(Argh: the spectre of Johnnie’s shame. Composite image from psychic CCTV cameras installed last March in the village shop to discourage covetousness.)Sponsors of Johnnie Valliant’s bid at Cauldercotte Easter Fun Run, from Cauldercotte Mill to the Village Green, were coping as best they could yesterday with the 11-year-old’s dismal failure to fund research into a serious condition.
“It’s a shame he didn’t manage to complete the mile,” said Mrs. Valliant. “I suppose our ten p’s will just have to go back in the penny pot now.”
Pharmaceutical giant Glaxo-Smith-Kline Plc. also found the Year 7 student’s performance disappointing.
“We had hoped to make quite a sizable donation,” a spokesman for the multinational consortium said.
“It’s so frustrating not to be able to give,” agreed representatives of Novartis International AG. “But when little Johnnie dropped out, there was little we could do. Such a pity. It was such a worthy cause.”
Avarice is endemic to the world, with new conscience-resistant strains appearing all the time. The condition is estimated to cost the economy over a dozen trillion pounds each year and to skew society’s moral compass by almost 180 degrees off the straight and narrow. It hits the Third World especially.
Valliant was still distraught today when reporters wrestled him to the ground on his way to school and asked him how he felt, but he insisted that he’d tried.
“I got stitch at the phone box. It was really hard to run then.”
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