‘You can pin a maggot on a
mackerel but you can’t pin a mackerel on a maggot,’ whispered the featureless
child, his unheard words of wisdom floating away on the wind.
There was lot of wind on the
Suffolk coast that day and it was busy dragging the kite belonging to the father
of the featureless child along the far side of the beach.
‘Feck it, feck it and feck it,’ scalded
Dad.
The snake on a rope thought he
said ‘fetch it’ but his impulse to slither over and fetch it was curtailed by a
sharp yank on the tie-rope around his neck. His trunk slinked and then coiled
up into itself; his gasping tongue protruding to fork the passing currents of
air.
Amongst the masses of messed up
line attached to the kite emerged a giant ugly deep sea fish. It stank and
shouted at a woman and a baby ahead of it.
‘Not mackerel, not a maggot and
not a monkfish,’ mumbled and murmured the featureless child.
‘Mmmmer mmmmer mmmmer, can’t make
any fecking sense of any fecking thing you say, lad,’ blasted Dad.
‘Sssssand shark, it’sssss a sssssand
shark,’ hissssssed the snake.
Dad went to have a closer look.
The stinking sand shark bit. He came back with the kite but without his hand.
‘That takes the biscuit,’ sobbed
Dad.
‘That took your hand,’ corrected
the featureless child.
Dad looked at him for a moment.
‘I understood that bit, lad, you’re right. Good to hear you talk normal for a
change.’
The snake slithered back with
Dad’s hand.
‘Thanks, snake,’ said Dad with a
playful yank at his tie-rope. ‘Now let’s go home, your Mum has got some serious
sewing to do.’
