Chapter Nineteen
The King of the Golden Dawn

After a couple of pints of Toby, and a pipe of finest Southha’p’ny, the group had put out of their minds the funny things that happened to them on the way to the Eagle and Flag. As he recalled the journey, Tick quietly observed the meeting of Dumbledalf and a strange-looking character with long and straggly hair. When he had first spotted him a minute or two before, he had pointed him out to Enid.

“Surely a character of ill favour I deem, Enid”, he said. “A man’s hair is his crown. Indeed, hairs are our aerials!” He patted his bald pate with a puzzled expression.
“They’re selling hippy wigs at Tesco’s, man”, remarked Enid, as she thought to herself, ‘Would that there were Woolworth’s in England still’.
The old fellow staggered to the bar with a gait suggesting that he had shat himself.
“Hail Theodore!”, cried Dumbledalf, “It’s good to see you looking so well”.
“Verily, but for the evidence of thine eyes.”, replied Theodore in a sad and deep voice, adding, “When the wolf is far from the lair, the deer give us no peace”.
“No? Really?”, said Dumbledalf, “What is it? Anything a pint won’t sort out? I’ll get you one.”
He turned to the bar tender, “Three pints of Ranger please”, he said, handing over a £10 note.
“Alas for vermiform fecundity, my friend”, Theodore said sadly.
“Worms?”, said Dumbledalf, “What a pain in the arse they are. I suggest you try flushing them out”.
“A golden dawn awaits the packhorse whose master still dreams”, replied Theodore King, appreciatively.
“Mine’s a pint”, said Brian, banging down his empty mug.
“I’ve got you one in. Theodore, this is Brian Sewell. Brian, this is Theodore King”, announced Dumbledalf.
“Delighted to make your acquaintance”, said Brian politely, extending his hand.
“As Kayam greets the grape”, said Theodore, shaking it.
They clunked their beer mugs and returned to their seats. “Cheers!”, said Brian.

It was still early evening, but the companions had settled in comfortably. Mary Poppins looked about the room. Hagrigorn and Enid were snogging like teenagers in an alcove, Brian Sewell and Theodore King were engaged in a drunken belching competition (with occasional farts), and others were variously staring into their beer (Thrakkarzog was fishing a peanut out of his), and talking. Tick was at the bar, chatting innocently with a sylph-like seductress with nice breasts. His antennae twitched as she invited him and Mary Poppins upstairs.
“Gads! Are you a lesbian?”, exclaimed Tick in excitement.
“Bi”, said the woman.
Tick was shocked. “Are you going? Have I offended you?” he asked, in some distress.
“No, not at all”, she replied.
“Thank goodness!”, said Tick enthusiastically. “I have a theory about lesbians”, he continued.
“Oh, what is it?”, enquired the woman, intrigued.
“I think lesbians are born to women with nice breasts. Conversely, gay men are born to women with miserable breasts!” He looked at her eagerly.
“Bye”, she said, turning away, not that Tick noticed.
“I don’t have a theory about them”, he continued, “Mediocre breasts?”, he pondered.
“No. I mean Bye as in bye-bye, creep”, she said, turning back to him to say it.
“Heavens! How have I offended you?”, asked Tick, obviously distraught, but the woman was studying the menu in a rather determined way. Tick walked back to where Thrakkarzog was seated.
“Women eh! Will we ever fathom the uncharted depths of their mystery?”, he muttered.

Dumbledalf was at the bar, too, ordering sandwiches, pies and other savouries for the Council members. He gazed casually over to the direction of an unusual gurgling sound, as if water was draining in a vortex down a drain. There he saw a large man with a shaggy mane, seated at a table covered in empty beer glasses. A bar assistant was collecting empties and supplying full replacements. As Dumbledalf watched for a minute, it seemed to him that typically, a single pint lasted about twelve seconds, or seventeen if the man took a breath during the drink. ‘Great Pachyderms!’, thought Dumbledalf, ‘That must be the legendary Beer Wolf, brother of the Beer Moth! Look at him’, he said to himself, ‘Imagine the size of his balls! So, it was no exaggeration after all. Thrakkarzog will be interested in this. I must point him out to him’.

Thrakkarzog was sitting with Tick, asking him what he knew about cloning, and what did he think was the connection between a scleroprotein such as keratin, and a fairly solid mucus that could hold its shape and support weight. Tick looked at him uneasily.
“I’m uneasy, friend”, he said, “These are the sort of windows faces look in at”.

Suddenly, and with a loud crash, in through the open window of the pub came a goblin, then another and another, then a three-foot alligator, two yellow rubber ducks, a fuzzy felt farm set, a snake, a slinky, and one of those little pepper-pot-like cylinders that makes a noise like the moo of a cow when inverted. There was much shouting and singing. Suddenly the door burst open and two figures, a great big fellow, and a smaller chap, came in. One was swaying and holding a mostly-empty bottle of Pimms No.1 Cup. The other held a wooden train and a pair of plastic eyes on springs. They appeared to be the same band encountered previously, apparently having broken into a toy shop. They were having some ‘college jaunts’, which they considered would be amusing to others. The barman placed a tray of assorted savoury snacks on the table and looked extremely alarmed.

“Well, oyv’e never seen such a thing in all moy loyf, though one thing droyvs out another as you moight say. Where do these toyps come from? That’s what oy want to know”.
Thrakkarzog looked at him, with a glazed, empty expression of sheer disgust. “I, I believe they come… at least I think they might be….”
“They come from Oxford, barman. Oxford, if that means anything to you”, interrupted Hagrigorn.
“Save us!” said the barman in horror. “Never has such a thing happened in moy toym”, and he went off in a sort of stupor, shouting something about his knob.

Educated in the Arts they might have been, but they were no match for Thrakkarzog’s quick and targeted humour, or Brian’s farting. With much shouting but little else, they gave up and left the building. Rumour had it that some were rounded up by the filf (though their fathers ‘had a word’), but most became lost in a wooded area infamous as the haunt of unsavoury predatory types, and woke up in the morning with sore bums.