The Curmudgeon

Some of the older ones have more or less died away. For instance, most of the Methodists have slowly accepted the C of E after the old chapel was closed for lack of support a decade or more ago.

With that went one of the fiercest fought battles of all, between the crusading tea-totallers and the regulars at the Beggars' Arms. Virtually everyone drinks the demon brew these days, even if it's cheap plonk bought in the supermarket at Mar'ton, much to the regret of Mean Mike at the post office.

Some feuds, however, seem to be getting worse. The political balance, which was once so far right that Attila the Hun would have felt quite at home, is now much more a swinging pendulum, what with the influx of university educated professionals who seemed to have been stamped out of the same soft left mould like so many caramel creams.

However, the Dale has been gripped for several weeks with a deep sense of shame coupled with hostile accusations and undoubtedly slanderous allegations. For the Big Itch has arrived. And no-one knows where it came from and who had smuggled it in.

It all began on Sunday some two weeks back as Cousin Kate, the post mistress, was sorting out the Sunday supplements whilst husband Mike was re-stocking the booze shelves in the off-licence.

Looking up from her task, she saw that Mike was earnestly scratching his head and growled: "Do you have to do that in public - anyone would think you're lousy."

But, as happens in these situations, Kate felt a sympathy itch come over her own scalp. So she allowed herself a furtive scratch - and then screamed so loud that Mike almost dropped a case of Aussie Shiraz.

For there, on the front page of the Sunday Times, was a tiny, black nasty, wriggling and squirming in the light. Then it jumped, and Kate screamed again, and Mike did drop the plonk, which began to spread across the floor like a blood stain.

"It's a flea," screamed Kate. "We are lousy." Then she ran to the shop door, twisted the Open/Closed sign and began to lock and bolt it like a Colditz guard.

Mike, wondering if he could soak up the wine in cloths and re-bottle it, was unimpressed. "Don't be silly," he said. "It's probably a black fly or something from the garden..."

"Don't just stand there - kill it," snarled Kate, her back pressed against the barricaded door. "It's there. On the front page of that paper..."

Now Mike comes from over the tops in Crookedale and we Beggarsdalians look upon folk from those parts as pretty scruffy wretches. And perhaps we are right, too, because when he finally got to the counter he took one look and exclaimed: "I told you not to be silly. It's not a flea..."

"Thank God for that," gasped Kate, her hand clutched to her throat.

"No - it's just a nit. We used to get them at school...."

He did not finish his sentence because Kate had disappeared upstairs with a great clattering of feet. When he finally caught up with her, she was immersed in an ancient copy of the Household Medical Encyclopaedia.

"It says here," she croaked, "that nits are quite common amongst school children. But we don't have any children in the village these days. So who brought them in..."

* The Curmudgeon is a satirical clumn based on a fictitious character in a mythical village.