THE SKY PILOT FROM BENTLEY PARK - PART 3

Horsey took it upon himself to do a "follow up" call with the local Cairns Post newspaper.
Horsey prided himself on "follow ups". It was amazing what could be achieved, he reasoned, with diligent observance of the social graces.

"Hey mate! On yer!" he chortled cheerily, as he finally reached the Editor's desk.

The frosty tone of voice which had identified the Editor changed immediately to one of familiarity and cordiality. "Horsey mate, how's it hangin'? Haven't heard from you in a couple of weeks?"

Horsey chuckled. "Too busy with all this Council bizzo, you know how it is. But hey, did you see that stripper from The Red Plum a little while ago? She was on her way in, to talk with you?"

"Haven't seen any stripper in here mate, wished I could though," came the reply. "What's all this about?"

Horsey frowned and silently cursed himself for not using his mobile phone to record Dilly reciting back what he had told her to say. It would have provided hard evidence to discredit the Reverend and he could have sent it on to the Editor. The benefits of modern technology, he thought with irritation, and he was not savvy enough to bloody use it!

Horsey chose his words, carefully. Very carefully. "Well mate, you know it's not like me to carry tales out of school, like........."

"No mate, that's for sure," broke in the Editor, raising his eyebrows and rolling his eyes.

"But I got to tell you this," Horsey continued, speaking slowly. "One of the strippers from The Red Plum, name of Dilly, told me only about an hour or so ago, that one of The Club's regular customers is none other than our own sky pilot bloody morals crusader himself. Not only that, but the Reverend has been an ummm, client of Dilly's more entertaining services."

"Really?" came the excited reply. "Well, well, well, doesn't surprise me in the least...you know what these so called Ministers of Religion can be like........"

"Exactly," Horsey answered. "So I sent this Dilly girl over to see you mate. Hasn't she arrived there yet?"

"No, I haven't seen her and no-one in the downstairs office has left me a message either," the Editor replied.

"You could always give Jaye a call at The Red Plum and find out where she is?" suggested Horsey helpfully, smiling broadly, even as he wondered what the hell had happened with the stripper.

"I'll do that mate and thanks for the info."

.................................

A phone call from the Editor five minutes later confirmed that "Dilly" was a stripper at The Red Plum, but that she was not available to talk at the time of the call. Jaye, the Manager of The Red Plum was circumspect when asked directly by the Editor if the Reverend Harmon was a regular guest of the premises. "Mate, he could be, I wouldn't know. We don't ask our patrons who they are," he replied. Several phone calls later, and the Editor had still been unable to talk directly with Dilly. On the last call, Jaye told the Editor that another stripper called "Candy" had last seen Dilly that morning walking down Lake Street to do some shopping.

The Editor decided to trust in Horsey and the stripper, for a well timed Editorial.
As he wrote, he wondered just how much of an impact it would have on that commie bastard's election chances on the following Saturday.
....................................................

The Editorial appeared in the Friday newspaper, one day before the by-election for Division 2.

"A LITTLE MATTER OF HYPOCRISY"

We all admire people of principles, integrity and moral rectitude, particularly in these uncertain times of rising crime, family break-ups, confusion over long held values and the general cynicism towards our elected representatives.

Yes, we all admire and respect those wholesome, honest, shining men and women whose lives are without blemish or the faults of us lesser mortals. It makes us feel good to know these perfect people are still around.

We admire goodness. We admire decency. We're tired of trusting in people who let us down. We want someone to represent us whom we can trust in absolutely.
We don't want someone who loudly proclaims to be an innocent, yet behind closed doors is as tarnished and sullied as the next person. We don't want someone who sells himself to all and sundry as "a good and decent man", yet hides a secret and immoral life.

Our society has wolves in sheep's clothing. This Editor has discovered such a wolf, a hideous, carping hypocrite of a man, who publicly condemns the Girlie Club industry in Cairns, while being a frequent patron himself.

For this coming by-election for Division 2, I would ask voters to give who they vote for some serious, critical thinking and not be misled by the wolves in
our community who speak with forked tongues. "

..................................................

The Reverend Matthew Harmon read the Editorial about mid morning on the Friday.
He hadn't read "The Cairns Post" until one of his congregation, old Tom Algey, had
phoned to pass the information on.

"He's writing about you I reckon," old Tom croaked. "Someone has it in for you!"

Matt Harmon read the Editorial with exasperation. He had guessed there would be
more attempts to sabotage his election chances, however he never thought for a moment
that it would go this far. He hoped, he prayed, that people would continue to trust him.
It was all he could do.

His Mother phoned, barely seconds after he had finished reading the Editorial. She was
upset almost to the point of hysteria. "Everyone at the Bowls Club has read it and
are talking about it," she said, with a catch in her throat.

Matt did his best to calm his Mother, while wondering if it would affect his campaign workers.

It didn't take long to find out. As he fired up his computer and checked his emails, he
found short emails from three volunteer booth workers, stating that they had other
commitments on the Saturday and would no longer be working for him. This was
followed by a phone call from a woman who had also volunteered to hand out his "How
to Vote" cards at the State School in Hambledon. "I don't want to do it," said the
woman. "I just don't believe in you any more!" Before Matt could reply, she hung up.

Another call was received. "Listen to Radio Cairns, will you," said the anxious voice of his
wife Amber, calling from her workplace. "They're all talking about you."

The Reverend switched on his radio. He was just in time to hear a caller say:-

"...and it is obviously the Reverend, the one they reckon is the sky pilot from Bentley
Park. He's just like all the ministers of religion. They preach God and all this bullshit
and then they go and do the opposite...."

"Isn't it just amazing," said the shock jock. "Where do all these creeps come from?
They creep out from under logs, like maggots, whenever there is an election, with all this publicity about how good they are, how decent they are, how they're going to clean up the city, and lo and behold, we find out, often through a sheer fluke, that they are nothing but
reprehensible, hypocritcal, self-indulgent liars. I've said this before, but you wonder,
you really wonder at the mental health of some of these people. That they truly
believe they can live a double life and not be found out? I mean, you do wonder
if they shouldn't be declared criminally insane or something?"

"Oh, we have another caller. I can't believe, I mean I just cannot BELIEVE
how this issue has fired up the community," said the shock jock, not bothering to hide his elation.

It was another regular talk-back caller, "Reg of Redlynch."

"Mate," said Reg, "I wondered about this reverend bastard, the very minute I
heard about him. I mean, as you said mate, he sounded just too good to be true. You
got it right again mate. And once again, all has been exposed. Lucky we found out in
good time. I reckon those voters tomorrow should do the right thing and vote for
Cush's man, Bud Yarrow. Now that's a bloody good bloke there, mate, as you have
always said."

The Reverend Matthew Harmon phoned desperately to contact the shock-jock to
defend himself. The receptionist at the radio station told him he was not welcome to
comment on the program.

..........................................

Across the city of Cairns, sitting back in a leather arm chair at one of Cairns' most
expensive hotels, Bud Yarrow, the Conservative Party candidate for Division 2, laughed
at the callers on the radio program.

Tomorrow would be a shit-in for him. On Saturday night, he would be COUNCILLOR Bud Yarrow.

.............................

In a small masonry unit in Mt Sheridan, another person was istening with great
interest to the radio call-back program. Doug Dunnysmore, the third candidate in
Saturday's by-election was sitting inside his PVC pyramid in the lotus position,
energising himself for the big day tomorrow. He had covered his entire body with
iodine and would paint himself again all over that night following a good spray with
magnesium. Iodine and garlic, liberal amounts of it, were his choice of weapons against
the never ending army of germs proliferating in the community.

He had to be very careful, going out in the community tomorrow, amongst so many
people all of whom carried trillions of little nasties with them.
He had a supply of face masks to take as well as surgical gloves, hand washing liquid
and bottles of disinfectant spray. Mentally he went over his stash.
He was sure he had enough to prevent any of the nasties getting through.
Even so, he knew he would have the usual nightmares that night, about armies of
germs flying through the air, crawling on the ground and in his clothes, and jumping
off people.

He concentrated on his election campaign. He had hand delivered his campaign letters into
as many letter boxes in Edmonton, Hambledon, and Bentley Park as well as his own
neioghbourhood of Mr Sheridan, as he possible could. He was proud of his campaign
promises and his slogan:

GET TOUGH WITH DUNNYSMORE

The going is tough for everyone now, that's why you need

DOUG DUNNYSMORE

A tough man for Division 2

Doug, if elected, will work hard to bring back

Capital punishment

Public floggings

The public stocks

Abolition of juvenile courts

Mandatory micro-chipping of criminals

Yes, Doug Dunnysmore thought. He had done real well. As he lit up a nice slim joint,
took a couple of puffs, he thought dreamily of the pleasure he would have watching a
public flogging. As a Cairns Regional Councillor, he would insist on having a front row
seat at all the public floggings on the proviso of ensuring "Quality Assurance". Yes,
he was big on Q.A. because people didn't like seeing their money wasted any more.
They wanted value, and by golly, so did Doug Dunnysmore. No half measures, or
gentle slaps on the backs any more, but a real flesh ripping, bloody, screaming, whip lashing
FLOGGING! Oh yeaaaaaaaah................

To be continued...............