The Taxonomy of Doom: An Opco Boone Adventure

The Adventures of Opco Boone, Legal Ace™ →Go uptown Index: Click ᐅ to expand: Opco Boone Finance fiction Tell me more Sign up for our newsletter — or just get in touch: for ½ a weekly 🍺 you get to consult JC. Ask about it here.

When Opco, Algy and George filed into the Defence Against Indemnities classroom, their regular teacher, Professor Cavalier, was nowhere to be seen. Instead a stout middle-aged management consultant sat at her desk, peering intently through a monocle at a clockwork contraption installed upon it. The machine was labelled “RISK TAXONOMISER”. A badger on her lapel announced her as Professor Skank. As the class settled in she gleefully twiddled the dials on the machine’s fascia.

“Good Morning, Class!” she beamed. I am Professor Skank. I shall be taking Defence Against Indemnities for the rest of term.

The whole class murmured gloomily in response — all, that is, but Ramsay Punchface.

Ramrod sat ramrod-straight in the front row, and yelped, “Good Morning, Ma’am! I say, what have you there? It looks jolly clever!”

The Professor brimmed. “Well, Ramsay, I’m glad you asked, and yes it is jolly clever! This is the very latest in modern risk management! It calculates and monitors all risks, tabulates them, and provides an overall risk rating.”

“Cripes! How does it do that, Ma’am?”

“Well, let me show you, Ramsay.”

Professor Skank manipulated the knobs. As she did so, the children could see drive-shafts turning interlocking gears, which drove connected flywheels, which spun tiny fan-belts, which rotated brass ratchets, which triggered a row of winking diodes and a bell that softly pinged. Her eyes betrayed an impish delight at the cleverness of the design: the elegance of the interactions; the intricacy of the machinery.

George looked at Boone. Boone shrugged. Algy had started cutting up his India rubber in preparation for a barrage against the little swot in the front row, so paid no attention.

Eventually, the Professor pressed a button marked “ANALYSE”. The machine whirred, rattled, chattered, and eventually spat out a punch-tape from a dispenser at the bottom and dropped into a stainless steel tray. Boone thought he saw a wisp of smoke drift up from the mechanism.

Algy catapulted a small nugget of rubber which caught Punchface upside the head. Punchface squawked.

Professor Skank retrieved the punch tape and regarded the output, her eyes aglow.

“Good news! Ambient risk is contained! We are at overall risk level 2.6, which is within acceptable bounds, and can be rendered green on the Steerco RAG Indicator. But, look!” she waved the card and tutted. “Well, that won’t do, will it?”

“What’s that, Miss?”

“Well, Ramsay, measured against that ambient risk, legal operating costs are too high!”

George put her hand up. The Professor nodded to her to carry on. “How can you tell what the ambient risk is, just by looking at that machine, Professor?”

“Can anyone answer that?”

Ramsay Punchface shot his hand into the air. The Professor pretended not to see it. She cast about the rest of the room. “Anyone?”

“Miss!” squeaked Punchface.

The Professor regarded the class register. “This might give me a chance to get to know you. Let me see now ...” She ran her finger down the list. “Bailey, Algernon Bailey?”

Algy, still preoccupied with his rubber, was not paying attention and therefore reacted as if he has been shot. “Er —”

George kicked him in the shins under the table. “Side letter!” she hissed.

Algy rubbed his shin and glared at her. “Ah, a side letter, Miss?”

Professor Skank paused, and sighed, and patiently said, “No, Bailey, side letters are not best pra —”

“DISCLAIMERS?” blurted Algy.

“Miss!” squeaked Ramsay.

Again, the Professor pretended not to hear. “Anyone?”

“Hold harmless executed under seal by deed poll?” volunteered George.

“Heavens no! What has Professor Bumblebore been teaching you?”

“Miss! Miss!!” Ramsay was hyperventilating now.

“Limited recourse?” put in Boone.

“No, no, no! Really, children: You are thinking about this all wrong. Think about the big picture. Think in terms of overall risk.”

Ramsay Punchface could bear it no longer. “KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS MISS!!!”

The room went quiet. Professor Skank sparkled with delight. She wheeled on the spot and regarded unctuous little Punchface, licking his lips from the front row. “Exactly, Ramsay! Key performance indicator!

“Ma’am, where is Professor Cavalier?” asked Algy.

Columbia Cavalier was the school’s usual Defence against Indemnities teacher. She was something of a legend in her own life. Now aged well over eighty, and frequently forgetful and prone to inappropriate outbursts may have been a crusty old malcontent and a dope fiend, but the children respected him for his practical and direct manner. They forgave him the occasional recess to toot medicinal opium — he needed it, he claimed, to alleviate the pain of injuries sustained at the Battle of Bretton Woods — and in any case it made the remainder of the class a whole lot more languid.