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I am dull. My hair is dull and my shoes are dull. My personality is
dull, too. If my life were a knife, it wouldn’t cut gravy.
I am an agent
for a secret branch of the government. My training class just graduated, in fact, and I
was dullest in my class. After receiving our certificates, we were asked if anyone cared
to volunteer for a dangerous assignment. My hand was up first, but I was overlooked
because I was so dull. What the job called for, though, was a very covert operator,
someone who would blend in and be ignored, and everyone else in my class was too vital
and interesting. My supervisor said, “There must be someone,” and went through the class
one-by-one. I was the last one looked at, even though my name was first alphabetically. I
got the job easily after that; in fact no one could believe I was in the agency.
The assignment was to be a bodyguard to a visiting prince. The prince
wanted a bodyguard for status reasons, but at the same time, didn’t want anyone hanging
around him. He wanted to be alone but not alone, particularly when he flossed his teeth,
was the way he phrased it. I told my supervisor I would be dull, and that he wouldn’t
know I was there. My supervisor said, “Uh-huh,” and looked uninterested. But I had my
first mission.
I shadowed the prince to a tractor pull exhibition he
wanted to see, and it was a good thing I did. Two guys with guns and false beards tried
to abduct him at the beer stand, but when they saw me step out of the crowd with my badge
out, they froze in boredom and I arrested them easily. Instead of thanking me, the
prince paid for his 12-ounce and returned to his seat, yawning. But that was all the
thanks I needed.
The way I got promoted to agent first class, despite
my dullness, makes a dull story. My problem was that I could never rise in my career
since no one noticed me. I was so dull I was invisible. So when the agent first class job
became available, I started a rumor that I already had the position locked up. The other
applicants heard the rumor and lost all interest in the job, in me, in everything. The
mere mention of my name was enough to narcotize the most energetic and self-promoting of
them. So I got the promotion, and now when other agents pass me in the hall they call me
sir, if they notice me at all. To get them to at least look at me, I explode firecrackers
in my breast pocket and wave a handkerchief wildly. This helps but is no guarantee.
Further details of my life and exploits would only be duller than
what I have already related. I could make daring behind-the-lines rescue operations and
thrilling assassination attempts sound as dull as making a sandwich or buying a bus
ticket. Stories I have that, if properly told, should curl your hair or turn it gray,
would in my telling seem as soporific as an opera or the endless pitch of a life
insurance salesman. So I’ll sign off here, though even that is dullness itself.
The End
