The Orphanage

This advertisement was ahead of its time. Sores and blisters grew out of its linen sheets. The Orphanage was underneath, soaking in its fumes. Perhaps a solo, unwarranted inspector, Mr. Bainbridge, would have a closer look at it. Otherwise it was installed as a feast for the eyes of the unsuspecting public.

Trouble travelled with the Orphanage wherever it went. Four schoolchildren were annually selected to participate in its circus. The only appropriate time for their inspection was done absent-mindedly, and from virtually any distance, during golfing trips. Thus, rats and termites freely flowed throughout the mansion’s corridors. The children were numbed of their sensations to these pesky horrors, for their greatest fright lay in their teacher, Queen Bee. She was irked, and buzzed, as a consequence of every example of their instinctual childish talents, and did the rightful work to subdue them. Those flowers daring to flutter in her radius spoiled on her watch. Bainbridge knew the signs and symptoms of these nukes, and their magnificent radius. He had detonated Fat Man and Little Boy, then the little-known Little Boy II, Balloon, and Sausage Fingers.

Bribery was the inspector's first council of a warning for neglect, then an unprompted smack to the face. The children of the Orphanage were unfettered by his methods. Their teacher’s insistent humming was the utmost facilitator of suppression. Bainbridge's third method, the sharp yelp and then the reaching for the phone, was quickly ousted by the resident blanket, whose sting could easily temper an outraged lion.

Queen Bee wired the authorities, and they were told, according to a pleasant landlady's voice, that the housekeeper had found Mr. Bainbridge collapsed on wet soil after attempting to, for whatever reason, repair the roof of the Orphanage.