by Alan Clark
I’d realized quite early that Faisal had little sense of humour. He never told jokes and often didn’t understand them. And nobody could have said my gags weren’t accessible. We weren’t talking Noel Coward, witticisms polished like limousines; we were talking nuns and cucumber-patches. When I’d taken him to some stand-up in Islington, he’d been lost as a toddler in Tesco’s. When I’d laughed out loud at his first ‘Partner Poem’, he’d not only been hurt but also unable to grasp why. Once, when I’d poured a lot of wine down him, he’d confessed that his work appraisals were often blotted by the feedback that his patients found him distant. He’d been really upset about it, because he cared about them all very much. I’d told myself that it hardly mattered against his other dazzling attributes, but tonight I felt that Vic detected some void in him too.
‘So where were you born in France, Vic?’ asked Faisal doggedly as he served the crème brûlée.
‘France?’ asked Vic. ‘No doc, d’Orsay is only a stage name. Seventy-seven years ago today I first appeared on the world stage as Victor Emmanuel Aronson in Warsaw.’
‘Ok cool,’ said Faisal ‘So what made you leave Poland?’
‘Is the kid serious?’ asked Vic, turning to me.
‘Oh. Right. Sorry,’ said Faisal, ‘Do you have any family?’
I realized I’d never bothered to ask Vic these questions and that perhaps he’d thought that odd. But although he looked Jewish, he rarely referred to it; never telling Jewish jokes or peppering his speech with ‘oy veys’. It was like he’d painted it over.
‘Not any more. As far as I know anyway,’ said Vic. ‘There’s still the wife of course. I always forget about her.’
‘Fuck me, you’ve got a wife?’ I said.
‘We’ve been divorced for years now’ said Vic, shovelling in the pudding. ‘She drinks on a terrace in Ibiza these days.’
‘Why the hell did you get married?’ I asked.
‘Oh c’mon toots,’ said Vic. ‘Ask Rock Hudson, though you can’t now, bless him. It was what they call a ‘lavender marriage’; an arranged union like I guess they still have in the doc here’s community. Her name was Greta, she was a showgirl, as Mr Manilow put it. She got the fancy clothes, the big house, her face in the papers. I got the smoke-screen.’
‘But what about sex?’
‘She had her chorus-boys, I had mine,’ said Vic. ‘Sometimes we even exchanged them. Though there was one awful Christmas when we both got stoned and she tried to make me do it. Jeez. I could just about cope with the bits up north, but not down south. I had to finish her off with a Minton candlestick, a present from Johnnie Gielgud. It was the only thing to hand. I never told Johnnie though.’
Faisal left the table to make coffee. When he returned with the tray he had several spiral-bound folders tucked under his arm.
‘I’ve got another present for Vic,’ he said shyly. ‘For both of you really.’
But as he filled the wee coffee cups, his eyes began to get their evangelical look, the one which appeared when he was talking about his work, the state of the planet or the life and times of Sir Roger Bannister.
‘Vic, as Rory’s already aware, I see a unique opportunity here,’ he said. ‘Mount Royal could be remembered not just as Britain’s first gay retirement home but also as the template for living well as one gets older. A whole philosophy inside four walls.’
‘Jeez,’ said Vic, ignoring the coffee and topping up his glass. He was fairly well gone by now. Faisal handed each of us a folder. On the front cover was neatly typed The Lazarus Programme: Unlocking Your Later-Life Potential.
‘As you know, my professional interest lies in the area of holistic medicine with particular emphasis on nutrition and preventative therapies.’ Faisal continued, talking ever faster, his usually measured sentences sprinting off the starting-block. ‘In this context, I believe that not only should we be offering our residents food and shelter but also, as far as is currently possible, the means to stop the clock and even to turn it back. That’s why I call it The Lazarus Programme, a chance to rise again.’
‘There are plenty of old guys who’d vote for that,’ smiled Vic.
Faisal didn’t get the joke.
‘Vic, can I talk to you as a doctor rather than a friend?’ said Faisal. ‘You’re seventy-seven today and, with respect, you look it. I suspect your biological age might be even higher. But with a combination of diet, nutrition, exercise, perhaps even some cosmetic surgery if you wanted to go that far, you could wipe ten years off the way you both look and feel. Maybe even fifteen.’
‘Wow,’ I said. ‘Amazing. What do you say to that, Victor?’
‘Let me be even blunter,’ Faisal went on. ‘When you sat down at this table, you let one go didn’t you?’
‘Sorry. Didn’t notice.’
‘You didn’t? There are two problems then. First, if you weren’t aware of the fart, you’ve slightly lost control of your sphincter muscles. That can be corrected with simple exercises. In six months, you could have the sphincter of a twenty year old.’
‘Only if we’ve been introduced,’ replied Vic.
Faisal didn’t get that joke either. He refilled our coffee cups and sat down again, the eyes still flashing.
‘The second problem is what your fart revealed to me’ said Faisal. ‘It’s a bit like a connoisseur savouring the bouquet of a fine wine. In one whiff, I can guess roughly what’s wrong with your diet. And in one glance I can see how that’s affecting your health and appearance.’
‘So what’s the bottom line, so to speak?’ asked Vic. The smile was still there but it was wobbling like a trapeze artist on a tightrope. I now wished Faisal would shut up.
‘It’s that you’re the perfect example of an elderly man for whom The Lazarus Programme could be, literally, a life-saver.’
‘But what if I’m quite happy as I am doc?’
‘Surely you’d be a lot happier if your body were happier too?’ countered Faisal with the smug tone of the expert witness. ‘You’re in this thing together after all.’
‘Suppose my soul isn’t too bothered about my body?’ asked Vic. ‘Suppose it’s quite content to witness a gradual deterioration because that’s in the natural order of things?’
‘Even if it means you may die five or ten years before you need to?’
‘Doc, in my seventy-seven years I’ve seen many people die long before their time. Knocked down by a bus or by some other goddam event that comes tearing round the bend. In even more terrible ways too, though I don’t know you well enough to talk about that. But against all the odds, Vic d’Orsay is still here and I’m so grateful for that. But it’s got to be on my own terms. So I don’t want to rain on your parade, but please excuse me the gym, the lentils and the lipo-suction. Just let me sit in the Italian Garden on a summer’s evening with a brandy glass resting on my gut and let me look at the bees buzzing in the honeysuckle. That okay with you?’
Faisal shrugged amiably, but looked a bit deflated.
‘Well I think it’s brilliant Faisal,’ I said. ‘Victor, The Lazarus Programme is a sensational add-on concept for our product. Nobody wants to get older, especially gay men for Christ’s sake. It’s a winner.’
‘Do you remember Dickie?’ Vic asked me. ‘The old guy back in that nursing home? Babbling on about being fucked by The Master?’
‘Sure. Poor old bugger.’
‘Exactly. I wonder how many thousands of poor old buggers are in his situation? The Dickies of this world don’t want biceps or Botox or sphincter muscles that could pick up a ping-pong ball. They just want a place to feel safe and to be themselves. Where somebody will be pleased to see them when they come down for breakfast, make sure they’re okay when they’ve got the flu and be within a taxi-ride of the latest revival of Lady Windermere’s Fan. This house is supposed to become a home, not a fucking boot-camp.’
There was long silence at the table, broken only by the purring of Alma the cat as she snoozed with her head against Vic’s sho
e with the treble clef buckle. Faisal was nearly always as placid as a duck on a midsummer pond but, when irritated or hacked off, he had a wee habit of pulling at his beard and he was tugging quite violently now.
‘So you oppose what I’m putting forward?’ he asked eventually.
‘No doc, not at all,’ said Vic, patting his arm. ‘Just as long as it’s not compulsory. Poor Dickie’s old pal, the great Mr Coward, once summed it up nicely. “There’s no point trying to bar the door against old age. Invite it in and give it lunch.”’
Vic dabbed his lips with his napkin and wobbled to his feet. His chair clattered to the floor behind him, but he didn’t seem to notice. I rose too, but Faisal didn’t.
‘Oops, I might have let another one go,’ said Vic. ‘I’ll leave it with you doc. See what you make of it.’
He hoisted his waistband above his belly and trundled across the room. His copy of The Lazarus Programme lay abandoned on the table.
‘Well if I don’t pursue this, there’s really no role for me here,’ replied Faisal, trying to say it lightly, but not succeeding.
‘Nonsense,’ laughed Vic over his shoulder. ‘You’re Mr Blaine’s paramour, to use an old-fashioned word. And a cute little one too. Jeez doc, what other role could any man want?’
He negotiated his way carefully down the staircase, as if he feared the glass might splinter under his weight. I followed with Faisal trailing behind. At the front door, Vic picked up a carrier-bag.
‘Hey toots, I almost forgot, here’s a present for you too,’ he said, passing me a fat leather-bound album. It was filled with photographs and pages of neatly laid-out type.
‘The result of a year’s hard work,’ said Vic. ‘A year of exhaustive networking, carefully-phrased letters, delicate phone calls and discreet word of mouth.’
‘Who are all these guys?’ I asked, flicking through the images.
‘They’re Rory’s Boys’ said Vic.
FIVE
‘One egg or two?’ said Marcus Leigh, his gaze drifting past my right ear and out through the silk-draped window into Carlton Gardens. ‘One egg or two. Not going to make it into any compilation of famous last words is it? Not going to be up there with “Kiss me Hardy” or “Bugger Bognor.”’
There was a long pause. Vic squeezed his friend’s pin-striped shoulder, then brushed off the dandruff which had gathered there.
‘I was in the bathroom. He was making my breakfast as he always did. Then an awful cry. A thud on the floor. Cerebral haemorrhage. Bang. Dead.’
Marcus Leigh waved across the dining-room of the Reform Club at a sad-looking waitress.
‘Not much of a goodbye was it?’ he sighed. ‘After thirty years, you’d have thought we’d earned a gentler separation. A little warning, time for one final weekend in Florence, even just a death bed-scene for God’s sake, a chance to say thank you. Not merely the sudden explosion of a blood vessel. Then full stop. Water under the bridge. Pull yourself together. Get on with your life. That’s what they all said. I recommend the lamb cutlets.’
‘I’ll have the guinea-fowl,’ I said. I’d only met him twenty minutes ago but I’d already clocked Marcus Leigh’s way of making suggestions sound like instructions; well-meant, but instructions nonetheless.
‘Apologies for getting morbid,’ he said, when she’d plodded away. ‘Bad form.’
‘Not at all Marcus,’ said Vic. ‘I was so sorry when you wrote to me about it. I’m sure all your clients were.’
Marcus flashed him a short tight smile.
‘Dear Vic, I have lived my life in different compartments. You are the only client of my firm who was ever au fait.’
‘And that was just because I once got you pissed at the Dorchester and you slipped your phone number to a pretty sommelier.’
Vic gave him a blokey punch to suggest that Marcus could be a bit of a lad. Marcus dimpled and blushed but anyone less blokey would be hard to imagine. When the guinea-fowl arrived, it bore him a definite resemblance. Dried-out and all trussed-up, just like Marcus in his buttoned waistcoat and tightly-knotted tie. It was impossible to picture him on the tube, shopping for loo rolls or in any environment that was completely marble-free.
The room was crowded, muggy and over-lit, which was a mistake as most of the diners had reached the age of needing soft focus. I couldn’t spot a soul under forty, nearly all clones of Marcus with grey hair, florid faces, dark suits and a lightly-worn sense of superiority. There were a few females; a mix of sharp-shouldered boardroom types and wives up from the shires with no make-up and awful clothes. Marcus had followed my glance.
‘Ghastly, aren’t they?’ he said quietly. ‘I know I shouldn’t feel that. I battle misogyny the way other people struggle with booze but, the blessed Margaret apart, I do feel the feminist pendulum has swung too far.’
He glanced round, then discreetly pulled a couple of dog-eared Polaroids from his wallet. A pretty Latin boy with a pencil moustache posed by the fountain in the Piazza Navona.
‘Phwoar!’ I said. Marcus’s ruddy cheeks flushed again, but I could see he was pleased. ‘So where did you two meet?’
‘In Oddbins in North Audley Street on a pouring wet Sunday,’ he replied. ‘He disapproved of the wine I had selected and suggested one that came from his own region. Everybody else was gloomy and smelled of raincoats, but Ricardo was wearing a bright yellow sweater and a smile like August. He asked me to go for coffee and we sat in a scruffy place behind Oxford Street laughing our heads off. We were as different as people could be, but for some reason we fitted together like two pieces of a jigsaw. That night, a dull chartered accountant aged thirty-five lost his virginity and found everything he’d ever wanted. It felt like I’d taken myself out of storage and blown off the dust.’
Vic’s eyes were already moist. It didn’t seem to take much. I was never sure if it was genuine or some showbizzy Dickie Attenborough thing.
‘He was an Italian actor from a council flat in Naples. Fifteen years younger than me,’ said Marcus, easing the photos back into the safety of his wallet. ‘So of course people said he was after my money. But even if he had been, I’m not sure I’d have cared. Ricardo was handing me his life on a platter and since nobody else had ever offered so much as a morsel of themselves, I thought I’d better tuck in. Wouldn’t you?’
Marcus dictated that we should all have sticky-toffee pudding and this time I acquiesced, hoping that it might cheer him up. Afterwards, he marched us up a tunnel-vaulted staircase to the gallery that overlooked the atrium. It was even hotter up here than down below. I peeked into a vast library, jam-packed with huge polished volumes and piles of magazines and newspapers. All the information the members might possibly need to help them go on running the country. Marcus poured out the coffee with a nervy precision as if he expected some hidden menace lurking in the pot. We settled ourselves beneath the portrait of a particularly tight-arsed Whig.
‘I suppose the reason I’m meeting you today is because Ricardo and I made one big mistake in our time together,’ said Marcus. ‘Neither of us really felt the need for anyone else. We saw ourselves as a respectable married couple and lived accordingly. We never went to parks, public conveniences or those fire-trap drinking clubs in Soho garrets. We ring-fenced ourselves from outside threats. And now he’s gone, I’m still in there on my own.’
‘I’m sure your chimney-piece is sagging with invitations Marcus,’ said Vic.
‘Not quite,’ he replied. ‘Most of my family has been culled too, except for a nephew who surfaces occasionally in the erroneous hope he might be in the will. My former colleagues rarely ring. My social life is All Saints, Margaret Street on a Sunday and the occasional livery dinner where you almost choke on the boredom.’
Poor old sod. I wondered if I should mention the pleasures of the websites and the chat-rooms where you could lead a perfectly acceptable, indeed riotous, social life without ever leaving your own fireside. I was just about to suggest DynamiteDads.com when Marcus sat forward in his c
hair and clasped me firmly in his gaze.
‘Tell me Mr Blaine, is your beautiful house haunted? Mine is, you see. The chairs, the tables, the bath, the bed, even the way the plates are stacked in the cupboards. I should have moved of course, but the ghost was at least some sort of presence. But he’d not have wanted it to be like this. For the past three years, I’ve been feeling that old carapace creeping back over me, the one Ricardo had cracked open and thrown away. And that scares me. So if you’ll forgive an old man getting rather fanciful, I wondered maybe if Vic’s letter really came from Ricardo. As if he’s showing me the way forward. I just need to be brave enough to take it.’
Marcus sank back against the wrinkled red leather of his chair. He looked away from us and straightened the knot of his tie. I sensed that this sort of confessional wasn’t in his nature and that he’d found it an effort. He stood up very suddenly.
‘Will you both excuse me for a moment? I’ve just seen the Lord Chancellor over there. We were at Marlborough together. He’ll be offended if I don’t say hello. Perhaps you’d care for a brandy?’
He snapped his fingers at a waiter then headed towards a tall wispy man in spectacles on the far side of the gallery. Vic and I watched as the brown-nosing began, Marcus’s shoulders heaving at some legal witticism.
‘I know he’s a bit heavy-going,’ said Vic. ‘Got a good heart though.’
‘He’s also got the readies I suppose?’
‘Leigh and Montague are among the sharpest accountants in town. It’s partly down to Marcus that I’m loaded enough to bankroll our little project. When he retired, he laughed all the way to Threadneedle Street. He’s also got a very classy pad just behind the Connaught. I don’t think we need to worry.’
‘Sad about the boyfriend,’ I said. ‘He’s gutted isn’t he?’
‘I guess you’d feel the same if Faisal dropped dead?’