‘I really don’t know.’ Lucy blew out smoke and looked doubtful.
‘Take it from me, young lad. Get your head down in a good wugby scwum and you won’t want to go thieving any more. It’s been an exciting time the past year, hasn’t it?’
‘Not all that exciting in the Scrubs,’ I had to tell him.
‘Even there it must have been exciting. Even in Aldershot. I tell you, I had to do a good deal of heavy knee work.’
By now he’d lost me. It was like listening to someone talking a foreign language. What did he mean? Bouncing a ball on his knees to encourage David Beckham? I could only repeat ‘knee work’ with a big question mark at the end of it.
‘On my knees. In the cathedral. Silent prayer, of course. I didn’t want to go public. Night and morning at my bedside, I prayed for our success in the European Championships. Heavy, heavy knee work. But Almighty God moves in a mysterious way, as I expect you’ve found to your cost, Terry.’
I didn’t have the answer to that, so I thought it was safer to nod my head and say nothing.
‘In his infinite wisdom he decided not to help us when it came to the penalty kicks. Well, there it is.’
‘Yes,’ said Lucy, stubbing out her fag on one of the Rev.’s saucers. It didn’t seem to me that she was enjoying all this talk about God and knee work. ‘But we’ve got no time for playing games. Terry needs a job as well as a bed to sleep in. Thanks, Timbo, we’ll be on our way.’
‘Yes, of course, Lucinda.’ Timbo was on his feet. ‘Do send my salutations to the dear bishop. What an inspiration he is to all of us! The photograph on the way out,’ he told us as though he was passing on an important secret, ‘is Cathedral Clergy and Staff versus the Aldershot Biscuit Factory. What a game that was. Three goals, all in extra time. I’m sure you remember it, Lucinda?’
‘No,’ ‘call me Lucy’ told him, ‘I don’t remember that at all,’ which I thought was really rude of her, quite honestly.
So, when I’d planted my toothbrush and toothpaste in Rev. Timbo’s bathroom, Lucy took me to the Intimate Bistro. We sat in the small, stuffy bar looking at old French posters showing girls in frilly skirts kicking their legs up, and ‘call me Lucy’ got her teeth into a strong Pernod and I went no further than a Becks beer. We were waiting, Lucy said, for someone she called Robin (‘you’ll adore Robin’), who, it seemed, ran the joint but only popped in occasionally.
‘My God, what an ass that Timbo is!’ Lucy shook her hair out of her eyes and took a big gulp of her white drink.
I told her that I didn’t get much help thinking about a life of crime from either the bishop or Timbo. In fact more sense seemed to have been talked about the subject in the Young Offenders wing. So the chat started which kept us going until Robin Thirkell blew in from the street and gave Lucy one of the longest and slushiest French kisses I’d witnessed since before I got four years from Judge Bullingham down the Old Bailey.
7
Although I say it myself, I think this praeceptor business is going rather well. In fact I seem to have quite a talent for it.
I mean, just look at the difference it made to Terry Keegan in only about a week! When I met him coming out of the Scrubs he couldn’t have been worse. Rude, sulky, non-cooperative, calling me ‘man’ deliberately. Stuff like that. I really couldn’t find anything good to say about him. And yet only a day later there we were having a drink in Robin’s bistro and a really good conversation. He even managed to be reasonably polite to Timbo, who as usual made a bit of an ass of himself talking about his ‘wugby’. I remember him taking me to watch that when I was still at school. Quite honestly, I thought it was rather a disgusting game, with grown men pushing their heads up against each other’s bottoms. Actually I couldn’t see the point of it.
I’m not quite sure if prison works, I’d probably need a bit more convincing, but, as I say, the praeceptor business seems to be working excellently, as witness our conversation about crime and so on in Robin’s bistro.
I haven’t told you about Robin, have I? I should do, as he’s been quite important in my life and will have more than a bit part to play in this story as it unfolds. I mean, I went out with Robin after I’d finished with my old boyfriend Jason and before I met my boyfriend at the time of this story, Tom. I suppose I’d have to admit that Robin Thirkell was the most interesting of the three of them.
He owned not only the Intimate Bistro but also Nifty’s, the dress shop in the High Street. He was always looking out for the latest trends and was so cool that one of the local newspapers actually called him ‘the Giorgio Armani of Aldershot’. He had a suntan almost all the year round, which I think owed a good deal to Tone Up, the local health and fitness club, but it suited him rather, as did the shades he wore even on grey and cloudy days.
Robin talks in a sort of mocking and dismissive way about most things, but there is a serious side to him. For instance, he makes quite a lot of money, I mean serious money, out of property. Lots of pubs are closing and Robin bought some of them up and turned them into desirable residences for weekenders. He’s obviously charmed someone on the local county council, so he doesn’t have any problems about getting planning permission, or getting girlfriends if I have to be honest. I’ve heard some farmers say, if you want foreign workers to pick your fruit or dig your potatoes, you just have to get in touch with Robin and he’ll find them for you at a reasonable rate.
Anyway, having fixed a bed for Terry, I had to get him a job and I thought immediately of Robin. I mean, Tom wouldn’t be much help. He couldn’t find Terry a job in television as he couldn’t even get one for himself.
Gwenny in the SCRAP office had explained to us that our ‘clients’ found it hard to get work because people who might employ them checked up on their criminal records. If they’d been caught thieving, as Terry had far too often, the job offer was off. So, by and large, I thought Robin was the best hope in the world for Terry, who wasn’t even an illegal immigrant.
Robin arrived, as usual, late and apparently in a desperate hurry, nicely browned by Tone Up and smelling strongly of Gucci aftershave. He gave me an enormous and long-lasting kiss, which reminded me of old times, and when I emerged from it I introduced him to Terry, who he’d ignored totally up to then.
‘Is this your little criminal, Lucy? How tremendously exciting!’
I could see that this particular remark had not gone down at all well with Terry, so I did my best to save the situation. ‘He’s not especially little and he’s not a criminal any longer. So, Robin, it’s up to you to give him a job in the Intimate Bistro.’
‘Can he wash up?’
‘I should think so. You’d better ask him.’
‘All right then, Terry whatever your name is, can you wash up? Clear tables? Bring a few dishes in occasionally?’
‘Course I can.’
It was obvious that Terry had not yet fallen victim to Robin’s undoubted charm. I thought he thawed a bit, however, when Robin said, ‘How about £120 a week?’
After that first talk in the Intimate Bistro it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that I became good friends with Terry. We had more chats in the bar of the bistro and two or three times we drove out into the country in the distinctly clapped-out old Polo I mainly keep at home. He talked to me about his ghastly mum (neither Terry nor I seem to have had much luck in the mum department) and it was clear how much he had loved his Aunt Dot, although his Uncle Arthur obviously suffered from extreme praeceptor deprivation and couldn’t help reoffending, which accounted for his continued absence from home when Terry was young. Now he was out of the Scrubs, with a job which, he was glad to say, saved him from Timbo’s cricket and wugby chat in the evenings.
Anyway, we were getting on so well and the days were full of spring sunshine and I thought Terry probably hadn’t had many picnics in his life, so why shouldn’t we have one? I got things together and Terry brought some bits of salami and pâté, together with a bottle of red Rioja which he might or might not have
stolen from the bistro. But anyway, I thought, Robin could well afford it and he probably wouldn’t have minded. And why would I want to spoil a picnic lecturing Terry again on how to be honest? Instead we drank Rioja out of plastic cups and laughed at something, I can’t quite remember what because now, after all that’s happened, it seems a long time ago.
When we’d almost finished the Rioja, I asked him how he liked his new job.
‘Not bad. It doesn’t pay so well as my old one.’
‘You mean thieving?’ I felt I had to say it, although I still didn’t want to lecture him.
‘Well, yes. I didn’t do no crime for nothing, you know. Not like that mad Russian.’
‘Which mad Russian was that?’
‘The one who hit the old pawnbroker woman with an axe. Sort of just for the hell of it.’
‘You mean you’ve read Crime and Punishment?’ I knew what I sounded, I sounded patronizing.
‘Course I have. Do you think I haven’t read books? I’ve read Charles Dickens.’
‘Really? Which one?’ I was still sounding patronizing.
‘The one where the boy finds the old con in the marshes and gives him a slice of the ham. Something like my Uncle Arthur that old con was.’
‘I suppose so,’ I said, although I couldn’t see the connection.
‘Wuthering Heights. That was a good one. Wuthering Heights.’
I have to say I was surprised at the width of Terry’s reading, and realized that there was undoubtedly a good deal more to him than met the eye.
‘You surprised I’ve read books?’ He was smiling at me, although probably as aware of my patronizing tones as I was. ‘I tell you, you get lots of time for reading in the Scrubs. Probably I’ve read more books than you have.’
‘Probably.’ I looked at him. He was still smiling and he looked younger than he had done at any time since I met him at the prison gates. The way he looked, I thought he might be going to make a pass at me, but he didn’t.
Instead he stuffed what remained of the food into my basket. But things were definitely better between us. I looked forward to his company and things stayed that way until an evening I’m about to describe and another parting.
‘It’s all gone extraordinarily well,’ I told my boyfriend, Tom, when he came down to stay with me at my parents’ place and we were having dinner, just the two of us, in the Intimate Bistro. Tom had told me he’d given up looking for a job in a television company and was spending his time writing a documentary script about the tube called Underground, which he was sure any television company would want to do when it was finished. So we were both in a good mood, holding hands and smiling at each other when we’d finished our platefuls of coq au vin and offerings of fresh, locally grown veg.
‘It wasn’t too easy at first,’ I told Tom. ‘I felt he resented me. He thought he could do it all on his own, without any support. That was a disaster! He ended up sleeping on Euston Station. But then I brought him down here and got him this job and we’ve kind of, well, hit it off.’
Tom said, ‘I hope you haven’t hit it off too far. I mean, you don’t fancy him, do you?’
‘Of course not, darling. It’s a purely platonic relationship.’
Looking back on it, what I said may not have been entirely true, but I didn’t want Tom to get into one of his depressed and sulky moods and ruin the evening, so I squeezed his hand.
It was then that Terry emerged from the kitchen wearing a striped apron, to collect our plates, piling them up on his forearm with the dish that had contained the locally grown mixed veg balanced a little insecurely on the top. I was pleased to see that he was learning some of the tricks of a professional waiter.
‘Terry,’ I said. Well, I couldn’t just ignore him, could I? ‘This is my friend, Tom Weatherby.’
‘Lucy tells me you’re getting on so well, Terry,’ Tom was concerned enough to say, ‘and you’re enjoying the Intimate.’
‘Am I?’ Terry’s answer was, I thought, quite rude. ‘Well, I can see you are,’ with which he buzzed off with our dirty plates and the dish, as I say, balanced a bit dangerously on his arm. As he pushed open the door and went down the steps into the kitchen, we heard an almighty crash. Terry had clearly dropped the lot. Our dessert, coffee and the bill were served to us by Hermione, who is Robin’s current girlfriend, and I saw no more of Terry that night, nor for a good many nights to come.
It was quite late when we got back to the palace. Robert was still up and working in his study, but Sylvia, my mum, had probably, as usual, staggered up to bed. When we found Dad he gave that sort of warm and deeply understanding look he usually saves for people who’ve lost a husband or wife, or at least a close relation.
‘Lucy,’ he said as he poured us each a rather small brandy, ‘I’m afraid I have bad news for you.’
‘Is it Mum?’ I steeled myself to listen to an account of one of Sylvia’s regular falls in the bathroom.
‘No, darling, it’s not Sylvia. It’s your pupil. The boy you are looking after. It’s about young Terry Keegan.’
‘He’s not hurt?’ I found myself unexpectedly anxious.
‘No. Not him. So far as I know he’s not hurt at all. The one who was hurt was poor Timbo. He rang me about an hour ago. He was in quite a state about it.’
‘About what?’
‘Now, Lucy, you mustn’t let this shake your faith. We must follow the sinner, you and I, down to the end of his chosen path. And we must not lose our faith. Not ever lose it.’
‘Perhaps you could tell me what happened.’ I’m really fond of Dad, but I was in no mood to hear one of his Radio 4 ‘Thoughts for the Day’.
‘Well, it seems that your Terry came home at about ten o’clock and assaulted Timbo and went off with one of my chaplain’s favourite silver cups. The one he got for the inter-denominational boxing tournament. Your friend Terry just walked away with it.’
‘Terry attacked Timbo?’ I was still trying not to believe it. ‘But he had no violence in his record.’
‘Well, he has now,’ my dad told me. ‘Poor Lucy! It just makes your job that bit more difficult, doesn’t it?’
Of course, Robert and Sylvia have no objections to Tom and me sharing a bedroom in the palace. ‘Sex is rightly regarded by today’s Church as one of God’s most generous gifts,’ was what my dad always said, although I never got used to the idea of Robert and Sylvia having it off and greatly preferred not to think about such things.
So we said ‘goodnight’ and made our way upstairs, where I found I wasn’t at all in the mood for sex. It was a terribly low moment and I was extremely depressed. All the same, I told Tom, ‘I’m not going to give up. I’m not going to let Terry have the satisfaction! It was all working so well. I’m going to get him back on the right track again. It’s just a temporary setback. I won’t let him go.’
‘Quite honestly,’ Tom said, ‘I thought he was bloody rude to us in the restaurant.’ Which didn’t make me feel any better.
8
I have to say that I found her behaviour disgusting. When I got my job with the Intimate Bistro she welcomed Robin Thirkell by allowing him to put his tongue halfway down her neck, or so it seemed to me. Three weeks later, there she is holding hands with this Tom and staring into his eyes as though he was the only man in the world for her.
Do you know what that sort of behaviour reminded me of? It reminded me of my mother. I just couldn’t put up with it.
All right, I showed my feelings. There she was pretending she was always in the right, knowing how to behave and teaching it to what her boyfriend Robin called her ‘little criminal’, i.e. me - and yet there she is putting herself about to all-comers. As I say, like my mum.
I just couldn’t be doing with it any longer. All this happened a good three weeks after I’d started work at the Intimate Bistro. Things hadn’t been so bad during that time. I did my work, got my 120 a week and, seeing as I lived rent-free with the Reverend Timbo, it wasn’t too bad - all things considered.<
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There were also a number of laughs to be had in the kitchen. The chef was a big fat Scot called Graham, who came down from Glasgow in search of excitement and landed up in, of all places, Aldershot. He cooked with the help of a good many bottles of the house champagne and it was a wonder to me that Robin didn’t seem to notice how much he drank.
He had some jokes too which made the girls laugh in the kitchen, except for Hermione, who was Robin Thirkell’s other girlfriend, so he didn’t do it in front of her. He might say that the cold cucumber soup needed ‘just a soupson [I can’t spell it] of urine’ and add it in. I’ve also seen him stick a lump of pastry into his armpit ‘just to moisten it a wee bit’. I don’t think he’d peed into the chicken with wine sauce that Lucy and her then boyfriend, Tom, had that night. Perhaps that was a pity.
Anyway, I made my view of what was going on pretty clear by the way I picked up their plates. I did it quickly and I didn’t make any apologies. I left them to whatever they had in mind as quick as I could, with the result that I had a bit of a crash going down the steps to the kitchen. So, to put it mildly, I wasn’t in a very good mood when I went home to the Reverend Timbo’s. I’d hardly got up the stairs and into the lounge when an extraordinary thing happened. I felt a bloody great bash to my chin, a vicious sort of upper cut which made my head spin and bloody near unhinged my jaw.
When I opened my eyes after this experience, what should I see but the Reverend, who must have been waiting for me behind the door. All he was wearing was shorts, a T-shirt with a picture of Aldershot Cathedral on it, socks and trainers and boxing gloves that looked about the size of footballs at the ends of his white arms. I could also see another fat pair of boxing gloves on the coffee table, beside a picture book of English country churches.
‘Come on, Terry,’ Timbo was hopping about shouting. ‘I heard you come in downstairs. You get the gloves on and why don’t we go a couple of rounds before bedtime? Blow away the cobwebs. A decent punch-up to get rid of your criminal tendencies. I’ve helped a lot of lads this way.’
Quite Honestly Page 5