QUILPS AT LUNCH

After his maiden speech, his lunch

Indigo Quilps gave a little smile, one that said I’ve always known how great i am, and sat down after pouring forth his maiden speech.

The house of commons was silent, but only for a moment, and then it seemed that all hell broke out.

To start with, a loud cheer erupted from behind the maiden speaker as if what he’d said reflected the thoughts and hopes and desires of every man and woman there, especially when he had gone into a description of the sort of punishment he’d like to see meted out to those who had the cheek to go on strike if they worked for the better comfort of the general public, which he supposed that everyone with paid work did. To him it was unthinkable that they should withdrew their labour and consequently upset others, especially if it was an offence and inconveniece against himself as well as that of lesser mankind.

He had been warned that his speech shouldn’t be contentious., but he chose to ignore that advice because he knew that it most certainly would be, as witness the huge eruption of protest from the opposition benches. There were howls of protest and even the speaker had to interrupt before the noise died down.

“Really Mr Quilps, I ask you to withdraw that reference to…” he began, but even he was drowned out.

Then the leader of the opposion stood up and commented on how the trades unions had won the right for the Quilpses of this world to speak openly about serious social matters, without fear of being silenced by the state, and the Speaker finally managed to be heard above a diminishing roar.

“I order you to withdraw from this house, Mr Quilps… the convention is for maiden speeches to not inflame opinions..”

“Shame!” shouted a lady wriggling on the bench her bottom behind Indigo, “the man deserves to be heard! It’s what we on this side really believe… all industrial action should be illegal and subject to the harshest possible punishment!”

The speaker heard and decided to let her speak in reply to Mr Quilps’s speech.

“The member for Bumstead,” he ordered.

The lady, who had really said all she wanted to say, had to extemporise, and had very little time to think about it. So she ploughed on:

“Mr Speaker, in my constituency of Bumstead East, there is a vital industry that manufactures false teeth, especially those for the gentry, false teeth of the highest possible quality, and the staff there, just the one in these days of automation, is a Mr Gregorious Smythe, and he has demanded an increase in his wage that, he says, is well below any minimum wage debated in this house, and if he’s not going to receive it he intends to withdraw his labour. In my opinion he should be horse-whipped before being incarcerated for the rest of his life in a Victorian jail without its luxuries!”

“Hurrah!” whooped Indigo Quilps. But his side of the house wasn’t going to get its own way. The next member invited to speak was o the opposite benches, Miss Patsy Prettyface of Gungedown Market.

“Excuse me, Mr Speaker,” he said in the sweetest voice imaginable, “but my constituency is adjacent to Bumstead East, and I happen to know Mr Gregorious Smythe, and I can assure you all that he is a gentleman well into his seventies who has a choice: either to die of starvation because he’s a working man on a low wage, or be locked up in a high security prison because he wants to continue living and may at least find a minimum of nutrition in a prison diet.”

“Age shouldn’t come into it, and why isn’t he on a retirement pension?” asked the Speaker, “I mean, he sounds as if he’s of an age when he could receive the state pension.”

“He loves his work,” said the lady member of Bumstead East, “and it would inevitably lead to his early demise if he couldn’t do it. His doctor says so, and doctors know all about these things. Anyway, pensions don’t cover much in the way of essentials these days.”

“Then I suggest he pays for the privilege of doing something he loves rather than beg for more!” grated someone from the back benches behind Indigo Quilps. “Daft going on strike if going on strike’s going to lead to what you call his demise!”

The debate raged on, members on both sides of the house quoting individuals and sometimes whole societies where wage restriction was leading to hardship of one sort or another. The pervy Peter Underblue, cheekily known as Blue Underpants, insisted that half the men in his village had to reduce visits to ladies of the night, as he put it, on account of being unable to afford their charges since inflation had bitten into their pay packets, which had, he believed led to an increase in the number of men caught abusing themselves on the canal bank when they thought nobody was looking. This brought a general titter from both sides of the House.

It was an hour before Indigo Quilps managed to ease his way out of the chamber and make his way to a restaurant where he could have a substantial lunch, he being, as he put it to himself, as hungry as a hog.

Much to his dismay he had just found a seat for himself when was joined by Patsy Prettyface, who sat opposite him without a by-your-leave, and invited him to share her bottle of wine with her.

“If I keep it all to myself it sends me to sleep,” she told him, “but you seem to be an all-right guy! But tell me, Why the titfer?”

Indigo was starting to feel annoyed by the number of times he had to explain his love of top hats. And, he supposed, love was quite the right word. It was a remnant of an orphaned boyhood and memories from precious moments when matron, who always smelled slightly of roses, had regaled him tales of such wonderful characters as Mr Scrooge and Miss Haversham,

“I like it,” he told her,, using his and that’s all I’m going to say about it voice.

“Suits you,” she smiled, “and doesn’t it make you feel good when you understand that the wonderful Shepherd’s Pie I see on your plate and this gorgeous wine is subsidised by the very people who can barely afford to eat themselves?”

He’d not been expecting that. This woman was a bit too like the defeated Eva Curry for her own good. And as with Eva, He both liked her and didn’t. But she was quite obviously socialist, and that was enough to condemn her in his eyes.

“I think I’ll find a table of my own,” he said, and did just that, but sadly when he returned for his meal someone had cleared it away.

“Sod it, he grunted, and picked up his wine glass.

That was empty too.

© Peter Rogerson, 01.08.22

...