“You seem preoccupied, Dobson,” said Marigold Chew to the out of print pamphleteer one morning over breakfast. It was a thunderous day of thunder and thunderclaps and the couple were tucking into boiled suet ‘n’ marzipan à la Metternich, a dish extolled in a footnote in Dobson’s pamphlet Breakfast Favourites Of The Austrian Empire Foreign Ministry 1809-1821 (out of print).

Dobson did not reply, for he was preoccupied.

The following morning, over breakfast, Marigold Chew became so perturbed at Dobson’s seeming residence in la-la land that she resorted to the Dusty Springfield method to snap him out of it. Named after the 1960s popstrel’s hobby, this involved the systematic smashing of crockery by throwing plates and dishes one by one with great, indeed hysterical, force against the wall. Several smithereens lay scattered on the floor before Dobson was of a sudden unpreoccupied.

“Ah, good morning, my buttercup of unparalleled gorgeousness,” said Dobson, through a mouthful of steamed shredded hyacinth stalks in syrup.

“You have been terribly preoccupied, Dobson,” said Marigold Chew, “Whatever is going on in that brain of yours?”

“I am inwardly tussling,” said Dobson, “With my latest pamphlet, to which I have given the working title Andy Martin, The Tyrannical Leader Of UNIT, And Why He Is The Most Fantastic Person In The Visible Universe”.

“I have no doubt your inner tussle will prove as productive as ever,” said Marigold Chew, “But may I make one small point, a point which I suggest is germane to your tussle and preoccupation?”

“And what would that be, oh daffodil of my dreams?” said Dobson.

“Well, as you and I and your optometrist know only too well, Dobson, you are severely myopic. Thus, for you, the visible universe does not stretch very far. Indeed, it stops just a few inches away from the front of your head. I do not see Andy Martin, tyrannical leader of UNIT, in the vicinity, and I feel sure I would spot him were he within a few inches of, or indeed sitting at, my breakfast table.”

“I am going to go and chuck pebbles at swans,” said Dobson, getting up from his chair and putting on his Swabian Bus Ticket Collector’s boots and crashing out of the door into the downpour which, as on the day before, was accompanied by thunderous thunder and thunderclaps. Marigold Chew had raised a sticky problem about his pamphlet, one he did not wish to discuss, indeed could not discuss. Hence his sudden departure, leaving his breakfast unfinished.

Unfortunately, so sudden was his departure that Dobson neglected to put on his specs. Unable to see more than a few inches ahead, he blundered towards where he thought the duckpond was, only to take a wrong turn and find himself hopelessly lost in a patch of bracken and rustic filth. He found himself, too, once more preoccupied, but this time on a wholly different subject. Why, he wondered, was the duckpond, populated as it was mostly by swans, called the duckpond rather than the swanpond? It was true that ducks were occasionally to be found dabbling upon it, but any such ducks tended to scarper pretty quickly when ganged up on by the savage and violent, yet indubitably elegant, swans.

“I wonder,” said Dobson to himself, aloud, in the mist of his own myopia, “Whether I ought to abandon the Andy Martin, tyrannical leader of UNIT, business for the time being and instead turn my propelling pencil to the question of duckpond nomenclature?”

And there was then a terrifically thunderous and thundery thunderclap, which Dobson chose to interpret as the Gods replying to his question in the affirmative. Turning in the direction he thought would take him home, he wrapped his Stalinist scarf tighter round his neck and squelched through the muck. But alas!, the pamphleteer’s sense of direction was as pitiful as his eyesight, and several weeks passed before he found his way home, by which time he had completely forgotten about duckponds and swanponds.

“What is the subject of the pamphlet you are working on?” asked Marigold Chew over breakfast on the morning after Dobson’s return.

“It is called Fortune-Telling By Interpreting The Patterns Created By Crockery Smithereens Smashed According To The Dusty Springfield Method,” said Dobson, “And I expect to be able to dot the final i and cross the final t this very afternoon.”

And he did, though the pamphlet itself is currently out of print.