Mike Dixon

„I was starting a …‟
He began to describe his new fitness routine but was interrupted
before he could proceed further.
„We were just talking about you, Humphrey.‟
The second voice belonged to Cecil Sparrow, who headed
their organization.
„I was saying to Principal Investigator O‟Neill that you
could handle the cataloguing of the Sydney parcels.‟
Humphrey stared at him vacantly.
„The Sydney parcels?‟
„If you‟d been at the happy hour, Humph, you‟d know all
about them,‟ Rodney O‟Neill said. „We wondered why you
weren‟t there.‟
He had a singsong way of talking which Humphrey found
irritating.
„I was at my scuba class,‟ Humphrey replied firmly, aware
that failure to attend the Bureau‟s happy hour was a cardinal
sin and an obstacle to promotion.
„The little sniffer dogs almost passed out,‟ Rodney gave a
high-pitched laugh. „One had to be given mouth-to-mouth
resuscitation.‟
Humphrey regarded Rodney as a twit.
„Why did they almost pass out?‟
„It was the parcels, Humph. They were laced with snow. It
was falling out of them.‟
„The parcels?‟
Humphrey turned towards Cecil Sparrow, hoping to get
more sense out of him. Instead he received a perfunctory
command.
„I shall instruct Alan to deliver the parcels to your office.‟
Humphrey noted that Cecil always referred to staff in the
inner core by their titles, whereas support staff, like himself,
were called by their given names. It didn‟t bother him. He
regarded the Narcotics Bureau as no more than a stepping