26. Travels With A Duck

What Ho Proles!

With only two weeks and a couple of days left before the 2005 general election, the Bentley got caught up in traffic outside Smallchurch.

There was a moment when I thought My Man had taken it rather well.

And then the vein behind his left ear began to pulse...

And then there was that strange gurgling sound coming from the back of his throat...

And then he began to curse...

I won’t deny that it was a dicey moment.

Knowing how to deal with a man taken to the edge like that requires years of experience, possibly working with those left severely traumatised by warfare, disaster relief, or commuting on the M25.

No doubt you think I exaggerate and, this far into a political memoir, you think you’ve got a pretty good handle on your subject and (I trust) friend, the Hon. Jacob P. Murgatroid. But you weren’t there and, due to certain contractual obligations and the laws of copyright, I can’t report My Man’s exact words.

All I can say is that their etymology lay in the idiomatic Anglo Saxon of North Gloucestershire and if you attempted any of the actions his words so colourfully described, the lower vertebrae would be made to bend in directions the great architect never intended when he drew up his blueprints for the human form.

I decided to keep quite and meditate in the back of the car until My Man came back from that far-off place he goes when so riled. He has this way of staring into the distance that makes the air turn quite cold.

And so, treating the traffic jam with the indifference that can only come from being a passenger in a Bentley, I poured myself a glass of muscle relaxant, looked to my Daily Telegraph, and tried to utter a few soothing words to keep Mr. Mullins calm. My Man roused is one thing but should it have angered the duck: the potential for bloodletting would match that found in certain East African countries.

Eventually, My Man’s eyes twitched, the vein in his neck contracted, and he seemed human again. The gurgling sound stopped and there followed a restful fifteen minutes as he patiently eased his foot on and off the brake as the Bentley crawled towards the aerodrome.

Not a word had been said until, with a gentle shudder to match my own, the car came to a complete halt as we arrived at a final bottleneck of traffic half a mile from the aerodrome’s gates.

‘Well, that’s it!’ I exclaimed with not a little relief as I grabbed the duck. ‘From hereon in, I dare say we must sacrifice much shoe leather and not a little dignity.’

Whatever calm you understand I possessed by making this pronouncement, consider it gone by the time I had climbed out of the car and realised the task in front of me.

I looked to the distance and the silver roof of the aerodrome’s tower, mocking me with its large radar disk wagging to and fro. It felt I was at the sticky end of a schoolchild’s prank and I cursed with some choice phrases of my own; many of which, you will be delighted to learn, were derived from the Latin and also anatomically correct.

‘You wait here and bring the car when you can,’ I finally instructed My Man as I set to securing the four pounds of political drake under my arm. ‘And if you can’t find us in the crowds, fire the shotgun into the air every five minutes. And if you can’t find us in half an hour, you have my permission to start thinning the masses in whatever ways you see fit.’

It would be neither a hop, nor a skip, nor even a jump to the aerodrome, but I clearly had no choice but to carry Mr. Mullins all the way to the gates. British ducks are notoriously slow walkers and I wished I had one of those Icelandic ducks you hear so much about these days. Apparently, they can cross Icelandic tundra at speeds faster than any predator but for Bjork and some types of Arctic fox.

I only tell you this only because the next half an hour was not pleasant.

Once I had elbowed, cursed, kicked, and shunted my way through half a mile of the great unwashed, I had lapsed in all my honourable intentions of imagining them as an electorate. It takes only a knee to a gentleman’s groin to turn a crowd of his fellow citizens back to ‘a great unwashed prole army’, which in this case, ready to take an inordinate amount of interest in Mr. Mullins.

Making the journey even more loathsome than your usual half a mile hike through the general public, they reminded me of the poor relations to people you’d really want to vote for you. My march soon turned into a litany of excuses and explanations married to downright exhaustion.

‘No madam,’ I cried for the seventeenth time, ‘he cannot quack on cue.’

‘Sir, a duck cannot eat a Mars Bar and certainly not sideways!’

‘That damn cowardly knave of a dog attacked him! I cannot be held responsible for his defending himself.’

‘You should have thought of that before you waved it in his face.’

‘He could not possibly have eaten your child!’

And much much worse...

Let’s just say that these were not people you’d entrust with putting a cross by your name. Airplane spotters may be a breed rarer than those which get excited by cans of boiling water going along metal tracks, but they’re a whole lot odder. By the time I reached the gates, I wondered if the government shouldn’t keep lists of all men who buy shortwave radios to listen to air traffic control. If you ask me, there’s something decidedly not right about them.

With a final desperation, I struggled up to the gates.

‘I’m here as the invited guest of Sir James Vembre,’ I said to the dark blue security guard stationed in a booth beyond the railings.

A thin man with diluted cheeks, he resembled a gothic portrayal of Famine, which perhaps explained why he seemed more interested in the plump bird under my arm.

‘Name?’ he asked, poking his finger through the fence. Mr. Mullins took a nip at it and the man chuckle seemed to indicate some dark unfed intentions. ‘Lively little blighter you have there,’ he said as he unclipped a pen from the top of his clipboard.

‘The name is Murgatroid,’ I replied. ‘The Honourable Jacob P. Murgatroid of Murgatroid Hall, C--- N----.’

‘Bit much for a duck, isn’t it?’ he said.

‘If you must know, the duck is called Mr. Mullins.’

He poked his fingers again through the railing. ‘Hello there Mullins,’ he cooed.

‘If you value your fingers, in the future I’d remember to call him Mr. Mullins. He may only be a duck but he is a Tory duck and believes in a man keeping to his station; which, I might add, does not include your poking him with your fingers.’ I sniffed back my distain. ‘And, if were you, I wouldn’t try that again. I swear he’s been bred from rottweiler stock and has a taste for uniform.’

My words made the guard step back and take notice of me for the first time.

‘Why are you carrying him?’ he asked, a suspicious tone coming over his voice.

‘I’m carrying this duck because I’m late,’ I explained, feeling quite ready to take a nip of his fingers should he have tried poking them in my direction. ‘And I would be grateful if you could find my name on that list and then we might get these gates open. Then we might be able to cease this pointless conversation that I’m sure we both regret entering into.’

‘Mullins?’ he said, running his finger down his clipboard. ‘No Mullins here.’

‘Well try Murgatroid,’ I said, quickly losing all patience with the man.

‘Ah, we have a Murgatroid,’ he said. ‘J. P. Murgatroid. He was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago,’ he said, nodding to the duck. ‘Sir Vembre’s waiting for him. Only, the thing is, I don’t know if I can allow a duck in.’ He shook his head. ‘Tricky one, really. Airfield safety, you see? Can’t allow any animal except for guide dogs.’

‘And what harm is there in a duck?’

‘Well for all I know, you’ve cut that ducks legs off and replaced them with explosives and that’s why you’re carrying him.’

‘But this is not simply a duck,’ I assured him. ‘This is a political mascot and if you forbid this creature from entering, then you are repressing the very essence of British democracy. You might as well stand in the way of Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, or Dominic Grieve.’

He examined me for as long as it takes patriotic juices to start flowing flow through a man.

‘If you put it like that,’ he said, ‘I don’t see how I can stop you.’

And with that, he unlocked a small gate set into the railings.

‘So,’ he said as he swung the gate open. ‘Are you some sort of novelty act?’

‘I’m the prospective parliamentary candidate for C--- N---,’ I told him, stepping through the fence before setting Mr. Mullins down and reattaching his lead.

‘So,’ mulled the guard, ‘what kind of business are you in?’

I looked at him, no longer bound by necessity to indulge his stupidity any longer.

‘Domination!’ I spat and marched towards the small terminal building.

In what passed for a departure lounge, I was met by a tall man with a dignified air about him: very old school RAF, walking with a limp, and in half a dozen ways, resembling a bounder on the skids waiting for a trust fund to open. His appearance reminded me that in a much better world, I would have been met by Terry Thomas.

‘You’re pretty damn late, Murgatroid,’ said Jimmy, coming forward to grab my arm. ‘But I’m glad to see you’ve brought your duck. Been telling everybody about it. Saw you on Newsnight last week. Smashing stuff. Reconnect the voters with the politicians and all that. Brilliant idea. Used to help feed a duck back in the RAF. Our regimental mascot. Smelly bird. Hated music except for anything by Tom Jones. Not seen you at the club lately. Wondered what you’ve been doing with yourself. Know I know. A duck. Really marvellous!’

‘To be honest, Jimmy, until Larry Harris mentioned it, I had never realised you were with the RAF,’ I admitted, deciding to ignore the overwhelming mass of detail that usually follows Jimmy around. ‘For some odd reason, I thought you were something to do with the British Airways catering school.’

‘I wish that I was,’ he said and as he limped ahead of me into the cool of the terminal building he slapped his gammy leg with his fist. ‘Couldn’t get into commercial flights these days. Carrying half a SAM missile in my thigh. Don’t get to see many surface to air missiles when you work in British Airways catering. Caught it flying over Iraq. Dark night. Don’t remember much. Lucky to be picked up by some friendly Kurds. Damn concussion, though. Thought I was in Leeds.’

‘No,’ I agreed. ‘The dangers are much more pronounced. They say that the chemicals in false tans are a leading contributor to learning difficulties in the nation’s cabin crews?’

‘Well, you live and learn,’ Jimmy purred. ‘Funny thing is, I always fancied going into commercial flying after I left the RAF. Either that or become a mercenary.’

‘I was probably confused,’ I explained, ‘because I was so sure I once saw you give a lesson on how to mix a vodka martini.’

‘One of my side trades,’ Jimmy replied with a proud look in his eye. ‘Discovered the secret off an old stewardess friend who used to do the run to Dubai. She was commended twice for the way she could serve a cocktail at thirty thousand feet. Come on through and I’ll show you around.’

He led me back out onto the airfield.

‘Got a few planes coming in from local airports,’ he said as a small jet came trundling down the runway. He began to stride out across the huge spread of smooth tarmac. ‘I want to show you the new Airbus. Lovely thing. Nice thing to fly I imagine. Pride of the show. I envy you, Murgatroid. It’s the plane you’ll be waving off.’

On the other side of the building, a large white sausage sat at the edge of a runway.

‘The Airbus A350,’ he said, squinting into the low sun. ‘Twin-engine, mid-sized, long-range aircraft. Beautiful lines, don’t you think, Murgatroid?’

I didn’t know what to say. It looked like a large white sausage sitting at the edge of a runway. Luckily Mr. Mullins seemed to know his mid-sized, long-range aircraft.

He said ‘quack’.

‘Absolutely,’ said Jimmy, in something of a daze. ‘Cracking. Absolutely cracking.’