My learned friend, Walter Zerlin Jr

The recent and untimely death of Rick Mayall brought to mind the considerable talents of one of my brother's colleagues who back in the 70s was doing the comedy circuit along with other young hopefuls including a very young and inexperienced Rick Mayall.

Robert Conway, a barrister by trade was a member of my brother's chambers in Lincoln's Inn. But by night he would exchange his barrister's wig for stage make-up and acquire the stage name, Walter Zerlin Jr. (A name taken from his late father who had sung in opera under the name Walter Zerlin.) Besides trying out his comedy material in pubs and advising the young Rick Mayall, he was an astonishingly prolific writer of comedy, and together with writer and producer David McGillivray, wrote ten farces in a riotous series under the deliberately convoluted title: The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Productions. These were staged versions of classic plays by the likes of Shakespeare and Dickens butchered in the most amusing and inventive ways by a group of amateur thesps, of whom the young Julian Clary was a member.

I had the pleasure of meeting Robert on only a handful of occasions. The first time was at a lawyer's party in Sloane Square hosted by one of the members of the Poet's and Peasants' Cricket Club, a club for whom I was the resident number 10 batsman. I remember little of the party other than being entertained for the entire duration by one of the funniest and instantly likeable characters I have ever encountered. Robert may have been a barrister, but he clearly had little time for legal talk and couldn't bear pomposity. Indeed, he spent much of the time at this party gently poking fun at his learned friends.

Following this encounter, I was fortunate enough to see two of his hilarious Farndale Productions: A Christmas Carol at the Edinburgh Fringe and a Murder Mystery at the Donmar Warehouse. The production in Edinburgh played to a packed house and Robert and his family occupied the front row. (I can still hear him guffawing at his own lines.) The farces have since become a huge hit with amateur groups around the world and have been performed no fewer than 2,500 times.

In 1980 he wrote Running Around The Stage Like A Lunatic in which he played all 17 parts including a one-legged nun - the largest cast ever played in a theatre by one actor. And for this he won an Edinburgh Festival Fringe award and got himself onto the Russell Harty Show.

As a barrister, he was later to defend John Cleese on some minor driving offence, and Cleese was so taken with him that he asked Robert to be the legal adviser on A Fish Called Wanda. Cleese was to later recommend his services to Marlon Brando who needed advice on court room scenes in A Dry White Season.

There is little doubt in my mind that Walter Zerlin Jr would have eventually hung up his barrister's wig and made his name in comedy, in much the same way as Clive Anderson has. But tragically, this was not to be. In early 2001 he suddenly became ill with cancer and passed away in November, leaving a wife and two young daughters.

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds 

Lovely hotels, terrific food and charming personal guides. The only downside: it's North Korea.

Way back in the 90s I was the Best Man at a cousin's wedding: a classy do in the grounds of a historic country house somewhere in Colchester. This particular cousin was and remains something of an intrepid traveller and is in the habit of traipsing off to some of the world's most far flung corners at the drop of a hat.

The spotlessly clean metro resplendent with chandeliers.

Following an incredible lunch, I was called upon to regale the assembled throng with the usual embarrassing anecdotes that is the Best Man's prerogative. I don't remember much of the speech other than my first line, which I've always thought a rather good opening line. If memory serves me correctly, it went something like this:

"Ladies and Gentlemen,

"Today marks a very sad day indeed...  for the economies of Bhutan, Madagascar and outer Mongolia. For I fear that now my cousin has tied the knot, his delightful wife will put an end to her husband's intrepid jaunts with his photographic paraphernalia, which have for so many years helped sustain these third world economies."

As it turned out, I couldn't have been further from the truth. Admittedly, my cousin and his good lady wife do take the usual holidays in civilised parts of the globe. But these are supplemented by regular jaunts to areas the average human being wouldn't touch with the longest of barge poles; expeditions that my cousin embarks on alone.

His most recent escapade was to that very peculiar country, North Korea; a country that the late, great Chris Hitchens described in the following terms:

'Unlike previous racist dictatorships, the North Korean one has actually succeeded in producing a sort of new species. Starving and stunted dwarves, living in the dark, kept in perpetual ignorance and fear, brainwashed into the hatred of others, regimented and coerced and inculcated with a death cult: this horror show is in our future, and is so ghastly that our own darling leaders dare not face it and can only peep through their fingers at what is coming.'

Hitchens, as you can gather, was not a big fan. But my cousin, having already taken trips to South Korea, was keen to see her Northern cousin with his own eyes.

In the unlikely event that you were interested in following in his footsteps, there are just two travel agents in the UK that can arrange such a trip: Lupine Travel and Regent Holidays, both of which deal with the Korean International Travel Company.

Once my cousin had arranged his trip he had to fly to Beijing to pick up his visa and then board a train - the K27 or the K28, which is a sleeper that goes all the way to Pyongyan. It's an extraordinary line that also connects China with Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Vietnam, and this particular section is used chiefly by Chinese diplomats.

On arriving at Pyongyan, my cousin was met by his two guides: two very courteous and and well dressed ladies who were fluent English speakers. They would have been members of the most privileged section of North Korean society. And for the following seven days these two would accompany my cousin everywhere except his bedroom and bathroom. Needless to say, the guided tour had to be rigidly adhered to; one could not venture off the beaten track. To do so would result in immediate repatriation at the very least. A couple of months ago a 24-year-old American was arrested for "rash behaviour" when going through customs, and he hasn't been released as this post goes to print. Sadly, his is not the only case. Kenneth Rae, another American has been held for more than a year for conducting a religious service, a crime for which he was arrested and sentenced to 15 years of hard labour for "subversion."

Apparently, the first thing every foreign visitor has to do before taking the official tour is to purchase at his own expense a bouquet of flowers, place them at the foot of the enormous 22 metre bronze statue of Kim Il Sung, and take a deep bow out of respect for the 'Dear' departed leader who lies in state here.

From then on, the tour was clearly a sanitised one. My cousin did not encounter anyone with anything other than a cheerful countenance. There was no evidence of starvation, severe poverty or human rights violations. But then, this, of course, is nothing more than a piece of state propaganda. In 1944 Adolf Hitler chose to show the world how nicely the Third Reich was caring for its Jews by housing them in a place called Theresiestadt. The film shows its inhabitants laughing and joyful, healthy and well-fed. Little did the world know then that Theresiestadt was in fact a death camp.

So on this sanitised tour my cousin was to be shown Kim Il-sung's birthplace; a captured American spy ship; the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum; the gloriously lavish metro system with chandeliers large enough to have impressed Liberace; the Mangyondae Children's palace where kids from the age of five study and perform music and martial arts with disturbing precision; the infamous demilitarised zone, which my cousin found strangely friendly; and the International Friendship Exhibition where you can view vast, cavernous halls housing gifts given to Kim Il-sung by world leaders including Gaddafi, Castro and Arafat.

So if you're looking for a holiday that can provide five star comfort, outstanding cuisine and a most courteously and attentive personal service at all times, North Korea certainly ticks all the boxes. But if you want to see the real North Korea, for heaven's sake don't go there, because it's just possible you'll never come back.

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds 

The ad man who's been airbrushed out of the picture

The year is 1995 and in the leafy and affluent village of Fleet in Hampshire, the police have been called out by a particularly distressed individual to a deeply bizarre and grizzly scene that wouldn't be out of place in a macabre episode of 'Silent Witness'. Only this isn't fiction.

On their arrival at a beautifully converted barn, the police are lead across a well manicured garden and then down a manhole into the bowels of an eerie underground tank. And here in this dank and poorly lit underground hide-away their eyes are greeted by the corpse of a middle-aged man. Unlike most they come across, this one is virtually naked, stripped down to his boxer shorts and is hanging upside-down from the ankles with his wrists tied behind his back. His head is immersed in a pool of stagnant water no more than six inches deep. The man who discovered the body is apparently the brother of the victim and is clearly in a state of distress.

In most cases the discovery wouldn't have received much in the way of column inches in the local papers, let alone the national press. But this case is different, because the corpse in question is that of Christopher Martin, one of advertising's most distinguished copywriters and one of the founders of Saatchi and Saatchi.

Within days the news hits the headlines and is on the airwaves. The advertising industry is shocked by the news and one of Mr Martin's former colleagues, Sir John Hegarty when interviewed by The Independent newspaper, makes it clear that he firmly believes his old working partner was murdered.

Some weeks later the second bombshell hits the advertising industry when the county coroner, James Kenroy gives his unwavering verdict. 

"It transpires," states Kenroy, "that this apparently normal and successful family man had his own Achilles' heel." Kenroy goes on to explain that Mr Martin's "vulnerability" was clearly his lust for high-risk erotic adventure. Being a sailor, Mr Martin had expert knowledge of tying knots and all the evidence pointed to the fact that his predicament had been entirely self generated. Tragedy had struck when a wooden stake that had been employed to ensure that the heavy roller to which the rigging was secured, did not move, had been dislodged, causing the roller to be dragged closer to the manhole and lowering Mr Martin in the process until his face sank into the water. From the pathology reports it seemed that Mr Martin had tried in vain for 16 and a half hours to keep his head out of the water, but eventually succumbed to exhaustion  and drowned. Recording a verdict of death by misadventure, ruling out suicide, Mr Kenroy said: "It is a tragedy that the deceased got himself into."

The inquest also heard that this had not been the first time Mr Martin had tried bondage. Frank Harris, a previous neighbour had, several years prior to this, heard him crying for help one night. Breaking into his cottage, he had found Mr Martin dangling from the beams of his attic with his wrists and ankles tied.

Had Christopher Martin died in normal circumstances, it is more than likely that we would have seen obituaries in the press and tributes in industry publications like Campaign. But this was not to be. Instead, there were a few pieces in the dailies and that was it. No more talk of the man. The whole episode was far too embarrassing for the industry, not to mention those close to him.

Even to this day, one cannot find much, if any, evidence of his work online, which is a great shame because he was an outstanding writer. Indeed, one of my favourite English press advertisements was penned by him. It was written for Volvo, ran across three consecutive full pages in The Times and didn't so much as show an image of a car. Instead the reader was treated to a fairy story in the style of the Brothers Grimm and an illustration of a castle by David Hockney. The discreet headline wasn't even a headline in the conventional sense of the word. It merely read: 'The Castle Race by Christopher Martin. Illustrated by David Hockney.'

In this regard, Christopher Martin is one of only two English copywriters to have successfully placed himself (a la Alfred Hitchcock who loved to place himself in his own movies) into one of his own press advertisements; the other copywriter being the late David Abbott. Strangely, Abbott's advertisement was also for Volvo. (In his ad, the car was shown suspended above him and the headline ran: 'If the welding isn't strong enough the car will fall on the writer.')

Martin's ad was, however, totally unconventional. It broke every conceivable unwritten rule. Besides not showing the car, it didn't even mention a single car in the text. The only mention of Volvo came at the end of the copy in he form of a very discreet logo. Yet despite these apparent shortcomings, this was a brilliantly effective and creative piece of branding that left the reader in no doubt whatsoever that Volvo was an ethical and thoroughly decent company that built exceptional cars. So I thought it time to redress the balance and give the text of Christopher Martin's ad a bit of an airing. Whatever people may have thought of him during his lifetime and after his tragic, if bizarre, demise, this piece of work demonstrates his gift as a writer and the fact that it can certainly pay, in terms of advertising, to be completely and utterly unconventional.

The Castle Race
By Christopher Martin
Illustrated by David Hockney

Once upon a time, and a time before that, there lived in the Northlands in the Kingdom of Hrolf, a beautiful princess named Asa.

She had many suitors from all parts, but two noble princes, Agnay and Volund were far more persistent and determined than the rest.

Unable to decide between them, Asa sought her father's advice. "Both are princes," she said, "both fine horse-men and one as handsome as the other. How shall I choose?"

At this, King Hrolf summoned the two princes to his court. "Guarding the northern and southern entrances to my Kingdom are two identical hills," he said. "Take one hill each and on it build a castle fit for a princess. Whoever shall finish first will marry Princess Asa. But one thing. You must complete the task for no more money than this." And so saying the king gave each prince one thousand crowns in gold (a modest fortune in those days). The two princes began at once, though with rather different attitudes of mind.

Prince Agnay reasoned thus: "It is a race," he said, "so speed is of the essence. I will engage many labourers who will have to work for low wages. We will use local stone because it is convenient and cheap, if a little difficult to work. We won't waste time with proper scaffolding, we will sleep rough and eat what wild berries can be found on the hill."

Prince Volund was of a different mind: "Building castles is long, laborious and often dangerous work," he said. "I will engage only enough men that I can pay fair wages. We will haul stone from across the mountains because it is easier to work. We must cut down pine forests as scaffolding and to make proper shelters for the men, and we will engage full-time hunters to keep us well supplied with deer and wild boar."

"Furthermore," said prince Volund, "every man who helps me build this castle shall have a part ownership of it, which will entitle him and his family to seek refuge here in times of trouble."

At the end of the first summer, King Hrolf came to view the progress. Prince Agnay's castle was half complete, but poor Volund had only just begun. The people laughed at Volund. "It will doubtless be a very fine castle when it's finished," they mocked. "What a pity there will be no princess to live in it." King Hrolf wasn't so sure.

Then winter came. And as you know, winters in the North-lands are very severe. Cold hands found Agnay's stone even harder to work. Accidents caused by the lack of scaffolding, trebled. The berries disappeared from the hillside, and where there had been grass for a bed, now there was snow.

Mumblings and grumblings became visible discontent, and one by one Agnay's men downed what tools they had and asked, "Why should we work under these conditions?"  Volund's labourers knew they would gain lifelong security for their families from the finished castle. They went to Volund and said, "Because we are so far behind in the race, we have looked around and found ways of being more efficient."

And so it was that as Agnay fell into disarray, Volund went from strength to strength. And as you will have guessed by now, one summer and winter later he not only finished first, but had built by far the most beautiful castle.

At the wedding, which by all accounts was a splendour in itself, King Hrolf took Volund to one side. "I have gained more than a son," he said. 

"In this part of the Northlands, the lessons that you have taught will never be forgotten."

VOLVO

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds 

Of course creative copy sells. In this case it sold the copywriter.

The year is 1934, and Robert Pirosh is a bright young American kid working in New York as an advertising copywriter. Like so many young men at the time, Pirosh likes to dream. He likes to see himself writing not for dreary household names, but for the stars of the silver screen. But unlike so many American dreamers, his dreams get the better of him, and before he has time to think things through thoroughly, he quits his well paid job on Madison Avenue, and heads for the Hollywood Hills with his typewriter.

Once there, he compiles a list of as many directors, producers and studio executives he can muster and impulsively bashes out a letter. But this is no ordinary letter. This is a letter concocted by a creative mind - one free from the shackles imposed by conservative clients and cautious account executives. It reads as follows:

Dear Sir,

I like words. I like fat buttery words, such as ooze, glutinous, toady. I like solemn, angular, creaky words, such as straitlaced, cantankerous, pecunious, valedictory. I like spurious, black-is-white words, such as mortician, liquidate, tonsorial, demi-monde. I like suave "v" words, such as Svengali, svelte, bravura, verve. I like crunchy, brittle, crackly words, such as splinter, grapple, jostle, crusty. I like sullen, crabbed, scowling words, such as skulk, glower, scabby, churl. I like Oh-Heavens, my-gracious, land's-sake words, such as tricksy, tucker, genteel, horrid. I like elegant, flowery words, such as estivate, peregrinate, elysium, halcyon. I like wormy, squirmy, mealy words, such as crawl, blubber, squeal, drip. I like sniggly, chuckling words, such as cowlick, gurgle, bubble and burp.

I like the word screenwriter better than copywriter, so I decided to quit my job in a New York advertising agency and try my luck in Hollywood, but before taking the plunge I went to Europe for a year of study, contemplation and horsing around.

I have just returned and I still like words. May I have a few with you?

Robert Pirosh

The letter secures him three interviews and a subsequent job offer from MGM. Within a year, Pirosh finds himself writing for the Marx Brothers. He co-writes both 'A Day at the Races' and 'a Night at the Opera'. And by 1941 his place as a Hollywood screenwriter is very firmly established, but also very abruptly interrupted by war, in which Pirosh sees active service as a Master Sergeant with the 320th Regiment, 35th Infantry Division in the Ardennes and Rhineland campaigns. In fact, during the Battle of Ardennes, he leads a patrol into Bastogne to support the surrounded American forces there.

After the war, he puts his extraordinary wartime experiences to good use by writing the screenplay for 'Battleground', a film based entirely on the Battle of Ardennes.  The film is hugely successful and picks up two Oscars for Best Screenplay and Best Cinematography. He then goes on to win the Golden Globe and the Writers Guild of America awards. And in 1951 he is nominated for another Oscar for his screenplay 'Go for Broke' which he also directed.

It's an astonishing achievement that might never have come to fruition had Pirosh not been so impulsive and bashed out those 189 glorious words on his typewriter.

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds 

There's nowt so queer as folk

I suppose, if pressed, we could all recall eccentric characters from our past; the kind of characters who'd happily populate the pages of a colourful novel. This country, after all, has something of a reputation for producing them. Writers like Alan Bennett (not a stranger to the odd English eccentricity himself) has something of a penchant for them (think The Lady in the Van and The Madness of King George).

A very good place to encounter such Great British eccentrics is, I find, the London Underground or the Electric Sewer, as I prefer to call it. On one memorable occasion many years ago while travelling to school on the Northern line I shall never forget the sight of a large, well dressed, middle aged lady clobbering the man sitting next to her with her handbag. A couple of years later while returning from school on the Central line I can recall a young man in sunglasses addressing the entire carriage, which was full to the gills. "Stop thinking about me," he demanded rather threateningly. "Stop it," he continued, "I know you're all doing it. Stop it now!" The English reaction to this hugely embarrassing situation was typical. Newspapers were unfurled and their owners were immediately shielded from this embarrassment by a wall of newsprint until, like a bad smell, it had dispersed. More recently and perhaps alarmingly, a very smart gentleman with a leather attache case sat next to me and immediately struck up a very peculiar line of conversation. "You look like a very good listener," was his opening line, to which I smiled nervously. I then began to hear all about his extraordinary ability to design motor cars through some form of telepathic gift that he had possessed since birth. "I can tell you're the listening sort," he said. "Most people would have told me to fuck off by now." It could almost have been Peter Cook. But sadly, it wasn't, and I don't think he was playing for laughs. It's probably the only time I've got off a train before my stop, just to get away from a fellow passenger.

But perhaps the strangest person I've ever come across for rather different reasons was a lady my mother used to know. Her name was Cynthia and she was widely acknowledged by those who knew her as being profoundly psychic. I only met her briefly on a handful of occasions, but I have to say that there was something quite unnerving about this gaunt looking woman with remarkably thick glasses; something you couldn't really put your finger on. When it comes to the murky world of psychic phenomena, I'm something of a cynic, but this woman would blurt out stuff that was plain spooky. On one occasion shortly after my grandmother died my mother and her sister visited her for tea, and over tea and biscuits, this woman began talking about my late grandmother. "She's here now," she said and began to give very specific instructions over items in my late grandmother's house that were not cited in her will. My mother and sister were utterly dumbfounded, as every single item named and described by Cynthia (and there were quite a few) actually existed in my grandmother's living room. And let me assure you here that my grandmother had never so much as met Cynthia.

Some months later, my mother being inquisitive went to visit Cynthia again for tea - this time taking with her a sealed envelope containing an old sepia photograph of her mother's brother. Nonchalantly, she presented it to Cynthia and asked her if she had anything she could tell her about the contents of the envelope. Cynthia took it in her hand, didn't even look at it, and then returned it. "All I can tell you my dear is that his name is Solomon, and it's terribly sad." The photograph was indeed a portrait of Solomon Barzinsky who had, like so many of his generation, joined the army to fight in the First World War and had been killed by a sniper in 1918. He was no more than 18 years of age, and yes, it was terribly sad.

In retrospect, had it been me, I'm sure I'd have felt a great deal more comfortable sitting next to some nutter on the London Underground who claimed to design cars telepathically, than being completely spooked by this kind of stuff.

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds 

'Scared to Death' - one of 23 short stories from an anthology to mark the Great War published by Mardibooks

Captain Alexander peered through his field glasses. Despite the bullets whistling past at ground level and the dull, earth-shattering thuds that shook the ground and spewed forth huge splays of clay and dust, the men were prepared to obey their orders like sheep.  The noise was deafening and incessant, and was enough to drive anyone unaccustomed to the world of mechanised warfare, insane. But most of the men were wholly accustomed to it by now; It had become part of everyday life for them.

Private Thomas Highgate, on the other hand, was hardly a man in the strict sense of the word. He was no more than seventeen years of age when he had signed up for the Royal West Kent Regiment. His mother would always refer to him as ‘the boy.’ “It’s alright, you leave those right there, the boy will see to it first thing,” she’d say; or “Never you mind about fetching coal, Sam, the boy will do it right enough.” He was used to a tough life back in Blighty. Farm labouring in Shoreham wasn’t exactly a picnic, and his father wasn’t the easiest of employers. So it hadn’t seemed like a big deal to sign those official papers; and besides, all his mates were up for it. It was going to be an easy war – a walk-over. Everybody knew that. So here he was, among the slimy, putrid, rat-infested trenches where death hung in the air like a bad smell – which, of course, it was. It wasn’t what he had expected. It wasn’t what anyone had expected. But it was too late to go back now. Too late to have second thoughts. Too late to let your nerves get the better of you.

It was just as well he had Jimmy by his side. Jimmy was a tough but sensitive soul, and looked out for him like the caring and compassionate father Thomas never had. The older man must have been in his early forties, was large framed with soft grey eyes and spoke with a deep, resonant, reassuring voice. He would always make sure the lad was close to hand, and out of harm’s way; not that anyone could rationally predict where that might be at any given moment. “You stick with me son, and you’ll be alright. Do you hear me?” Jimmy would say, and Thomas would follow like a shadow. As a carpenter by trade, this gentle giant with grey eyes had a young wife and child back home in the pretty village of Aylesford. Thomas knew it well. He’d enjoyed many a pint in its tiny pub on the high street that could trace its origins back to Henry VIII. In their quiet moments, Jimmy would always share his ration of cigarettes with the lad and show him photographs of the ‘two girls in his life.’ Here they’d chat like father and son. Thomas would talk of his work on the farm, the girl he intended to get engaged to after the war, and his dream of buying a Morris Oxford when he had his own farm, and employed his own labourers. In return, Jimmy would recount tales of courting, the pleasures of parenthood and colourful accounts of his sporting prowess on the village cricket green. He was clearly a very skilful leg spin bowler and had in one memorable game taken six wickets for the cost of just two runs.

The sound of captain Alexander’s whistle pierced the air like a sharp steel blade through butter, and Thomas felt Jimmy’s large leathery, callous-ridden hand grab his and pull him firmly but carefully up the firing steps into enemy fire. “Alright lad, he we go. God bless, eh.” It was a strangely compassionate and fatherly gesture in the circumstances.

As he emerged from his subterranean home, he glimpsed a couple of men to his right; their lifeless bodies collapsing like large sacks of potatoes back into the trench. As they did so, the roar of war seemed to intensify and Thomas unconsciously wet himself. He was petrified. “Keep looking forward lads. Never look back.” Captain Alexander’s words sounded more like a stern warning than helpful advice. The truth of the matter was that visibility wherever you looked above ground was unbelievably poor as all around them explosions would tear the landscape apart in violent, nerve shattering bursts, while smoke and debris filled the air with a kind of thick, acrid smog.  The ground here was no firmer than it had been back in the trenches as his boots squelched and slid on the mud. Thomas continued slowly, instinctively crouching as if this would in some way help him dodge enemy bullets and artillery shells. While carefully following Jimmy over a barbed wire fence, the ground just behind them erupted and the force of the blast threw him into the air and dumped him unceremoniously into a freshly made crater.

It was some while before he could open his eyes. The explosion had been so close and intense that it felt as if his eardrums had quite literally exploded, and as a result he could barely hear the sound of gunfire and the explosions of shells around him, though he could feel their violent tremor well enough. Thankfully, he was, for the moment, totally oblivious to the heart-rending cries of those poor wretched souls in close proximity who were dying where they’d fallen.

Thomas eased himself forward and as he did so, noticed a significant amount of fresh blood on his tunic. He tentatively unbuttoned two brass buttons and slid his hand gently beneath the fabric to feel his chest beneath the vest. There was no discernible wound or pain. The blood clearly and thankfully wasn’t his. Then he noticed that his boot was lying upturned no more than a couple of yards from his right hand. Instinctively, he stretched to pull it out of the thick, grey mud, only to discover that it wasn’t his; it was caked in dark congealed blood and still had its owner’s decapitated foot inside. Thomas retched and vomited. He didn’t want to be here. He wasn’t made for this kind of thing. He wanted to be back on the farm. And then he remembered his friend. Where was Jimmy? If he could find his mate, he’d be alright. He was tired from nervous exhaustion, and the blast that had obviously come so close to killing him had had a profound effect on his nerves, which hadn’t been in a very good state to begin with. In an attempt to calm himself, he closed his eyes and took deep breaths, holding each for 10 seconds and then expelling air slowly. While doing this he’d imagine himself in a pleasant and relaxing setting. It was a technique he’d use to cope with stress and would invariably induce a semi-trance-like state if only for a few minutes.

The war seemed miles away now as he stepped out of the pavilion and admired the view before him. It was the perfect village green, the midday sun threw long shadows across the neatly clipped outfield, and you could hear the birds singing in the distant hedgerows. The eleven men in white flannels assumed their fielding positions as Jimmy furiously rubbed the leather ball on his flannels so that one half of the blood red leather orb shone like glass. He turned and languidly strode towards the crease and in an elegant furry of arms and legs delivered the perfect ball. It pitched in line with middle stump and as the batsman strode down the wicket to drive it off his front foot, it turned sharply, sailed past the bat and clipped the off stump, knocking the bail to the ground. Jimmy smiled and there was much shaking of hands. He winked at Thomas. “Now that, young man, is how you bowl an off-spinner.”

Light rain quite literally stopped play as droplets rolled down Thomas’s filthy face causing muddy rivulets to stream down his army collar. The sound of war had returned to his ears, and he opened his eyes. The light seemed to be fading now as he gently eased himself out of the crater. His slightly rusty rifle, for which he had already been reprimanded, was nowhere to be seen, but he wasn’t particularly bothered by that. All he wanted to do was locate Jimmy. He hoped in God’s name that his older friend hadn’t been killed. From now on he wasn’t going to stand. He’d have a far better chance of staying alive if he crawled on all fours.

As it turned out, Jimmy hadn’t been very far away… 50 possibly 80 yards, no more. He lay on his back, eyes wide open staring into the heavens. He looked at peace with the world, and his right hand was clenched tightly around something that Thomas couldn’t make out. Gently the boy prised open his friend’s fingers and retrieved a photograph. It was the photograph of Jimmy with his wife and their little girl with ribbons in her hair. They were standing on a promenade looking out to sea. It could have been anywhere. Brighton, Lyme Regis, Penzance. Now he’d never know. He’d never be able to ask his friend, and the realisation brought tears to the boy’s eyes, one of which fell from his eyelash and landed on the black and white image. The boy tenderly wiped the photograph with his filthy sleeve and placed it back in the dead man’s hand. “Here you go Jimmy. I’m sorry mate. You were a good friend and I shall miss you more than you can imagine. I will never forget you mate. I promise.” And with these words, the boy gently closed his friend’s eyelids because it just felt like the right thing to do.

Without Jimmy, Thomas didn’t know which way to turn, so he just kept on crawling through the mud. And the further he ventured, the more corpses he encountered. Captain Alexander had half his skull missing and still had his field glasses dangling around his neck. Robin Paltrow was dangling ungainly from a barbed wire fence with one arm missing; Colin Rigby lay with a large gash in his chest. Other familiar faces greeted him with blank or painful stares: Jonathan Nelson, big Billy Butcher, Alan Townsend and countless others whose names now eluded him. As far as Thomas could tell, most of his regiment had been wiped out, and he had no intention of joining them. He would keep crawling away from the battle zone, away from the deafening clamour of war, and away from the stench of death.

He kept crawling until nightfall, and the further he crawled and the less muddy the terrain became, the safer he began to feel. It must have been around 2 or 3 in the morning when he finally felt blades of grass between his fingers. The din of battle had calmed and was certainly more distant now, so under the cover of a black velvety sky and luminous half crescent moon he continued on foot.

He hadn’t spotted the barn in the darkness but had by chance stumbled upon it quite literally. It was a godsend. His feet were in agony from blisters and the slow onset of gangrene. Inside were bales of hay and sacks of animal feed, the smell of which were familiar to him and reminded him of home. As his eyes slowly became accustomed to the darkness he discovered a set of clean work clothes draped over a roughly hewn wooden bannister. He couldn’t believe his luck as he tore his filthy army uniform off and pulled on the soft cotton civilian clothes. They were slightly too large for him, so he simply rolled up the trouser ends and shirt sleeves and used his army belt to tighten the trousers at the waist. Then he found a cosy corner, buried himself in a pile of hay and fell asleep.

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John Burton, the gamekeeper had worked on Lord Rothschild’s land in the village of Tournan for no more than 18 months and had got the job on account of his 15 years in the army in which he’d seen active service during the Boer War. He was a nondescript ghost of a man with sullen features and a high forehead. A man of few words, he had never married or formed a meaningful relationship with anyone in his 54 years. He’d only gone into the barn to hang a brace of pheasants, and on entering noticed the various items of the British army uniform lying scattered on the floor. Thomas’s gentle snoozing gave the lad away.

Burton put the pheasants down and stood over the boy. “Good morning young man.”

Thomas opened his eyes and registered the silhouette of the figure above him. “I see you’ve helped yourself to my work clothes. Army too much for you, was it?”

Thomas rubbed his eyes. “I’ve had enough of it… I can’t take any more of it. I want to get out of the army, and this is how I am going to do it.” He tugged at his shirt. “I hope you don’t mind.” As soon as he’d uttered these words, Thomas began to regret what he’d just said. He didn’t know who this Englishman was. And he could almost hear Jimmy’s voice berating him. “Easy lad,” he’d have cautioned. “Play your cards close to your chest boy.” But it was too late now. What had been said couldn’t be unsaid.

The man remained quiet for a little while before speaking. And when he did, he chose not to refer to the work clothes. “I expect you’ll be a bit hungry then,” he said.

“Could say that,” Thomas nodded. “Actually I’m starving hungry.”

Burton mumbled something unintelligible to himself and turned to retrieve his pheasants in order to hang them from a hook, which had clearly been screwed into the timber frame for this very purpose. “In that case,” he said with his back to the boy, “I’ll arrange to have some food sent over. Might be able to rustle up some ham and cheese and a bit of bread if you’re lucky. What’s your name lad?”

“Thomas. Thomas Highgate, sir. And thank you very much sir. I’d really appreciate that.”

“That’s alright Thomas. You wait right there. I won’t be too long.” And with that, the man was gone. The thought of food hadn’t crossed Thomas’s mind until now, but now that it had, he couldn’t think of anything else. He’d wait here for the man to come back.

The wait was rather longer than he’d have liked. But when the door of the barn did finally open, the boy’s eyes weren’t greeted by the sight of John Burton but instead, two men in military uniform. One stooped to inspect the uniform on the floor. “Royal West Kent Regiment, eh? Very fine regiment.” The other man who looked the more senior of the two stood in the doorway. Now it was his turn to speak. “Very fine regiment indeed, Lieutenant Martins. Not the kind of regiment to put up with the likes of cowards and deserters.”

The two stepped forward. Thomas could see their features now. The younger of the two was clean-shaven and the older man sported an impressive moustache. Now the older man spoke again: “It’s usual custom for privates to stand to attention in the company of senior ranks, Private Highgate.”

Thomas felt sick. He got to his feet and saluted. The younger man, this Lieutenant Martins character who appeared to be no older than 25, stood right in front of Thomas and looked straight into the boy’s eyes. Then he did something Thomas wasn’t expecting. He slapped him hard across the face, and Thomas fell backwards. Before he could pick himself up he felt cold metal handcuffs being clicked around both his wrists. And before he knew it he was being frogmarched into daylight and thrown into the back of a brand new Vauxhall D-type. In normal circumstances, a ride in a motorcar would have been something to get excited about. But this was one journey Thomas wished he didn’t have to endure. The older man drove while the younger one talked incessantly about Cambridge and something called a ‘May Ball.’ The car bumped along country roads for a few miles before reaching a small town. They turned into a side street and through an innocuous archway and then through a courtyard with two sentries standing guard at the entrance to what looked like a municipal building or town hall.

Thomas was bundled out of the car and led inside the building. A young man opened the door and saluted. “Fitzy, be a good man would you and take Private Highgate here down to the cell.” Thomas was led down a spiral of stone steps into the dank bowels of the building. The young soldier looked sympathetically at him. “The name’s Fitzgerald, but you can call me Fitz. Would you like a cigarette?” Thomas nodded. The soldier unlocked the handcuffs and handed Thomas a cigarette and lit it with a match. “You’ll have to wait in here I’m afraid.” The young man opened a large, heavy metal door and revealed a bare room. Thomas stepped inside and the door was closed behind him with a heavy metallic clunk, followed by the turning of a key.

Thomas sat on the stone floor and took a deep drag on the cigarette. He’d been a complete fool. He should have scarpered from that barn as soon as that deceitful bastard had hung up those stupid birds and gone and informed the authorities. God knows what was going to happen to him now.

An hour later, Thomas heard footsteps outside and the door key was turned in the lock. The young soldier appeared at the door with a metal tray. “It’s not exactly meat and two veg but it’s the best I could do in the circumstances.”  He handed Thomas the tray on which stood a glass of water, a hunk of bread smeared with chicken fat and an apple that looked as if it had seen better days. Thomas accepted it with gratitude and the young man closed the door.

Thomas hadn’t eaten anything for two days and devoured the meagre meal in no time. No sooner than he had, the young soldier appeared at the door again. “Colonel Mayhew has summoned you to the courtroom. I’ll take you there now, but I’m afraid you’ll have to wear these.” He produced the handcuffs and put them around the boy’s slender wrists and led him back up the winding steps and along a long corridor.

The courtroom looked more like an old classroom. In front of him was a trestle table behind which sat three men. Thomas assumed that Colonel Mayhew was the man with white hair in the middle. To his right sat the man with the moustache, and to his left, a bald man with spectacles. The young soldier seated Thomas in an upright chair before the three men, saluted earnestly and left the room, closing the door behind him.

Mayhew looked at Thomas disparagingly. “Private Thomas Highgate,” he began, “you have been brought to this military court because it is our belief and contention that on 5^th September you wilfully deserted your company – the Royal West Kent Regiment who were positioned a mile south of the River Marne. And we have it on good authority that when discovered by Mr John Burton in a barn just outside the village of Tournan, and questioned by Mr Burton as to your motive for stealing his work clothes, you responded with the following words: ‘I have had enough of the army and this is my way of getting out of it.’ You are therefore being tried for dereliction of duty, desertion and cowardice. I needn’t remind you, Private Highgate, of the seriousness of these charges. What, if anything, do you have to say in your defence?”

Thomas hadn’t prepared for this. He was confused and tongue-tied. “It’s true,” he stuttered. “I did say those things to Mr Burton… But I wasn’t thinking straight… My best friend had been killed, and I came close to being blown to kingdom come… The noise… The deafening noise… It was unbearable… You have no idea… I just couldn’t carry on…”

The room fell silent. Mayhew chose to break it. “I think you’ll find that we do have a fairly good idea about the nature of this conflict, Private Highgate.” He paused while the two beside him nodded in agreement. “And is it because you were not feeling yourself that you chose to steal the work clothes in which you consciously and wilfully chose to desert your company, your mates, your King and your country?”

Thomas’s eyes began to glaze with tears. This wasn’t fair. Why did he have to suffer this unpleasant barrage of accusations? All he knew was that he had been too petrified to carry on. The tears streamed down both his cheeks and he looked at his feet in embarrassment.

“Well, Private Highgate? Are we to have an answer for the record? Or do we assume blithely that there simply isn’t one?”

Thomas looked at the three figures through watery eyes. “I don’t know sir.”

Mayhew turned to his colleagues either side of him. “Any further questions?” Both men shook their heads. “Very well. This court is adjourned.” Mayhew made a hand gesture towards the door and Private Fitzgerald appeared. “Would you care to take the accused down to the cell now Fitzgerald while we deliberate?”

Precisely what took place next in that so-called courtroom is a matter of conjecture. Whether the three discussed the merits of the case and took into account the defence (what little there was of it) and the tender age of the accused, we shall never know. What we do know, however, is that Colonel Mayhew’s deliberations took no more than 10 minutes.

Thomas was led back up the steps by Fitzgerald and had barely taken his seat before Mayhew asked him to stand.

“Private Thomas Highgate, this court finds you guilty of dereliction of duty, cowardice and wilful desertion of your regiment. This is a most serious crime against the Crown for which this court can only pass one sentence. I therefore sentence you to death. Do you have anything to say?”

Thomas stood motionless. He couldn’t comprehend the enormity of Colonel Mayhew’s words. His thoughts turned to the girl he intended to get engaged to back in Blighty after the war. Her name was Sarah and he could see her long auburn hair and could almost smell that cheap perfume she dabbed behind her ears. Then he saw his old friend beaming out from the black and white scene by the seaside. The tears began to flow freely now. But he didn’t care. Nothing mattered anymore. As far as he was concerned, there wasn’t going to be an ‘anymore.’

Mayhew nodded to Fitzgerald who took Thomas by the elbow and led him back to the cell.

There were two chairs placed in the middle of the bare room, one of which was occupied by an elderly chaplain with a ruddy complexion and a receding hairline. “May the Lord bless you and keep you, my child. May he look down upon you with great loving kindness and resolve you of your sins. Amen.”

Thomas looked at the old man in his dog collar and crucifix with incredulity. “They can’t just shoot me. I’m not yet 20… they need me back on the farm… and I’m getting engaged to my girl after the war… and anyway, I’m not a coward.”

The chaplain took the boy’s hand. “It’s not my place to pass judgement, my child. I can only offer solace in the form of the Almighty in whose infinite wisdom, mercy and universal loving kindness we must all take comfort.”

Thomas took his hand away. “But I was never one for church and all that.”

The chaplain smiled. “It’s never too late, my child to see the light and embrace the Lord… Shall we recite Psalm 23 together? It might help.” He opened his leather Bible and began to read by himself while the boy sobbed. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…”

The chaplain’s voice broke off as the heavy metal door opened. It was the bald man with spectacles who had presided over the hearing. “It’s time,” he whispered to the chaplain who closed his Bible and rose. Thomas was led out by the bald man and his puny wrists were handcuffed once again. They walked back up the stone steps for the last time, then along a long passageway that eventually led out to a small courtyard at the back of the building. Thomas was led by the man to the far end of the courtyard where a wooden stake had been recently hammered into the ground. At this point, a number of uniformed men forcibly tied Thomas to the stake. Try as he might, the lad couldn’t resist; he simply didn’t have the strength. Once he had been secured tightly to the post, one of the men placed a sackcloth bag over the boy’s head and pinned a white square of fabric to the centre of his chest.

Six young soldiers were then led to their firing positions and issued with rifles; one of which would be unloaded. This was the one solitary concession to human compassion, ensuring that not one of the executioners would ever know for certain if they’d been responsible for the fatal bullet.

The bald man stood to the side and wiped his spectacles with a handkerchief.  He replaced them on his snub little nose and inspected the firing squad. “Alright men. Present arms.” All six aimed their rifles at the pathetic figure tethered tightly to the post.

Thomas was breathing very deeply. He was in a rowing boat and Sarah was sitting beside him in her Sunday best. The sunlight was glinting off the ripples and little ducks bobbed as they made steady progress upstream.

“Take aim.”

He was precariously trying to uncork a bottle of bubbly and his girl was giggling like there was no tomorrow. “Careful Tom, you’re going to rock the boat!”

“Fire!”

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Postscript: Thomas Highgate was the first of 306 members of the British armed forces to be executed during the Great War for cowardice, dereliction of duty or desertion. He was just 19 years of age. In November 2006, the UK government pardoned all 306, but to this day Thomas Highgate’s name remains conspicuously absent from Shoreham’s war memorial.

'Scared to Death' by Alex Pearl - one of 23 short stories published by Mardibooks in an anthology to mark the centenary of the First World War, and in remembrance of all those who have fallen in conflict.
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Wanted: accountant with feather duster skills

I've had my fair share of strange job interviews over the years. Perhaps the most surreal was when I applied for a summer job while still at school at the passport office in Petty France, London. The job, which was no more than a dog's body position that required me to spend endless days tracking down passport applications, came under the auspices of the Home Office. So I was required to go through a bizarrely official interview somewhere in Whitehall. It was, in short, the most daunting and nerve-wracking interview I've ever had to sit through. The interviewer, a stern woman in her late fifties with horn rimmed glasses over which she peered accusationally would have made a perfect MI5 interrogator. To make one feel even more uneasy, her office was a vast and gloomy affair and her desk enjoyed the proportions of an ample boardroom table. Once my interrogation was over, this Rottweiler of a woman informed me that in the event of taking up the position, I would be expected to handle highly sensitive, confidential material for which I would be required by law to sign the Official Secrets Act. That's right, we're talking poxy passport applications. I'm not entirely sure how the information I might have gleaned from the 'distinguishing marks' section of an application form could be classed as 'highly sensitive' and pose a threat to national security, but there we are.

In a rather different vein, a cousin of mine once recalled a strange interview he had at Cambridge university many years ago. The elderly Don enquired politely what my cousin's father did for a living, and my cousin responded that his father was a rabbi. "Ah splendid," retorted the older man, "he's in rubber." My cousin chose not to say another word.

But far more surreal than either of these two examples was an interview a very good friend of mine recounted to me last week. This friend is an accountant and had gone for an interview for a job in an area closer to where he lives. Everything went perfectly well. My friend answered all the questions perfectly, and then from nowhere came this: "Now Mr Smithers, what are your cleaning skills like?" My friend looked a bit blank. He was under the impression that the position was for a company accountant who could keep the company's books looking clean and tidy - not the company's carpets and skirting boards.

"Let me explain," continued his interviewer. "We have a rota here. Once a week we all muck in and clean the office." My friend, being an honest individual, admitted that his accountancy skills were far more impressive than his ability to don Marigold gloves and wield a feather duster. His interviewer looked somewhat disappointed; and my friend hasn't heard anything back since.

I know we live in an age where multi-tasking is expected of all of us; but this has to be completely and utterly bonkers.

Alex Pearl is author of Sleeping with the Blackbirds