THE GOLF-FATHER

ONE

'Mornin,' Mr. Alexander. I think it's going to rain.'

Shafts of sunshine which had been illuminating the crumbs on the gingham tablecloth in front of Jim Alexander suddenly vanished as his landlady spoke. He noticed that the crumbs looked different from the ones that usually adorned the breakfast table. The design, which had been the same for several weeks, had changed from being cheerfully modern into something dark and menacing. As for the sun disappearing, it was well known that his landlady could conjure up rain clouds at will.

Mrs. Harper teetered towards his table in the dining-room, a cylinder of ash from the cigarette in her mouth poised threateningly over the plate of porridge in her hands. Jim prepared for it to fall. A slight fissure appeared in the ash. As she reached his table Mrs. Harper inhaled greedily and the stump wilted slightly. She leaned over his shoulder, shaking her head in a resigned gesture. Miraculously, the coil of ash fell harmlessly to the right of his tea cup. Mrs. Harper gave a disappointed sniff and shuffled out of the room.

Jim was surprised at his good fortune. He poured milk onto the swelling mounds of porridge, reflecting how rare it was for Mrs. Harper to miss her target. Nevertheless she had succeeded in conveying the message that he was two weeks overdue with his rent. Mrs. Harper used a progressive signalling code. Three weeks arrears brought sacrificial burning of the main course of the evening meal; four weeks brought cancellation of all meals; eviction came after five weeks, accompanied, so it was said, by torrential rain, thunder and lightning.

Avoiding the eyes of Mrs. Harper's slightly dotty daughter, Camellia, sitting alone in an alcove, he asked the plumber who sat at an adjoining table: 'Any winners yesterday, Mr. Coyne?'

Mr. Coyne growled through his ginger walrus moustache: 'Not this week, Jim. I'm paying for that double I brought off last week.'

'Can't win them all, eh, Mr. Coyne?'

'That's right, lad-'

Mrs. Harper interrupted Mr Coyne's words, as she placed a plate of bacon and eggs in front of him. Jim noted with a pang that she placed her cigarette in an ashtray before serving the plumber, a polite gesture towards a respectable widower who paid his bill regularly.

'Everything balances out in this life, Mr. Coyne continued. 'If you 'ave a big win, you can expect a run of losses. It's only natural. Except, mind you,' he added darkly, 'that principle don't apply to the big financiers. They manipulate the odds so that they always win. Take my advice and never cross 'em. If you do, they'll make mincemeat of you.'

'I'm not likely to meet any, Mr. Coyne.'

'If you ever do, treat 'em with the same respect as you'd treat a poisonous snake,'

Jim nodded gravely. As a twenty-four year old failed actor, now dependent for his livelihood on a menial job, he saw little prospect of ever meeting, let alone falling foul of, Big Business tycoons. A tapping noise distracted him. Camellia was drumming the last rites on the upturned, empty shell of her boiled egg. Avoiding her melancholy gaze, he bolted the rest of his breakfast and ran upstairs to collect his raincoat. On his return, he found Mrs. Harper barring his way at the foot of the stairs. He swerved neatly past her, muttering a promise to clear his arrears of rent that evening.

Icy cold rain fell, as he waited for his bus. The first two buses roared past him with a full complement of passengers. The third, which he managed to board, stank pungently of wet clothing and unwashed humanity. However, as they crossed Hammersmith bridge, the sun suddenly stormed triumphantly through a barrier of cloud and brought the choppy waters of the Thames to scintillating life. His spirits rose as he told himself that for each one of the innumerable sparkling lights reflected from the river there must be a chance to make his fortune. Even the pressure of an umbrella handle in the small of his back failed to dampen his burgeoning optimism.

Three years had passed since he had made his final ignominious exit from the theatre. He salved his wounded pride by telling himself that failing in one branch of the entertainments industry, did not mean he would not succeed in another. One day he would devise a new game that would capture everyone's imagination and earn him considerable amounts of money. Ideas perpetually hovered in the air around him just out of reach ­ they were like invisible filaments just waiting to be grasped. If inspiration didn't come now- at this very moment- as the bus was halting with a squeal of brakes, it must surely come later that morning. If not then, perhaps after lunch.

In the tube train, pressed against a beautiful Eurasian girl, he tried to achieve a mental state described in a recent newspaper article as Creative Neutral. All one had to do was forget one's body and a seedbed of original ideas would unfailingly appear up in one's mind. The Eurasian girl was fluttering her dark eyelashes at him appealingly. 'Very squeezed today, is it not?' she whispered. He nodded, his mind disappointingly blank. He had gone into Creative Neutral and had succeeded in forgetting his own body only to become aware of hers. More passengers poured into the already crowded carriage. He consoled himself with the thought that soon that elusive message would slide out of his subconscious and provide him with the means to earn a fortune.

In the office of the firm of novelty merchants, Clagwammer and Pringer, Alf Jennings, the manager, was seated at his desk, surrounded by a sea of mail order coupons.

'That mermaid soap you suggested, Jim, is doing well. I told Mr. Pringer and he said to tell you he was grateful.'

Jim wished that Mr. Pringer, whom he had never met, would show his appreciation in a more tangible manner. Such as a raise in salary. Alf was looking at his wristwatch, one of a cheap consignment from Taiwan- the letters round the dial spelled Anthony Blair and the dial bore a caricature of the Prime Minister. 'Loads of orders for south-east London this morning, Jim. Deliver them and be back here at two o'clock sharp.'

This arrangement suited him- it would enable him to have lunch with Brenda, who worked at a nearby department store. He made his way round the rows of green shelving, selecting ink blots realistic enough to persuade fastidious housewives that their best table-cloth had been ruined, imitation dog excrement, itching powder and vast quantities of that eternal favourite with schoolboys- stink bombs. The merchandise, which included knives dripping with blood and whoopee cushions, seemed particularly revolting that morning.

'Jim, tell me what you think of this new line.' Jenning's voice interrupted his reverie. He and a commercial traveller were staring speculatively at two mechanical dolls moving together with a curious reciprocating motion on the floor. 'What are they doing?' he asked, then felt very foolish as the obvious answer dawned on him.

'Fucky-dollies. Popular with kids. Kind of educational, yer see. Six pounds fifty plus VAT.'

The salesman raised his bushy eyebrows, but remained otherwise expressionless as he gathered up the dolls in his hands, where they continued to twitch fitfully. He placed them in his suitcase and then rapidly produced a cornucopia of squirting buttonhole flowers, rubber balls with an eccentric bounce known as googly balls, china dogs with upraised legs which dispensed vinegar, and some Mark Two stink bombs. These last, he claimed impassively, were newly designed, with an improved performance guaranteed to disperse their disgusting odour over a much wider area than the obsolescent Mark Ones. Jennings, much impressed, ordered a considerable quantity- experience had taught him that the demand for stink bombs was constant and unvarying. Like their big brothers in the armaments trade, stink bombs could only be used once: the odour lingered on and so did the the yearning in the schoolboy heart for a repeat performance.

A googly ball rolled away into the corner of the office. Jim absentmindedly put it into his pocket.

On his way to make his deliveries, he grimaced as he passed a theatre in Shaftsbury Avenue. His downfall in the acting profession had been brought about by a fatal and irresistible propensity to giggle when called upon to pronounce solemn lines in a play. So far no cure had been found for the condition which had brought an abrupt end to his acting career. It was ironic, he mused, as he drove his van through crowded streets, that he had laughed himself out of his chosen profession into the joke trade.

Waiting for Brenda outside the department store when he had completed his morning's work, he compared her with the wax model in the window wearing a yellow bikini. Tiny bosom- Brenda was generously endowed. The model had a head with delicately-chiselled features- Brenda had a large generous mouth redeemed by a peach-like complexion. She was short on chic, long on dependability. During their brief acquaintance she had driven him frantic with desire. She had only one major flaw- an old-fashioned obsession with that out-of-date institution, marriage.

She enmeshed her hand in his as soon as she emerged from the store, impressing a sensuous message which gave him an erection. In a small café in a side street, Brenda pressing her thigh against his on the narrow bench, whispered: 'It's my turn to pay.'

He shook his head.

'How's the job?'

'Terrible! I must get out of it soon.' He told her about the dolls.

'Why don't you try to get back into the theatre?' 'It's no use. I giggle.'

'Can't you see a psychiatrist or something? You have a lovely speaking voice- it's such a shame to waste it.'

'Psychiatrists are for when you cry not for when you laugh.'

'But you could try.'

'I've decided to go into business on my own account,' he said gravely. 'I'm going to make a lot of money.'

Brenda looked slightly puzzled, then invited him totea the following Saturday afternoon, in order to meet her parents. He turned down the invitation, saying that he had an appointment to play golf. He arranged instead to meet her at Hammersmith tube station at seven o'clock Saturday evening.

*

Arriving at the municipal golf course, Jim surveyed the peaceful Surrey hills, with a pleasant sense of expectancy. The sun was warm. The flag on the first green some three-hundred yards away, waved lazily in a gentle breeze. The yellow bunkers protecting the green seemed as innocent as hollows made by a child's fingers. As he waited for his opponent to arrive, he basked in a private dream of effortless swings, putts of matchless accuracy and the tumbling of various course records. A tubby bald man sent a ball soaring into the blue sky, and as he watched it land in the middle of the fairway, an ingenious scheme entered his mind to aid the process of smuggling Brenda past Mrs. Harper's ever-watchful eye into his room that evening.

Bob Chedwick appeared, a lanky figure wearing an outsize red cap. He was trundling a formidable armoury of golf clubs which made his own spindly bag seem anorexic. Still, the little white ball was a great leveller, he told himself.'No jokes today, Bob,' he warned his opponent. 'Let's concentrate on the golf.'

Chedwick looked disappointed at being robbed of his favourite psychological weapon. He privately reckoned that his habit of telling unfunny jokes was worth at least six shots a round.

A young girl wearing tight-fitting blue slacks was addressing the ball. 'There was this guy...' Chedwick was saying- the inevitable prelude to one of his awful jokes. Jim watched the girl's swaying hips and gazed admiringly at the long sweeping arc of the ball.

'Go on.' he said resignedly. 'I promise not to laugh.'

The girl replaced her driver in the bag and strolled down the fairway with the bald man. As they waited to play, Jim listened patiently to the story- something about a bitch retriever who had been trained by a Scotsman to recover his lost golf balls. She was so unerringly successful that he decided to mate her with a dog and produce a new specialist breed of golf ball retrievers.

As they moved onto the tee, Jim, remembering that Chedwick was an accountant, asked him how to get started in business.

'You're better off with a safe job,' Chedwick advised him, knowingly.

'But suppose I get an absolutely stunning idea- how do I go about turning it into a commercial success?'

Chedwick gave him a sceptical look and told him to play off.

Carefully placing his elderly moss-stained ball on a tee-peg, Jim repeated to himself his private golfing prayer: "Let my head remain bowed and my club do its work without labour". As he took up his stance with the driver, Chedwick with devilishly impeccable timing delivered his punch line: 'And the bitch bit off the dog's balls and faithfully delivered them to her master.'

Jim's beautiful pattern of coordination dissolved, the ball sailed two-hundred feet into the air and landed with a resounding thump behind him.

Hard luck!' Chedwick grunted, as he despatched his own brand new ball in an accurate trajectory towards the flag. Jim sliced his next ball into the rough, but managed to reach the green with a five-iron. A miraculous twenty-foot putt evened the score.

'With that sort of luck,' Chedwick remarked enviously, ' you won't put a foot wrong in business.'

From then on, however, he built up a commanding lead, gradually weakening Jim's resistance with a withering bombardment of unfunny jokes. He was in the middle of one particularly tedious story, when Jim drove off on the eighteenth. It was his best ball of the day and as he watched it streaking towards the flag he felt as though some cosmic force had taken his destiny in charge and was about to propel him ever higher and higher towards dazzling success and riches. Even Chedwick's immodest crowing over the score card failed to dampen his spirits.

He was walking back towards the railway station, when two ten-year old boys leaped down from a stone wall and asked what it was like to play golf. Good-naturedly, Jim extracted his number-seven iron and judging the windows of adjacent houses to be at risk, offered them the rubber googly ball he had picked up at the office instead of a golf ball. Pointing to an oak tree, he challenged them to hit it with the ball.

A lad with shining pink cheeks played a creditable swing. The ball landed just short of the tree and darted off at a tangent. Both boys ran towards where it had come to rest twenty yards from the tree. They continued playing, with the ball dancing erratically, until they were both engulfed in helpless laughter. Jim retrieved his club and ball, said 'Good game, eh, chaps,' and set off once again towards the station.

More serious matters now began to occupy his mind as he considered his strategy for smuggling Brenda past Mrs. Harper's elaborate surveillance system.

TWO

'Open the front door very quietly and creep up the two flights of stairs. My door is on the right. I'll keep Mrs. Harper busy on the telephone. Ok?'

This was the third time Jim had tried to Brenda explain the tactic by which he proposed to get her undetected into his room. Unfamiliar with Mrs. Harper's strict regime, she couldn't understand why such an elaborate ruse should be necessary. Finally and somewhat reluctantly, she nodded compliance.

Mrs. Harper sat every evening in her sitting-room with the door open, her beady eyes monitoring the movements of her lodgers through the hall, aided in her vigil by a marmalade cat with extra-sensory perception. Mrs. Harper was no mean performer herself in this direction, her senses heightened by a fierce ambition to marry off her daughter to one of the male lodgers. The ban on girl friends was intended to make the law of supply and demand operate in her daughter's favour.

As he galloped round the corner to the telephone booth, Jim decided on a Scottish accent to lure Mrs. Harper from her observation post. To his consternation he found the telephone booth occupied. He prowled around it twice despairingly, before darting back to the house.

There was no sign of Brenda.

He cautiously entered the hall. Mrs. Harper was crouched over the television set like a disconsolate she-bear, stroking the cat. He ran upstairs and found Brenda sitting on the bed, rubbing her toes.

'There was someone in the telephone box. How did you get past the old girl?'

'I just walked through and up the stairs.'

'It must be a great TV programme. Normally a fly couldn't get through.'

'Are you sure she objects to your having a girlfriend in your room?'

'It's instant eviction- or castration, if you're caught. You're allowed to choose.'

'That's very unreasonable, when you've paid for the room.

Unfortunately, Jim remembered, he hadn't that week.

Brenda slipped off her jacket. Underneath she was wearing a grey skirt and white silk blouse.

'Never mind. We're safe now- you look wonderful in that outfit.'

'Why, then, are you trying to remove it?'

He kissed her and the token resistance quickly ceased.

The padded buttons at the back of the blouse created difficulty for his trembling fingers.

'Like this, silly.'

Brenda deftly demonstrated.

He kissed the delightful valley between her breasts as she slipped out of the garment..

'It's not a bad room, really,' Brenda exclaimed, with an elaborate show of indifference, examining theatre posters on the wall. 'Can I read your name on the cast list?'

'Afterwards, darling.'

More kissing, this time with an encouragingly fervent response.

'Jim, I do wish we didn't have to be so furtive about everything. Sneaking up the stairs like that seems so sordid.'

'We'll go to a hotel next time.'

Brenda looked pensive, as she lay back on the pillow, topless, but still wearing her skirt. She had clasped her arms around herself protectively.

'Jim, do you know what your trouble is? You haven't achieved your full potential.'

'Any moment now, darling.'

'I'm talking about your acting career.'

Unzipping the grey skirt wasn't difficult. Removing it without Brenda's cooperation was.

'Don't worry, my sweet. My head is bursting with plans.'

'For seducing me but not for marrying me.'

'My darling, we don't have enough money to get married. But soon I'm going into business and then...'

'Then what?'

'Then we'll get married.'

The magic word brought instant cooperation. Suddenly, just as the citadel was about to fall, Brenda pleaded: 'I want you to recite something romantic before we make love.'

'Recite what?'he enquired distractedly.

'Anything. I always want to remember this night. Something from one of your plays- anything.'

His memory refused to function. All he could resurrect from a remote corner of his mind was the Gettysburg speech. 'Four-score-and- twenty years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal...' His voice trembled, as he intoned the peroration: 'That government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.'

Abraham Lincoln's speech was never more rapturously received. Minutes later Brenda was giving little ululations of happiness. Drifting off to sleep with her in his arms, Jim blessed the memory of a man who had suffered an even worse fate in the theatre than his own.

The alarm clock rang at six o'clock. With some difficulty Jim persuaded Brenda to get dressed. It was raining, so he grabbed an umbrella and conducted her stealthily downstairs. Huddled together in pouring rain, they started to walk towards Hammersmith, where they found a taxi to take Brenda home. Jim arranged to meet her for lunch the following day.

He then set off over Hammersmith Bridge in a series of wild, exultant leaps. his sense of well being prompted him to break into an imitation of Gene Kelly's famous umbrella dance routine. He skipped from pavement to gutter, to the tune of "Singing in the Rain", using the umbrella as a pivot. Even this was insufficient to express his delight. Shortly afterwards, when the sun broke through, enveloping the red brick houses along Castelnau in a warm glow, he found the rubber googly ball in his pocket and using the upturned umbrella as a golf club, aimed the ball at a distant lamppost. Racing up to it again, he swung the umbrella again and hit the ball into a distant front garden. He was searching for it behind a privet hedge, when he heard the words: 'What do you think you are up to, my lad?'

A bluff, red face under a policeman's helmet confronted him across the hedge.

'I've lost my ball, constable. I was playing golf and the ball bounced in here.'

'Golf, eh? A golf course is the proper place for golf.'

'I was just practising with an umbrella and a rubber ball.'

A puzzled expression spread over the constable's face. 'Let's see what you were up to.'

Jim obligingly demonstrated with his umbrella and sent the ball bouncing crazily across the road.

'That's an odd sort of ball, isn't it?'

'It's a googly ball. Mustn't make the game too easy. There aren't any bunkers as in real golf. Care to have a go?'

The policeman looked up and down the deserted street. 'Come on, then. Let's have your brolly. I play to eighteen handicap.'

He took expert aim, the ball homed towards a lamppost, narrowly missed and ricocheted off a wall into the road. With the umbrella held behind his back, the constable marched ruminatively towards the ball. Jim, imitating his stride, walked beside him.

'Now what?' the policeman demanded.

'Carry on until you hit the lamppost. I'm counting your strokes.'

After seven strokes and six oaths he succeeded in hitting his target.

'O. K., your turn,' he grumbled.

Jim swung the umbrella. A sudden gust of wind helped him to achieve a direct hit.

'A hole in one,' exclaimed the astonished constable.

Again he scanned the empty street. Then twitching his shoulders, playfully, he declared: 'O.K., you're one up with seventeen to play.'

At the top of Castelnau, with the score even, they parted. Jim returned to his lodging-house. The policeman ambled off, wearing an amiable expression, in the direction of Barnes Common.

*

As Mrs Harper served Jim breakfast that morning, she declared, her eyes narrowing into slits: 'You were up unnaturally early for a Sunday morning, weren't you.'

'Thought I'd do some jogging. It's made me hungry- do you think I could have another plate of porridge?'

'Well, I dunno,' she grumbled.

Shortly, she returned, cigarette in mouth. In the process of serving Jim with his porridge, she scored an impeccable bull's-eye with her ash.

He flinched and scooped it out with a tea spoon.

Mrs. Harper removed herself to the window, where she appeared to be scanning the garden.

I thought I heard strange noises in the night,' she said, peering through the window. 'Randy tom cats, I shouldn't wonder.'

Jim countered: 'You can't go against nature, Mrs. Harper.'

'I can and I will,' Mrs. Harper returned grimly and stumped purposefully out of the dining-room.

THREE

Crisis had hit the firm of novelty merchants, Clagwammer and Pringer. The technologically superior Mark Two stink bombs ordered from the traveller had not arrived on time. Alf Jennings ordered Jim to carry out an immediate spot check of the dwindling stock of Mark One stink bombs. He was full of apprehension, in case they should run completely out of their best-selling line.

Jim was complying with this command and eating an apple, when it suddenly occurred to him that the innocent game which had amused two small boys and a London bobby, might attract a larger following. After all, it had the considerable advantage over ordinary golf that one could play it in any quiet street or cul-de-sac, without having to pay a green fee or join an expensive golf club. There was one drawback- the umbrella handle he had used had become badly scuffed- but this could be overcome by using an umbrella handle made of hard rubber and shaped like a golfing iron. It would be simple enough to make up a kit consisting of a dual-purpose umbrella, some googly balls and aset of instructions.

He decided to consult Bob Chedwick, who worked in the same building. As soon as Jennings left the office, he telephoned Brenda to cancel his appointment for lunch.

'Do you still love me?' she enquired anxiously.

'"I love thee freely as men strive for right".'

'Oh, say that again. It was lovely.'

'See you soon,' he said hastily, as Jennings returned through the door.

'What's that flaming apple core doing on my desk?'

Jim tossed it into the waste paper basket.

'Alf, how would you set about marketing a new game?'

Alf gave a world-weary titter, sat in his swivel chair and slowly rotated it.

'Mr. Pringer might be interested, if you've invented one.'

'I think I'll register it first.'

'OK, Jim,' Alf said acidly, 'that's your business. But remember the firm has first call on your time. You'd better get cracking on these deliveries.'

He handed Jim a sheaf of order forms and said peremptorily. 'Make up these orders and get on the road.'

Jim was already learning the hard lesson that anyone with a bright idea inevitably incurs the envy of his fellow men.

Before making his deliveries, he slipped upstairs to the office of Benson and Harris, Accountants, and arranged with Chedwick to meet him for a pub lunch.

Back in the stock room, making up orders into neat parcels, he was assailed with doubts about the rules of his new game. Then he remembered that countless millions of players all over the world eagerly submitted themselves to the disciplines of golf. They would no doubt just as unquestioningly accept the regulations he proposed to lay down.

'I think I'm onto something,' he confided to Chedwick at lunch, in between thoughtful gulps of Guinness. 'It's a kind of off-shoot of golf. I'd like to protect my idea before proceeding further.'

Chedwick chewed a slice of sausage for longer than was strictly necessary. After a while, he said: 'Old Tim Benlow, one of our clients, is a patent agent. I'll give you his address. If you want to go further after that, I'll introduce you to Max Benson, my boss.'

'Thanks. I'll see how I get on.'

'If you do decide to go ahead,' Chedwick added, with a speculative frown, 'I may consider putting in a little risk capital. I've a few bob in the bank.'

'We'll see,' Jim replied, non-committally.

Driving the van, he felt encouraged by the interest displayed by both Jennings and Chedwick. For the moment, though, he would follow this private dream on his own until he saw where it was going to lead.

*

'It's just a game, Mr. Benlow. Is it possible to patent it?'

Mr. Timothy Benlow, an old man with untidy white hair and flushed cheeks, replied: 'A game, eh? Games are big business nowadays. Let me see now- we can register the game and the set of rules- I presume it has rules. But the more widespread the protection the more expensive patenting becomes. Would you care to describe the game to me?'

Jim did so and was a little surprised by the reaction.

Mr. Benlow started to laugh, giving a series of puffy little explosions of laughter. His flushed cheeks grew redder and redder and then he started to cough and wheeze. Tears appeared at the corner of his wrinkled eyes and he became increasingly breathless, making Jim worried that his game was about to cause its first fatality.

'Are you all right?' he enquired anxiously.

'I'll be all right'- wheeze- wheeze- 'in a moment.'

Benlow's coughing and spluttering gradually decreased in intensity. He took a deep breath and produced two capsules from his top pocket, which he swallowed with the aid of some water from a carafe on his desk. He said, grimly, still heaving a little: 'Sorry for that little outburst, but I'm a golfer- ho hum (another painful shiver of merriment), and I was thinking about the likely reaction of the Professional Golfers' Association to this game of yours.'

Jim replied indignantly: 'I'm not in any way trying to belittle golf, Mr. Benlow. As a matter of fact I play it myself occasionally. This is just a little game that people can play when the mood takes them- in parks and in the street perhaps when there's not much traffic about. It might even improve the all-round quality of play by enabling people to practise their golf swing away from the course.'

Mr. Benlow assumed a solemn air, apparently deeply impressed by Jim's display of tolerance towards his longer-established rival game.

'You are quite right, Mr. Alexander. It could indeed.'

Taking a silver ball-point from his top pocket, he prepared to write on a blank piece of paper. 'Now what do you propose calling this game of yours?'

'Bun-golf,' Jim replied hesitantly. 'It's an acronym of British Union of Novices.'

'Good- good.' Mr., Benlow muttered under his breath, as he wrote. 'At least it acknowledges by implication that it has inferior status to real golf. We will protect the name of the game and the rules associated with the game and you will become the sole arbiter of what constitutes a genuine and true game of Bun-golf.'

Another quiver of laughter- more subdued this time.

'Should I call the whole thing off,' Jim enquired, a little intimidated.

'Mr. Alexander.' Benlow peered searchingly over the top of his spectacles. 'They laughed at the inventor of Monopoly. Why should you worry if I, or anybody else for that matter, laughs at you?'

He emitted a deep sigh, and twiddling his ballpoint between his fingers like a miniature golf club, enquired: 'Shall we include the use of a walking-stick in the all-embracing definition of the game as an alternative to an umbrella? It may possibly be played in countries with low rainfall where people do not carry umbrellas'

'I hadn't thought of that.'

'Now the ball- we can't patent that. A googly ball with a weight inside to give it an eccentric bounce is a common enough article. But you may, of course, insist on a regulation ball of specific size and weight on which the Bun-golf logo has been imprinted. Do you have a sign in mind?'

'A triangle, perhaps,' Jim ventured, 'to represent the angle of bounce?'

'Excellent,' Mr, Benlow responded and drew a triangle on his sheet of paper. 'We can register the sign, the name and the rules. One last question: do you want world-wide coverage immediately, or just the United Kingdom?'

'Just the United Kingdom for starters,' Jim said. 'I'll take out world-wide patents, when I have assured myself that the game will prove popular in other countries.'

Alf Jennings had closed the office when Jim returned. On his desk was a note which read: 'Jim, Mr. Pringer would like to know more about your new game.'

FOUR

Jim obtained a starting loan for his business from his father, who ran a small greengrocery shop in Fulmington, a small Sussex seaside town. At first he refused, pointing out that Jim had made a 'bloody hamus' of his acting career. But his resistance suddenly collapsed, when Jim's mother, a very large, determined woman, intervened on their son's behalf. Grumbling to himself, Fred Alexander rummaged behind a pile of chip baskets in the basement, removed a loose brick and counted out two-thousand pounds in crumpled notes.

'Good luck, son,' he said brokenly, 'And please don't blow it all on fast women and slow horses.'

His eyes lighting on a misshapen King Edwards potato in a basket, which seemed in his agitated frame of mind to resemble an umbrella, he offered it to Jim as a good luck token. Jim thanked him, but unable to see the supposed likeness, threw it out of the window on his way back to London. He spent most of his time during the journey designing an advertisement for his new game, to place in the local newspaper.

It was midnight when he let himself into his lodgings. As he entered the hall, Mrs. Harper's cat curled himself against his trouser legs and mewed ingratiatingly. Mrs. Harper, immersed in a late night tv program, looked over her shoulder and muttered from habit: 'You're still one week in arrears.'

'You shall have it tomorrow, Mrs. Harper.'

The cat purred appreciatively. Mrs. Harper murmured: 'In that case I'll make you a nice breakfast in the morning.'

Before hiding the money under the mattress, Jim extracted a week's rent and then, remembering his promise to take Brenda to a hotel, drew out a further hundred pounds.

The following morning, having paid his arrears, he was rewarded with a fried breakfast. Camellia hovered about his table, rolled her eyes beseechingly and then swept away in her flowing robes, like an ungainly butterfly. Mrs. Harper, her face looking naked without its customary cigarette, whispered, as she poured out his tea,: 'My daughter, you know, comes into a nice little bit of money when she's thirty.'

'She's a very attractive girl,' Jim answered politely. He was a little puzzled, because on a previous occasion Mrs. Harper had attributed Camellia's odd behaviour to the shock of being jilted on her thirty-fifth birthday. After breakfast, he telephoned Brenda and invited her to accompany him to Brighton.

'Are you sure you can afford it?'

'Absolutely. I'm going to be rich soon.'

On the train he was disappointed by her lack of enthusiasm for his new enterprise.

'It just isn't your style,' Jim,' she said in a slightly pained voice. 'You're simply throwing away your acting talents.'

'All I have is a talent for laughing at the wrong time. At least, going into business I'll have a share in the box office.'

'I'd rather you were a struggling actor than a discontented business tycoon.'

Arriving at Brighton railway station, full of impatient desire Jim whisked Brenda into the first hotel that came into view. Ignoring her whispered comment that the place looked down-at-heel, he signed them in as Mr. and Mrs. Evans, adopting a suitable Welsh accent.

The young man behind the desk enquired: 'Whereabouts in Wales are you from?'

'Aberystwyth.'

Handing Jim the key, the receptionist replied in a scornful tone: 'Aberystwyth is my home town. That's a funny accent you have. You'll find your room along the corridor- first door on your right.'

It wasn't a good start.

The room was small and dark and contained a rickety dressing-table, two narrow single beds covered with faded pink eiderdowns and a cracked handbasin. A shaft of light illuminated a print of the Regency Pavilion outlined against grimy wallpaper.

'It's grotty,' Brenda commented

'At least we don't have to worry about Mrs. Harper.'

Brenda sat at the dressing-table and combed her hair thoughtfully. She was frowning into the mirror.

He said suddenly: 'If you don't like it here, we can go and and book in at the Grand.'

Turning round on her chair, Brenda replied with dreamy sadness: 'It's not the hotel that worries me. I'm just wondering if we'll ever get married.'

'Of course we shall, darling. As soon as my new business is successful. Let's go for a meal.'

He ordered two bottles of wine in the restaurant and tried without much success to make her laugh at some of Chedwick's golfing stories. Back in the hotel, he unbuttoned the long row of buttons down the back of her dress, exclaiming: 'You're so beautiful, my sweet, my darling.'

They kissed with deep intensity and, locked in a passionate embrace, collapsed onto one of the beds.

'Get your clothes off.'

The words spoken in a foreign accent, came from the adjoining room.

They drew apart.

'Ooh, you cheeky sod.' More exclamations penetrated the thin walls. followed by muffled screams and heavy breathing.

'It's nothing, sweetheart,' Jim said reassuringly. But Brenda's hands were behind her, buttoning her dress with bewildering rapidity. She said firmly: 'I'm not going to make love with that disgusting noise going on.'

Jim's tentative suggestion that they should offer competition by making their own noises was indignantly dismissed. A further eruption of groans and squeals was followed by a frenzied feminine shriek: 'Not that way', evoking a basso profundo response: 'But datsavay I like it.'

Jim followed Brenda, as she dressed and made a hurried exit from the room.

They went to a cinema to see a film called Dracula's Lust.

Back in their bedroom Jim gave a humorous impersonation of the Count. But their subsequent love-making was again spoiled, this time by a fury of feline caterwauling just outside their window.

During the journey back to London by train, he said: 'Look, darling, I'm sorry about that rotten hotel. I'll make it up to you. I promise next time we'll stay at the Dorchester.'

'Don't worry, darling,' Brenda replied gently. 'I'm not worried about staying in posh hotels. As long as we have each other everything will be Ok.'

FIVE

Jim lost no time in registering his new company, Bun-Golf Ltd. He gave a week's notice to Clagwammer and Pringer and opened a bank account with the balance of the money his father had lent him. The bank manager, who had somehow formed the idea that Jim was a golfing professional, begged him for advice on his golf swing. Unwilling to disappoint him, Jim invented on the spur of the moment an authentic-sounding golfing tip, advising that the positions of the left toe and the right thumb should be exactly equal and opposite during the backswing. He left the grateful bank manager eagerly practising with a ruler.

A business directory led him to a firm called Thames Mouldings, where he ordered asupply of rubber umbrella handles shaped like golfing irons. After ordering some googly balls and placing an order in a local newspaper, he returned to his lodgings.

He spent a few hours puzzling over the rules of his new game. They must, he decided, be capable of inspiring legalistic, hair-splitting disputation- he had observed with other games that arguments often provided as much fun as the game itself. Handicapping occupied his mind, until Mrs. Harper's plaintive voice called him down to his evening meal.

He was eating a steak-and-kidney pie, when it occurred to him that the more serious street golfer might wish to abolish the googly ball with its added increment of chance, in favour of a straight-bouncing ball. He was puzzling over this, when Mrs. Harper enquired if he wished to have jam sponge pudding for his dessert, or prunes.

'Both', he answered absently, and as she disappeared muttering imprecations, he resolved to register both games. The game played with an ordinary squash ball he would call Gamp-golf.

It was a fateful decision.

At breakfast-time the following morning, Mrs Harper appeared to be in an agitated frame of mind. She stood at an adjoining table playing a kind of chess with the cruet, occasionally peering absently out of the window.

'Is it going to rain? Jim enquired politely, wondering if she was about to exercise her thaumaturgical powers.

'There's an unnatural lot of post for you this mornin', Mr. Alexander. 'Ardly room for anyone else's on the 'all table.'

'Thank you, Mrs. Harper. I'll remove it straight away.'

'Ave you been and gone and left your nice job?'

'That's right. I'm now in business on my own account.'

Mrs. Harper sniffed, as though she could smell mounting arrears. 'Well, I 'ope you knows what you're doing. Good jobs is 'ard to find these days.' She edged her way out of the dining-room, her demeanour expressing profound disapproval.

Jim took a swift gulp of tea and, with rising excitement, followed her into the hall.

On the mahogany hall table there were thirty-seven replies to his advertisement in the local newspaper. He carried them up to his room and began opening them. All but five contained cheques, postal orders and requests for Barclay Card and Access authorizations. He had not yet opened accounts with these excellent organizations, but proposed to do so that very morning. Two replies were from lady golfers who had mistakenly assumed he was selling umbrellas for use on the golf course. Another, addressed in error to Scanty Nighties, requested a size Fourteen See-thru in Passion Pink. A letter from the Umbrella Workers' Benevolent Society requested a subscription and another contained a card which said that Bunty's massage is guaranteed to reduce your golfing handicap. He composed a letter to all thirty-two of his customers promising delivery of Bun-golf kits within a fortnight and wished them many happy hours playing this new and exciting game.

He was particularly touched by one letter, which read; "I am a lonely widow, forty-two years of age and find it difficult, because of my shyness, to meet new people. I do believe Bun-golf will help me with my problem. Yours truly, Winifred Popple.

Just the thing for Camellia, he told himself. In fact, just the thing for everybody.

The next morning he placed an advertisement in one of the national dailies. If he could sell thirty-two Bun-golf kits by advertising locally, he could surely sell thousands by advertising nationally. The sale of a thousand kits would yield a profit of four-thousand pounds. But ahead lay minefields of government regulations and all sorts of financial complexities. It was time to consult an accountant. He arranged to meet Chedwick for lunch.

Bob Chedwick shook his head through the soup, the roast beef and yorkshire pudding and was still shaking it steadily when the coffee arrived. He explained: 'What you have got is a one-product company and a short-run success. What will you do when people get tired of playing your game?'

'You could say exactly the same about playing cards. I expect my game to go on for yonks.'

Chedwick heaved a sceptical sigh.

'O.K., if you're dead set on risking your money, I'll take you to see my boss.'

Max Benson, a short man with a large moustache, a small round face and gentle, discerning eyes welcomed Jim into his office.

'I believe you've developed a new golfing game.'

'That's right,' Jim admitted.

'Everything to do with golf seems to make money. But starting a new business is never easy. You'll be lucky if you cover your expenses in the first year.'

'That reminds me,' Jim said, 'fishing in his pocket for the bill relating to the meal he and Chedwick had just consumed. Does this qualify as a legitimate expense?'

Max Benson seemed impressed by Jim's promising signs of financial acumen.

'Hardly, but keep it just in case,' he said. 'Now where are your registered offices?'

'I'm operating from a private address at the moment.'

'Let me know when you've found suitable premises. Keep exact records of your revenue and your expenditure. I'll send young Bob over to you to advise you on how to keep a simple set of books. Incidentally, I used to play golf, but it was too far to drive at weekends.'

'The advantage of my game, Jim said proudly, 'is that the golf course is everywhere.'

He called in at the department store where Brenda worked, in order to acquaint her with his progress. Before he had a chance to describe the promising start to his new venture, she hustled him into an empty changing cubicle and engaged him in a passionate, clinging embrace.Five minutes later, he extricated himself and during the journey home composed a new advertisement based on Winifred Popple's favourable comment.

Strangers become your friends,

And the world your golf course,

When you play Bun-golf, the latest craze

That has enriched the lives of millions.

Send cheque for Bun-golf kit

To J. Alexander, the King of Bun-golf.

(Access or Visa welcome)

SIX

'I'm very good at screwing.'

Jim forgave the brash wisecrack- clearly a result of interview nerves. He had just told Sally Pratt, the applicant for a job as his asistant,that her duties would include screwing handles onto umbrellas. She had short black hair, a round smiling face and seemed keen to get the job. Her strong build and robust humour, he decided, would be helpful as the new business struggled into existence.

'OK, Miss Pratt, you're hired. You can start on Monday.'

The Bun-golf Corporation was now housed in a large wooden shed in the grounds of an old Victorian house occupied by a firm of solicitors. There was a desk, a filing cabinet and sufficient space outside for the packaging of umbrellas, balls and sets of instructions. Access to the main road was via a narrow, rutted path, along which the new secretary-cum-assembler was presently departing.

Filing the thirty-two letters occupied Jim for the next hour. He felt towards his first customers a deep sense of personal gratitude- their willingness to experiment with his new game had given him exactly the kind of encouragement he needed. He locked up the shed when he had finished his task, and walked back to his lodgings.

Entering the hall, he felt something brush against his legs, which gave him the impression that Mrs. Harper's cat was renewing its affectionate overtures. He looked down. Zig-zag piles of mail met his eyes. The passage-way was strewn with letters lying in irregular patterns as far as the stairs. They were all addressed to J. Alexander, King of Bun-golf. He gave a hiccup of excitement and started to gather them up in his arms.

'I'm not 'aving my house turned into a sorting office. It's a liberty!'

Hands on hips, his landlady stood observing him grimly.

'Sorry, Mrs. Harper- I had no idea it would be like this. I advertised in a national newspaper and look...success! SUCCESS! He gleefully flung a packet of letters into the air. The envelopes scattered like confetti; several lodged in the lampshade above his head.

'Success you may call it, Mr. Alexander, but I calls it gross impertinence treating my house as though it was a business office. You'll 'ave to take yourself off somewhere else.'

'Don't worry- the next lot will be addressed to my new office. Would you do me a favour and help me get this lot up to my room?'

She bent down and began to gather up piles of letters.

'How many would you say there were, Mrs. Harper- several hundred?'

'Thousands,' she returned grimly. 'Ere, 'ang on a minute while I get some pillow cases.

She returned shortly, carrying several patched and darned grey linen bags.'

Dramatically indicating the letter-filled hall, Jim said: 'Mrs. Harper, you see before you the opening salvoes of a great new business campaign that will create wealth and happiness throughout the land.'

She grumbled, as she stuffed letters into the pillowcases, 'Well, I wish you success of it- but I can see you going to prison, representing yourself as royalty.'

'Just king of my new game, Mrs. Harper,' he replied exultantly, 'just as sure as you're queen of this boarding house.'

Carried away by his excitement, he grabbed her round the waist and whirled her round the hall, scattering letters in the process.

'Ooh, I say, Mr. Alexander, what's come over you?'

Her chronic bad temper melting under the onslaught, Mrs. Harper gazed at him speculatively after he had put her down, and said: 'Upon my word, I'll have to put up your rent. I do believe you're going to be rich.'

*

'Darling, I can't see you this week- absolutely impossible. I'm up to my ears in P.A.Y.E., VAT, government bumf of all kinds and orders for umbrellas. And I've got a fire inspector standing right beside me... Yes, darling, I still love you. When things are organised, I'll be able to see you more often. Kiss, kiss, bye-bye.'

A bald, hatchet-faced giant in a long raincoat standing by the desk, his head nearly touching the ceiling, mouthed silent disapproval of telephone kisses.

'Now what about these fire regulations?' Jim enquired, scratching his head.

'You're clearly in breach,' the imbecile giant said gloatingly. 'But I won't take proceedings against you. I'll call again next week to see if you have complied.'

'Damn!' Jim said despairingly. 'I've only been in business for a fewdays. What do I have to do.?'

'You'll need one large fire extinguisher of the dry chemical variety, since you have electrical equipment. And you must have an alternative means of exit for your staff.'

'Staff? There's only one. What about the window- won't that do?'

'No- clearly not. You will need another means of egress. I suggest an alternative exit door over there- and it must be clearly marked with a red sign.'

'All right, Mr. Fotheringay. I'll attend to it. But if you would please go now, it would give me a chance to sell enough of my products to pay for your blasted fire precautions.'

'Only doing my job, Mr. Managing Director.'

He was alluding playfully to the plastic sign on Jim's desk. 'See you next week then.'

'Goodbye,' Jim answered in a weary voice.

He was immersed in a desperate struggle to keep his embryo business alive. The assembly, packaging and despatching of umbrellas and balls was simple compared with the task of coping with innumerable government regulations. He scarcely had time to think of Brenda. Sometimes, however, when he fell asleep exhausted, she appeared in a recurrent dream, posing in a transparent nightie, waving a Bun-golf umbrella. As he rose to embrace her, her image faded to the accompaniment of melancholy feline yowling.

Sally was in the yard, packing umbrellas into cardboard cylinders ready for despatch. She was a devoted slave to Britain's smallest business coporation, dividing her time equally between hectic sessions at the typewriter and the assembly and posting of the umbrellas. He went to the open door, glanced at her strong but shapely legs and shouted: 'How's the screwing, Sally?'

'Three-hundred so far today, Mr. Alexander.'

'That's enough to tire out most girls. I'm going out to buy a fire extinguisher.'

He purchased a fire extinguisher that looked as if it could stop a forest fire in its tracks. The shop next door sold computers. Did he need such advanced equipment in this early stage of his business? Instinct told him to get one as soon as possible. He purchased a popular model and after studying the manual decided that since Sally was QUERTY-qualified, he would let her handle the formidable beast.

That evening he studied the manual Max Benson had recommended called Management Techniques For The Smaller Manufacturer. Buy extra brain power it advocated strongly, if your own is wilting. He had no doubts that this was the case.

The shadows were falling, the birds fell silent, the book fell from his hands. He was facing a hushed and expectant audience in the theatre. The make-up on his face was melting and he was trying vainly to speak and unfurl an umbrella at the same time. Brenda, standing in the wings her face mute with anguish, appeared to be trying to warn him of some impending catastrophe. The umbrella obstinately declined to open; a googly ball fell on his head, bounced erratically along the floor boards and trickled into the footlights. More balls began falling in twos, threes and dozens, while the audience hurled themselves about in paroxysms of laughter. Someone in the stalls who resembled Mr. Fotheringay called mockingly: 'Managing director! Managing director!. The cry was taken up in chorus by the rest of the audience, as his umbrella remained obstinately stuck. An inner voice told him that the bombardment of googly balls and the verbal abuse would cease if he could manage but one small giggle; but his face was set solidly in a tragic mould. He suffered thus for an eternity, until a voice broke into his dream.

'Mr. Alexander, come down a minute- something on the telly.'

He bounded off the bed and leaped downstairs two at a time. Mrs. Harper was in the act of seating herself in front of the television. It was the tail-end of the news programme and a sprucely-dressed, fresh-faced young man was being interviewed.

'You were playing this game with an umbrella and a ball and the police accused you of causing an obstruction.'

'Yes, it was just a little harmless fun.'

'It highlights the fact that the stockmarket is not very busy at this moment.'

'Yes, rather. But we're hoping it will pick up when the next set of trade figures are announced.'

While the newscaster was giving the football results, Jim said: 'What was all that about, Mrs. Harper?'

She pushed the cat off the arm of her chair and said: 'Your little game is causing trouble. That gentleman you've justseen was playing this game with another gentleman and there was this bank robbery. The police car couldn't get through on account of it.'

'Why not?'

'There was this whole crowd of stockbroker gentlemen gathered around cheering them on.'

Jim gave a deep sigh of satisfaction.

'You'll be out of business when they ban your game,' Mrs. Harper said with sly malice.

'They can't very well ban umbrellas, Mrs. Harper.'

He returned to his room filled with a glow of satisfaction, believing optimistically that the story would give a fillip to his umbrella sales.

Next morning at breakfast, Mr. Coyne tugging at his collar as he read his Daily Mirror, exclaimed contemptuously; 'Financiers, I ask you. Playing like a lot of bleed'n kids in the street. No wonder the country is in such a mess. I wouldn't trust any of them further than I could throw them.'

He thrust his copy of the newspaper across to Jim, as Mrs. Harper appeared with a plate of porridge. The signs were propitious- her cigarette was unlit. The photograph showed a group of bowler-hatted men gathered around a lamppost. One of them was wielding a Bun-golf Corporation umbrella.

Jim smiled sweetly and returned the newspaper.

'Wouldn't it make you want to weep,' Mr. Coyne declared.

'As a matter of fact they're playing my new game, Mr. Coyne.'

'Really?'

Mr. Coyne looked hugely impressed.

'In that case, it's all right, Jim. 'I wasn't knocking your product. I just thought they might have better things to do during business hours.'

The Daily Telegraph carried a report, which said: 'Police cars speeding to the scene of a robbery in the City yesterday were held up for a few minutes by crowds which had assembled to watch a game of street golf. Bored stockbrokers were whiling away the time during a period of slack trading.'

SEVEN

A bright May morning. Warm golden sunshine filtered into the headquarters of the Bun-golf manufacturing company through a hole in the wall. Intermittent sounds of hammering and sawing echoed thunderously in the confined space of the wooden shack. The carpenter was preparing the ridiculous emergency exit door demanded by Mr. Fotheringay. Sally had just gone to the Post Office to buy social security stamps- it looked as though both employer and employee would be claimants in the near future. The flood of orders had dried to a mere trickle, in response to the latest hideously expensive advertisement.

Jim shuffled some letters irritably, then impulsively threw the plastic Managing Director sign into the waste paper basket. Chedwick had been right when he said that it was a flash-in-the-pan business. He had intended to telephone Brenda but refrained because he couldn't bear to tell her that his proud venture was on the point of collapse.

The stocky figure of Wetherby- of Wetherby and Bratby- his landlords- appeared on the uneven path outside. Wetherby hesitated between coming through the hole in the wall or entering the more conventional way through the front door. Having decided that the former might leave him vulnerable on some fine point of the law, Wetherby mounted the two steps leading to the front door and approached Jim's desk,

He gave anervous cough.

'Good morning, Mr. Alexander, you're aware that all your telephone calls pass through our switch-board.'

'Is it causing problems?'

'No. I've called to give you advance warning that a call is about to come through from the BBC. I told the operator to hold it until I had spoken to you.' He delicately fingered the black hairs plastered laterally across his balding head and added in a hushed voice: 'It appears they want to talk to you about...golf.'

'Golf, Mr. Wetherby?' Jim replied, surprised.

'I didn't know you were a golfing celebrity, Mr. Alexander. Perhaps we can have a chat about your golfing career over a cup of tea some time. I'll go back now and tell the girl to put them through.'

'O.K., thanks.'

Wetherby hesitated, as Jim lifted the receiver in readiness for his telephone call, then apparently inspired into a high act of courage, leapt through the gaping hole in the wall and made his way shakily along the path which led back to his office.

Jim heard a girl's husky voice, breathing with apologetic urgency: 'Mr. Alexander, we were wondering if you would find it possible to put in an appearance in our studio this afternoon. Peter Snow would so like to talk to you about your new game- er- Bun-golf. It's only for two or three minutes, you understand. But he's looking for a little light relief from the usually depressing subjects he has to discuss on the program.'

'Tell Mr. Snow I shall be delighted to accept his kind invitation.'

The girl told him how to locate the studio.

'No need to be nervous, Mr. Alexander.' she added. 'Mr. Snow will put you completely at ease. I'm sure you will enjoy it. Goodbye.'

'Bless you, BBC,' Jim exclaimed gratefully, as he replaced the receiver. Two minutes of television coverage could revive his fast-expiring fortunes.

When Sally returned from the Post Office, he said with a wide grin: 'Hold the fort while I slip away- I'm appearing on BBC television.'

On a sudden impulse he retrieved the Managing Director sign from the waste-paper basket. As he was getting into the firm's dilapidated van, he heard Sally shout: 'Which program?'

'Newsnight, Sally,' he shouted back, and drove to the Shepherd's Bush television studios.

*

'And now as a welcome relief from crime stories and a society beset with problems, we'll take a look at a new game which held up traffic in the City recently and is becoming a familiar feature of our streets and parks.'

Peter Snow furrowed his brow and favoured the cameras with a faint shadow of a smile, before turning towards Jim in the brightly-lit studio. Three whiskeys in a row had mellowed Jim and stabilised his mood of quiet confidence. He faced the cameras with the assured air of a man who has mastered the turgid sentences of Management Techniques For The Smaller Manufacturer. The pleasant thought crossed his mind that later that evening Mrs. Harper and her cat would be squinting at him through narrow, astonished irises.

'Mr. Alexander, your new game has given the police an added problem on a couple of occasions. Do you think that is fair?'

'As far as I know Bun-golf has only inconvenienced them on one occasion.'

'In Throgmorton Street.'

'That's right.'

'Why do you think stockbrokers were playing your game?'

'I think it has universal appeal, Mr. Snow. I suppose stockbrokers like it because it is about as unpredictable as stocks and shares.'

'Bun-golf is played with a googly ball and an umbrella. Why the umbrella?'

'Most people carry one at some time or another, and we all share this instinct for hitting a ball. Bun-golf gives people a chance to indulge that basic instinct without having to drive ten or twenty miles to the nearest golf course.'

Quizzical frown from the interviewer as he identified with a query supposedly in the minds of millions of viewers.

'The name is a little unusual, isn't it? Presumably, the game is played with a ball not a bun.'

'Ah! the BUN. That stands for British Union of Novices. You see it has been estimated that ninety-five per cent of golfers fail to achieve a handicap. My game is consolation for the hundreds of thousands of golfers who trudge miserably around a golf course scoring in excess of a hundred. They can play my game without fear of ridicule.'

'Is there an element of skill in the game?'

'I should think a professional would have a slight advantage. But the rules of the game give the average player a glorious opportunity to humiliate the scratch player.'

'Wouldn't you say that Britain has enough games of chance- Bingo, horse racing-the football pools?'

Perhaps Peter Snow had intended to end on a thoughtful note to justify the inclusion of a frivolous game on his essentially serious program. Unfortunately, this last question touched a deeply sensitive nerve which had remained dormant since Jim's last stage appearance. There had been no warning that a solemn question would be asked. As he attempted to reply, Jim gave anervous giggle. In his mind was the intention to say that the sole aim of his game was to give people pleasure. But for some reason the words would not come. Instead, he laughed; intermittently at first, then uncontrollably and finally, convulsively.

Peter Snow was regarding him with a faintly troubled expression. The cameraman's mouth was wide open with disbelief. Jim made some gurgling sounds, which counterpointed a series of frightful heaves affecting his entire bodily frame. Snow was now smiling a sympathetic, measured smile demonstrating concern for his guest, no doubt also shrewdly judging the effect on his viewing audience.

Sitting on a white chair, Jim turned to hide his tortured features from the camera, failed lamentably to coordinate his movements, rolled off the chair and on to the studio carpet where he lay in a crumpled heap, still laughing unrestrainedly. He tried to attain an upright position, pushed his rump into the air and lay helplessly, with his distorted, tear-stained face cradled between his elbows. Finally, still laughing, he managed to regain his feet and resumed his upright position on the chair.

Peter Snow enquired solicitously if he would like a glass of water.

'No, Mr. Snow,' (inhaling a deep breath)- 'I think I'm all right now.' A few more painfully suppressed stacatto chuckles.

'Well, thank you for coming to the studio, Mr. Alexander. I hope other people find your game as entertaining as you obviously do.'

'Thank you. I sincerely hope so.'

By the time Jim had negotiated the maze of corridors in the television centre and started to breathe fresh air in the car park, a profound reaction had set in. Deeply depressed, he started the engine of the van; it nearly stalled and he set off in a frantic series of lurches back towards Barnes. He had ruined a golden opportunity to publicise his new game, the one bright idea of his life. And all through that cursed penchant for giggling which had ignominiously ended his acting career. He had been humiliated in front of the whole country. He thought of all the people he knew who would enjoy his discomfiture. The world, he told himself mournfully, as he spiralled into a bottomless pit of self-pity, will display no compassion for the giggler. He carries his heavy burden alone.

Back at Barnes, he went to the Red Stallion and decided to remain there until the tv program on which he had just appeared was over. He ordered a beer and to hasten his path to oblivion poured in gin, whiskey and brandy. Meanwhile, watching the television screen above the barman's head, he accorded the actors in a soap opera a drunken accolade for maintaining their mirthless, deadpan expressions. By the time the Newsnight program had started he had collapsed in a drunken stupor.

Mr. Coyne, who came over to the pub every evening for his nightly pint, found him lying insensible in a chair. He woke him up and with great difficulty assisted him back to his lodgings. He told Jim the following morning that he had been mumbling something about giggly googly balls.

**

The following morning at nine o'clock Sally Pratt stood in the yard, trying to control a disorderly mob of photographers trying to push their way into the shed. A dozen or so reporters had already succeeded in gaining entry and were exchanging good-humoured badinage, while Jim tried to answer a constantly-ringing telephone. The carpenter, frustrated in his task of fitting the emergency door, had gone home in disgust. Several magazines, including the Radio Times, had telephoned asking for details of Bun-golf and its rules. Punch had informed him that they intended to publish a cartoon depicting him as the Laughing Cavalier playing golf with an umbrella. An irate golfer had rung him up from St. Andrews to tell him that he had brought the ancient and noble game of golf into disrepute. Brenda had left a message to the effect that she needed to see him urgently. Mr. Pringer had rung him up from the Bahamas and invited him to set a date for a business lunch, an invitation which he declined. He told the telephone operator that he would accept no further calls and faced the journalists crowding around his desk- one of them was clambering on top of his filing cabinet.

The Daily Telegraph asked if he thought his undignified performance on television had gravely harmed the image of British businessmen. He shook his head. Daily Express- 'Have you thought of playing your game with Union Jack umbrellas?'- News Of The World- 'We intend to tell the whole world about the scandalous goings on under those Bun-golf umbrellas.'- The Sun- 'Our Page Three tomorrow will feature topless girls playing your game- Daily Mail- 'Will Bun-golf improve our export performance?'- Daily Mirror- 'Is Bun-golf good for one's sex life?'- The Spiritualist- 'We are featuring an article that seeks to prove that Renoir's famous picture Les Parapluies was a clairvoyant precognition of Bun-golf.' Jewish Chronicle- 'Why not baigel-golf?'- The Morning Star-'Have you thought about the bitter class divisions your new game will introduce between those who can and those who cannot afford umbrellas.'

In between a blinding succession of flashes from the photographers' cameras and the thrusting of microphones in front of his mouth, Jim contrived more or less satisfactorily to answer most of the questions. By eleven o'clock the newsmen had gone.

He was replacing the telephone receiver after another call, when a pale, intense young woman wearing a long black caftan and mauve spectacles made a surprise entry through the emergency exit. She said she represented a magazine called Psychological Quirks and desired Jim to attend her flat in Knightsbridge for the purpose of finding out what made him giggle. He promised to consider her kind offer when he wasn't so busy.

Finally, just as he surveyed the empty shed with relief, a jaunty young man came in through the front door, twirled an umbrella in his hands, thrust the seven-iron handle in front of Jim's face to establish that it was a genuine Bun-golf product and requested him to play a televised game of Bun-golf with a famous golfer. Mindful of the publicity, Jim readily agreed.

'Perhaps Mr. Alexander, you will oblige with a little repeat performance at the start of the match.'

'Repeat performance?'

'As on Newsnight. We are going to feature you as the Giggling Golfer in our advertisement for a well-known brand of champagne.'

Jim refused, indignantly.

'Prime time on the box' the young man reminded him, with an ingratiating smile. Jim firmly shook his head. The young man took his departure, saying that he would soon be back with another offer.

'What do you make of it all, Sally?' Jim asked, wiping his brow.

'Gee, Mr. Alexander, I think you've hit the jackpot. All that publicity. You were a wow last night- your giggle is so infectious. All my family started laughing and couldn't stop.'

'It's a weakness, Sally, ' Jim confided. 'It completely ruined my stage career.'

'Well, I bet it will be the making of this one. We're going to get thousands of orders. We're going to need bigger premises.'

The telephone rang. Sally answered and then putting her hand over the mouthpiece, announced: 'Bunny magazine wish to know if you are prepared to change the name to Bunnygolf.'

'Certainly not,' Jim replied indignantly. 'Tell them to hump off.'

Sally spoke sweetly into the telephone. 'He'll consider your suggestion very carefully.'

'I told you to tell them to hump off, Sally!'

'Bunny magazine has an enormous circulation. We don't want to antagonise them.'

Jim looked at Sally with a new respect. 'Absolutely right, my girl. As of now you're promoted to public relations officer.'

The telephone was ringing again.

Suddenly, he realised that he was going to need more staff, bigger premises, more finance.

'I think I'll go and see my accountants,' he said thoughtfully.

However, he was talking to himself. Sally was busy assuring the editor of another famous women's magazine that two stretches of Bun-golf a day was an excellent way of reducing the waistline.

***

Max Benson wrinkled his face into an engaging grin as soon as Jim entered his office, and enquired: 'Expansion problems?'

'That's right, Max.'

'Saw you on the box- you were a riot.'

Jim pulled a face and said: 'It was a disgraceful performance. But I've had reporters by the score enquiring about the game, so with any luck I shall be getting orders for thousands of umbrellas. Unfortunately, the firm who normally supply me have other commitments and can't take orders in quantity.'

'Don't worry, my lad. We'll buy them up.'

'We?'

'I'd like you to appoint me your financial director.'

Max Benson had the look of a cat who has just sighted an endless ocean of cream.

'Where will the money come from to buy an umbrella factory?'

'Loan stock. I'll arrange everything. We'll form another company, Bun-holdings, in which Iwould like to purchase an interest. We'll discuss the details tomorrow.'

"Buy Brains" the book advised.

'O.K., Max, it's getting too big for me

to handle. You're in.'

Jim's business career was in full flood. Finance had become available to expand umbrella production, but orders were continually outrunning supplies. Having been made so dramatically aware of the power of the media, he had naturally ordered the public relations department (now headed by Sally) to keep him in touch with all newspaper reports on Bun-golf. He was gratified one morning to find that his game had won honourable mention in a third leader of The Times.

'Britain,' that august organ declared, 'has always followed an unorthodox path towards greatness. The International Monetary Fund recently predicted that Britain would soon again run into a balance of payments problem. Instead, by one of those curious sand-devils of history which confound prophecy. we find ourselves in the midst of an umbrella-led export recovery which has provided us with a healthy balance of payments surplus equivalent to the North Sea oil bonanza we are so often accused of squandering. Not the least of several debts which this nation owes to Bun-golf is that it has succeeded at long last in abolishing class divisions and provided us instead with a much-needed sense of national unity and purpose. It is not without significance that our loss of Empire coincided with a decline in our prowess at another game invented by our island race- football. In gratitude for the heaven-sent opportunity we have been granted, let us therefore strive to excel both at home and abroad at our new national game, Bun-golf, and thus retain and sustain our newly-won self-confidence and pride.'

The same newspaper carried a photograph of the Minister for Employment waving a Bun-golf umbrella. The accompanying report, under the headline Industrial Peace In Our Time, stated that he had challenged the Minister for Sport to a game of Bun-golf in Parliament Square.

The new game had spread like a miraculous and beneficent plague to every corner of the United Kingdom and was steadily making its way through the European Economic Community. Charladies whacked their umbrellas through deserted streets in the early morning; workers played on their way to and from offices and factories. In the small hours, drunken revellers hit- and frequently missed- the elusive ball. No game had ever achieved such immediate, totally captivating, popularity. As the Times leader had pointed out, its appeal was universal and virtually classless. The Duke played with his gamekeeper, the chief executive with his junior clerk; soldiers played with their officers. Prince Phillip had obligingly played a 'stretch' of Bun-golf along the Mall. Class-barriers had wilted under a euphoric wave of good will and a healthy spirit of competition.

The Daily Telegraph, initially sceptical of the new game, commented that in spite of the prodigious amounts of time and energy being spent on this slightly ridiculous pastime, industrial production had actually risen. It offered the suggestion that this was because expanded human contact allowed both sides of industry to discover each other's problems.

Jim put down a copy of The Sun- it carried a picture of a busty bathing beauty posing with an upturned umbrella- and turned his attention to the problems of keeping track of his fast-growing business empire. He had a controlling interest in seventeen umbrella factories- twelve in the Far East- five plants producing the modified handles, and twenty googly-ball factories, five of which were now producing straight-bouncing balls for the game's off-shoot, Gamp-golf, which was also becoming increasingly popular. Several magazines had sprung up, entirely devoted to the Bun-golf craze. Inevitably, because of the game's extraordinary success, there were some bizarre, and in some cases, unwelcome spin-offs. One of them was a troublesome and vociferous Left Wing movement more militant than the left wing of the Labour party had ever been. The cause of their disaffection was a persistent shortage of left-handed handles, leading to insurmountable problems for left-handed players. A compassionate and concerned Mr.McSnee- himself righthanded- had passionately espoused their cause. With his encouragement they had formed an action committee demanding the establishment of a Sinister-Dexter Relations Board dedicated to the total elimination of bias in favour of the congenitally right-handed. Frustration with the shortage of left-handed umbrellas had led to the discovery of other vast areas of human experience which discriminated against left-handed persons. McSnee had recently addressed a letter to Jim containing a deeply moving appeal on their behalf.

Jim was also in constant demand for opening High Street tournaments, judging competitions for the loveliest lady Bun-golfers and adjudicating obscure points arising from the prolix rules of the game he had designed. This last duty had become so onerous of late that he had set up a special court to which appeals could be made on the telephone at thirty-eight pence a minute. It had proved surprisingly lucrative. No one, apparently begrudged money that might overturn the result of a game on some hair-splitting technicality. A tabloid newspaper had featured an incident when a telephone call had saved a player from being whacked to death by an irate umbrella-wielding opponent. It happened somewhere in Yorkshire. There had been a heavy wager on the game. The winning ball had apparently landed in some dog excrement, which both affected the angle of bounce and spattered the other player. A timely telephone call to the referee on duty had saved the game and the wager. The headline: SHIT HITS FAN had been examined by the Press Council, who excused the editor on the grounds that a Bun-golf contest was extremely emotive and that in any case the word 'shit',a widely-used Americanism, was now largely shorn of its expletive significance.

The financial side of his fast-growing empire was something of a mystery to Jim. There was an interlocking jig-saw of companies all of which were rapidly accumulating cash reserves in preparation for the opening up of new overseas markets. He controlled fifty-nine per cent of the shares. Chedwick had purchased a small financial stake in the organization and was presently managing an umbrella factory in Birmingham. So great was the pressure of business that Jim had not seen Brenda for several months. Sally had her own office in the West End; his own life consisted of monastic dedication to what the Financial Times had described as the biggest growth industry since the invention of the micro chip. It now looked as though he would shortly have a law suit on his hands. A letter had arrived that morning from the Professional Golfers' Association threatening an action over what they described as misappropriation of the word Golf. Jim grumbled to himself, as he studied the letter again, golfers are trying to monopolise Golf much as some clerics try to monopolise God.

He had recently moved his belongings to a fifteenth-storey penthouse in the modern office block which housed his company's headquarters. Since his life consisted almost exclusively of work and sleep, he found commuting by elevator very convenient. He worked at a large semi-circular desk ornamented by six different-coloured telephones, a multi-channel comms-set for talking to his departmental chiefs and a computer monitor on which he could summons up amazing spread sheets, pie charts, as well as the latest computer games version of Bun-golf. There was also in pride of place a silver model of a stockbroker playing Bun-golf presented to him by a grateful Stock Exchange. For sentimental reasons he still retained on his desk the original plastic plaque inscribed: J. Alexander, Managing Director.

Irritated by the letter from the PGA, he walked over to the window and looked down into the square. A young man twirling an umbrella stopped by a bench on which a uniformed nurse-maid was sitting guarding a pram and motioned eloquently with his umbrella. The girl, buxom, sandy-haired, hesitated, then placed a ball on the ground and gracefully swinging an upturned umbrella produced from the side of the pram, propelled the ball towards a nearby chestnut tree. The young man followed suit, and seconds later they had disappeared beneath its luxuriant branches.

Jim sighed. When night fell, they would be embracing, while he, a victim of his own success, would remain chained to his unremitting round of business dealings. What he had just seen was the main reason for the game's success- it offered people a chance to meet informally, without having to join a club or association. But, unfortunately, in bringing millions of other people together he had isolated himself.

He returned to his desk and scanned the letter again. It seemed almost a cri de coeur from that distinguished body- the threat of court action almost an afterthought. He decided to discuss the matter with Wetherby, who besides acting as his solicitor, was also a keen golfer. Meanwhile, after the affecting scene he had witnessed in the square, his thoughts lingered romantically on Brenda. She had been left behind during his meteoric climb to success. But it was doubtful if she would have fitted into the world of high finance in which he was now so heavily involved.

He studied his desk diary and noted that the following evening was comparatively free of engagements. A cocktail party to inaugurate the House of Lords Bun-golfing society, followed by a televised interview with the Minister of Sport and the Minister of Transport. He would have time afterwards to take Brenda out to dinner and they would enjoy that long promised night at the Dorchester. Or would she prefer the circular bed in his newly-decorated apartment, which had recently been turned into a leafy imitation of Kew Gardens by a firm of trendy interior designers? He had a momentary vision of them in bed discussing the ginko trees on the ceiling.

He telephoned her home.

A dignified voice announced: 'This is Brenda's mother speaking, Mr. Alexander. My daughter isn't here.'

'Where can I find her?'

'Australia.'

There was a click as the telephone receiver was replaced.

Jim experienced an attack of heartburn, which he attributed to the cup of coffee his secretary had brought in. He then spoke to Max Benson on the inter-comm and read out the letter from the PGA.

'Cheeky bastards, ' Benson said. And after a pause: 'They can't monopolise the name of golf anymore than they can monopolise fresh air. But we don't want to get involved in litigation.'

'O.K., I'll talk to Wetherby about it.'

He read the letter out to Wetherby over the telephone. An awkward silence followed, which Jim broke by saying 'Off the top of your head do you think they have a case in law?'

'Jim, solicitors don't have tops to their heads. But I have to tell you that a certain resentment of your game does exist in golfing circles- perhaps because we have lost members. The ones who remain loyal to the game of golf are pretty scathing about Bun-golf- they call it "gutter golf"'.

'What!' Jim called out, thoroughly incensed.

'Jim- 'there was a pleading note in Wetherby's voice, 'every sport needs an element of dignity. Wimbledon played on hard courts in the nude wouldn't be quite the same now, would it.'

'The only question I'm asking you to answer,'Jim replied angrily, 'is can they sue?'

'They would probably lose. But you must consider whether the resultant publicity might not damage your business.'

'I'll send you a copy of the letter.'

Would the publicity associated with a law suit damage his business he asked himself. Hardly. Falling off his chair in front of the television cameras in a desperate fit of the giggles had done no harm- in fact it had proved to be a launching pad for his success. Then he had a sudden thought. There was always the possibility that when he retired he might wish to join a golf club.

He wrote the sacred name G-O-L-F on his note-pad, formed an anagram, and then rang for his secretary. 'Miss Peacock, tell Benlow to re-register Bun-golf as Bun-glof, spelled G-L-O-F, under the same patents world-wide. Inform publicity, our advertising agents and all departmental heads of the change. Take a full-page spread in all the daily newspapers and repeat in the personal columns of The Times, that out of consideration for the injured feelings of golfers, Mr. J.Alexander has changed the name of the game from Bun-golf to Bun-glof.

'Yes, Mr. Alexander.'

Miss Peacock trudged clumsily back to the outer office. Jim watched her retreating form with a sense of disillusionment. He had lost Brenda because of his total preoccupation with business and now seemed surrounded by humourless, unfeeling robots. There was no break in sight. Applications for franchises and manufacturing licences were pouring in from all over the world. An important question had yet to be answered: Would the super-powers embrace Bun-glof with the same enthusiasm as the United Kingdom and Europe?

NINE

Twelve miles above the Atlantic, Jim relaxed, after an excellent meal of boeuf bourguignon and several glasses of fine claret. He was flying Concorde to New York. Through the cabin window he could see far below a Jumbo jet toiling with painful slowness over patches of white clouds. Because it was a wide-bodied jet, it reminded him vaguely of Brenda's generous build. He experienced vague remorse, but assured himself it was just as well they had parted company ­ she would have found it difficult keeping up with his present life style.

Shortly afterwards, a slight lurch heralded the start of the descent into New York, where he was to meet a representative of the American Games Corporation- the company which dominated the leisure industry in America.

Max Benson had warned him that the Americans would strike a hard bargain- even harder than the Russians, who had also expressed a strong interest in the game. During the board room debate as to which of the two super powers he should visit first the argument that the Americans were superior at mass marketing had won the day. Bun-glof was also, of course, travelling eastwards and would soon, in any case, reach the the East under its powerful momentum. Meanwhile, the boulevards of Europe were thronged with happy citizenry in pursuit of the ubiquitous googly ball. Clubs and leagues were springing up like wild fire, inter-town and city championships were proliferating. International games made headline news. Application had even been made for Bun-glof to be included in the Olympic games.

Jim and his fellow directors had tried, but failed, to prevent the running of Bun-glof pools alongside football pools and the Ntional Lottery in the United Kingdom. The British instinct for gambling was far too strong to be curbed by vague admonitions from the manufacturers.

One of the stewardesses requested Jim's autograph just before the aircraft landed at Kennedy airport. He signed her book with a flourish, adding the jingle from the latest television commercial:

"Give a little wriggle, have a little giggle.

Life is really jolly

when you wield your Bun-glof brolly."

She exclaimed gushingly as he returned the autograph book: 'You've certainly conquered the world with your new game, Mr. Alexander.'

'Not completely,' he returned, smiling.'They're not playing it in Tibet yet.'

The wry thought occurred to him as he was being driven into New York that, while it was very gratifying to be rich and famous, his punishing work schedule was denying him the kind of fun that he was providing for everyone else. It was months since he had last been on golf course.

Harry Walker, a lean, rangy man of sixty, wearing a white mohairsuit and rimless glasses, met him in the foyer of the Waldorf hotel. His gait was artificially springy, perhaps to give an impression of youth. Inspecting Jim through thick pebble lenses, he thrust out his lower lip aggressively as he proffered his hand and said: 'Harry Walker. I sure am glad to meet the inventor of Ban-glof.'

'Bun-glof,' Jim corrected him. 'Delighted to met you, Harry.'

Walker motioned to a bell-hop to collect the baggage. Then he ushered Jim into a secluded bar full of exotic plants and tangerine leather chairs. When they were seated, Walker furtively crooked a finger and a waiter immediately appeared with a tray containing two glasses of a brownish liquid.

'A new drink we're marketing,' he explained. 'Care to try it?'

Jim sipped it suspiciously and then cautiously pronounced it 'O.K.'

Walker drained his glass in one gulp, burped and ordered another with a knowledgeable wave to the barman. 'Now, Jim, he said, 'it appears that your patents are copper-bottomed so we're very anxious to come to terms. We want to get the show on the road as quickly as possible.'

'It's a fantastic money-spinner,' Jim answered coolly. 'A number of other American companies have expressed interest in obtaining the franchise.'

'Sure, sure, Jim. I appreciate that. We don't intend to waste time in haggling. I surewish we'd thought of it first.'

'We British are good at inventing things but we often fail to exploit them commercially. We intend to squeeze every cent out of this one.'

Walker sipped his second drink with a slight shudder and then addressed Jim with a sage expression: 'Sure it's a great game by all accounts and America will go crazy for it. But it has to be adapted for this side of the Atlantic. I'm working on a publicity promotion and I'd appreciate your cooperation. We'll discuss it at the board-room meeting tomorrow. Goodnight, Jim. Have a good rest. Call for you at a quarter after eight.'

He stood up, shifted clumsily from one foot to the other, nodded imperceptibly to the barman and strode with exaggerated springiness through the swing-doors.

The barman then tried to serve Jim with a repeat of the obnoxious drink Walker had ordered. Jim declidned and ordered a scotch and soda istead. 'What one earth is that horrible stuff?' he asked the barman.

'That's a Grind Number Two, sir!' he replied, appearing surprised at Jim's ignorance. 'It was voted flavour of the month by the Barmen's Association.'

<They must have been got at,' Jim commented sourly.

He sipped his scotch appreciatively and asked himself what kind of adaptation Walker had in mind for his game. Pride in his invention made him hope that it would only require slight adjustments. A great deal depended on this deal with the U.S.A., a market five times bigger than the U.K. Max Benson had likened the progress of the business to a whipping top ­ it must continually maintain momentum and would topple if it did not do so. Selling the licence to the American Games Corporation would give it another tremendous spin, making possible a public issue of shares on the stock market on the most favourable terms. He had assured Jim it would make him and his fellow directors very rich.

He went up in the elevator to his luxurious bedroom and lay awake for some time, reflecting on the astonishing change which had taken place in his fortunes. It was barely four months since in blissful mood he had whacked at a rubber ball with an upturned umbrella, beginning a startling transition from rags to riches. But he realised he must act with prudence and caution. One's fortunes, like the googly ball, could change direction with capricious suddenness.

*

The New York pavements gave off a baleful heat, as Jim waited next morning outside the hotel. Looking up at the vertical cliffs of aluminium and glass rising towards narrow segments of azure sky, he felt suddenly dizzy. He quickly recovered, as a limousine draw up alongside.

'Sleep well?' he heard Walker enquire , as they drew away into dense traffic. Glancing at his heavy gold wristwatch qwithout waiting for a reply, Walker continued: 'This morning you're gonna meet our vice-president and legal and financial directors. I hope we shall manage to tie up a mutually satisfactory deal. But, of course, it will have to be approved by our president. He's in Dallas at the moment.'

'Who is the President of American Games?' Jim enquired.

Walker was too busy barking into a telephone to answer.'Yeah, that's a honey of an idea,' he was saying. 'Alexander is right here beside me. I'll ask him.' Turning his head, he said fawningly: 'Say, Jim, we'd like to feature you in a little commercial. It'll kinda bounce off that article Fortune magazine wrote about you.' Before Jim had time to considere his answer, Walker turned his head back to the telephone again. 'Sure, that's Ok We don't know whatwe're going to call it yet. Ban-glof is out, though. I'll have a name for you later- it's gotta be slick and roll off the tongue.'

He replaced the receiver and drew out a packet of Camel cigarettes from his top pocket. 'We've taken time on all the major networks and we'll start the promotion build-up this afternoon.'

'Don't you think we ought to settle terms first?'

Walker gave an easy grin and puffed his cigarette.

'Don't you worry, Jim- the old man won't want to miss out on this one. He hasn't been so enthusiastic since he bought out the Yo-yo franchise.'

Jim answered, somewhat surprised:'The Yo-yo ­ that was a helluva long time ago.'

'Yeah,' Walker said reflectively. 'Timber is getting on, but he can still smell a good deal from a thousand miles away.'

'Timber?'

Harry Walker ignored Jim's questioning tone. He said ingratiatingly: 'About this afternoon, Jim. Everybody knows it's a British game, but we have to give it a genuine American flavour- understand? And it must have a youthful image. To most teenagers- and that's the market we're after- golf is old-fashioned. We gotta convey the idea ofsomething spicey and new. But we also want to exploit the quaint image of the British. Got it? So we want you to pose before the tv cameras wearing a bowler hat, black jacket and Uncle Sam-style Stars and Stripes shorts.'

There was no time for Jim to raise objections. The car had arrived at a tall building with a mauve marble frontage. Harry Walker, preceding him onto the sidewalk, performed a parody of a tap dance routine and led him into the cool depths of the building. A neon-lit elevator rose like a bubble in champagne and released them on a floor high above the city.

'This way, Jim.'

Walker led him into a spacious room panelled in beechwood. It contained a large, horse-shoe shaped table fronted with rosewood. The centre was occupied by a drinks cabinet, from which Walker prepared a large whiskey and soda for Jim and a bourbon, lemon and ice for himself. At precisely nine o'clock. A blond girl in a white linen suit strolled into the room, followed by a stout giant with heavily-lidded eyes. Taking up the rear was a smaller, pale, nearly bald man wearing black-rimmed spectacles.

'American Games Corporation welcomes you to New York, Jim,' Walker said ceremoniously. 'We would like you to meet Miss Ingrid Harman, our vice-president, Mr Bud Schreiber, our financial director (indicating the corpulent giant) and Mr. Larry Sigmund from our legal department.

Jim was instantly fascinated by the girl. Shewas coolly appraising him, her delicious lips half open.

Once they were seated at the horse-shoe table, Harry Walker said solemnly; 'As you know, Jim Alexander has devised and marketed a game that has taken Europe by storm and looks like conquering the rest of the world. We can count ourself lucky that he has given us first option on licensing an American version and I sincerely hope we succeed in concluding a deal this morning.'

The girl, sitting opposite Jim, drew out a gold ball-point from her purse. She said in a soft, low voice that gave him the sensation of ice cubes gently trickling down the back of his neck: 'Your new game, Mr, Alexander, has distinct possibilities over here. I'm sure we shall be able to do a deal.'

'Call me Jim', he pleaded suddenly.

'Jim?' She sounded surprised. 'Sure, why not.'

She looked round the table with an amused smile. Following her gaze, Jim noticed that the huge forearms of Shreiber, who had just removed his jacket, resembled hairy beer barrels. But neither the financial director, nor anyone else present, seemed to have observed the sexual rays that were darting almost palpably between the vice-president and the young English businessman.

'You see, Jim,' Ingrid was saying, 'American Games Corporation has eighty-nine per cent access to retailers throughout the US of A, which means we can guarantee a much higher volume of sales than any of our competitors for this franchise. For that reason we feel you should make a small reduction in the commission defined in our preliminary exchange of letters. To come to the point we are prepared to offer seven per cent.'

Max Benson had told him to stand his ground on eleven per cent, but under the influence of those limpid blue eyes Jim felt his resolution waver.

'Well, actually, Ingrid, my board has instructed me to-'

'Shall we say nine per cent, then?'

And as he hesitated, she continued with a winning smile: 'That's settled, then, Jim. Let us know the name of your bankers. Mr. Schreiber will arrange for a quarterly audit of sales. I must tell you, though, that the British name for the game is entirely unsuitable for the American market and we would wish to market it under a different name.'

'What do you have in mind?'

Ingrid looked enquiringly at Harry Walker. He drained his glass and with a portentous air, his mouth working silently, wrote something on a piece of paper and handed the message to her. She read it and passed it onto Schreiber, who nodded earnestly and passed it to Sigmund, who in turn passed it to Jim. As he read the words, he heard Ingrid Harman repeat the syllables slowly with a breathtaking lilt in her voice: 'Brolly-golly. Brolly-golly. Sounds Ok, Harry.'

Walker was breathing heavily with excitement. He announced hoarsely: 'The Old Man will love it. He's authorised fifty million dollars for initial coast-to-coast advertising. I'm signing up national sporting figures to endorse the game and Jim has kindly volunteered to tee off the very first commercial this afternoon.'

Jim didn't particularly like the name but judged it prudent not to cavil.

The enchanting vice president stood up and said briskly: 'We are arranging for deliveries to commence to retailers on September first. If you would like to accompany Mr. Sigmund to his office you will find a contract drawn up ready for your signature.'

As as she left the board-room, Jim stood up and savoured every square inch of Ingrid's departing form. He must some excuse to see her alone. Conscious of the financial director's brooding eyes, he sat down. But as he did so the warning Max Benson had imparted before he left England fortuitously came back to him. It had been lost in the heady sexual aura of the delightful vice- president. She seemed so young for the job and she possessed sensuous lips and an exquisite dimple on her tiny chin. Benson's warning gave him precisely the excuse he needed.

'Gentlemen,' he said decisively. 'I omitted something very important when I was talking to Miss Harman. If you will permit me...'

He hastened from the board room and arrived in the corridor, in time to catch the vice president entering her office. She was studying some papers when he stood in the doorway.

'What is it, Jim?' She seemed surprised but not altogether displeased.

'Can I talk to you for a moment?'

'Sure. Sit down.' She motioned her blond head towards a chaise-longue embroidered in petit-point.

Jim sat down, inhaling a delicious perfume.

'We missed two important items during our discussion?'

'Really?'

'Yes, firstly my company would like to have the contract vetted by an independent firm of lawyers before signature.'

'That's normal practice, Sigmund will supply you with a suitable list of New York law firms. What is the other point?'

Putting on an expression of business-like severity, Jim said: 'Will you have lunch with me?'

'Why, of course, Jim.' Ingrid laughed gaily. 'You surprised me. It'll give us a chance to talk over the whole project. The President of our organization is anxious to have the deal signed by midday tomorrow, so that we can get things rolling.'

The telephone rang as Jim, excited by her proximity, was planning to ask her for dinner that evening as well.

'Hello, Timber darling,' she was saying. 'Yeah, it's going great- should be sewn up by tomorrow. Walker's going ahead with publicity this afternoon. Sure. I'll ask him.'

Replacing the receiver, she enquired: 'How would you like to spend next week-end with our president at his home in Dallas?'

'Sounds great, Ingrid, but the Soviet Ministry for Sports and Culture have invited me to Moscow. I'll be free the following weekend.'

'That'll be fine, Jim. I'll let him know you're coming. Dallas is my home town, too- I go there most weekends.' She paused, rattling a gold ballpoint thoughtfully between dazzling white even teeth. 'Timber has a deal going with the Russians- you may be able to liase for him while you're in Moscow. Now about lunch- I'll get my chauffeur to call at your hotel at one o'clock sharp.'

'Is Timber the president's name?' Jim enquired curiously.

She smiled. 'That's what his close friends call him. He's generally known as C.J. Says he's looking forward to meeting you. Incidentally, he's curious about why your company has such an oddball name.'

It just happened that way,' Jim explained earnestly. 'Because I'm a novice at golf. I gave it the acronym, B.U.N., which stands for British Union of Novices.'

'Well, you may be a novice at golf but you're no slouch at business, that's for sure. See you for lunch, Jim. '

She resumed her vice-presidential duties, bending her head low over a mass of figures. Jim threw one lingering look at her golden, fine-spun hair and returned to the conference room. He soon completed his discussion with the other directors.

Something happened soon afterwards, however, that filled him with murderous rage. As he was descending in the elevator to the foyer, the uniformed attendant whispered in a hoarse voice: 'They say that Miss Harmanis the greatest lay in New York. And the most expensive.'

<How dare you,' Jim spluttered. He was still seething as he left the elevator.

**

'Oh, Jim, I adore your British accent,' It sends lovely shivers down my spine... But as I was saying about importing spread sheet analysis, you get misleading readings unless...'

Jim was lunching with Ingrid in the Business Executive Club. He had an imperfect grasp of the technicalities Ingrid was expounding. All he could think of was that her eyes were beautifully blue, her cheekbones beautifully carved and her neck a beautifully-proportioned white slender pillar that demanded kisses. As she prattled on about discounted cash flows, profit margins and price-earnings ratios, he could not help noticing the movement of her pointed breasts brushing against her silk shirt.

'Your own career epitomises the American dream,' she was saying, her thoughts suddenly changing direction. 'I read all about you in Fortune magazine- you were an unsuccessful actor and within months you succeeded in building a multi-million dollar business empire.'

Jim remembered the interview with the Fortune reporter. Sally had briefed him to omit all references to his former association with the jokes trade, in case his connection with such infamous objects as stink bombs might sully his new image.

Ingrid continued admiringly; 'How many umbrellas have you sold so far, Jim? Was it a hundred and ten point three-two-two million or a hundred and ten point three-two-three? Plus all those googly balls. People keep losing them. There's extra profit there, as your prospectus rightly pointed out. Ah, that reminds me Jim, we're cutting production costs by manufacturing a vestigial umbrella.'

'Vestigial?'

'Yeah, just the outer cover. It looks like an umbrella but it won't keep the rain off.'

Jim nodded sadly, regretting the way American efficiency cut ruthlessly through tradition. But he supposed it didn't matter as long as they continued to pay royalties.

Toying with his fillet mignon steak, he wondered how he was going to divert the mind of this lovely business executive onto more important things.

'Ingrid, how about hitting a night-spot with me tonight?'

'Oh, sure, Jim. That would be real nice.'

He was startled by a buzzing from Ingrid's handbag. She fiddled inside it, produced a mobile telephone and spent a few minutes in heavily coded conversation with her stockbroker.

When she had finished, she smiled and said: 'Okay, Jim. We'll have us some fun. Pick you up at your hotel at nine-thirty.'

TEN

'Honey, but Grind Number Two is the in-drink at the moment.'

Thump-thump,

'That's what everyone keeps telling me, but I'm dying for a scotch and soda.'

'Thump-thump-thump.

They were dancing in the Sophisticated Cat. Ingrid was wearing an ice-blue gown slashed down to her enchanting navel. Two slender threads holding the dress together threatened- or perhaps, from Jim's point of view, promised- to burst at any moment. The music was deafening, with an insidious underlying beat- a compulsive thump-thump belonging to a distant atavistic past. Laser beams were weaving and convoluting like wild luminous snakes on the floors and ceilings.

The business of the whiskey bothered Jim; it seemed that in New York they played a kind of alcoholic version of musical chairs. Every week a different drink became fashionable. Last week it had been vodka and Coke, the week before gin and Pepsi: this week it was a Grind Number Two, consisting of equal parts rum and prune juice.

Thump-thump.

Ingrid was responding to the music with wild and vigorous abandon. Her thump-thumps, beautifully synchronised with his own, included an entrancing rotary motion that reminded Jim of something that the blare of a trumpet and the mental haze induced by eleven successive daiquiris and prune juice made it difficult to formulate precisely. What was it? Thump-thump...thump-thump-thump...thump-thump. Her eyes were half-closed in rapturous enjoyment; her trance-like gyrations were causing her creamy-white orbs to pop out of the cotton receptacles within the ice-blue dress. Suddenly, it came to him- the boy-girl dolls on the floor of Clagwammer and Pringer described by the salesman as "very educational." It seemed a long time ago.

'How was my television interview?' he shouted.

'Superb, Jim. You wowed them in those pink-striped shorts.' She gave a delicious chuckle.

'And I didn't giggle,' he said triumphantly, 'like I usually do on television.'

'Marvellous Jim. You were the perfect ambassador for Brolly-golly.'

'Will the Americans buy it, do you think?'

'They'll love it. And do you know what- after your introduction I bought shares in a bowler hat factory in Tennessee. They've sold their whole year's stock in advance.'

'Darling, you're a clever girl,' Jim said, admiringly.

'Not just a pretty ass,' Ingrid said, wriggling it appealingly, as the music stopped.

Holding her proprietorially round her shoulder, Jim escorted her back to the table.

'Sweetheart,' he pleaded as they sat down, 'I really would appreciate a scotch and soda.'

'You really would,' she said, imitating his British accent. 'Then you shall have one.'

She whispered to a waiter: 'Bring this British gentleman a scotch and soda under wraps.'

When the whiskey arrived discreetly hidden under a napkin, Jim complained: 'It's not a crime, is it, to drink scotch?'

'No, just a little disloyal, Jim,'

Looking faintly miffed, Ingrid bent down and rubbed her shapely calf with one hand. However, when she straightened up again, her expression was more tolerant.

She explained: 'Timber has a big deal in prune juice. He bought up practically a whole year's crop, gambling that Grind Number Two would catch on. Its going great now in thirty-eight states. It certainly helps when a prominent businessman like you is seen drinking it.'

'Are you in drinks as well as games?' he asked.

'We're multi-national, multi-merchandise. Anything that makes a buck. Drink up and we'll go back to my place. I've scotch by the barrel there.'

He gathered her sable-clad body in his arms as the Rolls slid silently through the deserted streets, and pressed his lips against hers. She responded warmly for a moment, then drawing away, said: 'Say, Jim, what got you started?'

'Your lovely face, your fabulous figure, your-'

'I mean with the Brolly-golly bit?'

'Oh, that. The idea just came to me when some kids asked me what it was like to play golf and I fished out a googly ball from my pocket.'

'Fantastic. Incidentally, C.J. will probably want a game of golf with you when you come to Dallas.'

'He's keen on golf?'

She laughed resoundingly.

'He practically invented the game.'

'Golf was invented in Scotland,' Jim insisted firmly.

'Well, he carries more weight in the golfing world than anyone else. Do you know what they call him?'

'I've heard you refer to him as C.J. and Timber. What is his name?'

'You'll find out soon enough,' she answered laughingly. 'Come on up and see my pad.'

Swaying drunkenly as the elevator ascended, they clung to each other in a passionate kiss that lasted for fifteen floors. Ingrid entwined her tiny hand in tufts of hair at the back of his head, as she responded ardently. For the rest of their upwards journey they exchanged endearments, calling each other honey-lamb, honey-child and, humorously, honey-bun. Giggling like school-children at this play on the name of Jim's enterprise, they staggered out on legs palsied by alcohol and their rocket-like ascent in the elevator.

'C'mun, Big Jim. she whispered huskily, as she fumbled in her purse for the electronic key that opened her front-door and warned of intruders during her absence.

Light from crystal chandeliers blazed on an opulently-furnished apartment. Jim's feet nearly slipped on a priceless persian rug and his somewhat impaired vision registered a silver-laden buhl commode, an ormolu escritoire and some handsome Louis Quinze armchairs. A giant stuffed panda stood guard at the entrance to the bedroom.

'Whassat?' Jim enquired, indicating the six-feet high black and white cuddly bear.

'That's Charlie, she answered cheerfully. 'He keeps me company in bed when I don't have a big hunk of a man like you.'

She flung her fur over the panda and led Jim into the bedroom.

'Have a peek at Manhattan while I fix your drink.'

He walked past a canopied four-poster bed and looked outside at the skyscrapers. Coloured neon-lights flashed their commercial messages against the darkened shapes of huge rectangular columns rising towards the stars. Directly opposite a red Coca-Cola sign flashed every fewseconds. A stolid-looking American Games blinked a sombre purple from the highest pinnacle. He was observing the lights of an elevator rising fitfully in the building opposite, when the whole scintillating panorama swung giddily on its axis and became a confusing, flashing kaleidoscope.

'Must be those sodding Grinds Number Two,' he muttered, blinking rapidly, in an attempt to restore his vision. This proved unsuccessful, so he kept his eyes firmly closed until he heard Ingrid say: 'Hullo there, Mr. Brolly-golly, I've brought your scotch.'

She had discarded her evening gown and was extending a glass on a silver tray. The Coca-Cola sign opposite illuminated her half-naked body in an eerie red glow.

'Never mind,' he said thickly, 'I'm not thirsty.'

She bent down, placed the tray on the carpeted floor and led him towards the canopied bed, unbuttoning his shirt with deft fingers. He was struggling with his trousers, when she started laughing.

'What's so funny?' he asked.

'Your shorts!'

He looked down and discovered that he was still wearing the stars and stripes shorts in which he had posed for a commercial that afternoon.

The ridiculous shorts came off and landed near the carelessly abandoned panties on the floor. Ingrid stretched her flawless white body on the satin sheet and pulled his face against a soft, round breast. He sighed with pleasure as a pink nipple tickled his nose. However, before he could collect his alcohol-fuddled thoughts, she plunged it into his mouth, giving a sinuous wriggle.

'Oh, Jimmy Jolly-Golly,' she whispered excitedly; then suddenly, with vice-presidential authority, gave aseries of complicated orders.

Puzzled at the complexity of her demands, Jim answered: 'I'd love to, sweet blossom, but I've only got two hands.'

'Darling,' she replied with a hint of reproach: 'You also have two legs, two feet, ten toes and a mouth.'

'Oh...oh...oh!' She gasped with pleasurable anguish as Jim complied clumsily, wishing that his education had included instruction on synchronised sexual gymnastics.

'Is that all right, darling?' he enquired, anxiously.

'Honey, don't take away your mouth. Didn't they tell you in school it's the second most important pleasure-giving organ?'

The Coca-Cola signs cast an endless procession of red ribbons across the darkened room. A delicious sensation assailed his loins, as Ingrid's hands navigated him towards his goal. Her vocal instructions had now become all but incoherent, as though ready to abandon herself to an ensuing, all-engulfing storm. Now she was gyrating sinuously. slowly and surely gathering momentum like an Olympic discus-thrower. Wonderfully athletic, he thought, for an office-bound girl. He asked himself if there existed any more delightful way of helping the export drive.

Suddenly, her eyelids fluttered open and her lips tenderly uttered the words: 'GO, man, GO.'

He was matching energetic wriggle for energetic wriggle and earth-quaking bump for earth-quaking bump, when suddenly he felt her hand reach out behind her towards a control panel on the headboard. The mattress, together with the four-poster superstructure, took off on hydraulic springs and began rising and falling in contrapuntal motion, like a heaving sea. Ingrid immediately gave a series of ecstatic screams, scratched like a wounded tigress and plunged her teeth into his right shoulder. With staccato pulsations playing against her lithe stomach she gave a series of shrieks, accompanied by tremendous shivers, which slowly diminished in intensity, as Jim experienced a firing of pleasurable projectiles. The bed continued jerking violently, until Ingrid, her eyes closed, lazily reached up and clicked off a switch. There were two more sluggish movements of the bed, then all was still.

Jim slipped dazedly to Ingrid's side. Only the remorseless sweep of the Coca-Cola beam on the ceiling echoed the passing of time.

He lay gratefully in the aftermath of love, his hand absently roving over her gently heaving bosom. He was idly counting the dull red strobes on the ceiling, when she bit his ear. Abruptly, his reverie ceased.

'Oh, Jimmy-Jolly-Golly!' came a wild cry, like the plaintive sound of a sea bird.

He was lost in admiration as his princess of high finance flung herself on top of him and swayed contentedly, her peerless breasts bobbing like mounds of white Jello. This time she spurned the electric motor and galloped frenziedly to a climax which contorted her pretty face and washed his chest with ice-cold tears, before sliding helplessly into a huddle by his side.

He had counted thirty Coca-Colas on the ceiling and was about to drift off into a sound sleep, when she roused him again. Love together with months of abstinence lent him an heroic strength, and as he obeyed her step-by-step instructions, they engaged in gymnastic contortions, providing revolving views of Ingrid's anatomy, before reaching a pleasurable oblivion.

Forty-two Coca-Colas later she was calling for him piteously. Tired though he was he could not resist when she pleaded: 'Unfurl your Brolly, again, Jolly Jimmy.'

In the midst of a sea of pleasure an earthquake of devastating proportions suddenly occurred. The four-poster vibrated violently and collapsed all around them.

'Aw shit!' Ingrid exclaimed, as she lay incongruously swaddled in the pink canopy, a gold-inlaid post lying across her bare leg.

'Gee, I'm sorry, Jim, I guess we'll have to have this goddamned Super A-model bed modified.'

'What the hell kind of bed is it?' Jim growled, struggling wearily to extricate himself.

'Like I said, it's a Super-A model made by one of our subsidiaries in New Jersey. I'll give Bernstein, the manufacturer, sheer hell when I ring him tomorrow. It's bad for our reputation when this kind of thing happens.'

'Perhaps we gave it more than fair wear and tear.'

'Honey, perhaps you're right. Do you know what- you're the greatest.'

Slipping carefully out of the tangled wreckage, she announced that she was going to have a shower. 'Would you like your scotch now?' she enquired as an afterthought, noticing the silver tray.

Without waiting for an answer, she ran gaily into the bathroom.

Jim limped over to recover his drink and watched the elevator in the building opposite repeating its unvarying journeying up and down. He felt enormously fond of this highly-talented girl, in spite of her predilection for mechanised gadgetry. He excused her foible by telling himself that modern society was constantly invoking machinery to perform tasks which the humanbody was perfectly adapted to do by itself.

Later, when they were both lying peacefully in the partially-dismantled bed, he said: 'Darling, how about a merger?'

'You mean a reverse take-over on the back of the dollar with currency guarantees?'

'No, darling, he breathed fervently. 'I'm talking about marriage.'

'We'll talk about it tomorrow,' she whispered and was instantly asleep, her lovely brow bedewed with moisture.

He was awakened in the small hours by a noise in the next room. Startled, he nudged Ingrid and enquired what it was.

She answered sleepily: 'It's just the opening prices of the London Stock Exchange printing out. But I'm too tired to care.' She operated a switch on the headboard console and the noise ceased.

'Ingrid, before you go to sleep, tell me who's the President of American Games Corporation.'

'...father' came the tired reply.

'Your father?'

'No, not my father. The Golf-father.'

Jim thought the name had a somewhat sinister ring.

ELEVEN

The Rolls was moving slowly through a phalanx of slowly-moving traffic. Ingrid was engaged in a prolonged telephone conversation with a man she addressed as Timber. The sublime form he had embraced the night before was now enveloped in a trim black trouser suit and a white silk shirt. Around her neck was a glowing string of pearls. She was smiling at some jest which had reached her through the ear-piece. Jealousy prompted Jim to place a protective arm around her slight shoulder. But as he attempted to nibble her unoccupied ear, she rebuffed him with a brisk motion of her blond head and continued talking rapidly:

'O.K., Timber darling, out of three-monthly bonds into longer-dated and we're to be prepared to go liquid. Understood. I'm bringing James Alexander to see you the week-end after next. He's off to Moscow this week-end. Really? Yeah, I'll ask him. Would you believe the goddam Super-A bed fell in on me last night. Bernstein is O-U-T. Brolly-golly is swinging into production on Monday. Watch your TV screen for a wow of a campaign that Harry's got going. Yeah, the deal is fixed. We're signing today. Bye, darling.'

Ingrid replaced the receiver, lifted her head and kissed Jim fondly. 'I'm in heaven today,' she whispered. 'I love you, Timber will love you and when the commercials are broadcast the whole of America will love you.'

'I want to marry you,' he said huskily. But even as he spoke, he felt a sharp contraction of the bowels.

The car was gliding to a halt outside his hotel, and as the uniformed doorman opened the car door, Jim leapt out of the Rolls in undignified haste. He grabbed his key at the reception desk, and as the elevator ascended, making numerous maddening stops, he tried to take his mind off the volcanic rumblings going on inside him by working out a complex arithmetic problem concerning thenumber of umbrellas which would be required if three-quarters of the population of Uzbekistan demanded to play Bun-glof during his forthcoming visit to the Soviet Union. A rapid sprint along the corridor nearly knocking over a chambermaid in the process, a struggle with two recalcitrant doors, atussle with a perverse trouser zip and he found himself staring bemusedly at crimson-striped boxer shorts.

There followed an almost mystical experience. He seemed to be on a cloud floating leisurely over a nineteenth-century cavalry charge. Below, trumpets sounded and horses reared and whinnied as they rode full-tilt into the fearsome roar of cannon. The crash of exploding shells mingled with the curses of thrown riders. No sooner was the battle over than a deluge of rain swamped the battlefield.

Thankful that he had made it in time, Jim looked at his watch. Just time for a shower before his meeting with Schwartz and Hinterman, the firm of lawyers who had been instructed to check the contract drawn up by American Games legal department. Sigmund had insisted on inserting a penalty clause, in case he failed to meet the midday deadline. He would demonstrate today, as indeed he had last night, that British businessmen could deliver the goods.

Splashing in the shower, he sang, intoxicated by his successful mix of work and pleasure. He would marry Ingrid and introduce his glamorous bride to his parents in their humble greengrocery shop in far-away Sussex. They would be smitten by her beauty, intelligence and wealth. Further vistas floated through his mind- Ingrid presenting him with a quiverful of beautiful children and graciously presiding over his far-flung estates as, in the course of a political career, he rose to cabinet office. He was Minister for Sport while drying himself, gained promotion to Foreign Secretary while applying talc and anti-perspirant and gravely accepted the Prime Ministerial Seal of Office from the Queen as he patted after-shave on his face.

Then, again, he experienced a straining sensation in his bowels. As he lifted the lavatory lid, he remembered the numerous Grind Number Twos he had imbibed the previous night. Working its way through his system was that vile, insidious prune juice, turning his bowels to water. No wonder the mysterious Golf-father was advising everyone to go liquid!

An eventful hour followed. A ten o'clock he telephoned the firm of lawyers he had chosen from Sigmund's list. 'Is that Schwartz or Hinterman?'

'No, this is Schultz.'

'Alexander of Bun-glof Corporation speaking. I had an appointment with Schwartz to discuss a contract.'

Schwartz died from a myocardial infarction in l908. Hinterman ditto in l910. You want Jensen.'

By the time Jensen had come to the telephone he had been obliged to escape once again to the bathroom. He cursed Schwartz and Hinterman long since gone to their reward, and Schultz and Jensen and all attorneys, and included a general malediction on New Yorkers for their capricious fashions in drinks, their mechanised beds and their obsession with high-speed wheeling and dealing. He excepted Ingrid, as a heart-warming recollection came back to him of their love-making the previous night.

At twelve o'clock he telephoned the firm of lawyers again to tell them that he was unable to venture forth to keep his appointments. The hotel doctor called, prescribed a white powdery liquid and left cheerfully, with a bag in one hand and two-hundred dollars in the other. Waiting the next call to arms, Jim lay on his bed and listened to the radio.

Alistair Cooke was saying: 'One day a historian will make it his business to write about the profound effects that apples have on human beings. The very first bite in the Garden of Eden produced interesting enough consequences. When Newton observed the fall of an apple an entirely new concept of gravity came into being. Recently, a young English actor was eating an apple, when a similar flash of inspiration came to him, causing him to turn that prosaic object, an umbrella, upside down and into a golf club. Ever since the highways and byways of Europe have been filled by a populace engaged in playing gamp golf with lunatic intensity. This same young man is presently in America and he is about to launch the new game on an unsuspecting public...'

Jimswitched off the talk as the broadcaster began speculating on the effect the new game would have on American society. Still, it was encouraging to knowthat even before a single Brolly-golly kit had been manufactured the new game had become a talking point. Soon, however, another bout of intense peristalstic activity commanded his total attention.

At twelve-forty Sigmund was asking abrasively on the telephone if Jim had signed the contract. He explained his predicament.

'Well, that's most unfortunate, Mr. Alexander. There are thirty-five assembly lines waiting to start rolling. It's time to start talking about penalty clauses.'

'Mr. Sigmund,' Jim replied weakly. 'I'm tied by invisible strings to the lavatory seat at the moment- a devastating attack of diarrhoea. But if you'd like to send a messenger around, I'll sign.'

It seemed straightforward enough. His company would receive nine-per-cent royalties at the prevailing dollar-sterling rate of exchange as long as the original international patents remained unchallenged. The system of auditing total receipts accruing to American Games Corporation from sales of Brolly-golly was somewhat complicated, but included an arrangement for arbitration agreement in the event of dispute over the figures. He signed, returned three copies to the messenger and filed three in his brief-case to take back to London.

The medicine seemed to be easing his condition, but he obeyed the doctor's instructions and remained in his bedroom reading a selection of newspapers.

Le Bun-glof, he noted, had been banned during working hours in the yards of the Renault factory in France. This had resulted in a mass walk out. A set-piece battle had taken place in Tokyo between rioters armed with Bun-glof umbrellas and police equipped with batons. The game had been banned in Northern Ireland after a handgrenade had been lobbed into an army post in Crosmaglen by someone using a Bun-glof umbrella. South Africa had banned the game in some areas where Whites had been seen playing with Blacks- it had not yet been officially promulgated as an official sport.

It was a pity, Jim thought, that his game had caused such problems- nevertheless, he was gratified by the publicity it was receiving.

By four o'clock he was feeling much better. He telephoned Ingrid, she suggested a quiet evening in her apartment.

'Great,' he said enthusiastically. 'But no more