On The Yankee Station_ Stories Part 1

On the Yankee Station.

by William Boyd.

Dedication.

Next Boat from DoualaNot Yet, JayetteHardly EverThe Care and Attention of Swimming PoolsKilling LizardsBizarre SituationsGiftsOn the Yankee StationHistoire VacheMy Girl in Skintight Jeans.e.xtracts from the Journal of Flying Officer JBat-Girl!Love HurtsThe CoupLong Story Short

Next Boat from Douala

Then the brothel was raided. Christ, he'd only gone down to Spinoza's to confront Patience with her handiwork. She hadn't been free when Morgan first arrived, so he had chatted to the owner, Baruch-as his better-read clients whimsically dubbed the diminutive Levantine pimp-for half an hour or so, and watched the girls dancing listlessly under the roof fans. His anger had subsided a bit but he managed to stoke up a rage when he was eventually ushered into Patience's cubicle. "Hey!" he had roared, lowering his greyish Y-fronts. "b.l.o.o.d.y look at this mess!" But then his tirade had been cut short by the whistles and stompings of Sgt. Mbele and his vice squad.

The day had started badly. Morgan woke, hot and sweaty, his sheets damp binding-cloths. Three things presented themselves to his mind almost simultaneously: it was Christmas Eve, in four days he would be catching the next boat home from Douala and he had a dull ache in his groin. He eased his seventeen-and-a-half stone out of bed and started for the bathroom. There, a hesitant diagnosis set off by the unfamiliar pain was horrifyingly confirmed by the sight of his opaque, forked and pustular urine.

He dropped off at the local clinic before going in to the office. Inside it was cool and air-conditioned. Outside, in the shade cast by the wide eaves, mothers and children sprawled. And inside he ruefully confessed to a Calvinistic Scottish doctor, young and unrelentingly professional, of his weekly visits to Patience at Spinoza's. Then a plump black sister led him to an ante-room where, retreating coyly behind a screen, he delivered up a urine sample. The clear tinkle of his stream on the thin gla.s.s of the bottle seemed to rebound deafeningly from the tiled walls. With a cursoriness teetering on the edge of contempt, the doctor told him that the result of the test would be available tomorrow.

He vented his embarra.s.sment and mounting anger at his office, Nkongsamba's Deputy High Commission, turning down all that day's applications for visas out of hand, vetoing the recommendations of senior missionaries for candidates in the next birthday honours and, exquisite zenith of the day's attack of spleen, peremptorily sacking a filing clerk for eating fu-fu while handling correspondence. He began to feel a little better, the fear of some hideous social disease retreating as time interposed itself between now and his visit to the clinic.

After lunch his air-conditioner broke down. Morgan detested the sun, and because of his corpulence his three years in Nkongsamba had been three years of seemingly constant perspiration, virulent rashes and general discomfort. He had accepted the posting gladly, proud to tell family and friends he was in the Diplomatic Service, and had enthusiastically read the literature of West Africa, searching, with increasing despair, first in Joyce Cary, then through Graham Greene, right down to Gerald Durrell and Conrad, for any experience that vaguely corresponded with his own. When the cream tropical suit he had so keenly bought began to grow mould in the armpits-a creeping greenish hue eventually encroaching on the b.u.t.ton-down flap of a breast pocket-he had forthwith abandoned it, and with it all hopes of injecting a literary frisson into his dull and routine life. But, thank G.o.d, he was leaving it all soon, next boat from Douala, leaving the steaming forest, the truculent natives, the tiny black flies that raised florin-sized bites. What would he miss? The beer, strong and cold, and of course Patience, with her lordotic posture, pragmatic s.e.x, and her smooth black body smelling strangely of "Amby," a skin-lightening agent that sold very well in these parts.

Morgan came home after work. There had been an unexpected fall of rain during the afternoon. The air was heavy and damp; great ranges of purple c.u.mulus loomed in the sky. He climbed up the steps to his stoop, shouting for Pious, his houseboy, to bring beer. There on the stoop table lay his copy of Keats, sole heritage of his years at his plate-gla.s.s university. He had come across it while packing and had glanced through it, with nostalgic affection, at breakfast. Now, carelessly left out in the rain, it sat there swollen, and steaming slightly, it seemed, in the late-afternoon heat-a grotesque papier-mache brick. He picked it up and bellowed for Pious.

He stood under the cold shower, allowing the stream of water to course down his face, plastering his thinning hair to his forehead. A startled Pious had received the sodden complete works full in the face and when he scrabbled to pick it up, Morgan had booted him viciously in the a.r.s.e. He smiled, then frowned. The sudden movement, though producing a satisfying yelp from Pious, had done some damage. Pain pulsed like a Belisha beacon from his t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es, now, he was convinced, grown palpably larger. He counted slowly from one to ten. Things were ganging up on him; he was beginning to feel insecure, hunted almost. Only three days to the boat, then away, thank Christ, for good.

An obsequious, chastened Pious brought him the gin on the stoop. Morgan poured two inches into a gla.s.s full of ice, added some bitters and a dash of water. He hated the drink but it seemed the apt thing to do; end of a tropical day, sundowners and all that. It was dark now and unbearably humid. There would be a storm tonight. Fat sausage flies brought out by the rain whirled and battered about him. Ungainly on their wings, one landed in his gin and drowned there, straddled on the cubes. His s.h.i.+rt stuck to his back; the minatory hum of a mosquito was in his ear. Crickets chirped moronically in the garden. He would go and sort out that Patience.

In Sgt. Mbele's fetid detention hall Morgan had two hours in which to repent that decision. Finally he managed to impress Mbele, a grinning, stubborn man-with, also, the help of a thirty-kobo bribe-that as he was First Secretary at the Commission he possessed diplomatic immunity, and that he would take it as a personal favour if the sergeant wouldn't mention him in his report. H.E., though profligate himself, admired a sense of decorum in his subordinates.

Leaving the police station, Morgan decided there and then to abandon his car at Spinoza's and instead go to the club-a ten-minute walk-and get drunk. The Recreation Club, as it was inspiringly named, had been built for the expatriate population of Nkongsamba in the heady days of the Empire. A long, rambling, high-ceilinged building surrounded by a piebald golf-course and tennis courts, it preserved, with its uniformed servants and air-mail copies of British newspapers, something of the ease and tenor of those times. As Morgan approached, it became evident that quiet inebriation was out of the question. Gerry and the Pacemakers boomed from the ballroom; coloured lights and streamers were festooned everywhere. It was the Christmas Party. Morgan, scowling and black-humoured, brutally shouldered his way through the crowd around the bar and drank three large gins very quickly. Then, moderately composed, he sat on a bar stool and surveyed the scene. The men wore white dinner jackets or tropical suits and looked hot and apoplectic. The women sported the fas.h.i.+ons of a decade ago and appeared strained and ill-at-ease. There were few young people; young people did not come to the tropics from choice, only if they were sent, like Morgan.

"Um, excuse me"-a tap on his elbow-"it is Mr. Morgan, isn't it?"

He looked round. "Yes. h.e.l.lo. Mrs.... Brinkit, yes? Erm, let me see. Queen's Birthday, High Commission last year?"

"That's right." She seemed overjoyed that he had remembered. She was tall and thin and just missed being attractive. Thirtyish, late, probably. She wore a strapless evening gown that exposed a lot of bony chest and shoulder. Her nose was red. She was a bit drunk, but then so was Morgan.

"Doreen," she said.

"Sorry?"

"Doreen. My name."

"Christ, yes. So sorry. And your husband, ah, George-how's he?"

"It's Brian, actually. He would be here but Tom, our dachshund, ran away and Brian's been out all night looking for him. Doesn't want him to catch rabies."

"'a la recherche du Tom Tom perdu,' perdu,' eh?" Morgan laughed at his joke. eh?" Morgan laughed at his joke.

"Pardon?" said Doreen Brinkit, smiling blankly and swaying gently up against him.

Morgan drank a lot more and danced with Doreen. They became very friendly, more by force of circ.u.mstance-they were both alone, unattractive and needing to forget it-than by desire. At midnight they kissed and she stuck her tongue in his ear. There was no sign of Brian. Morgan remembered them now from the c.o.c.ktail party at the Commission. Brinkit small, bald and shy. Doreen six inches taller than he. Brinkit telling him of his desire to leave Africa and become a vet in Devon. Wanted kids, nothing quite like family life. No place for children, Africa-very risky, health-wise. No place for you either, Morgan had thought, as he looked at the man's little eyes and his frail, earnest features.

Some time later in a dark corner of the ballroom Doreen squirmed and hissed, "No! Morgan! Stop it...honestly, not here." here." Then more suggestively: "Look, why don't I give you a run home. I've got the van outside." Then more suggestively: "Look, why don't I give you a run home. I've got the van outside."

Breathless with excitement and l.u.s.t, Morgan excused himself for a moment. On his way to the lavatory he reflected that possibly it hadn't been such a bad day after all. G.o.d. A real white woman.

But then a five-minute session of searing agony in the gent's toilet brought home to him-with an awful clarity-the nightmarish significance of the lyrics in Jerry Lee Lewis'"Great b.a.l.l.s of Fire." He reeled out of the toilet, eyes streaming, teeth clenched, and collided with a small, firm object. Through the mists of tears, the prim features of his doctor s.h.i.+mmered and formed, mouth like a recently sutured wound.

"Oh! Morgan, it's you. Well, I won't waste any words. Save you a trip tomorrow. Bad news, I'm afraid. You've got gonorrhoea." As if he didn't know.

The VW bus was parked up a track off the main road some miles out of town. The jungle reared up on all sides. Heavy rain beat down remorselessly. Inside, lit by the inadequate glow of a map light, Morgan and Doreen Brinkit lay in the back, s.p.a.cious with the seats folded down. Doreen moaned unconvincingly as Morgan nuzzled her neck. His heart wasn't in it. His mind was obsessed with a single image, rooted there since he'd heard the appalling news, of a rancid gherkin astride two suppurating black olives. With a shudder he broke off and took great pulls at the gin bottle he'd purchased before leaving the club. His brain seemed to cartwheel crazily in his skull. b.l.o.o.d.y country! he screamed inwardly. b.l.o.o.d.y filthy Patience! Three rotting years just to end up with the clap. He drank deep, awash with self-pity. A tense, frustrated rage mounted within him. Distractedly he looked round. Doreen was tugging at the bodice of her dress, all tulle and taffeta, reinforced with bakelite and whalebone. She pulled it down, revealing an absurd cut-away bra that offered her nipples like canapes on a c.o.c.ktail tray. Morgan's rage was replaced by a spasm of equally intense l.u.s.t. What the h.e.l.l, he was on the next boat from Douala, clearing out. She was desperate for it. He reached up and switched out the map light.

But then somewhere in the prolonged pre-coital tussle, with Doreen's dress concertina-ed at her waist, Morgan's trousers at his knees, the rain drumming on the tin roof, the air soupy with sweat and deep breathing, Morgan took stock. Perhaps it was when she breathed, "Come on, Morgan, it's okay, it's okay. It's the safe time of the month," and Morgan, spliced between Doreen's pale shanks, looked up at the windscreen awash with water, and images began to zigzag through his mind like bats in a room seeking an open window. He thought of his t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es effervescing with bacilli; he thought of pathetic Brian Brinkit searching for his f.u.c.king dachshund in a downpour; then he thought of impregnating Doreen, his putrid seed in her womb, Brian's innocent alarm at the diseased monster he'd inadvertently produced. He thought of Brian diseased, too, a loathsome spiral of infection, a little septic carbuncle festering in Africa behind him. And he realised as Doreen's grunts began to reach a crescendo beneath him that, no, in spite of everything-Patience, Keats, Pious, Mbele, the stinking heat and the clap-it just wasn't on.

He withdrew and sat up, breathing heavily.

"What is it, Morgan?" Surprised, a tint of anger colouring her voice.

What the h.e.l.l could he say? "I'm sorry, Doreen," he began pathetically, desperately running through plausible reasons. "But...it's just, um...well, I don't think this is fair to Brian. I mean...he is out looking for Tom, in this rain." Then, despite himself, he laughed, a half-suppressed derisive snort, and Doreen abruptly burst into tears, sobbing as she tried to cover herself up. Morgan sat and finished the gin.

"Get out!" Morgan looked round in alarm. Doreen, hair all over the place, face tracked with mascara, shrieking at him. "f.u.c.king get Morgan looked round in alarm. Doreen, hair all over the place, face tracked with mascara, shrieking at him. "f.u.c.king get out out! How dare dare you treat me like this! You filth, you fat sodding b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" She started to pummel him with her fists, pus.h.i.+ng him towards the back of the van with surprising strength. Somehow the door sprang open. you treat me like this! You filth, you fat sodding b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" She started to pummel him with her fists, pus.h.i.+ng him towards the back of the van with surprising strength. Somehow the door sprang open.

"Hang on, Doreen! It's pouring. Let's talk about it." She was. .h.i.tting him about the head and shoulders with the empty gin bottle, screaming obscenities all the while. Morgan fell out of the back of the van. He scampered out of the way seconds later as she reversed violently down the road. Morgan sat on the verge, the jungle at his back, rain soaking him completely. "Jesus," he said. He wiped his wet hair from his forehead. For some curious reason he felt light-headed, suddenly hugely relieved. He got to his feet noticing unconcernedly that his trousers were covered in mud. Then, for a brief tranquil moment, the rain beating down on his head, he felt intensely, exhilaratingly happy. Why? He couldn't really be sure. Still...He set off down the track, a bulky, dripping figure, humming quietly to himself at first and then, spontaneously, filling his lungs and breaking into a booming c.o.c.kney ba.s.so profundo that spilled out into the dark and over the trees.

"Hyme a si-i-inging in a ryne, hyme a singin' in a ryne."

Cicadas trilled in his path.

Not Yet, Jayette

This happened to me in L.A. once. Honestly. I was standing at a hamburger kiosk on Echo Park eating a chili dog. This guy in a dark green Lincoln pulls up at the curb in front of me and leans out the window. "Hey," he asks me, "do you know the way to San Jose?" Well, that threw me, I had to admit it. In fact I almost told him. Then I got wise. "Don't tell me," I says. "Let me guess. You're going back to find some peace of mind." I only tell you this to give you some idea of what the city is like. It's full of jokers. And that guy, even though I'd figured him, still bad-mouthed me before he drove away. That's the kind of place it is. I'm just telling you so's you know my day is for real.

Most mornings, early, I go down to the beach at Santa Monica to try and meet Christopher Isherwood. A guy I know told me he likes to walk his dog down there before the beach freaks and the surfers show up. I haven't seen him yet but I've grown to like my mornings on the beach. The sea has that oily sheen to it, like an empty swimming pool. The funny thing is, though, the Pacific Ocean nearly always looks cold. One morning someone was swinging on the bars, up and down, flinging himself about as if he was made of rubber. It was beautiful, and boy, was he built. It's wonderful to me what the human body can achieve if you treat it right. I like to keep in shape. I work out. So most days I hang around waiting to see if Christopher's going to show. Then I go jogging. Thead south, down from the pier to Pacific Ocean Park. I've got to know some of the b.u.ms that live around the beach, the junkies and derelicts. "Hi, Charlie," they shout when they see me jogging by.

There's a cafe in Venice where I eat breakfast. A girl works there most mornings, thin, bottle-blond, kind of tired-looking. I'm pretty sure she's on something heavy. So that doesn't make her anything special but she can't be more than eighteen. She knows my name-I don't know how. I never told her. Anyway, each morning when she brings me my coffee and doughnut she says, "Hi there, Charlie. Lucked out yet?

I just smile and say, "Not yet, Jayette." Jayette's the name she's got sewn across her left t.i.t. I'm not sure I like the way she speaks to me-I don't exactly know what she's referring to. But seeing how she knows my name I think it must be my career she's talking about. Because I used to be a star-well, a TV star anyway. Between the ages of nine and eleven I earned $12,000 a week. Perhaps you remember the show, a TV soap opera called The Scrantons The Scrantons. I was the little brother, Chuck. For two years I was a star. I got the whole treatment: my own trailer, chauffeured limousines, private tutors. Trouble was my p.u.b.erty came too early. Suddenly I was like a teenage gatecrasher at a kids' party. My voice went, I got zits all over my chin, fluff on my lip. It spoiled everything. Within a month the scenario for my contractual death was drawn up. I think it was pneumonia, or maybe an accident with the thresher. I can't really remember; I don't like to look back on those final days.

Though I must confess it was fun meeting all the stars. The big ones: Jeanne Lamont, Eddy Cornelle, Mary and Marvin Keen-you remember them. One of the most bizarre features of my life since I left the studio is that nowadays I never see stars anymore. Isn't that ridiculous? Someone like me who worked with them, who practically lives in Hollywood? Somehow I never get to see the stars anymore. I just miss them. "Oh, he left five minutes ago, bub," or, "Oh, no, I think she's on location in Europe. She hasn't been here for weeks." The same old story.

I think that's what Jayette's referring to when she asks if I've lucked out. She knows I'm still hanging in there, waiting. I mean, I've kept on my agent. The way I see it is that once you've been in front of the cameras, something's going to keep driving you on until you get back. I know it'll happen to me again one day. I just have this feeling inside.

After breakfast I jog back up the beach to where I left the car. One morning I got to thinking about Jayette. What does she think when she sees me now and remembers me from the days of The Scrantons The Scrantons? It seems to me that everybody in their life is at least two people. Once when you're a child and once when you're an adult. It's the saddest thing. I don't just mean that you see things differently when you're a child-that's something else again. What's sad is that you can't seem to keep the personality. I know I'm not the same person anymore as young Chuck Scranton was, and I find that depressing. I could meet little Charlie on the beach today and say, "Look, there goes a sharp kid." And never recognize him, if you see what I mean. It's a shame.

I don't like the jog back so much, as all the people are coming out. Lying around, surfing, cruising, scoring, shooting up, tricking. h.e.l.l, the things I've seen on that sand, I could tell you a few stories. Sometimes I like to go down to El Segundo or Redondo Beach just to feel normal.

I usually park the car on Santa Monica Palisades. I tidy up, change into my clothes and shave. I have a small battery-powered electric razor that I use. Then I have a beer, wander around, buy a newspaper. Mostly I then drive north to Malibu. There's a place I know where you can get a fair view of a longish stretch of the beach. It's almost impossible to get down there in summer; they don't like strangers. So I pull off the highway and climb this small dune hill. I have a pair of opera gla.s.ses of my aunt's that I use to see better-my eyesight's not too hot. I spotted Rod Steiger one day, and Jane Fonda I think but I can't be sure; the gla.s.ses tend to fuzz everything a bit over four hundred yards. Anyway, I like the quiet on that dune. It's restful.

I have been down onto Malibu Beach, but only in the winter season. The houses are all shut up but you can still get the feel of it. Some people were having a barbecue one day. It looked good. They had a fire going on a big porch that jutted out high over the sand. They waved and shouted when I went past.

Lunch is bad. The worst part of the day for me because I have to go home. I live with my aunt. I call her my aunt though I'm not related to her at all. She was my mother's companion-I believe that's the right word-until my mother stuffed her face with a gross of Seconal one afternoon in a motel at Corona del Mar. I was fifteen then and Vanessa-my "aunt"-became some kind of legal guardian to me and had control of all the money I'd made from The Scrantons The Scrantons. Well, she bought an apartment in Beverly Glen because she liked the address. Man, was she swallowed by the realtor. They build these tiny apartment blocks on cliff-faces up the a.s.shole of the big-name canyons just so you can say you live off Mulholland Drive or in Bel-Air. It's a load. I'd rather live in Watts or on Imperial Highway. I practically have to rope up and wear crampons to get to my front door. And it is mine. I paid for it.

Maybe that's why Vanessa never leaves her bed. It's just too much effort getting in and out of the house. She just stays in bed all day and eats, watches TV and feeds her two dogs. I only go in there for lunch; it's my only "family" ritual. I take a gla.s.s of milk and a salad sandwich but she phones out for pizza and enchiladas and burgers-any kind of c.r.a.p she can smear over her face and down her front. She's really grown fat in the ten years since my mother bombed out. But she still sits up in bed with those hairy yipping dogs under her armpits, and she's got her top and bottom false eyelashes, her hairpiece and purple lipstick on. I say nothing usually. For someone who never gets out she sure can talk a lot. She wears these tacky satin and lace peignoirs, shows half her chest. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s look like a couple of Indian clubs rolling around under the s.h.i.+mmer. It's unfair, I suppose, but when I drive back into the foothills I like to think I'm going to have a luncheon date with...with someone like Grace Kelly-as was-or maybe Alexis Smith. I don't know. I wouldn't mind a meal and a civilized conversation with some nice people like that. But lunch with Vanessa? Thanks for nothing, pal. G.o.d, you can keep it. She's a real klutz. I'm sure Grace and Alexis would never let themselves get that way-you know, like Vanessa's always dropping tacos down her cleavage or smearing mustard on her chins.

I always get depressed after lunch. It figures, I hear you say. I go to my room and sometimes I have a drink (I don't smoke, so dope's out). Other days I play my guitar or else work on my screenplay. It's called Walk. Don't Walk Walk. Don't Walk. I get a lot of good ideas after lunch for some reason. That's when I got the idea for my screenplay. It just came to me. I remembered how I'd been stuck one day at the corner of Arteria Boulevard and Normandie Avenue, There was a pile of traffic and the pedestrian signs were going berserk. "Walk" would come on, so I'd start across. Two seconds later, "Don't Walk," so I go back. Then on comes "Walk" again. This went on for ten minutes: "Walk. Don't Walk. Walk. Don't Walk." I was practically out of my box. But what really stunned me was the way I just stayed there and obeyed the G.o.ddam machine for so long-I never even thought about going it alone. Then one afternoon after lunch it came to me that it was a neat image for life; just the right kind of metaphor for the whole can of worms. The final scene of this movie is going to be a slow crane shot away from this malfunctioning traffic sign going "Walk. Don't Walk." Then the camera pulls farther up and away in a helicopter and you see that in fact the whole city is fouled up because of this one sign flas.h.i.+ng. They don't know what to do; the programming's gone wrong. It's a great final scene. Only problem is I'm having some difficulty writing my way toward it. Still, it'll come, I guess.

In the late afternoon I go to work. I work at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Vanessa's brother-in-law got me the job. I park cars. I keep hoping I'm going to park the car of someone really important. Frank-that's Vanessa's brother-in-law-will say to me, "Give this one a s.h.i.+ne-up, Charlie. It belongs to so-and-so. He produced this film." Or, "That guy's the money behind X's new movie." Or, "Look out, he's Senior Vice-President of Something Incorporated." I say, big deal. These guys hand me the keys-they all look like bank clerks. If that's the movies nowadays I'm not so sure I want back in.

Afternoons are quiet at the hotel so I catch up on my reading. I'm reading Camus at the moment but I think I've learned all I can from him so I'm going on to Jung. I don't know too much about Jung but I'm told he was really into astrology, which has always been a pet interest of mine. One thing I will say for quitting the movies when I did-it means I didn't miss out on my education. I hear that some of these stars today are really dumb; you know, they've got their brains in their neck and points south.

After work I drive back down to the Santa Monica Pier and think about what I'm going to do all night. The Santa Monica Pier is a kind of special place for me: it's the last place I saw my wife and son. I got married at seventeen and was divorced by twenty-two, though we were apart for a couple of years before that. Her name was Harriet. It was okay for a while but I don't think she liked Vanessa. Anyway, get this. She left me for a guy who was the a.s.sistant manager in the credit collection department of a large mail-order firm. I couldn't believe it when she told me. I said to her when she moved out that it had to be the world's most boring job and did she know what she was getting into? I mean, what sort of person do you have to be to take on that kind of work? The bad thing was she took my son, Skiff, with her. It's a dumb name, I know, but at the time he was born all the kids were being called things like Sky and Saffron and Powie, and I was really sold on sailing. I hope he doesn't hold it against me.

The divorce was messy and she got custody, though I'll never understand why. She had left some clothes at the house and wanted them back so she suggested we meet at the end of the Santa Monica Pier for some reason. I didn't mind-it was the impetuous side to her nature that first attracted me. I handed the clothes over. She was a bit tense. Skiff was running about; he didn't seem to know who I was. She was smoking a lot, those long-thin menthol cigarettes. I really didn't say anything much at all, asked her how she was, what school Skiff was going to. Then she just burst out: "Take a good look, Charlie. Then don't come near us ever again!" Her exact words. Then they went away.

So I go down to the end of the pier most nights and look out at the ocean and count the planes going in to land at L.A. International and try to work things out. Just the other evening I wandered up the beach a way and this thin-faced man with short gray hair came up to me and said, "Jordan, is that you?" And when he saw he'd made a mistake he smiled a nice smile, apologized and walked off. It was only this morning that I thought it might have been Christopher Isherwood himself. The more I think about it, the more convinced I become. What a perfect opportunity and I had to go and miss it. As I say: "Walk. Don't Walk." That's the bottom line.

I suppose I must have been preoccupied. The pier brings back all these memories like some private video loop, and my head gets to feel like it's full of birds all flapping around trying to get out. And also things haven't been so good lately. On Friday, Frank told me not to bother showing up at the hotel next week, I can't seem to make any headway with the screenplay, and for the last three nights Vanessa's tried to climb into my bed.

Well, tonight I think I'll drive to this small bar I know on Sunset. Nothing too great, a little dark. They do a nice white wine with peach slices in it, and there's some topless, some go-go, and I hear tell that Bobby De Niro sometimes shows up for a drink.

Hardly Ever

"Think of it," Holland said. "The s.e.x."

"s.e.x," Panton repeated. "G.o.d...s.e.x."

Niles shook his head. "Are you sure?" he asked. "I mean, can you guarantee it? The s.e.x, that is. I don't want to waste time farting around singing."

"Waste b.l.o.o.d.y time? Are you mad?" Holland said. "It only happens every two years. You can't afford to miss the opportunity. Unless you're suffering from second thoughts."

"What, me me?" Niles tried to laugh. He looked at Holland's blue eyes. They always seemed to know. "You must be b.l.o.o.d.y kidding, mate. Jesus, if you think...G.o.d!" he snorted.

"All right, all right," Holland said. "We agreed, remember? It's got to be all of us."

Niles had never asked for this last fact to be explained. Why, if-as Holland attested-the s.e.x was freely available, on a plate so to speak, why did they all have to partic.i.p.ate at the feast? Holland made out it was part of his naturally generous personality. It was more fun if you all had a go.

"Let's get on with it," Panton said.

They walked over to the notice-board. Holland pushed some juniors out of the way. Prothero, the music master, had written at the top of a sheet of paper: GILBERT AND SULLIVAN OPERA - HMS PINAFORE - CHORUS: Ba.s.sES AND TENORS WANTED, SIGN BELOW GILBERT AND SULLIVAN OPERA - HMS PINAFORE - CHORUS: Ba.s.sES AND TENORS WANTED, SIGN BELOW. Half a dozen names had been scrawled down.

"Cretins," Holland said. "No compet.i.tion." He wrote his name down. Panton followed suit.

Niles took a Biro from his blazer pocket. He paused.

"But how can you be so sure? That's what I want to know. How can you tell that the girls just won't be-well-music lovers?"

"Because I know," Holland said patiently. "Every Gilbert and Sullivan it's the same. Borthwick told me. He was in the last one. He said the girls only come for one thing. I mean, it stands to reason. What sort of girl's going to want to be in some p.i.s.sing b.l.o.o.d.y operetta. Ask yourself. s.h.i.+tty orchestra, home-made costumes, people who can't sing to save their life. I tell you, Nilo, they're doing it for the same reason as us. They're fed up with the local yobs. They want a nice public school boy. Christ, you must have heard. It's a cert. Leave it to Pete."

Niles screwed up his eyes. What the h.e.l.l, he thought, it's time I tried. He signed his name: Q. Niles.

"Good old Quentin," Panton roared. "Wor! Think of it waiting." He forced his features into a semblance of n.o.ble suffering, wrapped his arms around himself as if riven with acute internal pain and lurched drunkenly about, groaning in simulated ecstasy.

Holland grabbed Niles by the arm. "The shafting, Nilo, my man," he said intensely. "The royal b.l.o.o.d.y shafting we're going to do."

Niles felt his chest expand with sudden exhilaration. Holland's fierce enthusiasm always affected him more than Panton's most baroque histrionics.

"b.l.o.o.d.y right, Pete," he said. "Too b.l.o.o.d.y right. I'm getting desperate already."

Niles sat in his small box-like study and stared out at the relentless rain falling on the gentle Scottish hills. From his study window he could see a corner of the dormitory wing of his own house, an expanse of gravel with the housemaster's car parked on it, and fifty yards of the drive leading down to the main school house a mile or so away. On the desk in front of him lay a half-completed team list for the inter-house rugby leagues and an open note pad. On the note pad he had written: "'The Rape of the Lock,'" and below that, "'The Rape of the Lock' is a mock heroic poem. What do you understand by this term? Ill.u.s.trate with examples." It was an essay he was due to hand in tomorrow. He had no idea what to say. He gazed dully out at the rain, idly noting some boys coming out of the woods. They must be desperate, he thought, if they have to go out for a smoke in this weather. He returned to his more immediate problem. Who was going to play scrum-half now that Damianos had a sick-chit? He considered the pool of players he could draw on: asthmatics, fatsos, spastics every one. To h.e.l.l with it. He wrote down Grover's name. They had no chance of winning anyway. He opened his desk cupboard and removed a packet of Jaffa cakes and a large bottle of Coca-Cola. He gulped thirstily from the bottle and ate a few biscuits. "The Rape of the Lock." What could he say about it? He didn't mind the poem. He thought of Belinda: "On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,..." He found her far and away the most alluring of the fictional heroines he had yet encountered in his brief acquaintance with English Literature. He read the opening of the poem again. He saw her lying in a huge rumpled bed, a lace peignoir barely covering two b.r.e.a.s.t.s as firm and symmetrical as halved grapefruits. He had had a bonk-on all the English lesson. It hadn't happened to him since they'd read Great Expectations Great Expectations. What was her name? Estella. G.o.d, yes. She was almost as good as Belinda. He thought about his essay again. He liked English Literature. He wondered if he would be able to do it at university-if he could get to university at all. His father had not been at all pleased when he had announced that he wanted to do English A-level. "What's the use of that?" he had shouted. "How's English Literature going to help you sell machine tools?" Niles sighed. There was an opening for him in Gerald Niles (Engineering) Ltd. His father knew nothing of his plans for university.

Niles ran his hands through his thick wiry hair and rubbed his eyes. He picked up his pen. "Alexander Pope," he wrote, "was a major poet of the Augustan period. 'The Rape of the Lock' was his most celebrated poem," He sensed it was a bad beginning-uninspired, boring-but sometimes if you started by writing down what you knew, you got a few ideas. He scanned Canto One. "Soft bosoms," he saw. Then "Belinda still her downy pillow prest." He felt himself quicken. Pope knew what he was doing, all right. The a.s.sociations: bosom and pillow, prest and breast. Niles shut his eyes. He was weighing Belinda's perfect b.r.e.a.s.t.s in his hands, ma.s.saging her awake as she lay in her tousled noonday bed. He imagined her hair spread over her face, full lips, heavy sleep-bruised eyes. He imagined a slim forearm raised to ward off Sol's tim'rous ray, Belinda turning on to her back, stretching. Jesus. Would she have hairy armpits? he wondered, swallowing. Did they shave their armpits in the eighteenth century? Would it be like that Frenchwoman he'd seen on a campsite near Limoges last summer? In the camp supermarket, wearing only a bikini, reaching up for a tin on a high shelf and exposing a great hank of armpit hair. Niles groaned. He leant forward and rested his head on his open book. "Belinda," he whispered, "Belinda."

"Everything okay, Quentin?"

He sat up abruptly, banging his knees sharply on the bottom of his desk. It was Bowler, his housemaster, his round, bespectacled face peering at him concernedly, his body canted into the study, pipe clenched between his brown teeth. Why couldn't the b.a.s.t.a.r.d knock? Niles swore.

"Trying to write an essay, sir," he said.

"Not that difficult, is it?" Bowler laughed. "Got the team for the league?"

Niles handed it over. Bowler studied it, puffing on his pipe, frowning. Niles looked at the sour blue smoke gathering on the ceiling. Typical b.l.o.o.d.y Bowler.

"This the best we can do? Are you sure about Grover at scrum-half? Crucial position, I would have thought."

"I think he needs to be pressured a bit, sir."

"Right-ho. You're the boss. See you're down for Pinafore." Pinafore."

"Sorry, sir?"