes
that noise again. Now get rid of him and don’t let me find the house smelling
of weed in the morning.”
“Weed?” I replied, with as much
innocence as I could muster.
“You know what I mean.”
I returned to the sitting room to find
Kog slumped forward on the armchair, his head buried in two scaly hands,
emerald tears flowing down onto the carpet. Fearing that these might add a
discordant colouring to the carpet I hastily offered him a box of tissues which
in the confusion of his grief he ate.
“Kev, Kev, how can this be? He was so
young, sixty years at most, little more than a child.”
I consoled him as best I could by
saying that human lives were seldom longer than a hundred years and that
although George’s life had been somewhat shorter he had achieved considerable
fame and riches. His only regret, I ventured to suggest, was that he knew nothing
of his many fans on Kog’s planet.
Kog’s head slowly returned to its
normal positioning and nodded its agreement. The expression on the face
suggested that my last statement had been less than logical. To Kog’s credit, his next words were only to agree with me that George had many fans, “thirty
million at least and that’s only the membership of his fan club. They will cry
an ocean.”
Unsure as to whether this was an actual
ocean or a metaphorical one I decided to steer the conversation towards the more
certain knowledge that a statue of the ‘great man’ had been erected on the Isle
of Man. It is, I assured him, “an awfully good likeness.”
“But does it sing and dance?”
“No,” I counselled, “statues seldom
do.”
“Nevertheless I must go there to make
sacrifice. Tell me, Kev, what animal should I choose?”
I replied that on-street sacrifices
were generally discouraged on Earth and that the Isle of Man no doubt had
by-laws against them. “Why don’t you light a candle or, better still have a flyover. You could dip your wings or loop the loop.”
Kog considered my proposal behind an
expression that suggested that wings and loop looping were concepts he was
struggling to grasp. I was about to speak again when he did so himself. “I know
what, we will fire our guns and send ten fiery missiles exploding like thunder
in the night sky before falling back to Earth like sparkling rain. What could
be better! …Don’t look so worried, Kev, we will point the guns up high. There
will be no danger, and hidden by our invisibility shield no one will even know
we are there. Trust me, my friend, we come in peace. George makes us brothers
does he not?”
I agreed that he did, at least I hoped
he did. I was about to make some tentative enquiries about the guns when a
shrill ping announced the ending of the charging process. Detaching his devices
from the plug he turned to me with a rueful smile that signalled his intention
to depart.
“It has been great meeting you, Kev, an
historic meeting, yes? The first between our two peoples. I will mention you in
the book I will be writing. Who knows you may become as famous as dear George.
Well, almost. But now I must go. There is much work to do on the ship and we
must be away before your star brings its light again.”
We exchanged gifts, I gave him an A-Z
gazetteer of Great Britain and he reciprocated with an aerosol that he assured
me was very effective in sweetening the mood of those whose sweetness was less
than conspicuous. He gave me a knowing look and glanced up at the ceiling.
I saw him to the front door and watched
as he disappeared into the darkness. Too wakeful to sleep I lit up another
joint and contemplated the new reality of life in an ever changing universe.
What conclusions I came to I am unable to recall. Sadly the new dawn I glimpsed
at around 11.30 seemed much the same as any other morning; the spray, labelled
‘Urk’, produced a howl of rage from she who was its target; and the news from
Manx was so unremarkable that it is only known to those who live there. For
nearly a month the only proof of that extraordinary night was the otherwise
inexplicable disappearance of my A-Z, a circumstance already troubling for it
being overdue at the library. When proof did arrive, trouble took on a new
dimension - an email from Econ informing me that my quarterly bill was for
twenty thousand, two hundred and eighty nine pounds and a less significant
number of pence.
Some experiences are priceless, some
plain expensive, others are both, and I am broke. Heed well my tale. Beware the
night knock on the door, and if you do open up, at least get a selfie.
Copyright Richard Banks
