Jackpot Jack: A London Farce

Jack's Japes and the Jolly Jaunt into a Jocular Judgement

Jack, a fellow whose brain worked slower than a treacle tart cooling on a winter's day, had a habit of inserting his foot so far into his mouth, surgeons considered him a walking medical marvel. He was a plum pudding of prejudice, steeped in the stale brandy of outdated notions. One fateful afternoon, a misplaced invitation led him, like a moth to a particularly garish lampshade, to the home of the Honeywells.

The Honeywells were, shall we say, peculiar. Not in a “collecting stamps made of toenails” peculiar, but in a “defying every expectation you’ve ever had” peculiar. Mrs. Honeywell, a woman whose smile could melt glaciers and whose bank account could buy a small country, greeted him with a handshake that could crush walnuts. And the daughters! Three of them, each sharper than a new pin and more determined than a badger defending its sett. First, there was Beatrice, a legal eagle whose courtroom victories were the stuff of legend. Then there was Penelope, a coder who could probably rewrite the internet using only carrier pigeons and a tea cosy. And finally, young Cecily, who at the tender age of ten was already a chess champion and budding astrophysicist.

“Come in, come in, Mr… Jack, was it?” boomed Mrs. Honeywell, leading him into a drawing room that looked like a cross between a library and a botanical garden. Jack, never one to observe before leaping, launched straight in.

“Charming place! But, you know,” he said, patting Mrs. Honeywell on the arm with a familiarity that made Beatrice’s eyebrow arch like a cat's back, “It must be… well, inevitable, isn't it? With all these daughters. The future, I mean. All that… domesticity.”

Mrs. Honeywell raised an eyebrow. “Domesticity, Mr. Jack? Are you suggesting that my daughters are doomed to a life of baking and needlepoint?”

“Well, aren't they?” Jack countered, oblivious to the gathering storm clouds on Beatrice's face. “I mean, girls will be girls, won't they? After all, it’s inevitable, isn’t it, that they'll marry and keep the home fires bur-, well, never mind.”

Penelope, who had been quietly observing from the corner, finally spoke. “I'm sorry, but it's not inevitable to be a housewife. I prefer to live on the sofa, doing what I want. I don't mind if I have my own house or if I live with my future husband.”

Beatrice stepped forward, her voice as sharp as her legal arguments. “Mr. Jack, it is, sadly, inevitable that you will shortly be departing. My mother, as you may or may not be aware, practically funds this country, and I, as her daughter, am a lawyer of exceptional repute. I trust you understand the gravity of the situation?”

Jack, who up until this point had been thicker than pea soup, finally caught a flicker of comprehension. “Oh,” he stammered, “Oh dear. I seem to have… misspoken.”

“Indeed, Mr. Jack,” Mrs. Honeywell said, her smile as sweet as poison. “You seem to have confused the Honeywells with a flock of docile sheep. Now, unless you wish to be devoured by this family, I suggest you make a hasty retreat.”

And so Jack, like a coward running from a ghost, fled into the night, leaving the Honeywells to their formidable, and utterly un-domesticated, lives. He learned, or at least, should have learned, that the surest way to make a fool of oneself is to underestimate the ladies.

Jack, poor sap, was a frightful mess. He looked like a badly packed portmanteau, all wrinkles and bulging seams of shame. He'd made a right hash of things with the Honeywells. A family of formidable women, each one sharper than a tack, each one more successful than the last, and he'd dared to suggest that a woman's place was in the home, minding the sprogs. The Honeywells, naturally, had treated him like a particularly irritating bluebottle. He'd fled, tail between his legs, conviction in tatters. Now, slumped in Mike's frankly rather uncomfortable armchair, he looked like a man who'd lost a bet with a particularly tenacious badger.