The story so far: V and me booked a mini-break to Split in order to avoid having to dress up as clowns and entertain small children at the second birthday party of Molly, daughter of our friends Jody and Ian. Tragically, Jody knew what we were up to and moved Molly's party to the following weekend. Which is why V and me find ourselves on a farm in East Anglia. Ian, a chef, is filming his TV show The Gould Life.
******
I’m standing in a small, stone outbuilding at the back of Ian and Jody’s farmhouse. In front of me, on an old door propped up on some oil drums, lies the blackened corpse of a pig. Various medieval looking tools are scattered around: a small axe and a variety of thin, nasty-looking knives.
Around the animal stand Ian; Vincent, a sinewy, taciturn local slaughterman; and Camilla, Den and Dave, the three-person TV crew who make Ian’s show. The room smells strongly of burning, a result of the pig’s fur having been scorched off. There’s also another, strange, smell that I suspect is blood.
“Shall we continue?” asks Camilla rhetorically.
“It’s time…to bring home the bacon!” states Ian with the obligatory Clarkson Delay, a must for all telly presenters.
In real life, Ian is a phlegmatic type. He’s tall and slightly fat, verging on the slothful, and sounds like he has Jersey Royals in his mouth when he talks. Before my eyes, he is transforming himself into lovable geezer mode for the benefit of his viewing public. My presence possibly makes him feel uncomfortable, as he knows that I know this is all an act. That said, the fact that I am dressed in a clown outfit and am standing quietly in the corner may have the edge in the ‘making people uncomfortable’ stakes.
“Okay troops,” says Camilla firmly, “Vincent, if you could carry on and remember what I said – we want to show the punters the craft inherent in what you do, that in a way you are an artisan of the countryside rather than just being, well, a slaughterman.”
Vincent steps up to the animal, picks up the hatchet, raises it high above his head and smashes it down on the skull in a single, explosive movement. In the silence that follows, Ian stares aghast at the smashed-in head. Camilla gives Ian a signal: ‘Say something!’
“Phew! Righto Vince mate, so what was that all about?” he asks, shaking himself back into mockney action.
“We’ve already taken off the legs, the head’s the most important bit if you want to boil the head meat for sausage. Takes a long time, you see.”
From my corner, I note that Den the sound guy is suppressing a giggling fit. Vincent’s voice is surprisingly high-pitched. Feeling slightly hysterical on account of the gruesome scene unfolding before me, I blurt out a laugh.
“Cut!” shouts Camilla with a melodramatic groan. She throws me a look of disgust that deflects my gaze floorwards, towards my hilariously amusing clown shoes.
The filming continues, with Vincent revelling in his role as the Albert Pierrepoint of the East Anglian pig world, and Ian pitching in to do little bits of sawing and so on. Eventually, the fat is peeled off the pig like a blanket, revealing the animal’s inner workings.
I glance out the small, dirty window and see V with Jody and Molly, gambolling around in the garden outside, enjoying the fresh air. V is whirling Molly around and laughing uproariously. It’s tempting to make a bolt for it and join them, but I don’t want to appear like a girl’s blouse, having earlier assured Ian and the crew that this kind of thing was No Big Deal to a man o’ parts such as myself.
“Now for the fun part,” squeaks Vincent, grimly.
“Sounds like a rasher statement,” chirrups Ian. “What can he mean?”
“The intestines.”
Ian peers into the camera.
“The intestines...have you got the stomach for it?"
Camilla sighs and makes Ian do the bit again, this time without the stomach pun. Then Vincent gets back to work. Adrenaline rushes round my body as my mind is cast back to dissecting a frog in first-year biology at school. I have largely blanked the event from my mind, but I have a vague memory of not enjoying it.
Presently, Vincent and Ian pull the slithery, bulging grey intestines out of the animal. The organ looks like a string of absurdly large sausages, pumped up close to expoding point. I watch in horrified fascination. I can still see Jody and V and Molly mucking around outside. My attention is brought back to the present situation by the sound of Den the soundman making heaving noises.
The smell in the outhouse is almost beyond description. In fact, it is beyond description, save to say that it is by a country mile (no pun intended), the most fundamentally awful odour I have ever experienced, excepting the time Molly tested her nine-month old digestive system to the point of destruction by eating half a bag of liquorice allsorts she found in our flat. The intestines are slid into a plastic-lined bucket.
“I guess the important thing is not to puncture it, right Vince matey?” asks Ian, trying not to grimace.
“That’s right Gouldy,” (Vincent has obviously been told to call Ian this, to imply pastoral chumminess) “verrry important not to puncture the intestinal sacs.”
At that moment, a six-inch knife hanging from a belt loop in Vincent’s spattered dungarees does, in fact, puncture the intestine. A pfffft of gas fills the air. Suddenly, I feel like I’m having an out-of-body experience. Then I’m in a tunnel. The sounds of the crew groaning and Camilla hissing ‘keep filming!’ frazzle and fade out.
The next thing I know, I am lying on the cold, stone floor. Camilla is standing over me, peering at me and saying ‘Maybe you should get some fresh air’. From my low viewpoint, I can see Vincent looking at me impassively. In a moment of pure insight, I realise that he deliberately punctured the intestines. You can't beat the humour of the countryside.
I get to my feet. Once my eyesight and other critical functions return, I am dismayed to find that my hired clown outfit is covered liberally in mud, ordure and blood.
“You got any kids son?" Vincent squeaks at me.
"No."
"Thought as much. He's obviously never seen a lady givin' birth, prepares you for anything!” sneers Vincent to Ian, who is trying to cover up a series of mini-bokes with chuckles that say 'like you, Vincent my new friend, I have seen it all.' At least Vincent didn't follow up with the usual supplementaries - 'Why not?', 'Are you sterile?' etc. The front doorbell clangs.
“Tell you what mate,” says Ian, “Make yourself useful and get that? Probably the rest of the gang. We’re gunna carry on with this. Try not to get too much crap on the hall floor.”
I make my way groggily out of the room and walk through the hall. When I open the front door, a sea of faces meets me. In unison they smile, look me up and down, then grimace.
“Fucking hell!” cries Glen, putting his hand up to cover his mouth.
“Nice,” says Candy curtly.
Richard stares at me, disgusted. Rachael tries to smile. The twins start crying, violently. At that moment, V, Jody and Molly come round the front.
Within seconds, Jody has rushed past me and is surveying the hall for blood spatter. V, holding Molly's hand, coolly assesses the situation. I smile weakly at her. She frowns. I know what she's thinking.
'There's only one wearable clown outfit left, and it's mine.'
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