Et In Arcadia Ego:

Despite current circumstances, I start the day in the normal fashion: prayers and shares.  The caveat to that however; is that they don’t necessarily have to take place in that order.  I utter a momentary blessing, however as I look through my current portfolios on the tablet (oh, the irony).  Post Brexit, they are all performing well.  I had both the foresight and wisdom to invest in a mixed portfolio (military industrial, biofuels, private security).  Jesus be praised, they are thriving.  I feel slightly sullied, but Aurum Omnes Victa Jam Pietate Colunt (‘All men worship gold, all other types of reverence being done away’). 

Alas, the same cannot be said of my career as a Father.  Assumpta took both The Bentley and Primus, Secundus, Tertius, Quartus, Quintus and Sextus a few days ago.  I have heard nothing since.  I am still in bed when Nanny brings me breakfast.  She enquires on the last instance of me changing my nightgown and I say I will do it tomorrow.  She tells me to do it now.  I say I will be busy today.  She tells me to do it now.  Somehow, she is the only female I have been scared of.  Even though; I have both the skill and foresight to look after myself. Grimes House, with its fine grounds overlooking the glorious English countryside is now part of my soul.

I met a member of the family recently.  Splendid chap.  He recently sold his funeral business in Liverpool.  Although thriving through suicide and starvation, he felt he needed a change of direction.  Which is understandable, really. The art of business is knowing when to cut one’s losses.  Sometimes, the soul needs refreshing.  

After a long bath, with a good book on medieval history (I have yet to read a bad one) I am dressed like a mere rapscallion.  A pair of overalls I use for gardening, I push the wheelbarrow across the grounds towards the fence.  The flower beds will need tending. A gardener’s work never ends, even in late Autumn. 

It’s then, I notice the hole in the fence.  Slightly bigger: than to allow a small mammal access, but not big enough to allow one of the local yahoos in my property.  It has happened, I know this.  I was advised, shortly after All Souls Day to check my security.  I will speak to Mr Kelly, the loutish Celt who handles the odd jobs around the grounds.  His mobile, the one he accepted from me with a grunt; appears to be inactive. Today will involve pruning roses, Mr Kelly was supposed to have started a bonfire this morning.  Where is he?  If he is incapable of work, then he should indicate this to me, the man has both the means and initiative to do so. He should be aware I am providing him with gainful employment at a time of national emergency. 

It’s on the way back; I find Mr Kelly’s body.  What remains of it, at least?  He has been ravaged, torn to shreds and only the parts of him that were left behind are across the South lawn.  There are reports in some parts of the country (Liverpool and Manchester mainly, small pockets in Glasgow) of cannibals; such as that which occurred during the great famine on 1315-17.  Whilst I tend not to believe it; I believe I may have found some established evidence here.  I make a call on my Smartphone to the local constabulary.  A recorded message tells me my call is being re-routed through to the CPA.  What is the CPA? My friends in Westminster - of which there are, many – never informed me of such a development.   

I am on hold, and told I am currently sixth in the queue when I hear the woman’s screams.  It takes a mere second to process that it is Nanny. Disposing of Mr Kelly’s body will have to wait for another time.  Nanny (I have never discovered, nor need to know her real name) is being chased across the West Lawn.  By what, I am not sure I have neither both the skills or knowledge to understand what.  They appear to be human snakes. 

Yes, human snakes that would describe them. Naked as new born babies, hundreds of them slithering across the lawn.  Growling and snarling like dogs.  Nanny stumbles and they are on her in instant.  The noise is horrifying, her screams mixed in with the tearing and ripping of flesh. 

There is a moment of silence.  One – which appears to be female – rears its head and sees me. It snarls and the rest of them snarl in response.   I am running towards the door and bolting it, double bolting and placing an old bookcase against it before I can settle. 

What the Dickens is going on?  Who are these people? I pull the phone from my pocket.  I’m still on hold and told that lots of people are calling us today and your call is very important to us.  I’m still on hold and SIXTH in the queue. I throw the phone on the table and formulate plans.  All ground floor doors and windows are barred and shuttered.  I’m opening the gun cabinet and loading an antique Purdey.  I place a box of cartridges in my breast pocket. I won’t fire till I physically see one.  Firing at the widows merely increases the chances of them gaining entry. 

There is a banging somewhere. Slow, insistent banging.  Which is coming from The House Of Office on the ground floor?  They are coming though the drains.  I hear something, wet, hungry and inhuman slithering across the bathroom floor.  I edge towards the door, with no military training.  However, I have the breeding of an English gentleman. 

The door is edged open, by something from Hell.  I fire.  Its remains are splattered against the wall.  I’m reloading for another shot, when I see one and then another and another.  There is another line coming from the study.  A fronte praecipitium a tergo lupi (‘A precipice in front, wolves behind’. At this point, I urinate myself.  It’s something that I’ve not done since Eton, When a future Prime Minister, used to bully me.  I am surely dead and offer a silent prayer to my creator. I place the shotgun in the bath.

It’s then, I notice instead of swarming all over me. They are bowing down, these agents of Satan.  Slurring something, an phrase of introduction, a chant: ‘We… are…The Starving…’

‘Please to make your acquaintance.  My name is-‘

‘Your name is not important; Oh King Of Chaos’ says the one nearest me. It’s the lady snake from earlier. ‘Be silent’.

‘No need to be so rude’.

‘SILENCE!’ the cove screams and comes near me, like a cobra.  Dear god, the smell from its breath, reminiscent of Stinker Johnson, in the lower house. 

‘You created pain, misery and death.  You profited from this.  You are already a dead men.  We would eat your soul, if it existed.  We will settle for your flesh.  When you die, you will be a painful, hated memory in the hearts of humanity.  Your death will be a grain of sand on a beach. There will be no Heaven, no hell.  Only death’.

‘Isn’t this a bit Biblical?’

‘No Heaven, no Hell.  You were already told’.

‘How about if I offer forgiveness?’

‘A pointless exercise.  Already, your ‘friends’ (it spits this word at me, small globules of spit hit my face and burn like bleach) are facing show trials and the bloody hands of executioners.  Your death will be quick, clean and tasty’.  It laughs at this point, like a second hand car turning its engine over and over. 

It’s in my last moments, as my flesh is torn to ribbons and burned by that acid like spittle, that I realise I have taken the wrong path.  I have been a hypocrite, I conclude as my head is ripped from my body and thrown in the direction of the study.  As they eat through the layers of skin and feast on my organs I realise the motto of my old schoolmaster Et In Arcadia, Ego. (Even in Arcadia, Here I Am).  As my little life begins to blinks out of existence, neither rising or descending; I realise its grim meaning: death is inevitable, be it temporal or spiritual.

There is a small, last moment of pleasure, as the lady monster performs a service Assumpta refused to provide on several occasions.  Not quite this roughly, however. 

I’d like my last words to have been eloquent.  But: I feel nothing, absolutely nothing. I feel the weight of eternity, pressing down.

Oh. Bugger.