And no matter that my heart is nailed to that circle of lust, I will not, for no man can stay there. And so I stand, button my fly and turn to face the wall.
54. A TYRANNOSAURUS REX OR A SQUIRREL
Our great desire as human beings is to lose ourselves, to forget, and to rest . . . To become someone or something else! We look inwards, then quickly look outwards again, double quick! We travel, we buy and sell, we indulge ourselves. You require money for that, you lose yourself a whole lot deeper and easier with money.
‘What are you going to be when you grow up, Steven?’
‘I dunno . . .’
‘Not “I dunno”. I don’t know . . . I don’t know, father . . . not “I dunno” . . . Juny! This child has been playing over the council estate again! And don’t tell me he hasn’t! I thought I’d banned you, Steven!’
‘You can’t watch them all the time, and he’s been playing over the back. They have to have fresh air, darling.’
‘Fresh air, my arse. The child’s filthy! and he stinks! The boils! And look at the size of his feet, that can’t be natural. Did you clean your teeth, Steven? Because they look worse than your mother’s! Can he read and write yet? No, of course he can’t, he’s too bloody bone idle!’
My mother comes in with the clothes brush. ‘I think your taxi’s waiting.’
‘Well, let it wait woman, I’ll leave when I’m good and ready!’ . . . He turns on me again, ‘Finish your Weetabix before you leave the table . . . And for Christ’s sake, don’t slap your chops!’
He puts on his titfer, adjusts his Edwardian drape and consults his timepiece. My mother brushes his shoulders. He inspects himself in the mirror; he finds another speck of fluff, he points it out. ‘Look, Juny, there! And another!’
He turns to glare at me, then he’s off up the garden path. He boards his taxi and that’s the last we see of him. His whiskers gleaming through the back windscreen. A glimpse of his umbrella, tightly furled, his great bone hand encircling it twice, three times. And he’s gone.
‘I’d like to be either a Tyrannosaurus Rex or a squirrel when I grow up.’
I repeat it to the door. ‘A Tyrannosaurus Rex or a squirrel.’ And then the old man went into prison.
55. THE MYSTERIOUS MISTER HAMPERSON
‘The mysterious Mister Hamperson’, that’s how he describes himself, sat opposite me. A bottle of brandy between us on the coffee table, The Bull Hotel, Rochester High Street. He offers me a peanut.
‘That’s what they all call me in here, you know: the mysterious Mister Hamperson!’
He looks at me and blinks. I stare him back straight in the eye. I let my mouth pinch together at the sides; I try to smile with him, but then have to look down ashamed. It’s hopeless. I look up again and manage a half smirk and a nod of the head. This is his great magnanimous gesture, he has taken me into his confidences. I have to make the effort, to let him know that we’re accomplices, that we share the same jokes. ‘The mysterious Mister Hamper-son!’
‘All the staff here want to know who I am, but they just can’t get it. I stay in the finest suite, I take my meals in my room . . . The best dressed gentleman in the whole damned hotel! “The mysterious Mister Hamperson”, that’s all they’ve got on me.’
He laughs fully this time. He turns to Dolli and even encourages her to join in. That was some sight, his eyes bug up and he gets his teeth out . . . terrifying!
He pours the brandies, grasps the cork, two fingers and a thumb, anti-clockwise. He seizes the bottle up in both hands, grace and finesse. Blop-blop-blop-blop! His eyebrows arching . . . blonde, golden . . . He angles the neck perfectly, wets his lips and blop-blop-blop-blop! — three goldfish bowls, perfect! The ballet of the brandy flask.
And every time he leans over to take a peanut it looks like his hat is eating it. First his eyes disappear, then his nose . . . then, whoops! The nut pops into his hat. It looks as if his hat’s eating the nuts, but of course it isn’t, it’s just an effect, a trick of the light.
‘Steven, there’s a good chap, run along and fetch another bottle, will you . . . Mister Hamperson’s bill!’ He turns to Dolli and wrinkles his nose. ‘The mysterious Mister Hamperson’s bill!’
I leave them with the joke. I back out the room, keeping my eye on the old coot, sat there fondling his brandy bowl, his mouth going, but inaudible: the silence of words . . .
I walk to the bar and buy myself a double. That’s something, the old bastard being so matey, talking to Dolli, even! That’s unheard of, something I’ll come to dwell upon.
‘That’s your dad in there, isn’t it?’
I look up, the barmaid’s talking to me . . .
‘Wot?’
‘Mister Hamperson, isn’t it, he’s your father?’
‘Yes.’
She turns to her friend. ‘See Joan, I told you I recognised him. He’s just come out of prison, hasn’t he? It was in the paper.’
I follow her now, she’s talking about my old man, ‘The mysterious Mister Hamperson’, the fool with the nuts.
‘’Cos I thought I recognised him, as soon as he walked in here. Drugs, wasn’t it? That’s what they arrested him for. “The Downfall of Debonair Director” . . . Shame isn’t it? A real shame.
I don’t mean to be rude or nothing, but, why’s he sign the register “Sir Jonathan Hamperson”? He’s not a “Sir”, is he?’
I drain it, I look at her face through the bottom of the glass and speak, ‘The mysterious Mister Hamperson!’
56. JAILBIRDS
The old girl starts up again. She’s been cranking away for ages now. For years. For decades. For whole epochs! And always the same old truck, giving me the low-down on her crummy existence and what a bum deal she’s had. I sit here and nod.
Me, seven years old, looking to her tear-lined face, her nose gone all snotty. ‘I’m going to have a nervous breakdown.’ That’s how she reassures me . . . How she lets me know that everything’s going to be alright, that I’m safe and cared for.
‘I’m going to have a nervous breakdown.’
And I don’t know what a nervous breakdown is, all I’m sure of is that she’s going to leave me, and that I’m going to die, most probably.
I duck and dive, wading through that never-ending barrage. She talks to the cat, to the teapot, anything that will sit still and listen. Humming, murmuring, twittering away to herself on the edge of hearing.
No kidding, she talks to herself in whispers, that’s how nuts she is. She peters out mid-sentence, then someone sticks a starting handle in her mouth, and she’s off again.
I’ve heard it all before, what a ‘low-down crook’ the old man is, and how ‘I’m marching in his footsteps’. I turn off and stare into the middle distance, I suppress a yawn, I agree, I rummage under my fingernails . . . I agree! I agree! I agree! Shit, I’ll agree to anything!
‘Yes mum, yes mum, yes mum, I know mum. Yes mum.’
I have to check my tongue in the mirror, broad, flat, pink, very pink . . . A large tongue, a tongue screaming with blood.
‘Yes mum.’
‘He wanted me dead, Steven, you can vouch for that!’
‘Yes mum.’
‘Do you think I should divorce him?’
‘Yes mum.’
I’ve said that a few thousand times over the years, she’s not the only one content with talking to herself. ‘Divorce him!’ But she doesn’t bat an eyelid. She’s happy talking to the birds, cranking away sixteen to the dozen. But strictly in whispers mind, hushed, conspiratorial.
Didn’t I tell you? Whenever his name is invoked, the holy one — ‘Our Father’ — only whispers, low-down, in case he’s listening . . . in case he’s picking us up on longwave in London. His ears are everywhere . . . She’ll carry that one with her to her grave: the fear of his reprisals.
‘He wanted me dead, you can vouch for that,’ she whispers to me whilst polishing the saucepan, ‘and now he has the nerve to want back in! After all these years! And to think, I
smuggled twenty pounds of my own money into that prison, just so’s his lordship could drink whisky! It makes my blood boil, twenty pounds! I could use that right now . . . A brand new note: I had to fold it up and put it under my tongue, so’s the guards wouldn’t find it. . . I risked my own liberty, and where does he go when he gets out? To the south of France! That’s right, the south of France with her! Jailbirds, the pair of them! Well, as far as I’m concerned he can go back to her . . . for good! It would suit me down to the ground if he did . . . You know the only reason he came back, don’t you? Because this is where the money is! The house, it is his collateral. It’s all he’s got left . . . He’s squandered the rest! Well, I tell you, he isn’t going to get it! She’s got her eyes on the property, she’s not stupid, she knows this is his only investment that hasn’t turned sour . . . Well, she isn’t going to get it! When I think of it, all those years, the sacrifices made! And the house wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me! You know that’s true, don’t you, Steven . . . Isn’t it? You know it is, don’t you? Well, I can’t put up with it any longer, twenty-five years is enough . . . He loses his job, his money and now he wants back in! Well, I think that’s a bit rich, don’t you? Do you think, I’m being too rash? Nothing would be left if it wasn’t for me; I brought the pair of you up, single-handed! Up all by myself, on a pittance! On his miserly hand-outs! Whilst his lordship was out gallivanting, with his women, with his mistresses! And I was stuck down here, with you two . . . Do you think I should divorce him? They’d never believe me, they’d think that I made the whole thing up from start to finish! But I haven’t, have I? And my cats, they don’t like him, that’s a sign, they sense things . . . Nigs hides under the bed whenever he’s here. They can hear him coming streets away, my little early warning systems . . . I stayed when he quit, and now he wants back in, that’s rich! That jailbird! What type of fool does he take me for? I’ll divorce him!’
I nearly choke on my beer, I spit it back into the glass. I act as if I’ve heard nothing. I take a sip of my tea.
I stuck it out for twenty-seven years! And now that scoundrel thinks he can walk right back in here just as he fancies! Well, he’s got another think coming! He’ll sell the house and buy drugs with the proceeds, I suppose! You know he was smuggling diamonds as well, and that’s on top of the pornography! He’ll only fritter it all away, the same as everything else, on booze and loose women! If he’d only of listened to me, he’d be a millionaire by now, six times over! I’ve got money sense and he hasn’t! I was on the till in Le Fevres for fourteen years you know, from age fourteen, the haberdashery department . . . never a penny went astray. Only that time I lost the five pound note and I had to go and tell Mrs Wakefield. God, I almost died of fright. She was a tartar! But I’ll give her that much, she was fair! And she believed me, she didn’t deduct a penny from my wages, and I learned my lesson . . . I’ve always had money sense. If only he’d listened to me . . . But he didn’t, he’s frittered all of it all away! Thousands! Do you think I should divorce him? I couldn’t, not now, could I? Not when he’s down on his luck, I’d feel awful. . . This is the time when he needs me the most, a time for us all to rally round and show our support . . . Do you think I should divorce him? It’ll all go down the drain if I don’t. . . everything I’ve worked for . . . to the very last penny, you mark my words! And it’s not as if he’s ever cared about you or your schooling. I can forgive him hating me, but his own children! He’s never looked after you, he wouldn’t lift a finger, even when my mother died. He didn’t even show up at the funeral. And he owed her money, three or four hundred pounds. And that was in the days when money was worth something! He didn’t stand by me in my hours of need, and now he wants me to stand by him! All my work for nothing! For him to fritter away on his perversions! You may as well go and pour it down the sewer! And I’ve been stuck here bringing up his bloody children. I sacrificed the best years of my life! Doing his housekeeping on a pittance! And does he appreciate it? Not one bit! The place wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me! Who paid the bills when he was off womanising? Muggins here, yours truly! Do you think it was worth it? in the long run? What would you do in my situation? No one would believe it was possible, they’d say I’d made the whole thing up from start to finish . . . Fact is stranger than fiction! But who’d listen to me? He’s got the gift of the gab, you can’t argue with him . . . You know I’m telling the truth, don’t you, Steven? You know that the house wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me, don’t you. And what about my cats? What’s going to become of them? I’ll have to find a property with a south facing back and not too near a main road! Where are they? Have you seen the black one? You didn’t let her out, did you? I don’t let them out at night, they don’t want to go out, there’s no point, they only want to come straight back in again . . . You saw what happened to Minnie’s eye on fireworks night. It must have been a firework or a rose bush. And the vet’s bill alone cost me a fortune! Thirty pounds! We don’t want a busy road. You know we’ll never get a place as good as this one, we’ll never afford it . . . Do you blame me? Do you? I can’t afford to run this place, the rates alone . . . I’m only a dish-washer you know. We need somewhere where the cats will be happy, mid-price range, I can’t stretch any further, I couldn’t afford the bills . . . And we haven’t even finished paying for this place yet... Well, I can’t be blamed for that, it wouldn’t even be here if I hadn’t stayed on . . . He wanted it for his girlfriends and mistresses, but I stuck it out. If I hadn’t slaved to keep it running on next to nothing, it would all be gone! I paid all the bills and I’ve got all the receipts to prove it! For the last ten years! Longer . . . And his love letters. His girlfriends sent me those, a big parcel through the post. They know what he’s like, they’d vouch for me, but I bet they wouldn’t put up with him like I did — he’d be lucky to find anybody who would. The lies! Who would believe it? I mean the times I’ve taken him back, and then he’s gone straight back out and done exactly the same thing again . . . If it wasn’t for me there’d be nothing for him to come back to, that’s plain as day! All this would be long gone by now! And then there was you two, taking you to school, clothing you . . . new shoes . . . feeding you. He didn’t pay a penny towards any of that, it all came out of my housekeeping, and the bills, I paid those too. We’ll see how that would stand up in a court of law. If it hadn’t of been for my mother we’d of all starved to death! And the way he treated her! He drove her to an early grave! And he didn’t pay her back, not a bean! And now he has the cheek to say that he wants back in! I don’t know why they let him out in the first place. Six months? What kind of a sentence is that? It’s those friends he’s got in the masons, that’s what got him off, that and the Queen’s Council... and that doesn’t cost tuppence ha’penny! I could do with some of that money right now, that would suit me nicely . . . And now he has the gall to say that he wants back in! And he’s been writing to her whilst they were in prison . . . Oh yes, I know! She sent me all the love letters, a great parcel of them . . . Do you think I should take him back, Steven? He might be telling the truth this time, you never know. Do you think he could turn over a new leaf? Do you think it’s worth making a go of it? He wants to kick us out and move her in. She told me so herself. She rings me up in the middle of the night; she said he’d promised her the house. The diabolical liberty! If it wasn’t for me, there wouldn’t even be a house! What do you think of that? She’s got everything going for her. For a start, she’s thirty years younger than I am. And he bought her that car, do you know how much that cost? Six thousand pounds! Six thousand! Can you believe it? And now he wants to know if I still love him . . . He sent me flowers! Flowers, can you believe it? And he says he still loves me! Do you think he loves me? Do you think I’m doing the right thing? What would you do in my situation, Steven, honestly? Do you think I should divorce him? And then there’s my cats to think of, they don’t like him, we don’t want anything near a main road . . . You didn’t let Minnie out did you? Whe
re is she? Minnie-Minnie-Minnie-Minnie-Minnie.’
I nod, I agree, I go to speak.
This is the story of my life: twenty years. Twenty years, going on twenty-two. Three hundred pages, another draft, a thousand pages more and I might be getting nearer the truth. But words are only words, they’re not facts, not the real article. I’ve heard it all before, everything, a hundred times over, a thousand times, a million . . . I know the story backwards — talking achieves nothing, no shit!
That brought the low-down skunk running, he could sense his assets falling away . . . He went all to pieces. He couldn’t believe what was happening to him, his darling little Juny divorcing him? His little wifey? He blubbered, he split a gut, he gave everyone a right royal pain in the arse!
‘Divorce? Divorce? You can’t divorce me! Think of the house, the children!’
He looks at her sideways to see what effect he’s having.
‘My God, can’t you see, woman? Our future, our investments! Are you thick or something? You’re throwing it all away, you stupid cow! My hard work, my graft, my labour of love! Don’t be rash, Juny, you’re upsetting yourself. You’ll make yourself ill again.’
The crown prince of treachery and deceit, stabbed in the back by his very own darling wifey. His own flesh and blood! It gave him a bad stomach, he couldn’t shit straight. He rocks from side to side, holding his belly, howling . . . He gnaws on the chair leg, his face like puff pastry. He’s been dying his hair again, ‘born blonde’, a reaction to the peroxide. He pulls at a piece of loose skin, wrings his eyes out, and plucks out tufts of beard.
‘Look at me, woman! Look at what you’re doing to me. You’re thick, do you hear me, thick!’
Sock! He lets one off . . . If I’d have seen that punch . . . all I was looking for was an excuse.
57. HE CAN’T FIGURE OUT WHERE MY HATRED’S SPRUNG FROM
My Fault Page 31