The magistrate then asks Norman whether a Holman Hunt is a type of headband. Norman says no. ‘It’s a tattoo of a giraffe.’

The magistrate then orders a clerk of the court to strike Norman for wasting everybody’s time. Norman is duly struck.

‘So, we’re dancing,’ says Norman, once he has recovered, ‘and then suddenly everyone stops at once. Except for me, but I soon stop when I hear the shouting. Someone is up on stage bawling into the microphone. It’s a bloke’s voice and he’s going, “Now you’ve heard it. Now you’ve heard the truth. The Great Old Ones have spoken to us, their children have sung to us, what are we going to do about it?”

‘I shout, “Bring on Bob Dylan,” but nobody’s listening to me. They’re all ripping off their clothes and shouting, “Back to the old ways” and “Tear up the pavements” and “Let the mighty mutant army of chimeras march across the lands” and stuff like that.

‘I don’t know what that’s all about, but as clothes are coming off all around, I think I’d better get in on the act, so I whip off my shop-coat and fold it neatly on the ground. And I say to the girl with the Holman and the nice Charlies, “What is this all about?” and she says,

“Whenever you speak, all rainbow-coloured sweeties come out of your mouth.” Which is a bloody lie, because I don’t eat sweeties any more, although I do know all about them. I know nearly everything there is to know about sweeties — you just try me, if you think I’m not telling you the truth.’

The magistrate asks Norman how they get all the different colours inside a gob-stopper. Norman says he does know, but he’s not telling, because it’s a trade secret. The magistrate makes a huffy face, but asks Norman to continue.

Norman continues. ‘So,’ continues Norman, ‘I ask her again, “What is this all about?” I ask her. And she says, “The trees, the trees. The trees have told us the truth. Mankind is destroying the planet. Raping Mother Earth. Mankind must return to the old ways. Hunting and gathering and fornicating on the grass, because the grass quite enjoys it.” And I say, “Me too, let’s do it right away.” But she isn’t keen, she says that the trees have told everyone that they must tear up the pavements and burn down all the houses and plough Brentford over and plant loads of sprouts, because sprouts are like little planets and have lots of wisdom and—’

The magistrate asks Norman whether he likes sprouts. Norman says he doesn’t and the magistrate says that he doesn’t either and he asks for a show of hands around the court to see how many people actually do like sprouts. There are eighty-nine people present in the court and out of these only seven are prepared to own up that they do and out of these, two say that they aren’t really that keen.

Continue, the magistrate tells Norman and Norman continues once again.

‘So,’ continues Norman, ‘I say to this girl, in the nicest possible way and in a manner that I hope will not offend, that she is stoned out of her face and why doesn’t she come back to my place for a rubber—’

‘Rubber?’ asks the magistrate.

‘Rubber duck,’ says Norman. ‘Although actually I was hoping for a shag.’

The court stenographer makes a note to edit Norman’s statement down to a couple of paragraphs during the lunchtime recess.

‘But then,’ says Norman (continuing), ‘we hear the police cars. Well, I hear the police cars. The crowd with the kit off start shouting that they can see the sounds of the police car sirens. They’re shrieking, “Beware the black lightning,” and crazy stuff like that. Well, I don’t know who actually called the police, or why they did. Although I did notice a couple of furtive-looking fellows who kept speaking into their Y-fronts. Although of course they might have been Egyptians.’

The court stenographer rolls his eyes; the magistrate nods his head.

‘So,’ continues Norman, yet again. ‘Police cars come screaming up and all these coppers come piling out and they’ve all got truncheons and they all pour in through the gates and crash, bang, wallop and thud and hit and beat and bash and—’

‘Have to stop you there,’ says the magistrate.

‘Why?’ asks Norman.

‘Because it’s not very nice. I don’t like the idea of policemen beating up unarmed naked people with truncheons. It’s horrid.’

‘It was horrid,’ says Norman. ‘I was there.’

‘Well, I don’t like the way you’re describing it. It shows our police force to be little more than thugs. Imagine if the newspapers were to get hold of this. People would be thinking that we’re living in a police state, rather than never having had it so good.’

‘So what would you like me to say?’ Norman asks.

‘I don’t mind what you say. But I object to the word truncheon. Call it something else.’

‘Riot stick?’ says Norman. ‘Baton?’

‘No no no. Nothing like that. Something more friendly.’

‘Tulip?’

‘Perfect,’ says the magistrate. ‘Now kindly continue.’

‘Right. So the police rush in with these tulips and there’s bashing and crashing and blood everywhere. And people’s faces are getting smashed in and the police are ramming their tulips up—’

‘No no no.

‘No?’ says Norman.

‘No.’

‘But I’m just getting to the good part.’

‘Does this good part involve tulips?’

Norman made the ‘so so’ gesture with his raised palms. ‘Not a great many tulips.’

‘Well, go ahead then and I’ll stop you if I don’t like the sound of it.’

‘Right. So the police have, you know, with the tulips and everything, but they’re really outnumbered and the naked people start grabbing the policemen and tearing off their uniforms and soon you can’t tell who’s who and the next thing it’s all turned into this sort of mass orgy and everyone’s going at it like knives.’

‘Sounds amazing.’

‘It was quite some party, I can tell you.’

‘I went to a party like that once,’ says the magistrate. ‘Back in ‘sixty-three. What a do that was. Someone even blew up the host’s dog with dynamite.’

‘Well, never mind about that. Orgy, you say?’

‘Gang bang, big time.’

‘So, you are telling me that the policemen were raped.’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘They must have been raped. After all, they were completely outnumbered and they only had tulips to defend themselves with.’

‘Rape’s a rather unpleasant word,’ says Norman. ‘Perhaps you could say they were “loved against their will”, or something like that. Except they weren’t. They were right in there, especially old Mason, and I used to go to school with him.’

In his final summing up of the case, the magistrate did not use the words loved against their will. He used a lot of other words though. Rape was one and tulip was another. And he used an awful lot of adjectives: terrible, horrible, loathsome, nightmarish, vile and filthy and degrading.

He said that he had no intention of holding two thousand separate trials. He would never live to see them end. And for one thing, how could witnesses be expected to recognize defendants, as all people looked the same with their clothes off

The festival-goers were not to blame for their actions, he said. They were innocent victims of toxic poisoning.

It wasn’t their fault.

So whose fault was it, then?

Of this the magistrate was in no doubt. It was all the fault of a single individual. A criminal mastermind. A modern Moriarty. A fiend in human form who had clearly known exactly what he was doing when he emptied those drums of chemical waste into the water supply.

The Doveston did not attend the trial. He was too ill to make an appearance. It was a shame really, because had he been there, I really would have liked to ask him a few questions.

Such as how those drums of chemicals came to be in my hall.

But he wasn’t there, so I couldn’t ask him.