"No thanks. On my way home," he replied.

It wasn't just the golf jokes that had got to him. He'd found himself thinking, what if Merv was right and this guy Porphyry was pulling his plonker by using him to get at some of his fellow members? He hadn't struck Joe as that kind of bean-head, but what did he know about the mind processes of Young Fair Gods? So tell him to take a jump. Except he didn't know how to contact him. OK, just don't turn up. Except he had two hundred quid of the guy's money in an envelope in his back pocket (somehow it hadn't seemed decent to put such lovely clean money in with the dirty old stuff in his wallet). Perhaps he should get there early, intercept him in the car park, hand back the cash and take off. But that would be hard.

"What would you do, Whitey?" he asked the cat, who'd woken up long enough to join him for a late supper after he got home.

For answer Whitey yawned, jumped up on the bed and closed his eyes.

"Good answer," said Joe, who was blessed with the invaluable gift of rarely letting the troubles of the day spill over into his rest. He lay down beside the cat and soon joined him in deep and dreamless sleep.

6

Pastures New

The Reverend Percy Potemkin, pastor of Boyling Corner Chapel, master of its famous choir, and known wherever song is sung or souls are saved as Rev. Pot, preached a mean sermon.

Twice every Sunday he preached it, and with slight variations he made it do for weddings, funerals, christenings, and the opening of garden fetes.

Any suggestion that a little variety might not come amiss was greeted with the response, "If it's not broke, why fix it?" And if the doubter were foolish enough to persist in his doubt, perhaps educing in evidence the fact that most regular members of the congregation knew the words by heart, Rev. Pot would reply, "Now that is good, that's exactly what I want. I'm just a messenger, these are the words of the Lord, and He wants them to be burned on your soul so you never forget!"