My wife Dorothy’s Uncle Derek reckons that he, in effect, bought the parrot off his crooked father-in-law, the veteran jewel-thief Tommy Twinkle Toes (that really was what the Sunday paper had called him, back in the day: ‘Tommy Twinkle Toes’). Derek took in the parrot when Tommy was arrested and also lent Tommy quite a bit of money towards the costs of his defence lawyer. After Tommy was found (very) guilty, Derek visited him in the jail and asked him what he was to do with the parrot. Tommy begged him to keep it, saying it that would be a consolation to him, in his lonely cell, to know that the bird was in a good home.

The jewels from Tommy’s last heist were never recovered. They were certainly never recovered by Tommy, who dropped dead eight months into his sentence. There was a certain amount of media speculation about the jewels’ whereabouts at the time, because a reward had been offered for their safe return.

Over time, some pets grow on their owners. But that was not the case with the parrot and Uncle Derek. The novelty of owning a Bolivian Blue-Throated Macaw soon wore off, though Derek kept the bird fed and watered, in homage to his late wife, Tommy Twinkle Toes’ daughter, Auntie Pam. Truth to tell, both Derek and the parrot seemed rather out-of-sorts, most of the time. The bird’s vocabulary had proved rather limited and wearisome, especially the oft-repeated phrase, ‘Where’s The Racing Post?’ Derek periodically tried to teach the bird some new phrases (‘Come On Derby’, ‘Derby For The Cup’, etc.) but so far with no success. Hence my little ditty:

‘Uncle Derek got a parrot.

His pleasure in the bird was fleeting,

But he kept it, just in case,

It said anything worth repeating.’

Last Sunday, Dorothy and I were round there, and just for something to say, I asked if the parrot didn’t have a name – Derek always referred to it as ‘the bird.’

Derek said that Tommy had called it ‘Ballantrae,’ after some place in Scotland where Tommy had been born. He (Derek, that is) thought it was a daft name for parrot: ‘Ballantrae! Bloody Stupid! Ballantrae!’

Whereupon, the parrot immediately replied: ‘Ballantrae, Ballantrae. Second drain on the left. Second drain on the left. Caw.’

There was a shocked silence for a moment or two. We all gazed at the parrot, and then at each other, with a wild surmise.

That night, after midnight, the three of us went round with a torch and a jemmy to the street where Tommy used to live. We examined the second drain down the street from his old house. One of the bars on the drain proved to have some stout twine wound round it. It was a quiet street, but I couldn’t help wondering how things would turn out if one of the residents woke up, spotted us in a huddle in the gutter, and called the police. Dorothy told me not to be a wimp. We quietly levered up the drain cover and pulled up the leather bag on the end of the twine. And there were the jewels.

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Apparently, the reward more than covered the money that Uncle Derek had lent Tommy for the defence lawyer. Derek always addresses the parrot as ‘Ballantrae’ now.

Michael Bloor

(Image is of Mick in an intellectual pursuit)