He had given up all thoughts of being a young buck and a bit of a ladies’ man at an early age, and had fallen naturally enough into the role of aesthete. He had dutifully nurtured a six-hair goatee and frayed the bottom of his jeans. He had done the whole bit: the Aldermaston marches, which he joined for the last half mile to arrive in Trafalgar Square amidst cheering crowds; the long nights in coffee bars discussing Jack Kerouac and René Magritte over cold cups of espresso; the dufflecoats and Jesus boots, the night-school fine arts courses. But he never got his end away.

He had met many a big-breasted girl in a floppy sweater, smelling of joss sticks, who spoke to him of love being free and every experience being sacred. But they always ended up at the art teacher’s pad and he back at home with his mum.

He’d never been one of them, and he couldn’t blame it all on his nose. He was simply an outsider. That he was an individualist and an original meant little to a lad with stirrings in the groin department.

Neville rose from his seat and padded across the threadbare carpet to the whisky optic. Surely things hadn’t been all that bad, had they? Certainly his childhood and years of puberty had not exactly been the stuff of dreams, but there had been moments of joy, moments of pleasure, hadn’t there?

Neville’s total recall could not totally recall any. Still, things weren’t all that bad now. He was the Swan’s full-time part-time barman, and it was an office which made him as happy as any he could imagine.

If he had known when he was fifteen that this lay in store for him, he would never have suffered such agonies of self-doubt when he realized that he could not understand a single bit of Bob Dylan’s “Gates of Eden”.

But how had he come to get the job in the first place? It had been a strange enough business by any accounts.

Neville remembered the advert in the Brentford Mercury: “Part-time barman required, hours and salary negotiable, apply in person. Flying Swan.”

Now in his late twenties and making a career out of unemployment, Neville had jettisoned the camphor bags and forced himself into his one suit, given his brothel creepers a coat of Kiwi, and wandered down to the Swan to present himself. The acting part-time barman, who shortly afterwards absconded with a month’s takings and several cases of scotch, had given him the summary once-over. He asked if he thought he could pull a pint, then hired him on the spot.

As to who the actual tenant of the Flying Swan was, Neville had not the slightest idea. The paint had flaked off the licensee plate outside, and those who swore they knew the man like a brother gave conflicting accounts as to his appearance. Neville had been handed the keys, told to take his wages from the disabled cash register, and left to get on with it. It had been a rare challenge but he had risen to it. He had no knowledge of running a pub but he had learned fast, and the ever-alert locals had only ever caught him the once on any particular dodge. He had single-handedly turned the Swan from a down-at-heel spit and gob saloon to a down-at-heel success. He had organized the trophy-winning darts team, who had now held the local shield for a record five consecutive years. He had supervised the numerous raffles and alehouse events, acted as oracle and confessor to local drunks, and strangely and happily had evolved into an accepted part of the Brentford landscape.

He was at home and he was happy.

Neville’s smile broadened slightly, but a grim thought took off its edges. The brewery. Although they had no objection whatsoever to his residency, him being basically honest and the pub now running at a handsome profit, the brewery gave him no rest. They were forever suggesting special events, talking of modernization, and installing things… His eyes strayed involuntarily towards the bulky contours of the humming monster which he had now covered with a dust sheet tightly secured with baling wire.

Neville tossed back his scotch and looked up at the Guinness clock; nearly five-thirty, nearly opening time. He squared up his scholar’s stoop and took another deep breath. He would just have to pull himself together. Embark upon a course of positive activism. Be polite to his patrons, tolerant of their foibles, and indulgent towards their eccentricities. He would smile and think good thoughts, peace on earth, good will towards men. That kind of thing. He was certain that if he tried very very hard the horrid odour would waft itself away, to be replaced by the honeysuckle fragrance of spring.

From not far away the library clock struck the half-hour, and Neville the part-time barman flicked on the lights, took himself over to the door, and opened up. On the doorstep stood two bearded men.

“Good evening, barlord,” said Jim Pooley.

“God save all here,” said John Omally.

Neville ushered them into the bar without a word. Now was the present and what was to happen happened now and hereafter and it surely couldn’t be all bad, could it? The two men, however, seemed to be accompanied by a most extraordinary smell. Neville pinched at his nostrils and managed a somewhat sickly grin. “Your pleasure, gentlemen?” he asked when he had installed himself behind the jump, and his two patrons had resumed residency of the two barstools which had known not the pleasure of their backsides for more than a week. “What will it be?”

Pooley carefully withdrew from his pocket the five-pound note, which had not left his clammy grip since it had been handed to him, and placed it upon the bar counter.

Neville’s eyebrows soared into a Gothic arch. He had hoped that if he thought positively things might turn out OK, but this? This transcended even his wildest expectations. Jim Pooley with a five-pound note?

And it got worse. “Two pints of Large please, Neville,” said Pooley, smiling almost as hideously as the barman, “and have one yourself!”

Neville could feel a prickling sensation rising at the back of his neck. Have one yourself? He had read in paperback novels of the phrase being used by patrons of saloon-bars, but he had never actually encountered it in real life. “Pardon,” said the part-time barman, “might I have that last bit again.”

“Have one yourself,” Pooley reiterated.

Neville felt at his pulse. Could this really be? Or had he perhaps died and gone to some kind of barman’s Valhalla or happy drinking ground? The nervous tic went into overdrive.

Omally, who was growing somewhat thirsty, made the suggestion that if Neville wanted to take advantage of Jim’s generosity it would be better if he dropped the amateur theatricals and did so at once. Neville hastened to oblige. “Thank you Jim,” he said. “I don’t know what got into me then. Your kindness is well received, I thank you.”

Still mumbling the phrase “Have one yourself” under his breath, Neville pulled two pints of the Swan’s finest. As he did so he took the opportunity to study the two men, whose eyes were now fastened by invisible chains to the rising liquid. The beards were odd enough in themselves, but that Pooley’s shirt appeared to have shrunk by at least two sizes and that the colour of Omally’s regimental tie had run on to his neck were things of exceeding strangeness. Caught in a sudden downpour perhaps? Neville could not remember any rain. The ducking-stool then? Some lynch mob of cuckolded husbands exacting a medieval revenge? That seemed feasible.

The barman passed the two exquisitely drawn pints across the counter and took possession of the magical blue note, which he held to the light as a matter of course. Having waited respectfully whilst Pooley and Omally took the first step towards quenching their long thirst he said at length, “Well now, gentlemen, we have not had the pleasure of your company for more than a week. You have not been taken with the sickness I hope, nor struck by tragic circumstances.”