short story
Alexandra’s Ragtag Band
1,600 words
Toby the black Labrador was easy to see in his hi-vis bright yellow harness and jacket. So that he wasn’t mistaken for a guide dog for the blind, the word POLICE was emblazoned across the back of the dog coat in silver-grey luminous capital letters. Many passengers using the railway station still wanted to pet and stroke him. It was easy to forget that he was actually working and he carried out his duties admirably on that Friday evening at King’s Cross Station in London.
Toby had been trained to sniff out drugs and explosives and was part of a four-man (or woman) two-dog team.
The seven members of Alexandra’s Ragtag Band lounged untidily amongst their luggage and their instruments on the cold, tiled station floor. Normally they’d be busking or jamming in such a busy environment, but today they were tired and all jammed out. They’d been away for four days, had worked for most of that time, and they’d had a long journey home on the Harwich boat train — and they still weren’t home yet.
They’d had a great time entertaining passengers in the restaurant car or ambling along to the music through the carriages, and that was how they’d earned their passage. On the ferry too.
The band competition they’d taken part in, in Haarlem, had been fantastic. They’d done a good job coming fifth out of so many entrants. No prize money this time but a lot of fun and some good exposure for them. They’d already been booked to go back in the summer and another venue was contacting them in the next few days.
But now the trip was catching up on them and they were tired.
“Uh-oh,” warned Alex, after whom the band was named. “Here come the sniffer police.” She wasn’t really called Alexandra, just plain old Alex, but nobody checked. She played the trumpet.
“And it looks as though he’s coming this way,” agreed Manjit, the only other female of the group. She played banjo.
“Who’s got it this time?” hissed Brian, the unlikely but Mohican punk who played snare drum.
“I do,” replied Leon the hippy. He played the tuba.
With Jonah the giant Jamaican on the big bass drum, Neil the wannabe gigolo on slide trombone, and Arabian Imran on, rather surprisingly, piano accordion, they really did make a motley crew. But as that band name was already taken, of a fashion, the raggle-taggle band of oddballs had instead decided on a parody of Irving Berlin’s Alexander’s Ragtime Band. The new name suited them and they had all, in fact, been born and bred in England — apart from gigolo Neil who was born in Scotland but brought up in England.
“Don’t look him in the eye,” said Alex quietly, and they all instead began to rummage through their luggage. But it was too late. Toby the black Labrador sniffer dog with POLICE emblazoned across his back homed straight in on Leon the hippy’s hard tuba case.
Leon went quietly, glancing quickly at the others. He knew they’d be waiting for him when he came back.
The room they took him to was white and cold and clinical. The police tried to look disinterested while the station security staff tried to look fierce. There were two of each, and Toby received a biscuit and a quick chuck behind the ears as he sat patiently and thumped his tail on the floor.
While the male security officer checked his passport and asked the questions, the female security officer emptied the contents of the tuba case onto a table and examined each item one by one. She wasn’t interested in his other luggage because Toby hadn’t been interested either, which was just as well as it was mostly dirty laundry.
And so the perfunctory staccato questioning began. Leon tried not to sound too rehearsed but made sure to give more information than less in his replies to speed things along a bit.
“Where are you traveling today, Mister… uh…” he checked the name on the passport.
“Leon. It’s Leon,” said Leon. “I’m on my way home.”
“Where is home?”
“We’re waiting for the connection to Doncaster. The last one was canceled and the next one’s running late.”
“Where have you been?”
Leon resisted pointing out that the security guard had all of his travel itinerary along with his passport. “Haarlem. In Holland.”
“What was your business in the Netherlands?”
Leon glanced across at his tuba that the female security guard was patiently dismantling where she could, but he resisted… “We were in a band competition.”
“How did you get from Haarlem to King’s Cross?”
“We came via Amsterdam and the Hook of Holland and caught the boat train from Harwich.”
“Surely it would be easier to fly from Schipol to Doncaster?”
“No, they decided not to fly that route from Robin Hood Airport in the end. We’d have to come into Humberside or Manchester instead.”
“But that would still be quicker than coming through London.”
“Yes, but it’s cheaper by train and we work our passage. That way it costs us nothing in the end, and we get paid.”
“How did you do in the competition?”
“We came fifth. Out of forty-five.”
The security guard raised an eyebrow and looked impressed for a moment. But he seemed to be all out of questions and the female security guard seemed to have exhausted all avenues with the tuba case. Leon tried not to get annoyed that someone else had mauled his instrument, but he knew it would be covered with fingerprints by now.
The security guard turned towards the security guardette. “What did you find?”
“Nothing,” she said, indicating the table in front of her. Even the x-ray machine had remained idle. The tuba was in as many pieces as it broke down to for cleaning purposes, she’d opened a small bottle of Brasso, a green cleaning cloth covered with smudges lay spread out next to the Brasso, a pair of lady's gardening gloves (pink, flowery) was next to that, and there were a few mini sheets of music.
“There must be something,” said Mister Security, but Miss Security simply shrugged her shoulders and shook her head.
There was nothing.
Mister Security looked across to Toby’s handler. “Can the dog come and identify what it was he could smell?”
The policeman nodded and fetched Toby to the table. Toby panted happily, wagged his tail twice, and woofed quietly at the gloves.
“Thank you,” said the security man, and Toby and his handler resumed their place alongside the policewoman. Toby received another treat.
“Can you tell me, Mister… uh…” said the security guard.
“Leon,” reminded Leon, helpfully.
“Er… yes, why do you have a pair of gardening gloves in your case?”
“They’re for when I’m polishing the brass. They save me from getting fingerprints everywhere.” He glanced pointedly at the security woman, who didn’t even have the good grace to blush.
“But these are gardening gloves. Ladies gardening gloves.”
“Yes, they’re much cheaper than the white polishing gloves and those came free on the front of a gardening magazine.”
“Do you also use them for gardening?”
Leon thought for a moment. “Yes, actually… I think I did use those… when I fertilized the grass. The fertilizer grains burn my skin, so I used the gloves when I scattered it.”
Tony’s handler cleared his throat.
“Yes?” said the security guard.
“What kind of fertilizer do you use, Sir?”
“Bone meal. Fish, blood, and bone.”
“Ah.” The policeman looked at the security guard. “Could we have a word?”
Mister Security smiled unsmilingly as he excused himself and the police officer. When they returned, Miss Security was told to put everything back, Leon was given his passport and travel itinerary, and he was told he could go.
“We’re sorry to have detained you, Mister… uh… Sir.”
As expected the rest of Leon’s bandmates were waiting for him.
“All okay?” asked Jonah the giant Jamaican.
“All okay,” grinned Leon.
“Come on, then. Our train’s on platform seven.”
And the unlikely raggle-taggle group of oddballs finally completed the last leg of their journey home.
Two days later, on Sunday, the band met up again, this time at the bandstand in Rotherham’s Rosehill Park. They were fully garbed out in the band’s livery of black trousers, black waistcoats with red shiny satin back panels, fluorescent turquoise shiny satin shirts, and sparkly black bowler hats with turquoise and red shiny satin ribbon around the rims.
Alex’s hair was already short, but Manjit pinned hers into a neat little bun, Brian hid his Mohican under his hat, and Leon tied his beaded braids into a ponytail.
They were ready to entertain Rotherham on this sunny Sunday afternoon.
“Okay,” said Manjit on banjo. “Who has the Dutch beers?”
“Me,” said Jonah the giant Jamaican on the big bass drum. “Who has the ‘cakes’?”
“Me,” said Alex on trumpet, after whom the band was named. “Who has the ‘smokes’?”
“Me,” said Neil the wannabe gigolo on the slide trombone.
“And whose turn is it next time to carry the decoy through customs?” asked Leon the hippy on tuba.
“Mine,” said Arabian Imran who, rather surprisingly, played piano accordion.
“Perfect,” said Brian the unlikely punk who played snare drum.
“We don’t get stopped that often, thankfully,” said Alex. “But when we do, that bone meal certainly confuses the dogs.”
They all grinned at each other and then Alexandra’s Ragtag Band began to tune up.
This short story is © Diane Wordsworth. It was first published in My Weekly, and it has since been published as a standalone story and in the following anthologies: Twee Tales Two, Twee Tales More, and Ten Short Stories: Wordsworth Shorts 11–20.
You can buy all of my books at www.books2read.com/DianeWordsworth
Sign up for my newsletter
If you would like to sign up for my regular newsletter, please follow this link. There’s a free short story with every issue.
Don’t forget, you can unsubscribe at any time.
Originally published at https://vocal.media.