Moving Statues

Welcome back Kid. During the time you were away,Tommy my cat and I sealed off the corner of the room where the radio sat, with police tape. WARNING! DO NOT ENTER! CRIME SCENE! screamed the yellow fluorescent tape. We were both aware, that Mr Coyle was sitting in a secret bunker, broadcasting high octane diddy-dee music to an unsuspecting public.

In an effort to stop any infiltration, Tommy and I had removed the plug and stuffed a cocktail of Diazepam and Temazepam through the grill of the radio.

As an added precaution,Tommy had drawn on the floor the chalk outline of a man with his hands to his ears in utter agony. We could do no more. All we could do now was wait, as Sean Coyle was unleashed on the poor innocent people of Ulster.

Tommy bit my lip and whispered, "The casualties will be very high."

"I know," I whispered, "We must do what we can. Let's give blood."

We whipped out our respective pen knives and cut each other on the arm. We could do no more. We cowered as we heard the terrible screams, coming from people who had fallen foul of Coyle's dreaded-Diddly-Dee. Then the siren sounded and it was all over.

"A programme to end all programmes," was how Churchill the insurance dog summed it up.

OH YES! OH YES!

As soon as I felt the buzz from the potato bread, I grabbed Tommy by the neck and yelled,

"Where was Gerry? Come on, spit it out. Where was Gerry? We have ways of making you talk. It's called-Primary school."

"It's a fair cop Guv," spluttered Tommy, pointing out the window at Matt Baggott who was going by wearing a Dusty Springfield wig.

"It all began at-Knock," whispered Tommy. "Gerry saw something-move."

"Something move?" I yelled. "What was it, a council workman or a hair on John Daly's dome?"

"Gerry saw a moving-statue," whispered Tommy.

I blessed myself with an open cut throat razor in my hand, which is a very dangerous thing to do and yelled, "Gerry saw a moving statue?"

"Well, yes-and-no," said Tommy. "He was standing on a grassy knoll with a high hedge to his right. Suddenly he saw the head and shoulders of John the Baptist go flying past the hedge. What Gerry didn't know, was that John the Baptist was lashed to the trailer of a small van and was on his way to have his broken arm repaired."

"So our Gerry was conned?" I yelled.

"No!" yelled Tommy. "Our Gerry conned himself. He was in a heightened state of awareness and allowed his eyes to play tricks on himself."

"AH!" I said. "So our Gerry has been in the Priory clinic for a few days."

"No," said Tommy. "Our Gerry has been in Lough Derg for a few days. Lough Derg is closed for the Winter, but our Gerry got the Pope's dispensation to spend four days on Lough Derg, confined to a Monk's cell and fed nothing but water and the stale heels from pan loaves."

"It's his own fault!" I roared. "Did not Oscar Wilde say, "When one sees what one thinks is a moving statue behind a hedge, one should not bet the farm on it. Better if one hedged ones bets."

"Good old Oscar!" cried Tommy. "I wonder how he's getting on these days."

I began to wonder about Oscar Wilde too, and that's how we spent in the rest of the day, in Wilde wonderment.