jenkins

by bofa xesjum

but, stephen, i thought you liked laura. i never said i liked or did not like her. i am just not particularly thrilled at the thought of meeting her again, as you for some incomprehensible reason seemed to have thought i should be. how politely and elegantly these people express themselves, terence thought, sitting serenely in the corner. especially about nothing at all. having disposed of laura, stephen poured himself a brandy. eventually the butler appeared, announcing a new guest. but the guest he announced was not the previously discussed laura, but somebody named jenkins. jenkins, forsooth, randolph muttered. sounds like a policeman. that can hardly be possible, stephen murmured, as we have all long since been sentenced to permanently undramatic existences. at that moment the mysterious jenkins appeared. one of his shoulders was lower than the other. good evening, randolph quietly greeted him, are you a policeman of some sort? a flatfoot! i ain’t no stinking flatfoot! i perceive, sir, that you are not a gentleman. you got that right, my righteous fine feathered friend. i see you are gifted with a way with words. that being said, how can i help you this evening? don’t play innocent with me. excuse me, can you be a little more informative? what exactly am i not innocent of? your name is arthur adams, right? no, i am not. may i ask who you are not? i am not exactly the pope, or the secretary general of the united nations, or the president of the united states of america. well then, rest assured that i have nothing to say to any of those worthies. i must have been misinformed, the man calling himself jenkins admitted ruefully. on that less than happy note, the self-proclaimed jenkins departed. i feel that we got out of that rather nicely, randolph asserted with a sigh of relief. oh, stephen intoned, i would not be so sure of that. i fear the day is coming when civilization will be besieged by such creatures, day and night, until it finally crumbles and falls. that would be unfortunate, randolph replied. stephen began making himself a martini. terence wondered how much either of them knew or suspected about jenkins, or about laura.