Clairvoyants

Jane didn’t believe in clairvoyants. It was true that she had seen a picture of one once but that was in her dusty old copy of “Kolbold’s: Fabled Creatures of the Yesteryear”. The beautifully airbrushed artist’s impression took pride of place among other elusive characters such as pixies, leprechauns, and Eskimos.

She remembered seeing the latest edition of the book not so long back in her local dusty old village bookshop and noted with interest that after a number of confirmed sightings leprechauns had been removed.

Only last year there had been a prime slot news item on the BBC about a number of possible sightings of clairvoyants, but they had turned out to be a hoax. The Department of Fabled Creatures had performed an extensive police style operation to stake out and investigate the funfair where the creature had been spotted reading tea leaves and gazing into crystal balls.

The perpetrator turned out to be a dear old lady from Wigan out to make a fast buck. She had been successfully touring the country for the past five years, mostly unnoticed before an over zealous member of the public reported her to the current editors of “Fabled Creatures”.

The department threatened to sue for the immense costs of their operation but withdrew the action after her appointed solicitor countered with a “Daily Mirror” article about government departments trying to defraud an old lady out of twenty two million pounds in costs. The lawsuit mysteriously disappeared but the cabinet member responsible for the department was later imprisoned for embezzlement.

Jane’s brother had insisted all along that clairvoyants were like Santa; people dressed up in suits going round the country taking vulnerable people for a ride in their little grottos. Jane knew this to be silly as everyone knew that Santa was in fact alive and well and living in Greenland. His multiple sightings could always be explained by the fact that he, like god, was omnipresent; either that or he had a time machine built by his elves. The jury was still out on that one.

No, the fact was clairvoyants didn’t exist.

Now, if that truly was the case, then what was it that was currently stood in front of her? It definitely wasn’t human. It did however look slightly like a small human female with large tightly curly hair. Perched on the top of those curls was a headscarf, in its left hand was something that looked remarkably like a crystal ball and attached to a cord hanging from its belt was an unmistakeable teapot.

“Hello Love.” it said. The ‘it’ sounded like an old women, slightly gravely but somehow calming. Maybe a mixture of sand and rich ruby sherry.

“And you are?” Jane asked.

“I’m a clairvoyant petal.”

“Right— Name?”

“Rosie— Fancy a cup of tea chuck?”

“So that you can read my leaves?”

“That’s right my dear.”

“I don’t think so. Where are you from?”

“The mystical land of Doncaster— I could read your palm—”

“—I doubt it.”

“Tarot Cards?” Instantly a pack of cards almost instantly appeared in the old lady’s hand.

Neat trick Jane thought as she considered the space that the cards now firmly occupied. For a moment Jane was almost tempted, the packs appearance nearly swaying her into giving it a go. She thought for a moment before finally regaining her composure. “No!”

“Erm, Crystal Ball?”

Jane just shook her head with a new determination.

The old woman looked distressed and a little heated around the forehead. Small droplets of sweat poised to make an escape. “Aura maybe?”

Another shake.

“Oh go on, this is my first time.” Rosie paused for a moment and looked Jane up and down. “They said it would be easier than this.”

Jane interrupted, the slight crack in the old woman’s voice was most evident even to an untrained ear. “You’re not really from Doncaster are you?”

The old lady looked rather sheepish as she recognised that she was now dealing with a much higher intellect. An intellect that now had her by the short and curlies. She had be caught out. “No.”

“You’re not actually an old lady either?”

“Shit.” The pitch was high with an unmistakable Geordie accent combined with a slight twinge of Liverpudlian and maybe a firm undercurrent of Yorkshire, mixed with a splattering of German.

“Real name?” asked Jane now on the attack.

 “Kev, mystic Kev, but my friends just call me Kevin.”

Almost before Kevin could finish his sentence a black Cherokee jeep screeched to a halt next to them. Two black suited men leaped out of vehicle and grabbed Kevin before bundling him into the back of the jeep.

A third man walked over to Jane producing a small id card from inside his jacket. Although she couldn’t see them Jane felt the stare of his eyes behind the black ice mirrored sun glasses that prominently featured on his face.

“Department of Fabled Creatures Mam.” He placed the id back in his jacket. “You have nothing to worry about here. We have been tracking this impostor for some time just waiting for him to make his contact with a civilian. And now that he has we can finally arrest him for breaking the terms of article 1056.5a”

“Oh—” Was all that Jane could manage.

“We will take him in for interrogation so that we might find vital information about the whereabouts of the other members of his gang. He will be tried for crimes against the state and put in a special facility to assist his rehabilitation and hopeful replacement back into the community.”

“Oh—” Jane said nodding.

“I presume you are not harmed and there will be no lingering side effects from this incident. You will forget everything you have seen here and continue with your life as normal.”

“Oh—”

And with that the man returned to the jeep and screeched off into the distance. “Weird” Was all that Jane said.