Thought For The Day

   In ‘It’s Your Funeral,’ the new mural in the library is made mention as one of Number 2’s achievements. I wonder what that mural was of, and for that matter who painted it? Might it not have been Number 118, that artist fellow who painted Number 6’s portrait that time? I can’t see the village Administration bringing in an artist from the outside, so it could have been Number 118. But no, there is someone else, someone who is a proven artist with plenty of time on her hands, the widow Professor. I admit that’s a peculiar form of address, but when you don’t know the lady’s name, and she certainly had no number the last time we saw her. Anyway I can’t see Number 42 painting a mural on a wall, well I can, but it took him long enough when he was painting that yellow arch that time in ‘Checkmate!’ So there are plenty of painters about the village, but natural artists are thinner on the ground. So my money would be on the widow Professor. Now the only question is, what might the subject have been? Something classical maybe, or a simple scene of a group of villagers with the Village in the background. Or maybe a line of different Villagers, the shopkeeper, the painter, electrician, gardener, waitress, and waiter, and a lady in the colourful striped cape all in front of a white background!

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Exhibition of Arts And Crafts

                              Who Is No1?

BcNu

Thorpe

    Poor old Thorpe, by the end of Hammer Into Anvil I bet he’d wished he’d never heard about the village! I shouldn’t wonder that those “masters” we hear about heard of Thorpe’s animosity towards Number 6, and thought him to be the ideal candidate for Number 2. But then again that theory presupposes that Thorpe and Number 2 of Hammer Into Anvil are one and the same character. They are not supposed to be, according to Patrick Cargill because their characters are different. But fictionally there is no reason why not, after all I don’t think village life suited Thorpe and would have been enough to change anyone. After all we have no idea just how long he had been in the village before the advent of Hammer Into Anvil. And in any case Thorpe wasn’t involved with Number 6, not until Number 6 went and involved himself in the matter of Number 73. There was no recognition between Number 2-Thorpe and Number 2, not that we see. However Number 2 had encountered old colleagues before in the village, Cobb, Fotheringay, 2 Colonels, and Dutton, so why not Thorpe? And besides how sure can we be sure of the Colonel and Thorpe, as it seems impossible to say whether or not they had knowledge of the village before their ex-colleague came calling or not. As for Thorpe, look at him, he has scepticism or is it sarcasm written all over his face!

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MindGames

    After the events of The Chimes of Big Ben Fotheringay is told to get back to London before any embarrassing questions are asked. Embarrassing questions? Perhaps Fotheringay wasn’t supposed to be away from the department, but certainly he was working for the village seeing as he wanted to know what his next assignment was to be. Not that he was heavily involved with this assignment however his being there was important. Had he not been, Number 6 may well have smelled a rat, as he would have expected to see Fotheringay and not just the Colonel. It does seems likely that one day Fotheringay himself once woke up in the village to find himself a prisoner, just like Number 2, and perhaps even the Colonel. However Fotheringay is to leave the village for London, and in time the Colonel would join him. I can imagine the Colonel would have some questions to answer before he was permitted to leave. But the failure wasn’t his, there was nothing the Colonel could have done about Post 5’s wrist watch. But what of Potter, formerly a manager of the Labour Exchange and Number 2’s assistant. I don’t expect he was allowed to leave the village, he may well have made the place his home. Perhaps he found personal importance in such a place, as in his previous work he was a man simply to “fetch and carry.” He was certainly not a man to be relied upon, just ask Colonel Hawke-Englishe……..no, that’s not possible now. Did Potter have contact with the Colonel and Fotheringay? I shouldn’t have thought so, being tucked away in the Control Room, and no longer Number 2’s assistant!

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Who’s That On The Telephono?

    “Yes it’s me.....................what?......................well as it happens I’m on red, well I could have been on turquoise, or yellow............no I don’t have a grey telephone..............................Why red? Well the red telephone started bleeping and I answered it, it must have been the telephone operator who put the call through.......................Am I smoking?........................It’s just a small cheroot.............yes I do know about the no smoking policy...............................well it’s not actually lit, you see I don’t have a match!..........................How would who?...............................How would Jason King set about escaping The Village?..........................he’d probably get the help of a beautiful young woman, drink a bottle or two of fine wine, smoke cigarettes, and then escape in one of those trendy looking Mini-Mokes, arriving back in London just in time for tea......................Department S what about it?..............................You can’t keep me here, my friends will come here and rescue me.......................they don’t know where this is, good point!...........................Operator, put me through to Number Six, Number Six I want to be part of your gang........who’s speaking, it’s Num..........it’s Jason............what do you mean Jason who, Jason King of Department S.................what do you mean you’ve never heard of it! Now look here..................hello, hello are you there................He’s hung up!”

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No.38

    She must have been in the Village for a very long time, since the war perhaps, maybe before the war. But what was it that had such a dear little old lady brought to the Village? Perhaps she once worked in a Government department, or the private secretary to someone of importance. She might have been a female agent working for the S.O.E {Special Operations Executive} during the war. But there can be no doubt that during all her years in the Village Number 38 must have seen many changes. The introduction of the Mini-Mokes as taxis, cordless telephones, the free electronic information board. The helicopter, the introduction of new modern household appliances. It would not surprise me if Number 38 told them all the information she knew, whatever that may have been. But if she had been a member of the S.O.E, I expect she gave Number 2 and his interrogators a very hard time, and didn’t give up information easily. On the other hand, this sweet little old lady might just have been recruited to work in the Village as a maid or waitress. And therefore now lives in quiet retirement in the Old People’s Home, but now at least with those 2,000 credit units she can afford an extra little treat now and then!

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The Prisoner’s Own!

  “Slippers” said the doctor on the occasion of the Prisoner's medical, the day after his arrival.

    “My size?” the Prisoner enquired.

    “Naturally” replied the doctor.

   Well they would be wouldn't they, because were they not the Prisoner’s own slippers? Perhaps the Prisoner should have made comment about that. But he didn’t. But they were used slippers, and if they were not the Prisoner’s own, one would have thought they could have found him a new pair to wear. Unless of course The Village has a recycling policy! And yet it could be realised that the pair of slippers given to the Prisoner to wear were his own, those belonging to Patrick McGoohan that is. This in the same way that the pair of spectacles Number 6 found in the breast pocket of the white coat and wears in the episode ‘Dance of the Dead,’ are also McGoohan's own spectacles. If not, then the lenses are of plain glass so that he could see properly, as with John Drake when he was in the guise of an insurance investigator in the ‘Danger Man’ episode ‘Say it With Flowers.’ But then remembering that the spectacles were taken from the pocket of a white coat, they had to belong to someone. And therefore the Prisoner's vision should have been impaired by said spectacles!

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