Wednesday 15 June 2016

Liturgy for the Death of GK Chesterton (1936)


Hymn (Knees up Father Brown)

A small, dishevelled priest in a shovel hat stands blinking in the spotlight. He looks exactly nothing like Mark Williams and is distinctly not a Brummy.

Father Brown: Let us throw soup at the walls.

Beaker Folk throw soup at the Moot House walls, break the windows and chase after men in passages.

Archdruid: I hope you're going to pay for the damage.

Fr Brown: Indeed, when I corrected the bill to £2,000 from £200 yesterday, I ensured you had enough.

Archdruid: Ah, but I corrected it from £2,000 to £32,000 pounds.... 

Burton Dasset: Hang on! That was my credit card!

Fr Brown: Flambeau! You have betrayed yourself again.

Flambeau (for it is he): Curses. And I thought I was the master criminal.

Hnaef: I thought Burton had put on some height....

Archdruid: You cannot escape. We have Young Keith's uncle the police officer outside. And Mark Williams dressed as GK Chesterton himself is on the roof, above the tin sheet.

There is a loud crash

Flambeau: One mere constable from the Bedfordshire Constabulary cannot stop the great Flambeau!

He springs nimbly through the South East Door

And is dragged back in by the....

Archdruid: ....wolves. Forgot to tell you about the wolves.

Fr Brown: But those are all the wolves. If they are only guarding that door, there is nobody at the Northwest door....

Flambeau leaps nimbly through the North Door

The clang of a heavy hammer on bone is heard .

Fr Brown: .... except the blacksmith.

Hnaef: So Flambeau - if you can just give us the giant opal you stole from the Russian princess.

Flambeau: Aha! I have my little victory! That parcel containing a PlayStation for my nephew that I had to drop off at the post office? It was the jewel. It is even now on its way to my apartment in Paris.

Fr Brown (blinking): I fear not. I switched parcels in the White Horse. The opal is even now being delivered to the princess's secret Belgravia townhouse.

Flambeau: OK. It's a fair cop. I'm gonna get years for this.

Archdruid: Not so. Flambeau, you have two choices for redemption.

Fr Brown: Either you spend the next 30 years in a monastery, where you will confess your many sins to me and do penance for your many wicked ways....

Archdruid: .... or you can stay here for a few days at very reasonable rates, light a couple of tea lights, and realise you're actually quite a decent chap and it's society's fault. (She hums a few bars of "Will You Come and Follow Me")

Flambeau: No contest is it? Monastery it is.

Dismissal

Archdruid: The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. 

All: The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected.

Archdruid: Then let us all go about our business.

Charlii: Keith, Hnaef - get down to Drayton Parslow's house, take the fascia down and retrieve the opal before he gets home

Archdruid: Master criminal? Genius Priest Detective?

Charlii: Yeah, what fool would think a vilkage like Husborne Crawley would have a post office, these days?

A far-off  sound can be heard. It is PG Wodehouse turning in his grave.

1 comment :

  1. A village Post Office? Ah yes, I think I can just about remember what one of those is! We lost our 4-mornings-a-week PO a decade or so ago when the postmistress died.

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