The 17th Apr 2010 WriteOnSite Winning Entry
Every year the same nail-biting wait. Gilbert, 70 and gnarled, Myra, 65 and plump as a butternut squash, paced back and forth, anxious parents waiting the delivery of their prizes. For one or other would win, oh yes! They always had. Inconceivable a newcomer, an upstart could trounce them.
The fairy on the Christmas tree, the Oscar of the show was Class 64: Tray of Mixed Veg. Not to exceed 6 in number. Currently Gilbert had 15 1sts, 12 2nds and one ignoble 3rd. Myra was on 13, 15 and 2.
This year the judge was Ben Towbury, known for his fastidiousness. Ben the Stickler.
"I reckon I've got the edge," said Gilbert, "on account my veg patch is less overhung with trees."
"Mayhap, maybe and perhaps," said Myra, "but I knows what I knows."
And what did she know? Or was it a bluff?
A lackey of the 73rd Chess-by-Cheating Flower and Produce Show drew back the marquee flap, and they could enter. There was a hiatus, a time when neither could move, then the onrush of other competitors stirred their limbs and in they went.
The Mixed Tray was on the far side, of course. GIlbert limped his way over, Myra hobbled on account of her bunions. And Myra turned pale.
It was not that Gilbert had won. That was always a possibility. It was that she was disqualified. Her! Myra Mennymone, spinster of Chess-by-Cheating. It was unheard of. Not even Emerald Leat's pushing of the vicar into the village pond because he had spurned her advances, and him only 20 years younger than her, had been as scandalous.
In a most precise hand on the card beside her exhibit were the words: 'Disqualified. Rule 17b. Tomato is fruit not veg.'
Well! Double well! Tomatoes had always been treated as veg in the show heretofore, rule 17b or no. It was unfair. Myra's tomato was top notch, spherical, shiny, scarlet and toothsome.
She appealed to Gilbert. "Gilbert," she said, "I have been wronged."
"You have," he said. "It's a liberty the like of which has not been heard of in Chess-by-Cheating for many a long year, not since Emerald Leaf pushed..."
"That's enough of that, Mr Gilbert Lardon," cried Myra. "Mayhap, maybe and all that a tomato is technical-like a fruit, but I ain't having it."
Having said which, she ate the tomato.
The judge, Mr Ben Towbury, Ben the Sticker, about to go home, was brought back by the show's chariman after Myra complained. She pointed to her entry. "What tomato?" she demanded.
And Ben the Sickler could not answer. There was no evidence that there had ever been a tomato, except his memory, and he had judged a lot of shows and did get things muddled, being 85 and three months, and there were Myra and Giblert insisting no tomato had ever graced the tray.
So he relented and judged Myra's entry. Unprecedented in the history of the show. And what did he give her? Commended. Not even 3rd prize. Unheard of. Well, and double well!
Copyright © 2008 Rob Richardson. All Rights Reserved.