It is so nearly time for your return. Hooray! I send hugs, kisses and much, much more as usual. BTW There's been a dreadful rumour that you are leaving the calendars with rude messages for the next chaps - Royal Marines, I gather. You'll have to say I was part of the Starlight Foundation or they'll wonder why you chose such a minger! No comments about High Tower please - well, only if they're incredibly witty!
Here is a piece of prose by a fellow Everyman Theatre writer, Kassel 'Kate' Ibbotson. It was recently broadcast on BBC Radio Gloucestershire.
I spent most of my teenage years making sure my father never taught me anything. Let's face it, parents are always too old, too out of date. He never had the puff to play any running about games. He was overweight too and he said it was from playing the saxophone in his dance band but we had our suspicions. Then he died and that's when I realised he had taught me a few things. I'll start with the most important.
My father taught me the value of chips. My mother spent most of her time, enjoying being ill. This meant Big Sis and I spent lots of school holidays with Grandma, in Portsmouth, in the rain. School term meant father's cooking, which was chips. Yes, bless him, chips. In return, Big Sis tried mince in many ways - spaghetti bolognese, shepherds pie, stuffed peppers but always cheered up by a side order of his excellent chips.
He taught me the value of achievement through perseverance. This can come in many forms. For example, DIY, better known as JKG – just keep going. If you're going to point the house, then accept that it's going to take eighteen months. Fit the sheer slog into your life. Set yourself goals. Today, I will clear out and re-point one square yard. Then do it. Don't stand there clutching at your arse, saying, no quarter past two is far too late to begin. My father came from a generation that came home at six, had tea, put down in front of him by appointment by mother, and then out on the ladder for that square yard of work. Result – the achievement of a repaired house.
But DIY isn't all there is to life. My father also taught me that never one door slams in your face but another opens. My father's father died when he was ten. Frank, that's my father, ah, we'd better go for a touch of background here. In Norfolk, at that time in history, everyone was either Frank or William. My father had the double problem of being both Frank and William. So, if Frank, to show which person you were talking about, Frank became Francis. Francis became Frano. Therefore Frano must have become William, or maybe even Frank. So, my father Frank, was called Francis to show he wasn't Francis and Uncle Francis, here's the turn in the Norfolk logic, remained Uncle Francis. Uncle tops a change in name. You had to leave the county for more exotic names like John or Henry.
Anyway, as we were learning, my father's father died when my father was ten. My father persevered, tried his best. He helped his mum look after his two younger sisters and then his mother married again. This taught him that sometimes you have to cut your losses. His mother married a Londoner called Sam, though they had met in Great Yarmouth. What was Londoner doing in Great Yarmouth? Probably avoiding the First World War, good for him but, downside, Sam was bone-idle. My father could not take to him but instead of the complete Eastenders shouting match, father left home. You could back then, even if you were only twelve years old. He took himself to Uncle George's in Hull and Uncle George gave him a job. This taught him the randomness of luck. Uncle George recognised my father's musical talent and paid for violin lessons. If father had stayed in Great Yarmouth, he'd have become a farm labourer, not a musician who travelled the world. However, Uncle George was also a cautious man and made father take an apprenticeship as an electrician, “in case the music thing didn't work out.” My father wired up spitfires during the war and so met my mother who was in the Aircraft Inspection Department. I have their wedding photo. Her glamourous movie-star hat dwarfs them all. My father is wearing a suit with stripes so broad, it could once have been a deckchair.
He taught me that authority is inconsistent. It reacts mostly when its own dignity or power base is threatened. Now, my big sister could not climb trees. She never hesitated to play the sneer card. “No, I'm going out to play with my friends. You can't come. You're too small.” I realise now that I was and at many years her junior, it matters as it' s her street cred at stake. But the sheer unfairness of it all caused a red mist to come before my eyes. So what you do is, you climb a tree with her copy of some nauseous celeb mag in hand and out onto the garage roof. Hold the stuff dangerously over next door's garden. Taunt her, it so makes your soul feel good because hers isn't.
“Dad, Dad, it's my stuff and I haven't finished with it yet.”
Her subtext: Even if I have, you can't have it.
My subtext: Don't tell me what I can and can't do.
He didn't do a thing because he couldn't climb trees either and it meant fetching the ladder. It was, apparently, all a fuss about nothing. We were to sort ourselves out. Of course, your father has to clip you round the ear when you come down, in the style of the casual violence of the 1950s, for form's sake. But Big Sis had failed through the inertia of authority. Result.
So that's it. My father taught me other people's motives aren't always to your benefit, so recognise your enemy; the randomness of luck; the ability to annoy is an excellent life skill; just keep going; don't give up. And over and above all else, always eat chips. They are truly a comfort food sent to make this world bearable.
The Sort of Blonde that ….
by
Phil Jones
She was beautiful. She was the sort of blonde that any half-sentient male would cheerfully have skinned his Granny alive for. I first saw her when she came striding over the forecourt in that pale suit.
I’d been in the office at A C Brotherton trying to decide whether to go for Tudor Prince or Belle Helene in the 2-45 at Epsom when Ferdie rapped on the door.
“What is it?” I grunted. I wasn’t best pleased; I didn’t have too much time left to phone my bet in. The interruption had better be worth it.
Ferdie, overalls on, Chamois leather in hand, beckoned me insistently to the door.
“Forget your bloody horses, young Charlie. Come and cop a look at this,” he said. “You should have watched her get out of that Roller. It left nothing to the bloody imagination.” He pointed out through the showroom window to where a blonde was just locking the door of a burgundy Rolls Royce. And what a blonde! She was splendid; absolutely prime bloodstock.
She turned and walked through the sunlight towards the showroom door. She had legs that went way up beyond her navel and, as they swung, long, easy and confident over the tarmac, they weren’t over-hindered by skirt. We were well used to seeing short skirts by then, but trust me, that skirt was very short. The suit was a pale, pale stone suede and the skirt barely covered the junction of those thighs. She wasn’t wearing stockings and those smooth legs had been tanned to a turn. She stopped to take a long look at an Aston Martin that was parked outside and then carried on towards the door.
I dived back into the office, grabbed my morning coat and slipped it on over my waistcoat. Bit of snobbery really, but we did like our customers to feel that they were dealing with a serious organisation.
She pushed the showroom door open and came in, leaving the door to swing back behind her. I walked towards her, extending my hand and forcing myself to look her in the eyes.
“A very good afternoon to you, madam,” I said, giving my RADA received pronunciation full rein. “What can I do to help you?”
She had a smile that would have melted diamonds. I kept on looking into her eyes but the gentle upper curves of the two breasts above the jacket lapels were tugging down at my eyeballs like magnets.
“I’m thinking of selling the car and I wonder if you’d give me an idea of what it might be worth?” she began. Up close she was a fraction older than I’d first thought but that only increased the attraction. She was mouth-wateringly gorgeous and somehow you sensed that she would know exactly how to handle herself if it ever came down to it.
“What year was it registered?” I asked, beginning to churn the numbers in my head.
“1998,” she replied. “It’s done 8,000 miles.” 1998. That made it two years old.
“It’s hardly run in,” I said, before I’d thought, and kicked myself.
A 1998 Roller with 8,000 miles on the clock was worth at least £60,000 to us.
“It’s such a pity,” I said apologetically. “It’s a fantastic car but the market’s very quiet and people just don’t seem to be going for the Burgundy any more. I love it myself but it just doesn’t seem to be the ‘in-colour’ at the moment. The most I could go to would be about £50,000.”
“I had rather less than that in mind,” she said with an amused smile, stopping me dead in my tracks.
“Less than that?” I asked, trying to get my head round it.
“I thought that something like 10,000 might be more appropriate,” she remarked casually, watching my reaction with a little grin.
“£10,000?” I parroted feebly like a 14 year old chatting up his first bird.
“It’s a little complicated,” she started to explain. “Is there somewhere more private where we can talk about it?” She made a little half-turn of her head to where Ferdie was polishing and re-polishing the same spot on a Bentley, his bottom jaw hanging open idiotically.
“Certainly, Madam,” I squawked, waving her towards the office. I followed her in, pulled the visitor’s chair out for her to sit on and swept The Sporting Life off the desk-top before sitting down opposite her.
“My name’s Alicia Fensbury-Stewart,” she announced.
Fensbury-Stewart! I’d heard of the Fensbury-Stewarts. Very well-to-do, apparently, and living out somewhere by Stowe-on-the-Wold.
“Charles Fletcher,” I reciprocated quickly.
“Look,” she began, leaning forward over the desk. That was the point when my eyeballs lost their courageous fight. Suddenly they were peering into those mysterious shadowy depths above the top of the fawn jacket with only the catenary curve of a thin gold chain to interrupt the view. Manfully, I forced my gaze back to her face. She didn’t seem to have noticed, but surely she must have.
“Look, Charles, it’s really rather difficult.” She hesitated, apparently wondering just how much to say.
“If there’s anything that we can do to help,” I volunteered eagerly.
“You’re so very nice,” she said, giving me this big, wide appreciative smile. “You see, my husband James has just left me for this other woman.”
“Left you? For another woman?” I was incredulous. Surely the man must be off his head?
“Well,” she said, giving me an impish little grin, “perhaps I have been just a teenzy-weenzy bit naughty.” She hesitated. “And he is quite a bit older than me. I think he was finding it all a little bit too much. Camilla, this new squeeze of his, is a bit more like his first wife. She’s much more into hunting and shooting and tweeds and walking about in mud in green wellies.” She gave a little shudder at the thought. “The dreadful Camilla is also very determined to get her hands on as much of his inheritance as she can and I don’t see why she should get away with it. Anyway, darling, he’s gone off to live with the old trollop at her place in the New Forest.”
“OK,” I asked, intrigued, “but where does the car fit in?”
“Well, you see,” she began, “when he went off, he sent me instructions to sell the house and the car. According to his solicitor, he reckons that the more I can get for them, the better off we’ll both be, however the divorce settlement works out.”
I sat there and waited for her to continue.
“Anyway, I thought that perhaps we might do a little deal, darling.”
“A deal?”
“Yes. If we could agree on, say, £55,000 for the Rolls ….£50,000 was a bit cheeky wasn’t it, sweetie,…you could give me £45,000 in cash and a cheque and a bill of sale for £10,000.”
I hesitated, thinking it through. It sounded legal enough, it would make good money, Mr Brotherton was always up for an imaginative deal and it would be up to her to argue the case with her ex.
“By the way,” she added, “I’m very taken by that Aston Martin on the forecourt. Much more of a car for a gay divorcee than a Rolls Royce, don’t you think?”
I certainly did. Now we were talking serious business. When he got back, Mr Brotherton would be more than happy if I’d got a good deal on the Roller and shifted an Aston.
I took her for a very satisfactory test drive in the Aston, me unable to avoid catching an enticing flash of white knicker as I held the door open to let her swing those legs into the driving seat and she purring contentedly as she threw the car round the bends like a racing driver.
Back in the office, we haggled a bit over the prices but it wasn’t too hard. I got her down to £53,000 for the Roller, invoking the unusual financial arrangement, and I managed to get a pretty good price on the Aston too.
After a while, we shook hands on the deal. She was to bring the Roller in on the Friday afternoon and I was to give her a cheque for £10,000 as well as £43,000 in cash. She’d give me a cheque for the Aston and, when the cheque had cleared, I’d deliver the beast round to the house near Stowe. Funnily enough, cash isn’t a problem in our game. It doesn’t happen all the time but you’d be amazed at how many people who we never see again want to buy a Bentley or a Rolls for cash.
And the delectable Alicia was to be just as good as her word. Late Friday afternoon she arrived to deliver the Rolls. She was in a strapless sun-frock this time and still looking a million dollars. She took the cheque and the £43,000 and put them in a brief-case that she’d brought. She handed me the log-book and her cheque. J P & A M Fensbury-Stewart it said under her signature.
“You’ve been really, really sweet, Charles,” she said, as she got ready to leave. “This’ll teach James and the dreadful Camilla.” She stretched up and gave me a fierce little kiss on the cheek. She had this way of looking at you like you were the very last man on earth.
“Look, Charles,” she said. “Make sure that you deliver the Aston yourself next Wednesday. I’ve been getting terribly bored up there by myself. Stay for a drink and we can relax a bit. It should be fun.” She pressed two fingers to her lips and then reached across to press them onto mine. She gave me a slow smile and a little wink. She turned and walked out of the door, across the forecourt and into a Rover 600 driven by some guy in a chauffeur’s cap.
I spent the next few days thinking about little else but my visit to Stowe on the next Wednesday. And it wasn’t the drink that I was thinking about; it was the ‘relaxing’ that had caught my fetid imagination; the relaxing and the delights that might be waiting for me beneath that sundress.
I called the bank on Wednesday morning and, irritatingly, the cheque still hadn’t cleared. Even so, I knew that there couldn’t be anything wrong and we had the Rolls Royce. I enjoyed the drive up through the Cotswolds in the Aston and found the place without any trouble. I drove up the long drive and pulled up outside the door of a splendid old Cotswold stone house. I rang the bell and awaited Alicia’s response.
When the door opened, though, it was a middle-aged man.
The only thing that I could think to stammer out was, “I’ve come to deliver Mrs Fensbury-Stewart’s new Aston Martin.”
“What on earth are you talking about, young man?” he said looking cross. “Alicia,” he yelled, looking towards a gateway at the side of the house. A middle-aged lady in a Barbour jacket and green wellies appeared, secateurs in hand. “This idiot says that he’s brought an Aston Martin for you.”
In the end, I managed to explain about the blonde called Alicia and the Rolls Royce. They were just very grateful that they now knew where to find their Rolls. They’d arrived back from holiday in Italy the night before and had only just realised that the Rolls wasn’t in the garage. What’s more, their new housekeeper was missing. They were scared that she’d stolen it. She’d had the run of the house while they’d been away, they said. They’d had every confidence in her, they said. After all, the references had been excellent. She was a fantastic cook, they said, and such good company.
Well, the Fensbury-Stewarts decided not to call the police. After all, they had got their car back and nothing else was missing.
When he got back, Mr Brotherton also decided not to pursue the thing any further. How stupid would Brotherton’s look when it was reported in the paper. As you can imagine though, he was not at all happy at losing £43,000 and he took his anger out on me. I was out on the street by the end of the morning and I’ve never trusted a blonde since.
I did see her once more though.
Three years later, I was by a set of traffic lights in Cannes, touting time-share, when this open-topped Ferrari had to stop for the red light.
“Alicia?” I said stupidly to the stunner in the bikini top and sarong driving it. She looked puzzled for a few seconds and then light seemed to dawn.
“Charles?” she asked tentatively. It was her all right.
“Yes. Charles. That’s me. We ought to have a little chat.”
“Charles. I’m so very sorry.” At least she had the grace to look embarrassed. “You were very tempting but I just couldn’t afford to hang around that long. Besides,” she continued, grinning, “used car salesmen were never really quite my thing, even if the cars were Rolls Royces.”
I reached for the door handle, angry now, but the lights had changed. All the horses under the bonnet of the Ferrari roared at once, the back wheels burnt rubber, I nearly lost my fingers in the door handle and I was left standing in a cloud of dust watching that Ferrari disappear into the middle distance.
No, take my word for it: never trust a blonde with a sincere smile.
She was gorgeous though; absolutely drop-dead gorgeous.
