My father was once a paratrooper and as the eldest I was expected to follow him

But I was scared of heights and the thought of jumping out of a plane filled me with dread

So when the war came along I stayed at home making needles and hatpins and the coloured paperclips that we all like to steal

Some called me a coward but as I only spoke Danish I did not understand them

I received white feathers by the lorryload which I found useful when stuffing the red ornate cushions

Which my family factory produced with the aid of my needles and embroidery silks

During the conflict we were allocated a number of rather handsome prisoners of war

At first I did not know what to do with them until my cousin suggested that we train them as paratroopers

I encouraged them to jump from tall factory chimney’s to improve and sharpen their undoubted skills

The authorities frowned upon these activities and I was accused of being a collaborator

My head was shaved which was of little concern to me as I was already quite bald

They threatened to hang me but as our factory supplied their rope this presented something of a logistical problem

In the end they released me from the high security prison on the moors and ordered me to be very good boy

When I returned to our Hull factory I found that one of the prisoners of war had married my cousin Nice twice

He had taken charge of the business expanding into decorated quilts and soft bedroom furnishings

This upset me greatly and although I was terrified of heights I trained to become a paratrooper just like my father

All went well until my first jump when I was stopped at airport customs because my passport was out of date

Again I was incarcerated this time as a spy but as luck would have the war ended and I was presented with a small postcard shop In Southend on Sea

Along with a Swiss chalet which made rainbow parachutes for all the repressive regimes in the developing world

For the first time in my life I experienced great happiness and when I reached my twenty-eighth year I returned to my orphanage home

Where as a mature student I wrote books about rodent control in the eighteenth century

FIN