The day the circus came to town, by Peter Morford

          It’s funny how the memory works. You’d think that it would be the big things that you’d remember all your life.  What I call the “peaks” – first day at school, or the new job, your wedding day, the first-born child.

If you’d scored a century at Lords, you’d remember – and I suppose no one forgets the dark days of clangers and embarrassments. But amidst all these big things are the little events which make a distant day stick in the memory.

Mention D-Day 1944. It was also my tenth birthday and we were all looking forward to the summer holidays.  Dad was probably in Normandy with the first wave – we couldn’t be sure. As I finished breakfast Mum put sandwiches and an apple into my lunch box.

          “You’d better take this with you,” she smiled.

          It was a new cricket ball.  Not a proper leather one but a hard, red composite with a moulded seam.  I knew it would sting my hand when I caught it but unlike a real cricket ball it would keep its shape.

          “Thanks Mum, I can try it out in the lunch break.  Johnny Vaughan’s got a new bat. I’ll bowl this so fast that I’ll break it,” I boasted.

          School was a mile away. Johnny was waiting for me at the cross roads and we had to run the last half to arrive, a bit breathless, just as the bell was ringing.

          All through that morning’s lessons I planned how I would bowl my new ball. It would leave my hand at 80 mph, pitch on just the right spot, break away to the left and take out Billy Anderson’s off stump.  The next batsman would fall to my leg break and –

          “What did I just tell you Charlie Morris?” Mrs. Skeet yelled. “Stand up.”

          But before I could say anything, the noon bell rung and I was saved.  Far louder was the howl of the siren, the air raid warning.

          “A fine time to have an air raid,” Johnny muttered. “You wouldn’t think the Jerries would have time to come here.”

          “Right class, bring your lunch-bags and gas masks and follow me,” Mrs Skeet shouted, leading us to the shelter.

          We had to cross the yard and go down about a dozen steps into a cold and dim place with bare concrete walls and ceiling. Against the long walls were benches for the girls on the left facing the boys on the right.

          The caretaker brought in a crate of milk and went out again, slamming the heavy door behind him.

          Mrs Skeet lit a candle and we waited for the bombs to fall.

The Salutary Tale of Ed Punch, by Peter Shilston,

Despite his impeccably middle-class background, Edwin was always fascinated by organized crime and the activities of gangster leaders. This led to his hanging around in the bars and clubs of Soho, hoping to be noticed by the Kray twins and their associates, who at this time were enjoying the heyday of their power in the district. This made him feel superior to his less adventurous friends.

   For a long time he was simply ignored, but one evening a thief who was being pursued by the police thrust a piece of jewellery into his hand with the words, “Hold that for me, mate!” Quite probably he had mistaken Edwin for someone else in the gloom. The police arrived shortly afterwards and questioned everyone on the premises, but Edwin, with his respectable appearance and accent, was allowed to leave without being searched.

   He felt immensely proud of his coolness under pressure. A few days later he was approached by two threatening-looking men in dark suits who hustled him into a car and demanded that he handed over the stolen item to them. For a wild moment he considered answering them with snarling defiance, but common sense prevailed. Managing to show no trace of the gnawing fear he felt inside, Edwin answered them respectfully and politely, complied with their wishes without protest, and indicated that he was willing to undertake any similar work in the future. Feeling, probably correctly, that his real name of Edwin Prosserly, was nowhere near hard enough for a would-be gangster, he told them that he was called Ed Punch. His self-regard increased greatly in consequence.

   Before long he was approached again. Edwin sensed that he was being tested, with increasingly important tasks. He was asked to dispose of a pistol, which he duly chucked into the Thames near Windsor early one Sunday morning. Was it, he wondered with a thrill of vicarious danger, a murder weapon? For this task he was rewarded with a considerable amount of money in old banknotes. He decided to devote himself to this new, exciting and potentially lucrative life; and he dropped out of college.

   He rented a flat in Old Compton Street, where shortly afterwards he was required to play host to Tony, a young man he had never met before. Edwin felt very uneasy in Tony’s presence, and took great care not to annoy him, for the young man showed every sign of being a psychopath. He was most relieved when after a couple of weeks Tony disappeared and was not seen again.

    Other tasks followed over subsequent months. He drove getaway cars and later disposed of them, he kept account-books for semi-literate criminals, and occasionally vacated his flat when it was required for other purposes by persons unknown. He was well paid for his work, but the tension was beginning to take its toll. He could sense that, although the mobsters occasionally found him useful, he wasn’t really one of them and never would be: he was just a middle-class kid who thought it was cool to hang around with gangsters, and that they might cast him off or betray him at any moment, without a second thought. And did he really want to spend the rest of his life in company with men like Tony?

     Then one day the police conducted a swoop and arrested the entire gang. They were all interrogated separately, on a charge of involvement in a murder. It should surprise no-one that Edwin was the first to crack and turn Queen’s Evidence in return for immunity from prosecution.

    He is believed to be living in South Africa under an assumed name.  It is safe to assume that he never admits to ever having been called Ed Punch.