reputations

"You missed the meeting in the Heritage Centre. There were some great reminiscences."
"Good, was it?"
"Have you heard Noel Clare's story about Canon Furlong?"
"Ughhh, not that hoary old chestnut."
"You have heard it?"
"Well not from Noel himself. But it's been around the town for a couple of decades. Noel was a little boy and Canon Furlong cycled up, hopped off his bike and slapped him."
"He got off his bike, James, called the little boy over, and said 'you didn't salute me,' and then punched him, punched him James, three times."
"Do you not think the story might be growing a bit in the telling?"
"Are you saying you don't believe it?"
"Not exactly. But every time I see Noel Clare I want to punch.him too. And he does salute me."
"James!!!"
"Oh come on. Canon Fulong spent his life performing the sacrifice of the mass for us. Conducting weddings for us. Baptising our sprogs. Burying our dead with honours, Visiting our sick. In between times contributing to the gaiety of the peasantry by flying around the hinterland in his biplane with a little Jack Russell dog looking out of the back seat. If in his senescence the dotty old coot really gave Noel Clare a few stuffs fifty years ago, are we content to allow that to be his epitaph? Is that to be the summation of his life? Do we write off his whole lifetime of service on our behalf? I don't think we should."