Softie turns a hard corner

Okay, I'd like to think I have pacifist tendencies. Which means I'll probably never ever be great because, as my friend Ryan once said, a pacifist isn't able to "put the foot down on his opponent and press hard, when winning".

But like I said, I'd like to think I'm pacifist. Only, now I'm not so sure. Especially after what I've been doing - quite uninhibitedly - with my left foot, or my right, whichever was closest; and also in liaison with men of science, schooled in the use of deadly chemicals.

Let's say that, for the moment, the foundations of my ideology have experienced a minor quake of sorts. Pacifism, though seemingly unstirred, is shaken. This illusion of limitless patience, silent endurance, incalculable tolerance has, temporarily, been in a state of upheaval, in my case. I've experienced, let's say, a "last straw on the camel's back" moment. This took place when I discovered that they'd been, secretly, reading my manuscripts.

Three unpublished works that I'd boxed very neatly and - apparently - securely, and deposited in a large carton in the dark room under the stairs. To say that my words were being, literally, feasted upon would be correct. I can tolerate criticism, in fact often find myself inviting it, but when I discovered that some of my phraseology bore the remnants of fecal residue, I cracked.

Also, vital elements of my meticulous plotting now displayed myriad little holes. And there they were - these secret midnight readers - scampering helter-skelter under the shocked glare of my torchlight.

Hundreds of them, thousands even, although in that first dizzying instant I would have, with authorial licence, have claimed millions. The first few perished, I think, in what I'm inclined to term an accidental by-product of an unplanned war. Neither of us was looking for a fight but, suddenly, confrontation was unavoidable. They scattered, alarmed. I leapt, equally panicked, and landed on a fleeing few.

I still have memories of one of the escapees running, dazed by the torch beam, up my trouser leg, insinuating itself between trousers and shin, then scaling said shin before being stamped free and chased mercilessly in the dark.

Lost my sense

With the individual pursuit of this one creature, I admit that as general of my own team, I temporarily lost my sense of proportion, opting to fight a battle and ignore the war.

The "war", meanwhile, disappeared with a frightening suddenness. Not a trace of those brown bodies - apart from the trod-on dead - was to be seen. I must say I had no idea there were so many of them congregated in the vault containing my words, and indeed elsewhere. I had only on the odd occasion glimpsed an occasional "stroller" and shooed it away.

One time, I remember, sitting with a guest in the drawing room discussing the Melbourne test match when to my horror and embarrassment, I spotted one of these vermin ambling vertically up a wall, in plain sight. It may very well have been saying, "Look at me, look at me!"

Had my guest inclined his head a mere five degrees he would have spotted it, too. I couldn't allow that. So I kept up an incessant chatter, very uncharacteristic of me, but held the guest's attention sufficiently long for my in-house acrobat to vanish from sight. That's how kind I was, in those days.

After the devastation of my manuscripts, however, I picked up the phone and dialled pest control. This is the dark side of the moon every man is, apparently, said to possess, I guess. My heart did not feel heavy. Not even when the booted, masked men arrived with their flit pumps and canisters and syringes and packs of transparent gels.

It's writers' dignity, I guess. The right to protect his patch of turf, his printed forest of leaves. Who was it said, there's an extremist in all of us? It just depends on which buttons get pressed, and when, and where.

Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia.