Moon Boots and Dinner Suits

by Jon Pertwee

  Once inside ‘The Ring’ itself, it was hard to see your hand before your face, so great was the smoke fog. The noise was cacophonous and unceasing, until the Master of Ceremonies, Mr Frankie Blake, (later my brother Michael’s Sergeant in the Field Security Police, and later still my ‘Schlapper’ during our Vaudeville days), would hop up into the arena, with a ‘My Lords, Ladeeees and Gentlemen? (A bit of wishful thinking here, as most ‘Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen’ would have thought twice before gracing ‘The Ring’, Blackfriars with their elegant presence). To a scratchy fanfare of recorded trumpets, the two contestants jumped into the ring, heads covered by grubby towels. At the very sight of the infamous wrestler, Jack Pye, the crowd went berserk, spitting and screaming obscenities at him. The MC would then bellow over the tumult, ‘This, is a five round heavyweight contest between the undisputed champion of the North, Jack Pye, and . . .’

  Shouts, boos and catcalls greeted the very mention of his name. Not that Mr Pye was cowed by this in any way, for he would without hesitation give the Nazi salute, lean over the ropes, raise two fingers in a most unseemly gesture and scream to the now hysterical crowd, ‘Ah, get fucked.’ That really got them going.

  ‘Gentlemen, please!’ yelled the MC. There was a temporary lull. Jack’s opponent tonight is your favourite – Black “Butcher” Johnson – a Cockney from the Congo!’

  This introduction of the ‘hero’ was followed by loud cheers and the stamping of a thousand feet.

  ‘Butcher’ had a ‘special’ called the ‘Back-kick’, a blow much favoured by Thai boxers or those skilled in La Savatte. When he seemed at the end of his tether, was when he was at his most dangerous. He would lie gasping over the ropes, eyes rolling like the 30s screen actor ‘Stepin Fetchit’, but if you watched those eyes carefully you could see a twinkle and a glint in them that told you that Butcher was a crafty bastard and was about to deliver up his ‘special’. The eager Mr Pye, sensing that victory was nigh, advanced upon the luckless Butcher snarling and gnashing his gums. He only had two top teeth, the rest having fallen by the ringside many years before. Butcher, carefully watching his opponent from the corner of an eye, shifted his weight almost imperceptibly to his left leg. That was the moment the crowd was waiting for. ‘In the tomatoes, Butcher,’ they implored. Like a bolt from the blue the right leg shot backwards, catching the unsuspecting Mr Pye right in the ‘goolies’. Going completely crosseyed and cupping both hands over his privates, he staggered around the ring, crying copious crocodile tears and appealing to the ref (affectionately known as ‘The Spider’), for an immediate disqualification.

  The bell for the end of the round rang and Jack’s seconds, rushing into the ring, escorted him crosslegged and wailing, back to his stool.

  ‘Serves you bloody right, you bleedin’ Nazi,’ opined a ‘lady’ sitting in the front row, shaking her umbrella at the stricken Mr Pye. Jack took a secretive swig of water from his bottle, leaned over the ropes opposite his critic, and, with deadly accuracy, spat a jet of blood-tinged water right into the astonished lady’s face. Her gentleman friend, leaping to her defence, attempted to climb into the ring and admonish Mr Pye for his singular lack of manners. Luckily for the gentleman friend, he was held firmly back by accompanying followers of the ‘fancy’. At this impending onslaught upon his person Jack Pye took extreme umbrage. Picking up his wooden stool, he advanced threateningly upon the lady’s defender. But by now ‘The Spider’ was angrily ordering Jack back to his corner, and he, finding no-one else in proximity to assault, hit the startled referee smartly over the head with the stool. Bedlam again broke loose, to be quelled eventually by a beseeching Mr Blake. There was then a short respite, during which time ‘vendors’ walked up and down the aisles calling out their unique sales pitches.

  ‘Wants a nice apple?’

  (How succinct can you get? No extraneous words here.)

  ‘Wants a nice apple, then?

  (Note the subtle change of phraseology to prevent boring repetition.)

  From the opposite side of the arena came another fascinating exhortation.

  ‘Any minerals wanted ’ere?’

  Swigging my mineral, and munching my apple, I felt a disturbance under my feet. Looking down I saw to my intense surprise a ruddy bibulous face peering up at me from between my legs. It was covered in ash, melted ice cream and gunge of every description, the result of his long inexplicable crawl under the seats. Breathing the breath of a buzzard, he asked, “Oo’s winnin’?’

  ‘Black Butcher Johnson,’ I replied tentatively.

  ‘Good ole Butcher,’ he belched, and crawled back under the seats whence he had come.

  There was one bout where a certain Mr ‘Tiger’ de Lisle was fighting ‘Gentleman’ Cliff Warner, a British Admiral’s son who was later to become a great personal friend. De Lisle was a muscular villain who revelled in his reputation of being the best-hung wrestler on the circuit. That night Douglas Fairbanks Jnr and Joan Crawford, with whom he was then having a tempestuous love-affair, were present. Seated in the front circle in a specially roped off area, they were enjoying the evening enormously, until the Tiger, down on points to Gentleman Cliff and feeling that the reputation of his virility and manliness was in jeopardy, decided that he would give Miss Crawford a treat, by exposing his splendid genitalia. I have rarely seen anything so ludicrous as Gentleman Cliff living up to his prenomen by repeatedly pulling up the wrestling tights that the Tiger was equally determined to pull down. The MC, Frankie Blake, realising de Lisle’s intentions, rushed headlong to the circle, calling upon the services of a fat usher to place himself between Miss Crawford’s line of sight and ‘Tiger’ de Lisle’s flashing privates. Doug Fairbanks, quite unaware of the reason for this corpulent barrier, kept yelling at the two overweight dodgers to ‘Get out of the bloody way, we can’t see a thing.’

  Sad to relate neither did we, as Gentleman Cliff had done a sterling job of safeguarding Miss Crawford’s moral susceptibilities, by tossing the unprincipled Tiger out of the ring on to the time keeper’s table and bell, which, ringing inadvertently, brought the evening to an uproarious conclusion.

  I wish ‘The Ring’, like ‘The Windmill’, had never closed; for there indeed lay the heart of London at its best.

  *

  Dad was enjoying considerable success at this time, as his play Interference was packing them in in the West End, and he was writing film scenarios for the British and Americans, as well as short stories for The Strand Magazine and Blackwoods in England, and for Colliers and The Saturday Evening Post in America.

  Being an enthusiastic sportsman, he had always hankered after his own place in the country to go with a number 86, his town house, a place where he could shoot, hunt and best of all, fish, and with the considerable income now coming in from his writing, he was able, in 1929, to buy a new home in Devon, and indulge himself in his hobbies. Rejoicing in the romantic name of Highleigh St Mary, it was also a haven of new delights for us boys and we were able to indulge them by spending much of our holidays, both summer and winter, there.

  If you have ever, for the amusement of your children, taken an old shoe-box, cut out the windows and front door with a pen-knife, and put it on the coals of a fire to watch ‘the house burn down’, then you will know what our four-up, four-down cottage in Devon looked like. Highleigh was perched on the top of a steep hill overlooking a lush valley and could be approached three ways. One, by car along the bottom of the meadow, and then up in a broad sweep through the newly planted pine wood to the car port, and its terrifying ‘turn-around’, with only a horizontal tree trunk of pitiful circumference between you and a ‘back somersaulting’ death.

  Two, along the meadow again, and a sharp turn right up a hill so steep, that only a tank could make it with any degree of certainty.

  And three, up the long steep path and across the meadow. This journey, undertaken as it was several times a day, caused the blood to course invigoratingly through our young veins.

  At the bottom
of the hill, and through the valley ran the river Exe, one of the West Country’s most renowned trout and salmon rivers. Our property ran a mile or two from Exebridge, along the valley to Oakford Bridge and afforded excellent sport in the pools, mill-leats, shallows and weirs, for the residents. There was a fishing hut with old rods, gaffs, creels, tackle, tins of mummified worms and all the assorted bric-a-brac of those men and women who thought and dreamed of little else than the ‘big-one’ and its subsequent visit to Mr Tout, the unlikely, but nevertheless true name of the local fish taxidermist, for stuffing, mounting and glass-casing. This corrugated iron hut sat rusting away by the edge of Highleigh pool, the best spot for salmon and also the best spot for swimming, not always a popular combination. It was situated just above a wide, fast-flowing weir, which, with plenty of water running about, could have swept us over the lip and drowned us, but as ever danger was of the essence in our games. So, under Michael’s orders - Michael was always our leader, despite his unaggressive temperament; he was much more restrained than me, and only occasionally bordered on the bossy – we built a raft of oil drums and timber, roped it together and sailed it over weir and rapid, on the way to Tiverton. This, without a single loss of life, and only the occasional ‘Man overboard!’ A fig for Captain Bligh!

  At Highleigh St Mary - BC (that is, before conversion) there was no running water, so in our shared attic we had to make do with a china jug and basin. Having no lavatory up there, we had to use ‘pos’. ‘But only,’ threatened Dad, ‘only in extreme emergencies.’

  So the pos rested, virtually unused, under our beds until that dreadful day when the minuscule ‘caca’ was found nestling in the bottom of my po! The attack came from all sides . . .

  ‘You little pig!’

  ‘Have you no self-control?’

  ‘Don’t you ever consider poor Elsie? (The pretty ‘£18 a year and all-found’ ‘tweeny’ and a sure favourite in Dad’s book!)

  What could I say? I was completely innocent of the dirty deed.

  ‘If it was me, it would’ve been bigger than that,’ I protested.

  ‘Well, don’t let it ever happen again,’ said Dad, ‘or you’ll really catch it.’ I was afraid he meant it literally.

  That night I hardly slept a wink. If the ‘Phantom Crapper’ struck again, he would not go uncaught.

  In the early hours of the morning I heard a movement under my bed. Shaking Coby awake and snapping on my torch we peered underneath. There sitting right inside the pot was Tinker, our cat, not only making another little offering, but this time really putting the thumb-screws on by adding a quarter of a pint of pee. Throwing the offending animal out of the window and on to the roof, I marched downstairs and held out the malodorous contents before Dad and his assembled guests.

  ‘There, see! It happened again! But it wasn’t me, was it, Coby?’

  Coby gravely shook his head. ‘It was that stinker Tinker all the time!’ The annoying thing was that I really don’t think they believed me – even then!

  Below the house on the banks of the river stood Highleigh Farm, excellently run for Dad by one Farmer Broomfield and his kin. There were fascinating new areas to be explored which until then were unique in our experience. There were the pig-sties for example, where we watched pop-eyed as the boar was ‘introduced’ to the sow, and the fact that the pig’s ‘winky’ resembled a corkscrew left us speechless. Ditto the cow-sheds and the subsequent serving of the cows by the bull. ‘Gosh! Look, Mr Broomfield actually touches the beastly thing and he puts it in! Can’t the old bull do it for himself ?’

  ‘Course not silly, he might miss and break it off,’ said Coby, already showing off his pre-medical-school superiority.

  Mr Broomfield actually gave me a dried bull’s ‘twizzle’ as a walking stick once but a rude boy stole it.

  After all this, the sex life of chickens and ducks was just plain laughable, and no longer to be considered seriously as a spectator sport. There was a morbid hypnotic fascination, however, for the horrific sight of the farmer’s way of killing chickens for the table. To ensure that the meat should be as white as possible, the poor bird would be bled by having its feet tied together with a handy thong, hung upside down from a convenient hook, then with the sharp hooked blade of a penknife have the roof of its mouth sliced open. I was assured by both Mr and Mrs Broomfield that once this was done the bird was off into ‘limbo’ in no time at all. But by the way it was flapping and thrashing about flinging its life-blood all over its executioners, I was inclined to doubt them. Thank God the RSPCA have since banned such cruel practices.

  Parallel to the river ran the mill-leat which slowly turned the mill’s huge wooden water-wheel. This, when engaged and set in motion, started the crushing wheel of the cider press on its endless circular journey. Every summer when the day came for the annual cider apple pressing, Mr Broomfield went into the barn where the press lay and removed various things that had been thrown on to it during the winter months, such as an old pram, a boot, several dried up mangel-wurzels, a child’s headless doll, last year’s Christmas tree and a quantity of straw that Janet, the Broomfield’s tabby cat, had had her bi-yearly litter of fourteen kittens on. A couple of buckets of water, quickly sloshed across the crushing area and the press was once more ‘clean and ready for them apples’! When queried on the question of hygiene and taste Mr Broomfield would reply, ‘You’m mazed me dear!! It’s all the gubbins that gives it the flavour.’

  In the stable was Dad’s big hunter Polly, ‘D’s’ broad-beamed chestnut, Tommy, and our ‘hunter’, a minuscule fat black Shetland pony called Shadow. It was an extraordinary little beast in that it never seemed to tire. It took itself off to the ‘meet’ with one of us up, at full trot; rested before the ‘off’ by going round and round in ever decreasing circles; went flat out during the chase; did its circling routine again throughout the ‘kill’ and when it was finally time to hack the many miles home at what one hoped would be a leisurely pace to lessen the pain of a red, rubbed-raw posterior, it would be off again at a ‘double-time trot’ as if there was a rocket up its bottom. This most unenviable experience could best be likened to sitting on top of a red hot vibrator.

  From our bedroom through a low bolted door was the water tank room. It was dark, dusty, covered in cobwebs and after a fruitless search for a ‘sea-chest with treasure map therein’ made the perfect ‘lair’. One day while scrabbling about I found a loose floorboard. ‘Aha! Maybe that’s were the treasure is buried,’ I whispered. How right I was, for on prising up the plank there before our eyes lay the greatest treasure we had ever seen – a completely naked lady. Below the attic floor was Dad’s bathroom ceiling and directly above the bath was a wrought-iron ‘flower petal’ ventilator. Through this ventilator we closely observed the supine soapy body of a beautifully constructed famous authoress who was Dad’s guest at the time. Her splendid attributes were all there for us to feast our eyes upon and we, being in the dark with little chance of discovery, hurried not at all our detailed examination. The only intrusion to the whole exciting episode was a continuous verbal discourse by Coby on the finer points of the female anatomy.

  ‘But how do you know all this?’ I breathed.

  ‘Because, you ass,’ he answered grandly, ‘I’ve read a medical book and I’m going to be a doctor.’

  There were daily chores to be carried out at Highleigh which, if done satisfactorily, were rewarded by a few coins of the realm.

  They were as follows: –

  1) If a boy wound up the gas weight (a Heath Robinson contraption that, raised to the top of a ‘gibbet’, was party to the making of gas for lighting the house) he received one penny.

  2) If a boy went down to the farm and collected the milk he received one penny, plus the additional perk of a sip of the rich cream that floated invitingly on the surface; and

  3) If the three boys didn’t wake up Minnie Hooper with their ‘early morning caterwauling’, they would receive one penny a-piece.

  Minnie Ho
oper was a widow-woman from Hove with a whiny, wingeing voice that always brought a smile to the lips of those who heard it. She was a funny and highly original lady who seemed to derive great pleasure from being joshed. The most memorable part of Hoopie however was an accoutrement, i.e. her spectacles. She had a different pair for every mode – red dress, red specs; blue dress, blue specs; red and blue dress, red and blue specs. They turned up at the corners, or down; they were round, square or oblong; they were plain or covered in sparkling bijouterie; but all were held round the back of the head from ear piece to ear piece by a gold link safety chain. ‘If I once put them down and mislay them, I’m too blind to find where I put them – if they are chained to me, that eventually won’t arise.’

  When Dad decided the time had come for ‘Hoopie’ to be properly summoned from her leaden stupor he would lead us into the garden under the slumbering lady’s window and at a given signal, the cry in French of ‘Arsh-Dooble-O-Pay-Eh-Air-OO-Pair!!’ would rend the air and ricochet down the valley. After a moment’s pause allowing the echo to fade into nothingness, the sight of a reluctant Minnie Hooper would be framed in the window. Hair in curlers, covered by a mob-cap, glasses on the end of her nose, and shoulders covered by a hastily-grabbed eiderdown, she would moan, ‘Bussie, you really are the bottom! Can’t you and your beastly boys go and yodel somewhere else? I was just getting to sleep!’

  And this at ten o’clock in the morning!

  *

  When Highleigh was being converted, Dad rented ‘Stag Cottage’ in Oakford Bridge as a temporary home. This consisted of two simple Victorian cottages knocked into one. There were therefore two front doors, and two staircases leading up to the bedrooms. Dad and ‘D’ would say goodnight to us before going out to dinner, and on occasion one of them would return to see if we were all right, opening one front door, mounting the staircase, coming into our bedroom in the dark, passing through it to Michael’s room, down the other staircase and finally out through the other door to wherever they were spending the evening. To us, who were perfectly all right, it seemed a pointless exercise, and we told Dad so – that he need not bother to come all the way home just to check-up on our welfare. He looked at us as if we were quite mad.