Tinnitus and Phlegm Solicitors

Tinnitus and Phlegm Solicitors ©

By

Michael Casey

Tinnitus and Phlegm were Solicitors in London, their office was 25 paces away from Morley and Scrooge, though Morley and Scrooge were nothing compared to them, they were just money lenders, but Tinnitus and Phlegm were Solicitors, they had even studied at Oxford. Tinnitus wore a tall tall hat and strode with his very long legs, so he knew that the common money lenders were exactly 25 paces away, or 40 for short people. Tinnitus was tall, so tall that the French fishmonger called him deux metres, but only behind his back, or Tinnitus would strike his back with his silver topped cane.

Phlegm, was fat and round, very round, the French fishmonger called Phlegm grosse deux metre, 2 fois 2 egale 4, so if the 2 were together then then fish monger called them les deux quatre metres.  They were a strange pair, but they liked his fish, so they were good customers. Fish is for brains was what the pair of solicitors always used to say as they carried their fish away, inside of an old piece of newspaper no doubt with a new Charles Dickens story printed on it.

The fish was cooked and eaten with a smack of the lips, the cat called Dickens ate the head as a reward for keeping the rats away. London was full of rats after all, it was 1843 and the Thames was full of boats and rats.

Now Tinnitus had wanted to be a sailor but his family were Solicitors so a solicitor was he, no sea for him. He did watch the cannon being fired, he stood close so he could smell the smoke. Only he stood too close and as well as the smoke a cannon misfired and nearly killed him, it was supposed to be seaman’s drill but it nearly killed him. And now Tinnitus had forever the noise in his ears, the sound of and explosion followed by a whoosh as a cannon ball just missed his head. The doctor could not mend his ears, but as the Dr, a Dr Watson was a family friend he decided to name the condition after Tinnitus. And that is how Tinnitus came into the language. Dr Watson explained it to Charles Dickens his dear friend when they were down the pub drinking ale, Sherlock the barman thought it was a great tale too, before being told to know his place and get another round in.

Phlegm really was called Phlegm, the family had come to England from the Low Countries several generations ago. Phlegm could not get used to the London smog by the river, what with the tanners and the fish smoking, so his weak chest meant he forever had phlegm and was always spitting it up into the spittoon by his desk. Though Tinnitus and Phlegm never had need to buy glue, they just used the bucket of phlegm to stick postage stamps on, or to stick posters on walls advertising their Solicitors services. They were ahead of their time as far as recycling was concerned, Waste not Want not.

One of their best customers was a Mr Pickwick, he was so very rich, he had folding money, so much folding money, coins were for criminals he often joked. Mr Pickwick was a Paper man, though he could be a Tiger the ladies said. In fact Mr Pickwick owned high class Whore Houses, his first was called the Nevada club, because he had travelled the world and liked Nevada so much. He was forever buying houses, the kind only whores and the poor would live in, but he had to squirrel his money away someplace. And Slum dwellings brought in a steady income, though he did buy a fancy house for himself, off Sloan Square, and other places for his high-class whore business. The Rich and Gentry could not be expected to visit bad areas after all, their whoring must be done in high class areas, they had their reputations to keep after all.

So, Mr Pickwick visited Tinnitus and Phlegm so they could handle all his paper work, and even more eagerly handle his large white paper five-pound notes. Then with Tinnitus saying it’s just 25 paces away Mr Pickwick would go to Morley and Scrooge to get them to arrange the rental of his slums, a perfect business operation. Sally one of the local whores used to bump into Mr Pickwick, but he’d just bowl her over, she was no lady. He only had Fallen Ladies work in his high class whore house, because they could talk proper, and were good in the bedroom department too. So Sally was bowled over into the mud, and horse pooh, she nearly was killed one day, but Bill Sykes saved her, but that’s another story or two.

London in the 1840s was a different place than it is today, but for Tinnitus and Phlegm it was good very good even, they even got invited to Nevada, Solicitors finding nirvana in Nevada, a high class whore house. Obviously, Morley and Scrooge were never invited, they were just money lenders and lower class people, not high class solicitors, so no invites for them. Tinnitus and Phlegm enjoyed life and all of Mr Pickwick’s business, so much so that on occasion they would offer a drink to keep the cold out. It was French cognac, the fishmonger had a bottle and Tinnitus enquired what it was, so when he tasted it he enticed the fishmonger to get him a few bottles. Hence French cognac for Mr Pickwick.

And it was because of the cognac and Dickens the cat that Mr Pickwick died. You see he had a drop too much as it was such a cold day, that he slipped on a stray fish head that Dickens the cat had left lying about, he banged his head on the cast iron stove and that was that. It would have been ruin for Tinnitus and Phlegm, so they had to think who to blame for the sudden death, and Dickens the cat couldn’t tell a tale, and take the blame.

They thought long and hard then they remember Jacques the fishmonger and Jill his wife. He’d said they were going back to France forever to look after his mother in Yvetot, so an idea was hatched. Mr Pickwick was stripped and placed in a trunk, with a few fish heads too. Then the trunk was taken to Jacques’ fishing boat, Tinnitus said he always wanted to be a sailor, and it was the truth. But now everything he had saved for being a sailor, books and so forth he was going to symbolically throw away at sea. Jacques thought he really was a stupid Englishman, they really were A Nation of Shopkeepers, or butcher baker undertaker. But for a gold sovereign he’d let him act his play out, who did he think he was Shakespeare, to be Candide. So, Jacques let Tinnitus throw the trunk overboard into the English Channel, all the time he hid his face up his sleeve, or la Manche as the French say, the fish in the trunk stunk after all.  

Tinnitus had got away with murder, or accidental death due to slipping on a cat’s fish head. When he got back to the office, Tinnitus used his left hand to forge Mr Pickwick’s signature. He inherited everything. Thus Tinnitus became a big noise in the entertainment business, the British are Phlegmatic after all.