Another Fine Tale
By Maureen Grealis
I was ambling along my road on the return from
shopping when I bumped into one of my neighbours rooting through the bushes
outside her block of flats and looking very perplexed.
“Hi Jane,” I called on my approach to her.
She looked up and said, “oh dear what am I going
to do? I’ve lost them.”
I guessed she’d lost her marbles - please ignore that thought - and I didn’t
mean it unkindly but, sadly, she did have a predisposition for getting into
strange situations but, who was I to judge?
“Oh dear,” I said, “what have you lost?”
Guess what she said!
“My marbles.”
Haha no she didn’t, I digress, she said.
“My rings.”
Apparently,
she’d been tidying around the area, it being such a lovely day and somehow her
rings had managed to come off. I offered to help her look for them and popped
my shopping on the ground when I noticed a magpie staring at us from a distance
away and it seemed to have something in its beak and yes, you’ve guessed
it, one of the aforementioned rings and, talk about bright and shiny, it was
massive and all colours of the rainbow and sadly it flew off, no not the ring,
the magpie. Jane hadn’t noticed this as she was so busy with her head down in
the bushes.
“Jane,” I said, “were they very expensive rings?”
“Oh no, just mere baubles really. I bought them from
the car boot at West Kirby, but I had grown fond of them,” she replied.
Mmmm, I wondered, where had the magpie taken the
ring to? Did he have a partner in crime who had gone off with the other
ring?
You won’t believe this but the next day I was in
my garden and guess what? No the rings weren’t on the ground but there was a
magpie sitting there looking at me and it spoke, yes it spoke, and said, “get
me a couple of pounds of best mince from Dewhursts and I’ll give you that old bling
back.”
Well, to say I was astounded and taken aback was
the least of it. I mean Dewhursts, does he know the prices they charge? Still
Jane was a nice old dear so I told him it was a pound and a half or nothing. He
settled on a pound and three quarters and the deal was done.
Jane’s a nice old soul and I always feel sorry
for magpies - they get such a bad rep. Anyway, I went to Dewhursts and made an
appointment with the doctor for the next day, I mean, talking magpies!
Jane was extremely pleased when I returned her
ring to her later on that day as was Mr Magpie when the handover was secured
behind the bushes in the garden. Thankfully, there were very tall bushes as
I didn’t wish to be seen chatting to magpies and putting mince down - best
mince at that - dear me no and, needless to say, I told Jane I’d spotted the
ring twinkling in the sunlight, actually such massive bling would do far more
than twinkle.
***
I simply couldn’t believe it. I was in my
garden the next day when a magpie flew down and said, “I’m Fred.” Fred! But it
got worse as he said he’d been talking to his friend Barney, who’d actually
given him some of the mince - do they have telly in magpie land and do they
like the Flintstones?
Aaargh! He then said Wilma - it gets
worse - and Betty liked fruit plums and peaches.
I really am making that doctors appointment now and
guess what, Fred said he had Jane’s other ring and if I got the fruit we could
do another deal but, the cheek of it, they only liked Marks and Spencer’s
fruit, can you believe it? Still Jane was so happy to get her other ring back
so I’m off to Marks now to buy the gear and wine; I think I need wine, if not
certifying and, if he asks me to get some grapes for Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm,
I think I’ll need to go and lie down in a darkened room. LOL.
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