"Ah Lord Pinkerton?" an emboldened mature lady around my mother's age accosted me as I lounged amiably enough with my cronies at the Misses Fotheringay's ball at Southam Courtenay, "Have you met my daughter Molly?"
I looked past the matron and there through the fug of intoxication I believed I beheld an angel, a great vision in gleaming virginal white, and at second glance an improbably plump one, "No, I haven't had the pleasure," I agreed uncertainly for the sweet Mull-berry wine had had its effect on me.
"I should hope not!" Algy declared, "For she may have two legs, two arms, two bosoms and two eyes, though remarkably dis similar, but two chins Johnno, well you must draw a line somewhere!"
"Ah," I agreed with a contented burp, "Indeed."
Poor Molly turned and fled as fast as her considerable bulk would allow.
"You sir are an abomination!" the mother averred.
"Fattening her up for Christmas," Bobby Fawkes chipped in, "I like a plump bird at Christmas!"
"I'd like to sit down," I suggested as I regretted mixing French and English wines so early in the evening.
"You slight me sir!" the matron avowed.
"Tell me," I asked, "You have but one chin, a thin weasel like face, a narrow waist, thin spindly legs beneath that gown I'll wager, so how did you bear a baby elephant for a daughter?" It was said by way of an honest search for the truth.
"I shall not remain to be insulted!" the matron replied.
"Oh, shall you go elsewhere?" Bobby enquired.
"Oh it was no insult Madam," Algy insisted, "No Johnno seeks to bed you."
She half smiled, "Indeed, then I shall inform my husband, Lord Garth."
"That great oaf," Samuel Verney added, "I should quake in my boots if it were me."
"Madam," I added, "I have no great desire to make love to you," I insisted, "Though I should certainly prefer you in my bed to that great ox of a daughter, for she would surely break the bed frame!" It seemed funny at the time, you understand but the next thing Algy had to step forward to stop the matron striking me.
I can not recall much of the evening after that, but in the fullness of time I awoke in a bed in the Red Lion Inn in Southam Whiston with the sun high in the noon day sky and the pipe and drum band of the Caithsby Militia playing inside my skill.
"Oh my head," I croaked.
"So you are not dead?" an unfriendly female voice boomed around inside my skull.
"No madam." I agreed, "Though if I spent the night with you I wish I were."
"Indeed," she boomed,
"Can you please keep the noise down." I asked, "My head is bursting!"
"You insulted my daughter Molly," she insisted.
"Oh god, Mrs Garth," I groaned.
"Lady Garth," she corrected me, "What do you intend to do about it?" she demanded.
"Absolutely nothing madam, for she is fat as a pig," I explained, "I own I'd rather kiss a pig than Molly, on account of the lesser number of chins they display."
"Very well then," she said and began to shout, "Unhand me you drunken oaf," and with theatrical flair she tore at her bodice and through its fine quaity and exquisite needle work she dislodged but one solitary button where she sought to expose her bosoms to plain view.
"Lord Pinkerton I am a married woman!" she protested and right on cue my door opened and there were Molly and the Inn keeper's maid as witness and Lord Garth himself, a frail creature of apparently octogenarian vintage though in truth he was but sixty such it was said was the voracity of Lady Garth's night time demands that he had aged twenty years in the first six months of marriage.
"Hold hard young Pinkerton, why are you dallying with the mem sahib?" he asked.
"No idea sir," I explained, "Your daughter is fat as a pig sir," I said inelegantly, "Lady Garth came to remonstrate.
"Carry on then," he said from the doorway.
"Daddy Lord Pinkerton has shown entire disrespect for myself and our family," Molly cried.
"But you are as fat as a pig dearest," Lord Garth admitted and nodding towards his wife he continued, "And watch that one for she'll eat you alive sir," he added as an after thought.
"But my honour, challenge him Oswald," Lady Garth insisted.
"Challenge, why he would win hands down," Lord Garth averred, "No you challenge him if you see fit, I am taking a walk around the park, good day."
Lady Garth stared in disbelief, "He," she started to say.
"Is a very wise man, Lady Garth," I added, "May I wish you good day?"
"No indeed you may not!" Lady Garth insisted, "Not until this matter is settled."
I groaned, my head was far from cleared yet, "Then allow me some privacy that I may dress,"
I asked reasonably enough.
"No, I shall remain," Lady Garth insisted.
"Then so be it," I suggested and I pulled my night shirt clean over my head to stand naked, sadly unaware that my cronies had writ "Pinkertons Prong a shilling an hour," across my belly in lamp black in the depths of the night.
"Oh!" Lady Garth cried in surprise, "Its huge!"
"Oh, its huge!" cried Molly in alarm,
"Oohh, its huge," the maid said admiringly as sensing the scent of a woman my prong raised himself to his full eight inches and more of extension.
"Put it away sir you will frighten the horses," Lord Garth said as he returned to seek the cause of the commotion, "Or else do someone an injury."
"Ooohh yes what an injury," the maid simpered.
"Damn it where's me breeches," I cursed as my night shirt descended to drape itself around the root of my prong leaving him straining still.
"Marigold, stop staring," Lord Garth councelled, "Wife come away!" he repeated.
"Mummy did he do it?" a fresh voice asked.
I looked an another maid had appeared, dressed in a simple white shift, her face like the mother perhaps yet twenty years her junior, blue eyed and blonde of hair, svelte where the sister was porcine, well proportioned where the sister was porcine, fair of face where the sister was distinctly porcine, and she regaled my prong with a steely gaze as her hair flowed untamed around her shoulders.
"Look away girl!" Lord Garth cried, but to no avail and though I knew it not at once the maid was smitten.
"Uh, it's huge!" she said, "Poor Mummy!"
"Hannah!" Lady Garth cried, "Look away, normal men are not so well endowed, so fear not."
"Earl Marchington?" Hannah asked.
"How should I know, probably not," Lady Garth blushed, "My Hannah is betrothed to Earl Marchington."
"What old Freddie!" I asked.
"No the old duffer," Hannah admitted, "Freddie's daddy," she continued, "He is rich, we are not."
"Your daughter is most forward sir," I suggested as I tried to cover my prong even as the throng pushed into my room as more joined to investigate the commotion.
"I'd be wed by now if only Molly would get herself betrothed," Hannah argued.
"Oh I see!" the fog cleared, slowly, "And I have the only prong long enough to penetrate the voluptuous mounds of flesh that protect Molly's ah, honour?"
"Yes in a nut shell." Lord Garth suggested.
"Just get out all of you!" I demanded.
