Dorchester is a lovely little town. Its history is older than England itself. Even before the Romans arrived there were Celtic people living in the area. The Celtic people had either pushed out or integrated with even older tribes. When the Romans went home the Anglo-Saxon people arrived and either pushed out or integrated with the Celtic people that the Romans had left behind. Their descendants make up the majority of the population still. I haven't mentioned the Norman French, they made no attempt to push out or integrate; they only subjugated.
Since all this pushing out or integrating had taken place the prosperity of the town had risen and fallen at different times. As I say, Dorchester is a lovely little town and despite being the County Town of Dorset, and strategically placed on the road to nearly everywhere, I can't help thinking that Dorchester has never quite reached its full potential.
Unfortunately, someone who had reached his full potential was Barnaby Barnaby. If I was being kind, I would describe Barnaby as being simple. Most people weren't kind when describing Barnaby Barnaby.
Barnaby Barnaby liked being called Barnaby Barnaby because it saved him having to remember his surname. Although, sometimes it saved him having to remember his Christian name instead.
Under normal circumstances Barnaby Barnaby would have led an unhappy life full of poverty and misery. But his circumstances weren't normal. Mr and Mrs Barnaby had built up quite a successful grocery business in Dorchester and, because Barnaby Barnaby was their only son, they had employed him in the shop. At the age of twenty-one, he had risen to the position of errand boy. Each year his parents had increased his salary without increasing his responsibilities. By now he was their best paid employee. This didn't make him overly popular with the other hard working people at Barnaby's the Grocers.
I am sure that many of you have worked at a firm where the idiot son of the proprietor is in a high paid position which is of no earthly use to the company. I know that I have.
You may be questioning the wisdom of Mrs and Mrs Barnaby naming their son Barnaby. I must point out that their decision was not devoid of logic. You see, within both of their families there was a well established tradition of using the wife's maiden name as the Christian name of a couple's first born child. Now, as Mr and Mrs Barnaby were cousins, Mrs Barnaby's maiden name was in fact Barnaby.
Some unkind people have suggested that this may be the reason that Barnaby Barnaby was soft in the head. I, personally, wouldn't be so unfeeling. If pressed, I would suggest it was more to do with the fact Mrs Barnaby did absolutely everything for her son. When nothing is expected of you there is no reason to achieve anything.
From all that I have told you, I wouldn't want you to think that Barnaby Barnaby had to be transported about in a basket. Or even that he breathed through his mouth and dribbled all the time. Outwardly he was quite a pleasant looking young man. Admittedly, he wasn't the sharpest tool in the box but that was forgivable. His big crime against humanity was that he was as gullible as fuck.
If anyone told Barnaby a sob story about a misfortune he would put his hand in his pocket straight away.
You may be saying that that is not the worst trait in the world and I am inclined to agree with you. That is why I am determined to pay him back just as soon as I can.
......................................................................
Barnaby, I think that you know enough about him by now for me to use his first name only, had been sent to deliver two bottles of ginger beer to a customer three streets away from the shop, more to get him out of everybody's way than anything. It was a pleasant Summer's day so he was walking slowly.
As he turned the corner from High West Street, Barnaby bumped into Colm Jeffries; literally.
"Watch where you're going mummet!" said Colm, holding out his hand.
Barnaby reached into his pocket and fetched out a shilling which he gave to Colm. Years before Colm would tell Barnaby some elaborate yarn about needing a shilling to rescue a litter of dead kittens or such like but now he didn't even bother with the pretence.
At a point about half way further into his errand he came across an obstruction to the pavement, furniture to be precise. There was a woman sitting on a dining room chair exactly where Barnaby needed to pass. In his opinion she was older than him but younger than his mother so that made her attractive.
"Is this your furniture?" he enquired of the woman.
"Yes, the carter just dumped it here and then buggered off."
"Are you moving it into this house so that you can live there?"
"No, I'm moving it in so I can build a bonfire."
"I could help you but I don't want to be here when you light it," said Barnaby.
The woman laughed. She was under the impression that he had made a witty riposte to her sarcasm.
"That would be very kind of you. But first of all, why don't you share your ginger beer with me. I'm parched dry."
"Well, it's not actually my ginger beer. It belongs to my parents, they own the grocery shop in High West Street. I have to deliver it to a customer. Then it will belong to them.
Delilah, that was the woman's name, perked up when she felt that Barnaby had connections to a source of money. "Do your old folks pay you for all this important work that you do?"
"Yes, very well. Thirty-five shillings a week, sometimes more," replied Barnaby.
Delilah nearly choked when she heard this, "Thirty-five bob!"
"Yes, my mother loves me. She makes my father put my wages up. Father thinks that I'm a bit simple."
Regaining her composure, the woman moved an ornate wooden box from the chair next to her.
"Come and sit beside me and open one of those bottles. I'm sure that your mother won't mind."
Barnaby rarely got such an invitation so he obliged.
"What is in that box?" he asked as he released the bottle stopper.
"Oh, that's just my crystal ball," replied Delilah, "I dabbles a bit.
"You know, fortune telling and the like."
"Oh!" said Barnaby, like she was speaking Flemish.
Then he thought for a bit and then said, "What, like Gypsy women do at fairs?"
"I tells the customers that my mother was a Romany, but she weren't."
"Are you very good at it?" the young man enquired.
"Not really, but it don't really matter with my sort of customer."
A brief silence ensued while Barnaby took all this in.
Then he asked, "Would your husband like some ginger beer?"
"I can't really say, he died last month," laughed Delilah.
She went on, "That's why I've moved back here.
"We was living in Portsmouth but I never liked the shithole, too many sailors.
"I was born near here so I thought I'd move back this way."
"Was your husband a sailor?" asked Barnaby.
"Oh, no. Not him."
"What did he do then?"
"Well, mostly he would find men and bring them back to the house so that I could tell their fortunes for a fee," laughed Delilah.
"Other times, he would help people with their investments. He always had some scheme or other that he persuaded folk to give him money for. None of them ever came off," she added.
