‘We?’ Hugh looked at his daughter-in-law with increased astonishment. ‘Oh, so you’ve lost your senses as well, have you?’
‘We’re all in this together,’ Walter interrupted. ‘It’s something we all believe in.’
‘The family who builds ships together,’ Hugh muttered, ‘goes to bits together.’
‘What about those poor people running their little café?’ Loopy wanted to know. ‘What did you do? Just buy them out?’
‘They were having a bit of a struggle,’ Judy explained. ‘And although it takes time to get a place like that going, I have a feeling time was fast running out.’
‘But you don’t know the first thing about building boats, Walter!’ his father protested. ‘Anything you built would sink in dry dock!’
‘I can learn, Papa. I do know a little about boats, and an awful lot about sailing – and as far as building boats goes, that is something I am going to learn.’
‘And Walter’s had a very good idea who from,’ Judy said. ‘He’s coaxed Rusty’s father, old Mr Todd, out of retirement.’
At that moment Tam exploded back into the bar, his eyes searching for Jenny. He found her gossiping with Flavia and immediately interrupted, wanting to know what time lunch was set for.
‘Your mother said half past one and don’t be late.’
Tam looked at his watch, bit his lip and then took Jenny’s hand and began to drag her out of the pub.
‘If we hurry we’ll only be ten minutes late.’
Bexham being such a small place, the journey in his rented car didn’t take long, his destination being, happily, on the way to Churchester.
‘The old iron works?’ Jenny wondered as Tam swung the red Fiat to park it in front of a large pair of heavily padlocked mesh gates. ‘What on earth do you want to see the old iron works for?’
‘That shed,’ Tam replied, pointing to a huge building which had once been the heart of the foundry. ‘All I know is, when they closed down here, they stripped that shed bare – took all the machinery and stuff out of it, just leaving the four walls and the roof and that’s about it.’
‘So?’ Jenny said, getting out of the car to follow Tam along the fence line. ‘What are you thinking of doing? Buying it?’
‘I wonder who owns it now – I mean it’s been empty for how long now? Years. I remember they closed it down when I was still a nipper.’
‘Tam – Tam, we’re going to be not just a little late for lunch with your mum and dad, but very late.’
‘OK, OK – just one last question. How many people do you reckon you could get in there?’
‘How many people?’
‘How many people,’ Tam repeated. ‘What do you think its capacity would be?’
Peter Sykes knew who owned the old iron works. He happened to be a fellow Rotarian and a good business friend. Peter also thought that Tam’s plan, while being a top plan, was also doomed to failure since as far as he knew the old iron works had been declared a no-go zone for some time now, and the old foundry in particular.
‘Problem is the overhead rails – all those huge, heavy blocks and tackles which it would be practically impossible to secure and make safe, let alone the vast cooling pits on the floors which would also present a possibly insoluble problem.’
‘Couldn’t you fill them in, Dad?’
‘With the amount of people you want to let in?’ Peter shook his head, laughing, which he found he did a great deal nowadays. ‘Filling in means concrete and that would cost a small fortune. Then you’d have the problem of fire exits, and adequate ventilation. The council are very strict about these things, as far as entertainment licences go – and while I think it’s a great notion, son, I think it’s a doomed one.’
‘What a pity.’ Jenny sighed. ‘I wonder how many it could have held?’
‘I don’t know.’ Peter scratched the beard he had been proudly sporting since Australia. ‘Say two and a half – three thousand maybe.’
‘As many as that?’ Jenny gasped. ‘Good heavens.’
‘Lot less than we get at Park Road of a Saturday.’
Jenny frowned and shrugged at Tam, unsure what his father was referring to.
‘Park Road,’ Tam said. ‘The home of Churchester United.’
‘Who have done a bit of all right this season, thank you,’ Peter said smugly. ‘Thanks to their brilliant newly elected chairman.’
Rusty cuffed her boastful husband on the back of his head with her table napkin as she sat down again.
‘And how many does Park Road hold, Mr Sykes?’ Jenny enquired. ‘I’m afraid I’ve never been there.’
‘Fifteen thousand,’ Tam said. ‘There or thereabouts.’
‘Twenty thousand I’ll have you know, son,’ Peter corrected him. ‘You’re forgetting the new stand.’
‘Twenty thousand,’ Jenny echoed. ‘Wow.’
She looked at Tam, who got the message.
‘Wow is about right. What do you think, Mr Chairman?’ Tam turned back to his father, who was looking serious.
‘We’d have to take a cut. Can’t all go to Bexham Fighting Fund, you know. Fair’s only fair.’
One of fame’s greatest assets is the ease with which the word can be spread. The bookings for the concert began to pour in long before the first proper formal advertisement in any national let alone regional newspaper, leading Tam jokingly to remark to Jenny that since word of mouth was all that was needed they could have saved on the promotion. Not that there was any shortage of promotion either; as soon as the media learned The Bros were to play an impromptu gig in aid of some tiny heritage charity the papers, radio and television all carried stories. Within five days of opening the bookings, every seat in the stadium at Park Road was sold.
‘Which all goes to show something,’ Tam said, wryly, to Jenny.
All the Tates, bar none, were invited to the Directors’ Box as Peter Sykes’s guests. Since none of them had ever experienced such a concert before, the sense of excitement was electrifying. The crowds were vast, the roads around the stadium packed not only with fans who had tickets but also with those who had arrived in the vague belief that somehow they would either find themselves a scalper’s ticket or be able to hear something from outside the ground.
‘I think you’re the most excited of us all,’ Waldo said to Loopy, who was sitting beside him in the back of one of the limousines Tam had laid on for the Bexham contingent. ‘Why, I think you might even be turning into what I believe they call a groupie.’
‘I think it’s heavenly, Waldo,’ Loopy confessed. ‘This just has to be one of the very bestest of days.’
The young of course tried to play it cool, as if this was the sort of thing they experienced every weekend when they went to a party, but keeping cool soon proved to be a bridge too far for both Sholto and Hubert, who became completely transfixed by the girls who pressed their over-painted young lips up against the car windows whenever the traffic slowed down. Flavia found the whole thing a bit of a shriek – but when they actually got inside the stadium and up into the Directors’ Box and heard the terrifying volume of noise that was rending the night air over the sedate city of Churchester, she was actually silenced.
There was a large stage set in the middle of the pitch, canopied on top in case of rain, but open on all the sides, and pitched high enough for the fans even on the tops of the terraces to have some sort of sight of the performers. Finally, after an interminable wait during which several dozen young girls were carried out fainting in the grateful arms of cheerful young policemen, a voice announced over the PA system that this was the moment they had all been waiting for.
‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ the voice boomed. ‘Here they are! Here they are in person! The fabulous, fantastic. . .’
The rest of the announcement was simply drowned in hysteria as the spotlights picked out four tiny figures running out between a cordon of security guards towards the raised stage, where their instruments were already set. For five minutes they stood on stage while the
ir fans screamed and they stood smiling and waving, turning round and round so that everyone could see them. When they realised the mayhem was not going to cease, Lonnie climbed behind his set of Rogers drums and beat them hard into their first number.
Even then the noise continued, but the fans hadn’t come to hear the music. The fans had come to see these four gorgeous young men from America who were setting the world dancing and grooving, swinging and singing with their rhythmic, sweeping, insistent rock. At long, long last the noise died down enough for Brewster’s tenor to rise above the screaming, for the licks of Lee’s guitar to be heard, for Tam’s bass to swing along and Lonnie’s drumming to beat them all up.
The ends of most of the songs went unheard, such was the crescendo of sound that built with the climax of every number, and the beginning of each new number was drowned in hysteria from the moment Brewster announced it, yet enough could be heard to savour the unmistakable sound of the now world famous group.
It was a fantastic night, with no frills other than the performance of the band. There were no fancy lights, no fireworks, no girl dancers – just the music.
But it wasn’t just the music they all took home with them, the twenty thousand fans who had come from everywhere and anywhere to experience something they would remember for the rest of their lives. What they took home was the whole occasion, the sense of celebration, the extraordinary moment, the entire happening.
‘I must say,’ Hugh’s voice came from the back of the vast car he was sharing with Loopy, Waldo and the Walter Tates, ‘I have to say I wouldn’t have missed that for the world.’
‘Of course you wouldn’t,’ Loopy agreed. ‘I’ve never seen your feet tap like it.’
‘Not quite Rodgers and Hart,’ Hugh continued, determined to qualify his admiration. ‘But damn’ good all the same.’
‘So now perhaps you’ll say something nice about Tam. Or even to him.’
‘I already have.’ Hugh looked round at the others, a smug expression on his face. ‘Sent him a note.’
‘Which said?’
‘Mind your own business.’
And so it was that Bexham came to be saved – or rather those parts of Bexham that were under threat came to be saved. But then it can be argued that by saving those parts the whole of Bexham was saved, so perhaps the first part of the sentence may stand uncorrected. Bexham was saved.
The concert raised more than enough money, as it was bound to do, once the idea of filling the Park Road ground was realised. The shortfall was made up easily, even after Churchester United FC took their commission, and there was money to spare which went a long way to help local causes.
The Three Tuns was already safe, so all that was left to accomplish was a coup at the Yacht Club to rid the board of its irksome chairman. This, it was rumoured, was masterminded by the Club’s patron, Captain Hugh Tate, Rtd. Once the coup had been effected, and the chairman replaced by John Tate, the shareholding members at once voted that the new bid for the Club, tendered by a private local cabal, should be accepted.
So it was too that when spring finally turned to summer, Loopy suggested to Hugh they should give a thanksgiving party. Hugh agreed that this was an excellent idea, and while remembering how much he had enjoyed the now famous pop concert thought it might not be such a good idea to ask them back because ‘they might disturb the neighbours’.
Loopy reassured him that the band were well and truly back in America, where their success continued, but she did express the hope that Tam might be persuaded to fly over for a week, if he was not too busy.
‘Of course it’s not really up to me,’ she said. ‘But even so I’ve already suggested it to Jenny, and she’d already suggested it to Rusty, who’d already thought of it anyway.’
‘What size of party did you have in mind? If I’m going to be expected to sing, which I dare say I will, I mean if it’s going to be a large party then I might have to ask John to fix me up with a microphone like he did at Christmas.’
‘It will just be family and friends. We won’t have to hire Park Road.’
In the end over a hundred people filled the gardens at Shelborne on a warm, fine and sunny June evening that took everyone by surprise, emerging as it did after a week of persistent drizzle and grey skies. All the Tates were of course present, young and old, including Kim who, having heard about the success of their campaign, found a return air ticket in the post a few days later, and so was able to leave Culoheen for a long overdue break. The entire Sykes clan were represented, Joe Todd rejuvenated by having been dragged – with no great difficulty let it be said – out of retirement by the new owner of his old shipyard. Richards naturally refused not to be allowed to serve drinks and food, if and when he felt like it. Hugh sang, and Jenny played. Sholto ran a very good disco in the basement, and Waldo took Judy down for a dance.
‘You know I’m leaving Bexham.’
‘Yes, Loopy told me.’
‘To return to my native land – where I belong.’
‘You belong here too, you know.’
‘I know, but here’s not home, not finally. I brought you a farewell gift, left it in Loopy’s studio. By the way, it’s the one that’s wrapped!’
Judy stopped dancing and took a step back from Waldo.
‘You can’t give me that—’
‘How do you know what I’m giving you?’
‘Because, Waldo, I know you.’
‘I’m leaving my Meggie in safe hands, with her best friend, Judy. And who knows? One day I may come back for her. Now let’s go join the others upstairs. I find I’m getting too old for discos.’
‘Never.’
They both laughed. It was, after all, all that they could do.
Later, when some of the non-family guests had departed and the dancing had finally stopped – not because everyone was exhausted but because as they wandered out into the garden to cool off they saw what an enchanted night it had become and so stayed outside, some of the older guests wrapping sweaters or cardigans around their shoulders against the very faint chill but none the less determined to enjoy the beauty of such a star-filled summer’s night – gradually everyone who was left congregated on the terrace outside the drawing room, where they sat on the walls or on the loungers, talking and drinking and smoking, or just watching the sky above them and the waters beyond. Finally, it was Jenny who disappeared inside, reappearing with an ordinary six-string Spanish guitar that she handed to Tam.
‘Wow.’ He smiled. ‘You’re full of surprises. My very first guitar. I haven’t seen this fellow since I was seventeen.’
They looked at each other. The accident, the flight to America. It might be a hundred years ago.
‘Have guitar, now sing for us, and that’s an order.’
‘Hey, man!’ Tam teased. ‘I’m a bass man, man!’
‘No you’re not, Tam Sykes, don’t obfuscate,’ Jenny insisted. ‘Now sing for your supper.’
‘Only if you’ll play along.’
‘Only if you tell me what you’re going to play.’
She sat at her grandfather’s piano, which was only a step inside the French windows, while Tam sat on a stool in the opening, and they set about playing everything from the Beatles to The Bros, from Barbra Streisand to Joan Baez. Everyone was captivated, and the party turned into an enchanted semicircle that arced around the two performers.
‘That really is enough, surely?’ Tam protested at last. ‘Don’t you people ever sleep?’
‘Are you a man or a mouse?’
‘Very well, Captain Tate. Anything in particular?’
‘We’ll leave that entirely to you, young man.’
‘Then let’s finish with Pete Seeger’s famous song.’
He looked at Jenny who knew at once, and after a short pause started to play a simply lyrical introduction before Tam came in with an eight bar lead and launched into the song itself.
At first no one else sang, and there was only Tam’s fine, sweet but oddly original voice to
be heard, until he got to the second verse, when one by one the younger generation started to join in, their sad lament hanging in the night air and drifting slowly away from them towards the estuary, and eventually, and at last, the distant sea, to be drowned by the sound of the envious wind.
When the third verse of the song asked Where have all the young men gone? it seemed everyone joined in, quietly but carefully, afraid to be found singing out of tune.
By the time they got to the last verse, and found that all the graveyards were covered with flowers, every one, some of the singers had taken each other’s hands, while others preferred to look up at the sky, or over to the trees where the music of their voices was drifting away towards other gardens, and from there to the dark fields, where the grasses swayed, and nature for once stayed silent, perhaps because she too was listening.
When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn?
Epilogue
Loopy and Hugh had just settled down to enjoy a drink in the conservatory overlooking the estuary. It was what Hugh always called a ‘springish sort of day’ which is to say there was a blue sky, a fast breeze, small clouds and small sailing boats dashing about on the horizon in equal quantities. There was much about which they could be thankful, most of all the idea that Bexham, at any rate for the time being, had been saved from the forces of evil commerce.
Despite his father’s best advice Walter had indeed resigned from the Bar and with Hugh’s help was buying the old Todd boatyard, his declared intent being to start making sailing boats in the old way, re-employing many of the locals who had long ago been forced out of the business. Not to be outdone, Judy was now designing dresses for Rusty’s ever growing chain of shops, for which Peter had managed to find backing in the City, while Peter had sold up his business and joined Walter in his father-in-law’s old boatyard.
Waldo having returned to America immediately after the party, no one knew exactly what kind of person the new incumbent at Cucklington House might be, but the feeling was that they must be someone of substance, since the house had changed hands for what was rumoured to be a considerable sum.
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