One of the advantages of living in Dobbstown, Malaysia was
that after I had finished my afternoon security rounds I could stroll
down to the Dobbstown Municipal Dump, meet up with the then extant "Bob" Dobbs and enjoy a rousing rat shoot! I generally used by trusty Benelli/SPK riot model autoshotgun, but "Bob", being more of a purist, used an over and under Hollands @ Hollands.
"Bob" usually arrived in a special, four-wheel drive
limo accompanied by several ladies of the Malaysian night.
He would have the car parked so that it faced the enormous
open pit that held the refuse. Then we'd 'frop and drink
"Bob"'s whisky while we waited for the sun to go down. Being
in the tropics there was little twilight and itnight fell
very quickly. As soon as it was good and dark "Bob" and
I would approach the pit and stand shoulder to shoulder,
shotguns loaded and locked. At "Bob"'s command one of his
"companions" would flick on the headlights and the
fog-cutter beams, illuminating the pit full of refuse which by now
was a crawling mass of Malaysian rats.
We'd open up and give 'em hell, rodents flying
everywhere in our withering blasts of number four shot,
all of them scrambling madly for cover, hissing and
squeaking like a devival audience. When the more fortunate
have escaped leaving only the dead and wounded behind, two
or three of the Asian ladies would venture out, each equipped
with a kris and a plastic bag, to administer any necessary
coups de grace and collect up the bodies. These Asian rats
were primarily jungle dwellers, extremely large and very
tasty when cooked properly, and Dobbs had acquired a taste
for their flesh.
One afternoon there was some sort of trouble with
the perimeter security system, and by the time I had
straightened things out and hied myself down to the dump
Dobbs had come and gone, leaving only the faint reek of
cordite mixed with the smell of his own special 'frop blend.
I decided to visit the Epopt at his sumptuous digs
because I was curious how many he had bagged, shooting alone
and using the archaic weapon that he preferred. I was able
to pass through his security net with no trouble and I rang
his doorbell.
Surprisingly, Connie answered the door herself and
as she took me to see "Bob" she made two things clear:
She did not approve of our manly rodent hunts and she wanted
to switch our wednesday liason to a friday for the next three
weeks.
"I get tired of him coming in all pumped up from the
"kill" and reeking of cheap liquor and cheaper perfume
Gordon," she told me. "You really are a bad influence on him
sometimes!" (As if I had any control over "bob"'s actions!!)
I promised her I would try and do better which
mollified the high-spirited woman somewhat and she conducted me
to her mate's study.
There was Dobbs, seated in his favorite, over-
stuffed armchair in front of his large screen television
set with a basket of crispy, deep fried rats on his lap.
He smiled and waved me into the room unwilling to speak with a full
mouth.
""Bob"," I said. "Do you have some rats in that basket?"
"No," he replied with a seraphic smile while smoke
billowed from his pipe like an active volcano and wove an
aromatic wreathe about his head almost obscuring his
handsome visage.
I sensed that my master had devised some sort of
koan for me and I decided to try a different logical tack.
""Bob"," I said again. "Do you have some rats in
that basket??"
"No," he said again, smiling even more broadly and
leaving me in a logical cleftstick from which I had but one
recourse for escape.
""Bob"," I said a third time. "Do you then have rats
in that basket???"
"Yes Gordon I do," he replied, beaming at me,
obviously well pleased with my perspicacity, and from
that day forward "Bob" and I became the closest of friends!
Original file name: A DobbsTown Reminiscence
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