You're Knicked..

La Comédie Humaine


The ingenuity of the human kind - male mostly - to land itself in the hot murky waters of sex and the law knows few bounds. It being many years since I read the whole of Balzac - do try it, he is a superb reader of souls - I cannot recall whether he ever pitched up with a 'pantie thief disguised as an elf' character. Bet he wish he had have done!

We have, mercifully, by and large been spared the uncomfortableness of sharing our village life with persons of an inclination to warped sexualised behaviour in public. In private, perhaps so - indeed assuredly so, though that is strictly a matter for the confessional where it shall remain - but public displays of without the norm activity have been rare.

It was suggested by some that Old Tom used to employ his night hours not so much in poaching as in peeping, but I'm inclined to the view of many that this was just an ugly rumour put round by Colonel X in a vain attempt to shame Tom into remaining indoors, thus preserving the Colonel's pheasants until they were ready to be properly shot as God intended. (Colonel X's view of the purpose of being a pheasant, not mine.)

Then there was Q, a Church organist for some years. Q's views that choir boys were 'God's little seraphs' was considered dangerous by some, though again the majority opinion prevailing was that Q was merely terribly ill-informed as to the naturally horrific nature of boys. (Someone once gave Q a copy of 'Lord of the Flies' for Christmas, which struck me as a little cruel.) Eyes were kept posted for signs of misconduct, though all that was ever reported was Q beaming as the boys sang. Sadly one year not long ago Q fell off a cliff whilst on holiday bird-watching on Orkney, so that was the end of him and of that.

The nearest one has ever come oneself to any such desperate scandal - far from, yet quite close enough thank you! - was on an occasion H and I were returning from a foreign holiday. (Nowadays of course one has E and E's horse so one doesn't have foreign holidays, but then we had neither so we did.)

The holiday itself was grand - a small Greek island that could have tempted me to turn Orthodox and stay forever. H's objection that she wouldn't care to see me in a long full beard sadly held sway and we returned by night flight as one does.

Safely landed and disembarked we waited, again as one does, for our luggage to duly arrive too. (Always of course an anxious moment until confirmed that one's suitcases had boarded the same flight as oneself.) H stood one side of the carousel and I the other. Spotting her case I grabbed it, yelled at her to retrieve mine and legged it towards Customs. (You can tell all this happened so long ago. There were actually officers of Her Majesty's Customs and Excise waiting to grill every last one of us should they so choose.)

They chose me for some strange reason. Must have looked deeply suspicious no doubt with deep tan and dog collar - a well-known disguise for the criminal I am sure. Anyways they hauled me over and began quizzing. "Where had Sir been?" "What had been the purpose of Sir's visit?" "Did Sir have anything to declare?"

Resisting wisely the urge to respond to the last with 'three bottles of ouzo and my genius' straight answers were at once given. Sadly though I must have been utterly unconvincing as we finally reached the clincher "Is that Sir's suitcase?"

Well what a dilemma! To own that no in fact it was not mine but another's - albeit my wife's - would have led to hours of endless probing (swift and painful visions of body searching flashing across my very tired and now troubled mind!) To falsely claim it for my own would be a lie. Not in itself a good thing, but in the circumstances the better of two bad options. So I lied and said yes most assurredly the suitcase lying between ourselves was indeed my very own personal property and possession.

From the corner of my eye I could see H hovering close by looking flustered and furious - whether with C&E or with me I could not tell. But swift as ever H had anticipated where all this would be leading and was not about to be best pleased. With due reason it proved.

"Did Sir pack Sir's own case?" came the next line of questioning. Having begun the lie there was no choice but to continue it to the end. Yes indeed of course one had done one's own packing, one was not a complete nitwit! The ascerbic touch of that response was not, in hindsight, the tactically correct approach. H was by now wincing as well as looking flustered and furious. Scared me rigid that combination, though water off a duck's back to phlegmatic, stern, meritricious C&E of course.

"Would Sir mind opening Sir's suitcase?" Well suddenly Sir saw just how deep in the mire Sir was. To refuse was out of the question. To comply courted disaster. One therefore complied and disaster duly followed. Out came H's clothing - her day and evening wear (rather fetching frocks all), her beach wear (one piece numbers mostly but the odd bikini too) and finally the underwear of delicate hues and a variety of designs. (Though being before the advent of the thong there were garments of a certain daring nature. Pleasing in any other circumstance, but deeply galling in this.)

Not one word, not one smirk, passed the lips of C&E. Not even a solitary sparkle in the eye. (If Sir wished to be a cleric within the Church of England yet also a full-on transvestite that was entirely Sir's business and no concern of Her Majesty, was clearly the awful line they were taking.) Just each item held aloft for far more moments than was in any way called for for the purpose of seeking contraband. H the meanwhile was incandescent, fit to explode, yet not daring to intervene. No woman wants her 'smalls' to be so publicly flaunted by a state official for the titillation of said state official's colleagues and the humiliation of said woman's husband. (On reflection though, perhaps the humiliation of husband angle was not something she so much minded, that being condign punishment for foolish fellow having allowed the whole sorry event to occur in the first place.)

The torment finally over and all garments safely restored, Sir was cursorily dismissed as if nothing untoward had passed between State and subject. Not a good end to the otherwise blameless and enjoyable holiday. H said nothing about the matter - indeed spoke not a word on the whole journey home, which was deeply troubling.

H indeed never once referred to the matter, day passing day with no comment at all. Shortly after, however, I discovered that - so sadly - she had mixed my very own, largely white, underpants with a garish red shirt purchased in Greece whilst doing the domestic laundry, with the result that everything white became at once forever deep pink.

Hell, it would seem, has little fury to compare with that of a woman whose lingerie has been subject to unauthorised public inspection!