fiddler blues

Alfred Henry  was a fiddler, he couldn't keep still. For forty five years he had fidgeted, for twenty eight years he fiddled. It was difficult to describe him without mention of the child catcher from Vulgaria. It wasn't that he looked like Sir Robert Helpmann, he was bald on top with a ring of ginger hair. His nose did protruded like the vile baddie and his lips were a thinly drawn line. A slim man resembling a long length of snot dangling from a child's nose, he was not well liked.

In the evenings he played violin in the window of his apartment that overlooked the playground. He serenely led the bow backward and forward over the strings creating beautiful music, he favoured Mahler, he smiled each time a child heard the notes carried on the wind to the swings. They would turn and point at Alfie then continue swinging, or run to the slide.

Alfie worked as a cashier at the local "SupaSaver" hypermarket, he had started in the stock department, filling up the shelves with processed, packaged foods, so full of additives they were probably atomic bomb proof. A couple of years into his employment a new manager came and with a clean sweep moved everyone from their comfort zone to the next station. In Alfie's case this meant a move to the tills, dealing with people, he was not best pleased. He made the best of it, robbing a bit here, stealing a little there, enough to make it worthwhile without it being enough to arouse suspicion.

Alfie had aspirations, a long term plan that involved a motorcycle, no not just a motorcycle but a Harley Davidson and a trek across America. In his wardrobe he had a garment bag and each day after his shift he would drop in whatever dollars he had procured that day. He played the violin for the same amount of time, ten dollars equal to 10 minutes in Alfie's head. 

Unfortunately for Alfie he never made his trip, he fiddled in another way and a vigilante mob attacked unmercifully till he died, a thinly drawn smile on his lips. The money, when found was anonymously donated to the playground fund.