THE IMPERFECT ALIBI

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 87, 21 February 1941, Page 13

THE IMPERFECT ALIBI

(Written for "The Listener" by

E.M.

S.

at the end of the commentary on the news, which was rather dull he thought; in fact all the commentaries seemed more or less dull since poor old Macdonell had passed on. He decided on a short walk, getting back in time for Radio Newsreel at nine o'clock. Letting himself out of his flat, he set off. In the little house next door, he noticed that old George’s light was burning. He wanted to let old George know about that new Athens station he had picked up. Oh well it would keep until he had completed his walk. B OB switched off his wireless There were few people abroad at that hour, mostly soldiers and their girls, standing close together in the partial darkness afforded by the entrances to shops and business premises. Just ahead a man, muttering aloud and clasping a newspaper-covered parcel, weaved an uncertain course around a corner and passed from sight. As Bob passed one recess, somewhat darker than the others, a girl giggled suddenly and gave a little excited scream. As he turned sharply at the sound, the girl’s companion turned as if to glance about the street, and Bob caught a fleeting look at his face. Well I’ll be damned, he thought as he passed by, if that isn’t George then I never saw the old devil in my life. Old. George, that model of most, if not all of the virtues, and with a girl! You had only to mention the fair sex to old George, and he shied off like a skittish horse. On one occasion, long since, when he had suggested their taking a couple of girls to the pictures, the confused and: stammering man who had got out of that little adventure forbade any further incursion into the realm of petticoats, Give old George his wireless, pipe and books, and he considered the world, or the rest of it, well lost. * * * [Tt must have been some trick of lighting, he mused, as he walked on, trying to puzzle it out, but no, damn it all, it was old George. You couldn’t mistake that face. He would swear to it if need be. He paused suddenly, as an idea came to him. There was one obvious way of proving it. He turned homeward. He would call in and see old George for himself. He would find the old devil, of course, listening in. The little fish and chips shop he noticed, was open — the window containing the usual depressing display of symmetrically arranged bottles of soft drinks, a few forlorn looking tins of food and some dead flies. He stopped, considering treating old George and himself to some supper, but, as was usually the case, those bottles

put him right off. He could not, for the life of him, see the connection between soft drinks and fish and chips. The arrangement seemed to be the customary thing in most of the fish and chips shops, a sort of trade mark, but it never failed to irritate him beyond measure, To blazes with them. In one shop he

had recently noticed, the proprietor, even himself. apparently convinced of the futility of the bottle and tin arrangement, had contented his artistic soul with a simpler display. In his otherwise empty window, exactly centred upon a piece of rather dubious oilcloth, stood one lonely potted aspidistra.

He shrugged and resumed his home ward walk, the smell of stale fat pursuing him for quite a distance. * Es Ea ARRIVING before the little house, he rang the bell, which was promptly answered by his friend. Greetings followed as they made their way to old George’s den. Bob glanced keenly at his friend, but could notice nothing unusual, just the same old stolid stick-in-the-mud, The chair was drawn up at the wireless which, Bob noticed, was not switched on. Going closer he noted that old George had been, as usual, pottering about on shortwave. "Been out?" asked Bob. "It’s perfect out to-night." "No," answered old George. "I’ve just been doing a spot of listening in." "Anything good from London?" queried Bob. "Nothing special," replied his friend. "I waited for Big Ben at nine o’clock and then gave it best for the evening." "Yes," remarked Bob. "Good old Big Ben and his nine booming strokes." This, he thought, was where he had’ got old George, hook, line and sinker. "Oh, no," corrected old George, "ten strokes. Remember they are on British Summer Time now." "Ah, got you, you delicious old liar," shouted Bob. "Daventry doesn’t broadcast Big Ben at nine o’clock. Come clean, now, you old scoundrel! Who was the girl?"