Eponymous Botch

To find out what war-torn Afghanistan needs most, only France would send a philosopher. President Jacques Chirac and his prime minister, Lionel Jospin, this week entrusted France’s most flamboyant intellectual, Bernard Henri-Lévy, with the mission of explaining to them ‘the expectations and needs of the Afghan people.’ (The Manchester and London Guardian, 9 February 2002).

London, England

‘Sorry sir,’ he said to me, frowning, ‘this is a respectable establishment. We don’t sell those kind of books here.’

‘Ah, right,’ I sighed, swiftly exiting the premises. ‘Sorry to have bothered you.’

Out on the street, my Groucho disguise safely back in my pocket, I headed up towards Cambridge Circus – a route famous for its assault course on your conscience. Every few yards I was wrenched from my feelings of quiet contentment by angels with clipboards. ‘Sir, can you donate any money or blood to the Red Cross?’

Each time, my wallet bulging with the membership cards of a plethora of good causes, I would effect an odd gesture with my hand, pretend I was a Japanese tourist, and say, ‘I’m OK for now thanks. I just ate.’ But Angel No. 5, a determined little cherub, cornered me, the nib of his pen digging into my ribs. There was no escape.

‘It’s me or Les Mis,’ he said. ‘The choice is yours.’

An offer I couldn’t refuse.

‘Now if I can just take some details’, he suggested, licking his fangs. ‘First name?’

‘Er, Red.’

‘Red,’ he confirmed, scribbling it down. ‘And your second?’

‘Er, Cross.’

‘Red Cross.’ His pen stopped, and his unconvinced eyes bored into me.

‘Yes, I know,’ I said, blushing. ‘My parents were socialists.’

His expression lightened. ‘Oh right. You mean they were red?’

‘What? No. I mean they were always cross.’

An hour later, tears streaming down my face, I signed my life away.

20,000 feet, Western Africa

As I leapt from the plane, air-dropped into a foreign land, I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of remorse. If only I had shown more spine on that London street, perhaps I would now be soaking in a hot colander, or taking out a show – anything but watching my first parachute fail to open, and relying on my hair-do to cushion my rendezvous with earth.

As luck would have it, I landed on the only farmer’s haystack for a thousand miles. True, it was being torched by a set of angry pitchfork-wielding rioters, but who was I to quibble? I had survived phase 1 of my mission, and was ready to carry out my duty – preferably on a stretcher.

Werarwe, Zimbuctoothed

I arrived in Werarwe by the traditional method – curled up in the boot of a car. I was minutes away from dislocating my hip when, lo and cuckold, two heavies in mirrored shades, a minimum of five toothpicks in each other’s mouths, descended upon me, double-barreled.

‘Can I help you?’ I asked in my best bell-boy voice.

‘What you doin’ in that boot?’ they probed with an electric cattle prod.

‘What boot?’ I cunningly tricked.

They illustrated the said space by slamming the door shut on my head.

‘Oh, das boot,’ I acknowledged, caving in like an avalanche. ‘I was just looking for this.’

I felt in my pocket for my Red Cross Survival Kit, and held up what I thought was a picture of President Ruetheday, their viperous leader. Unfortunately, I must have been given another volunteer’s kit, and I proceeded to smack kisses on a picture of Rock Hudson. I realised my error too late, and escorted them head-first to a place of detention.

By the time I came around, I was hanging naked from my feet.

‘My God!’ I exclaimed. ‘How did you know I was a Delta House man? University of South-Western Kentucky, class of ‘79!’

They weren’t buying it, and proceeded to lash me in the traditions of good diplomacy. Next to my carcass, also positioned bat-like, was another beaten party, squaring his jaw in a Yankee display of resolve.

‘You’ll never get away with this boys,’ he proceeded. ‘The Dallas Driller doesn’t tolerate this kind of treatment of its reporters. Especially its chief make-up correspondent.’

‘Youse a journalist? And youse admit it?’ they howled, polishing their clubs on his washboard stomach.

‘I’m Chuck Doubt!’ he exclaimed. ‘I can get you free blusher if you want it.’

A few days later, our protectors tired, and took a short lunch-break. As my eyes emerged from within the swells, I noticed a Frenchman pacing up and down before us, admiring his trolley-displayed tarte au citron and mumbling something about nothingness. It was Jean D’arc-Glacés, the famous philosopher and narcissus.

‘You fancy French phoney!’ barked Chuck Doubt.

‘Tu est un journaliste!’ he rationalised. ‘C’est la vie!’

I seized the opportunity and bellowed for the guard, who arrived within the lunar cycle.

‘Wot you want?’ he inquired.

‘Je suis une philosopher,’ I begged. ‘Cogito ergo summary injustice’.

‘Non,’ he said after a moment’s reflection, ‘cogito ergo summary beatings’, and remained true to his creed, launching a sustained attack on a much treasured part of my anatomy.

Then, much to my astonishment and against the weight of history, the Frenchman partook in a moment of brave heroism. Suffocating the guard with the tarte, he untied our feet, and nursed our head wounds after we came crashing down onto the concrete floor of the cell.

‘One for all, and all for one!’ enthused D’arc-Glacés, as the three of us, heroes of our time, made a dash for freedom (or liberty, we never agreed on which).

That first night, we hid under a bush. Unfortunately, it was the same one. JDG snored the whole night through, scaring off the local lions, and Doubt made up his lost press-ups, counting each one of the three-and-a-half million. I finally nodded off at noon, cinq minutes before JDG rose to light a handful of Gauloises, exhaling directly into my nasal windpipe.

‘Petit Dejeuner?’ he proposed as I went to throttle him.

The only safe place was a little known roadhouse called McDonsomething, chosen by the drooling Doubt, and at which one could purchase such delights as the traditional Zimbuctoothed Quartered-Ostrich Pounder. JDG turned his nose up as he sucked black coffee from a straw, a cigarette in each nostril.

‘What’s going on in this country?’ I asked the Gaulling thinker. ‘They don’t exactly seem welcoming to foreigners. Is something wrong?’

He looked me up and down, as I readjusted various organs. ‘You know you’re still naked, huh?’

I screeched and patched together a choice garment from my styrofoam carton and napkins.

‘Eez-coutmoi. You, Doubt and I, we are the last Westeners left in Zimbuctoothed.’

‘Westerners? You’re French aren’t you?’ I rejoined.

‘Ah, bon mot! Nevertheless, nous est içi to – er, how you say? – search pour le truth.’ His arms shot above his head. ‘What is truth in Zimbuctoothed?’

I spat an eighth of a pound of ostrich over the table. ‘Truth? How should I know? All I agreed to was a yearly donation of £4. I don’t even know where we are!’

He chuckled. ‘Ah, l’anglais, always so ignorant. Let me post-structuralise. Le situation is dire ‘ere. Journalists have been silenced, citizens killed and tortured, and farmers pasteurised. I was sent here by my government. I am compiling a report, you want to see it?’

I waved him away, but it landed in my exposed lap. Fortunately, it was a short read. ‘Une dirth d’agents intellectual’.

‘Good point’, I acknowledged, eyeing Chuck Doubt as he wolfed a fifth chocolate shake.

We talked for many hours, Doubt filling up on creotine, JDG adding most of the words. The key, he said, was to imagine oneself out of a situation in order to be in it, thereby confusing your own consciousness into submissiveness before booking yourselves into a motel. I slightly amended his theory and imagined him out of this situation, thereby giving me some peace.

The rest of the day, in which I began to scribble my report-back to my namesake (‘International laws being disobeyed subjectively. All is well.’), was no picnic, even though JDG brought a liberal supply of pain, vin and boursin. We were trapped like caged animals, unable to leave our safe-house, despite the best efforts of the owners. Every ten minutes or so, a gang of savage mutilators would come knocking, but we would let them know we weren’t interested. JDG was in a state of phenomenal excitement, unable to recall whether etre-pour-soi should be contrasted with etre-en-soi, or the other way round. I enlightened him by contrasting the power of my boot with the softness of his derriere. He said this was ‘Bad Faith’, and sulked as he blow-dryed his bouffon.

US-French relations were suffering badly. JDG kept pretending to cough, but the words ‘unilateralist imperialist’ were unmistakable. Doubt responded by boiling his blood over a gas stove, dabbing on a touch of foundation, and telling tales about his father’s exploits in World War Deux, in which he ‘saved legions of liver-livered frenchies from having to wear jackboots’. Zimbuctoothed was rarely mentioned.

Fate had obviously left us musketeers together, and I was just planning to have her garters for guts when she re-emerged in the form of an order for our exile.

‘Thank God!’ I wept, as a limo pulled up, President Ruetheday punching the air with his fist out of the sunroof.

We were driven around Werearwe, adoring fans shackled at the sides of the streets, as the President displayed his capture.

‘These sick perpetrators of colonial debauchery,’ he intoned, ‘are forever banned from my land, or ownership of it.’ Through sheer force of habit, he slipped some public funds into our breast pockets as he booted us over the border into Italy.

And that is where we now reside, locked in a detention centre with other illegal immigrants. At least, that is the fate of Doubt and me. JDG managed to sweet-intercourse his way out of here, bribing the governor with an objective plea to pratique. Just before he left he turned to me, saying, ‘Mon ami, it’s never too late to plan for the future’. This false and meaningless statement has haunted me ever since, especially as he succeeded in selling me insurance with it.