It was the hottest day of the year. Danny One was watering his Jericho Rose in the corner of the garden. As he let the water fall onto the dry rose he considered the month. August was always a month that deceived. Within weeks the air would have cooled and the days would become darker.
August promised everything a summer without end.
In the Atlas Mountains Danny Two has just purchased five biros from an orphan. Only biros were sold above one thousand feet. To sell any other goods was illegal. He sat with the young boy and together they began to translate Low Barometer a less well known poem by Robert Bridges. Bridges had visited the area in the 1880s and his poetry was popular especially with orphans and other itinerants.
Danny Three has just arrived in Palmyra. As he sat amongst the ruins he began brewing the tea he had purchased in Southampton five days earlier. He was drinking it without milk as the milk machine had broken down and was awaiting a new motor from a supplier in Damascus.
Jill tapped Danny One on the shoulder and offered him some grapefruit juice. She was not aware of the cunning of the month and had spent the previous hour squeezing fresh grapefruits.
As they decided upon the translation Danny Two was given a slice of lemon by the orphan. He was aware of the illegality of citrus fruits at the altitude so he hid his snack from view.
A lorry carrying limes had crashed near the ruins and there were a large number of limes scattered on the road. A passing trader was helping the driver who appeared unhurt as the a few onlookers picked up the injured limes. A man of about sixty approached Danny Three and offered him a scored lime. He took it and thanked the man but realised his dilemma at once. Would it be sensible here in the wilds of Syria to combine black tea and lime? He pondered this question until the sun became low and eventually placed the lime in his pocket. Limes are a solitary fruit, he reasoned. The accident was probably caused by their multiplication in the first instance.
Danny Two returned from the mountains. He was directed to the Castrol town by the orphan as it was thought to have a hotel but he found nothing except shacks made of Castrol cans. His enquiries revealed that some years previously a coach full of Castrol enthusiasts broke down where the town now stood. As a gesture of thanks for arranging another coach to the coast the Castrol collectors bequeathed their entire collection of Castrol cans to the local population. Although no hotel exists Danny Two liked the effect that the colours of the cans had on the harsh landscape.
In Palmyra, Danny Three knew that he will never leave the ruins. In time he will become a tour guide and would have tea shipped out from Southampton.. But tragedy struck as he was found dead at the crossroads. No cause of death was established and he was subsequently buried under a milk machine. Its part due from Damascus never arrived and in time the machine was moved.
His grave was quickly forgotten although his likeness appeared on maps of area.
As Jill taught her carp to smile, Danny One caught the train that passed their house. He liked to see her teachings at speed and only the train could provide this service.
One thousand yards east of Southampton Bus Station on the corner by the traffic lights was the Café Laura. Its owners Mr and Mrs Orchard had recently visited Syria as part of their retirement grand tour.
When in the country they visited Palmyra and purchased a map. It could be found on top of Mrs Orchard’s collection of Agatha Christie novels.
Danny One was a designer of escape roads. He worked in a office in Three Bridges which overlooked the railway station. To the left of the right hand window hung his calendar. It had views of Porlock Hill in Somerset. The view (of escape road seven) has not been changed since August and because of this the weather had remained hot. Christmas trees are wilting in the heat and Santa Claus fatalities had been reported. Global warming was blamed but Danny One was aware of the truth. He shared his knowledge with the carp who are amused.
In the 23rd of December Danny Two arrived at Mudawara on the Hejaz Railway. He was informed by the stationmaster that there would be no trains either way for eight days. External carriage cleaning was to blame. Resting Danny Two carved a model of Neuschwanstein from the station bench and sent it to his mother the next day.
The stationmaster sorry for the traveller dressed all in orange invited Danny Two to spend the festive day with his family. Gifts were exchanged and as well as a jar of honey Danny Two was given the guardianship of the stationmasters lazy brother Clayton and a rusty Fiat Lugana which had seen better days. The stationmaster explained that Clayton (when slim) had harboured ambitions to travel after missing his stop one day.
He had however grown fat on camel meat and now middle aged had not been seen outside of the town for some fifteen years. His idea of travel consisted of collecting destination travel boards from the carriages of the trains that stopped at the station.
Danny Two named the car Hermes and he and Clayton left Mudawara on the day before the new year.
Their initial destination was Akaba via Rumm. In the boot of the car they had enough honey to last them until May and a dozen snails who spoke both Phoenician and Assyrian. Sadly one was accidendly crushed on departure so a replacement one specialising in Babylonian was contacted and agreed to join them at Bir el Mashi on the second day of February.
At Christmas, Mr Orchard as a present gave his wife three handsome volumes of Agatha Christie novels bound in dark maroon with gold leaf. This pleased Mrs Orchard immensely as her entire collection of Christie novels attracted a great deal of dust and the associated mites.
She asked her husband what should become of the now replaced books. After consideration he suggested that they should bury them in a time capsule for future generations. He also noted that dust would not be a problem and that mites disliked darkness especially if it exceeded a five year period.
As the sales were on in the Southampton City Centre they went to Herbert’s The Time Capsule Specialists and purchased one for a reasonable price. They also received an extra one as it was a buy one, get one free offer.
The following day Mr Orchard buried his wife’s entire collection of Agatha Christie novels in the time capsule at the end of the garden near the entrance to the Café Laura. What he was not aware of was that Mrs Orchard had been using the map of Palmyra as a book mark since returning from Syria and this too was buried in the time capsule between pages forty six and forty seven of Ordeal By Innocence.
As Danny One left his office for the Christmas break Mrs Perkin the office cleaner dressed in her mauve housecoat passed him in the lift. They exchanged greetings of the season and shared a mince pie. By the time Danny One had reached the railway station Mrs Perkin had begun cleaning his office.
She considered him an untidy sort of man and placed his plans for future escape roads in the wall safe. It was as she was leaving that she noticed that his calendar on the wall was still showing the month of August. Without consideration she removed the August sheet and almost immediately Sussex was covered with five inches of snow.
Swooping swallows froze in flight and the harvests were cancelled. When Danny One arrived home some hours later the whole country had been covered by snow which was causing chaos. The bankruptcy of a number of deckchair vendors was announced on the news that evening.
The smiling carp were frozen solid in their pond and Jill had to cut each of them out and had placed them in the fridge next the Uruguayan yoghurt.
The carp although rather cold were still much amused.
Two months after the time capsule was buried by Mr and Mrs Orchard in their garden in Southampton Danny Three was found alive and well living on the banks of the Euphrates some one hundred and fifty miles from Palmyra. He had married a local woman named Amalia and was so proud of her beauty that he kept his desert bride from public view only inviting specialised guests to view her.
Unknown to him, his resurrection had caused problems elsewhere. The authorities in Palmyra wondered who had been buried under the milk machine. They could not locate the grave as the machine had been removed and the contractor who had completed the task was now living in El Salvador. They authorised an emergency census of the inhabitants of Palmyra but as normal there were six thousand, nine hundred men women and children and three dogs. Experts from Damascus were brought in but to no avail.
The mystery was not solved.
Another problem caused was to the dust mites in the time capsule. It is well known that dust mites are very fond of ruins especially Palmyra. In the sealed darkness of the capsule they had become attached to the map of Palmyra and had began to worship the likeness of Danny Three.
Elaborate rituals were devised to occur once a month and on selected feast days .Unknown to mites the discovery of Danny Three and his wife would have severe implications on their High Church views as Mr and Mrs Orchard had decided to dig up the capsule and join them in the darkness as they had become fed up with the travel delays in and around Southampton and wanted to be rediscovered in the distant future when travel delays had been consigned to history.
Whilst letting selected visitors gaze on the beauty of his wife Danny Three carelessly let one take a photograph of her when his back was turned. Mr Shaw the photographer had then with equal carelessness left the photograph on a bar stool in the smoking room whilst crossing the Red Sea by ship.
It was found by Danny Two an hour and thirty six minutes after it was lost who immediately considered Amalia the most beautiful woman he had ever seen and vowed to protect her honour to the ends of the earth.
On discovering Mr Shaw’s deceit Danny Three removed his wife from their home on the banks of the Euphrates and headed for the desert. He dressed Amalia in a dull yellow to camouflage her from prying eyes. When he reached the desert he was informed by the leader of a camel train that he had used the wrong shade of yellow for the environment they were in. His choice of yellow was more suitable for the northern deserts of the country. To reach this desert and live in partial obscurity Danny Three and Amalia would have to cross the Red Sea.
Being a benevolent man he sold Danny Three a quantity of red cloth (for the Red Sea crossing) and some dark blue cloth (Amalia liked walking the decks of ships at night).
In the middle of the Red Sea there is an unchartered island which was first noted by a drunken fisherman in 1508 who neglected to report his findings. It has been forgotten ever since.
On the first day of April Danny One was asked to design two escape roads in Dhaba on the shores of the Red Sea. As there was still snow on the ground he accepted but Jill did not accompany him as she was still thawing out the carp. At Cairo airport whilst changing planes he brought her a book on Margaret of Anjou and ordered her a new fridge as a surprise.
Danny Three and Amalia boarded the SS Qual’At Ja’Bam from a small undignified jetty half a days journey from Suez. As they boarded the ship Danny One’s plane flew overhead. Danny One did not see them as he is reading about different types of sand.
The long days of travelling had made Danny Three quite hungry. He accepted a plate of fresh lobster and limewater at the first meal but this made him ill as the lobster had ingested some diesel oil during the hours prior to its capture. The ships doctor confined him to their cabin for at least a day as diesel poisoning could be quite serious in areas near to the Indian Ocean.
Amalia grew bored and longed for the night so she could wear her blue cloth. Unfortunately she was colour blind and wore her white one (for artic journeys only) instead. She walked the around the decks of the ship eight times (which was the custom when sailing on the Red Sea) and settled near the bow to view the stars.
It is then that Danny Two spotted her. He was in the same circumstance. Clayton too had had the lobster (washed down with some butterscotch) and lay unwell in the Fiat Laguna with two of the snails.
As they were stowaways the ships doctor had not been informed mistaking Clayton’s groans as noises from the aged engines of the ship.
They had been translating some early poems of Robert Bridges into Koine Greek and prior to Clayton’s malady had been working by the light of the sun.
As it was now night he was working by the light of a blowtorch that he had purchased at a souvenir stall in Salt along with two postcards.
Danny Two held the photograph of Amalia towards the blowtorch and recognised her likeness. He approached the woman and introduced himself to her pledging eternal allegiance. Asked if there was anything she required Amalia noted that she would like to visit every washroom on the ship to study her beauty in the mirrors.
Until daybreak he and Amalia visited every washroom on the ship (except those in the engineering quarters which had reported a blockage). They even visited the cabin where Danny Three lay ill. They found him vomiting but Amalia did not care as the interior lighting of the washroom was superb and almost paralleled the washrooms of the restaurant for subtle restraint.
When a mirror was found to be agreeable she ordered Danny Two to unscrew the unit and carry the mirrors around as she went from deck to deck. When the sun rose he counted that he had collected nearly two hundred mirrors of varying luminosity but he did not complain as he packed them into the boot of the Fiat Lugana next to the bilingual snails and the remains of the honey.
He returned to his translation of Bridges a happy man and looked forward to telling Clayton of his adventures that night. Amalia had noted that the depths of inland seas had always been of a great fascination to her so as a surprise he brought a depth gauge at the ships shop and intended to examine the depths of the sea at various times during the day so he could publish an average depth graph to present to her (framed and signed) that evening.
During their delirium Clayton and two of the snails decided to get some air on deck. Whilst leaning over the guard rail all three noted the unchartered island first seen by the fisherman in 1508. Although not drunk they too ignored the island and the lone figure waving frantically on the beach. Their sole occupation during the minutes passing the island was to return the remains of the lobster to the deep where had previously lived
The lone figure that they had ignored was Danny One who had foolishly gone to sleep on his pedalo whilst reading the latest Construction News and was now marooned on the unchartered island in the middle of the Red Sea.
Danny Three although feeling better could not see his reflection in the washroom so he went back to bed thinking he would look better when he awoke again.
Unaware of the gravity of his situation Danny One reasoned that he would be missed at dinner that evening (Scampi and Fresh Oysters followed by an Eton Mess) and that tomorrow a rescue craft would pick him up from the island. He would be able to write an account of his adventure for the spring issue of the Construction News.
Danny One had been in a tight spot before as during a scouting trip in the Brecon Beacons he had become separated from the troop and had become totally lost.
With only a compass as a friend he had been brought up by a herd of sheep for the next three years.
He looked around him and noted an abundance of rare spices some not indigenous to the area and seventy three species of primroses. He made a shelter for the night with the help of an electric carving knife that he had made for himself out of palm leaves taking tips from an article in the latest edition of the Construction News as well as his knowledge of scouting.
Although the hot and cold taps did not function as well as he had expected he settled down for the night only to be interrupted by the passing ferry.
What he did not know was that he had not been missed at dinner at the Hotel Wisdom as it had been invaded by sand lizards shortly after he had left for the beach. The guests, staff and two burned out writers had been moved to the Hotel Seven some miles away which although having a minor ant problem did not suffer from periodic invasions of sand lizards.
On the first evening after exploring the island which was only about the size of Castle Cary in Somerset Danny One settled down for dinner. He had Sea Bass lightly draped in Primrose leaves seasoned with Rosemary and Tarragon followed by Baked Apple and Cinnamon with chilled spring water.
One the second day he had Basking Shark which was divine but by the third day he decided that he was not going to be rescued so he sent a text of complaint to the owners of the Hotel Wisdom (The Malay Group in Singapore) and decided to build a raft to escape his captivity on the island.
Pedelo number 23 had taken a battering on the outward crossing but with a few improvements would be seaworthy again. By day four he secured the bow and had added a ballroom, a grand staircase as well as two cinemas.
He decided that with the favourable winds in the Red Sea that sail would probably be the best option as although the island was rich in natural resources there was not a lot of coal.
With a great deal of emotion he left the island (which he had named Carp Island) on day five. As he sailed away to his astonishment the island sank within minutes with only spouts of water seen at intermittent times to mark its existence.
Danny One sailed for nearly two weeks before ending up on a mud bank near a river in Central Africa where a rather odd colonel took an interest in his welfare.
Fully recovered Clayton sat on the deck sketching the Ile d’ Oleron bridge in Western France. Danny Two commended his choice of subject and suggested two further bridges in Bordeaux and Aix en Provence respectively.
He had not seen Amalia for over two days and was worried that she too had fallen foul of the diesel lobster. He need not have worried as she had not eaten the lobster choosing the Lemon Scampi instead.
But Amalia had a problem she had lost her key to the cabin.She had asked Danny Three for his but he had refused as he considered himself very near death as he could no longer see him reflection in the mirror.
He had also become aware that Amalia was colour blind and although dying appreciated the dangers posed.
Whilst Danny Three slept Amalia looked at her reflection in the cutlery she had stolen from the dining room. She was fond of the Edwardian knives but it was the set of six teaspoons that gave her the most satisfaction.
It was then she had an idea on how to bring back Danny Three from deaths door. That evening she drugged his limewater with a mixture only known to herself and various tribes in Persia.
As Danny Three slipped into what he considered his final sleep she secretly stole his cabin key and proceeded to the engineering quarters where she knew there were some mirrors in the washrooms.
She wore her oil coloured cloth as she did not want to be seen and arouse suspicion.
Danny Two had been correct in his warning to avoid the washroom area in the engineering quarters Holding her breath she stole into latrine number two and unscrewed the mirror taking a brief moment to appriciate her beauty in the soiled environment.
In good time she returned to their cabin and placed the mirror opposite Danny Three so he would see his reflection when he awoke.
The plan worked and in no time Danny Three and Amalia were promenading around the ship. It was as they passed the shop selling Mojave Mound Cacti that Danny Two spotted them again. It was the first time he had seen Danny Three who he considered a rather suave chap very much as he imagined himself.
As Danny Three was buying Amelia a dozen of these cacti the cloth covering her face slid down for a moment. It was the first time Danny Two had seen her beauty in the sunlight and he was overwhelmed.
All plans to translate Robert Bridges into Koine Greek were put aside.
As Danny One had quite a fair complexion he had become a little sunburnt during his voyage. He had used factor fifteen ignoring advice to use factor twenty five during Red Sea voyages. The colonel applied a special mud from the river to his sore head and arms which soothed the burns.
It was during this time that they found that that they had many interests in common such as the towns of the Thames Estuary and The Escape Roads of Lancashire.
They spent many hours discussing the commerce of these riverside towns and the colonel was thrilled when Danny One gave him a detailed map of the one way system in Southend on Sea on his birthday.
Although slightly perturbed at the colonel’s habit of executing his enemies and placing their heads on bamboo poles (the flies were dreadful) they became firm friends and a month later the colonel gave Danny One a Fiat Lugana and his complete collection of photographs of Gravesend.
In return Danny One gave the colonel his battered pedalo and extended the bridge on the port side so the colonel could see all the passing boats clearly as traffic was getting worse on the river.
When he left some two weeks later Danny One promised to return and build the colonel an escape road of his very own using a one in three gradient calculation.
Jill in the meantime was not worried at Danny One’s disapperance as she reasoned that it was likely that he was lost in Central Africa.
She shared her thoughts with the carp in the new fridge where they all now lived and as normal the fish saw the funny side of the situation.
Captian Luigi Titian was in his retirement year. He was the grandson of the great artist. Unfortunately due to a attack of St Vitus Dance he had been unable to paint anything but abstracts in the manner of the New York School and apart from one sale to a dying cleric in Port Said in 1970 had never sold any paintings.
Most of his finished works were given to Chief Engineer Bacon who burned them to keep the ship going. It was a much cheaper alernative to buying the normal fuel and after paying the captain a small remuneration he kept the remainder for himself.
In the thirty years he had been with the captain he had built an observatory in Northern Japan where he could watch the planets and had collected house bricks from all around the world.
Captain Titian when paid by the chief engineer just purchased more paints and proceeded to paint on all available surfaces. By 1973 he had covered most of the companies ships with abstract paintings and in the years since had covered the frigates of both Chile and Peru.
But he had a much greater passion, England. He had been master of the SS Qual’At Ja’Bam for some sixty years and had since 1958 been itching to visit the oldest democracy in the world. He ran his ship on the English model with fair play and cricket being the mainstays of any voyage.
The fifth test between England and South Africa in 1961 had actually been played on the main deck but was rained off after two days.
He also had a pet rabbit called Peter who had been born in Hampshire and was also longing for the country of his birth so it was on the fifth Tuesday of the voyage that the captain ordered the chief engineer to change course and head for Southampton.
The latter noted that he would need seventeen more abstracts and a copy of a Robert Motherwell to complete the voyage.
Captain Titian was in the middle of a Yves Klien (Red on Red) homage when the ship docked at Southampton. As soon as he finished his painting the captain ensured that the ship was safely secured and he and Peter were last seen catching the 93a to Bournemouth from the bus stop opposite the Cod Wars fish and chip resturant.
They were never (apart from a sighting in Norwich) seen again and on the following Friday declared officially dead. By the Monday of the following month his paintings began to fetch increasingly higher prices on the international art market.
Both Chile and Peru sold their frigates to collectors from around the world and Chief Engineer Bacon was soon able to retire to his observatory in Japan where he began to study an increasingly interesting planet called Kalpha9.
Just before he left the colonel’s lost villages Danny One received a letter from his office in Three Bridges noting that due to an earthquake in the area the planned escape roads would now not be required
As he drove along the jungle road towards the sea in the colonel’s car he turned left onto the Three Bridges bypass and headed home.
He was keen to see Jill again but deep down was a little concerned about the weather in Sussex.
But he need not have worried as a Mr Ross from Dorset had worked out the games that August had been playing and had reported the month to the authorities.
August had since been bailed by Magistrates pending further investigation.
The weather in the country had returned to normal and the carp were back in the pond although Jill was still living in the fridge as she had had the house decorated (for Danny One’s return) and had been told to allow time for drying.
Danny Two was troubled after seeing the glimpse of Amalia’s beautiful face and this grew worse when Amalia rebelled against Danny Three’s idea of wearing coverings to suit the environment and cover her beauty and adopted standard western dress fifty one days into the voyage.
He had retreated to the back seat of the Fiat Lugana and counted the doors. It was during this time that he noticed changes in Clayton.
Gone was puffyness in his face from eating too much camel meat. His thin wiry hair had seemed to becoming much more luxurious and longer and to the naked eye he seemed to becoming taller.
His dull inane eyes suddenly had a sparkle in them and he was fast developing a passion for mirrors spending a lot of time in the boot of the car and in latrines one and three in the engineering quarters (where the blockage had reached a critical situation)
By day fifty three the metamorphosis was complete. Clayton was now Amalia or at least Amalia mark two. The only difference was that the real Amalia favoured clothes from the major northern cities of Europe whereas Amalia mark two favored the traditional dress of Sicily and other islands off of the coast of Italy.
Danny Two married Amalia mark two in a ceremony off of the Cape Verde Islands on day sixty nine. It was attended by the whole ships crew as well as Danny Three and Amalia with three of the snails (the others had been involved in a mutiny on day forty four and had been banished to a small island where they hoped to set up a Christian community)
For their honeymoon they stayed on the bridge in considerable comfort and were given a tour of the ships navigational room.
As they came into Southampton at the end of the voyage what struck both Danny Two and Danny Three was the lack of shops selling specilised tea, There were plenty of shops selling coffee from around the world as well as plumming appliances as a sideline but no specilised tea shops
Enquiries at the customs desk noted that the nearest one was on Sunk Island many miles to the north of Southampton.
Within the year Danny Three and Amalia had opened up a specialised tea shop not far from the bus station. It had been an instant success with forty six customers on the first day alone.
It was agreed with Danny Two who had opened a specialised tea shop exactly opposite with Amalia mark two that Danny Three would sell teas from the Northern Hemisphere whereas Danny Two would sell teas from the Southern Hemisphere only.
They both agreed there would be no restrictions regarding the islands of the world.
The beauty of both Amalia’s came to the attention of the Tea Drinking Council and they were both featured in an advertising campaign which was the most successful since the Elsie Harding campaign of the mid 1920s.
Unable to be apart both Danny’s purchased pre-fabs in the east of the city and shared an allotment where they grew runner beans.
They were both in time elected onto the city council where they took charge of the green issues of the day.
About a month after Danny Three and Danny Two had taken complete charge of the green issues affecting Southampton and Greater Hampshire Danny One and Jill were listening to Beethoven’s Tenth Symphony on the wireless when they felt a heavy vibration.
They thought it to be an earthquake or the carp’s recent dietary problems.
They went to bed giving it little thought and it was not until the morning when Jill popped down to the pond that they became aware of the enormity of the situation.
The carp instead of their normal grins had a look of absolute astonishment on their faces although this did not last long as they began to chuckle amongst themselves soon after Jill‘s arrival.
What was reported to have happened was at two minutes past nine the previous evening the City of Southampton appeared to have taken off heading in the direction of Kalpha9 some fifty six years and four months distant.
As Danny One sat on the train that morning he read an account of the whole episode in the Three Bridges Gazette. It was reported that Southampton was never a city in Hampshire but a giant spaceship from Kalpha9 and was travelling in that direction.
Amalia was not only a very beautiful woman from Northern Persia but the captain of the spaceship and was also the Minister of Culture on Kaplpha9.
She was also very adapt at cloning herself when the need arose with other clones reported in Argentina and in the Artic Circle
Eastleigh and Chandlers Ford were now costal resorts and had had both built piers to receive the steamers from the Isle of Wight.
Both resorts were holding big band evenings that weekend and were in the process of ordering donkeys for the summer season.
The reason that Southampton had taken off the previous evening was that the inhabitants of Kalpha9 had become increasingly impressed at the variety of teas available in the city centre as well as the suburbs.
The councils green policies also helped them to make their decision.
When Danny One reached his office in Three Bridges he received a phone call from Amalia. She was interesting in securing his services as there was a large road improvement scheme in progress on Kaplha9 and this involved a number of very steep hills and as tunnelling was very expensive they had decided to built over the hills which necessitated the addition of escape roads
Danny One expressed an interest but noted that he would not be available until after Jill’s birthday the following Tuesday.
In 2018 whilst excavating near the crossroads in Palmyra a skeleton was found clutching a note reading ‘ Den Mussen Wireinseifen’ between its teeth. As DNA techniques had progressed rapidly the remains were soon identified as that of the itinerant writer Stephen Masefield author of works such as Walking with Doctors and Bicycle over Water.
He had disappeared some years previously whilst swimming in Lake Starnberg in Bavaria. As there are no known decedents his remains were returned to the sandy grave and today lie under a series of vending machines serving milk, limeade and Euphrates Water to thirsty visitors.
Fin
2003