Who Knew Felix Marr?

by Paul Kelly

  When I told Emily about Freddie’s proposal, she laughed and told me that she was no mystic, but Freddie was getting too old to remain single and she hoped that Georgia was young enough to have children and then I remembered that Emily had never actually met Georgia, but I had... and I felt sure that Georgia was very much in love with Freddie and if he wanted a family, he wouldn’t have to look far to get one and by some strange coincidence when I next saw him, he asked me what it felt like to have a family and I told him it was AGONY and that he shouldn’t consider it as it would bring nothing but trouble to his life and as he sat beside me with a frown on his face, I started to laugh and told him about Sylvie an her ballet dancing and Alfie with his new love affair whom we hadn’t yet met and Freddie left the office with a strange smile on his face and as I looked through the window as he was getting into his car, I am sure I could see him grab his crutch and grin from ear to ear.

  It was nice to know that Freddie had at last found a love in his life and I wished him every happiness and was delighted to become his best man. I thought again of the time when he imagined he was in love with the lady who turned out to be his cousin. He loved her then, but he knew that she would never love him and I supposed that the thought of this ‘finale’ in his life had made him imagine that he was destined for bachelorhood until he met Georgia and it was then that the reality of life came home to me and how each day told a different story.

  I wondered how Gerard was getting on in his new job as a G.P. and if he and Assim had arrived at any arrangements for their own lives together and I could not forget the transforming of my own life from the way I had been born from what I had always thought to be NOTHING. If there was love there with the two people who lay together, I will never know... nor will either one of them. It was just a simple act of sex without feeling, where you got up and walked away from everything and I wondered if I was the only person in this strange world who was conceived in such a barren way? I doubted it, but I will never ever know.

  I watched Freddie drive off in his dream of happiness and I just sat at my desk when everyone else had left the office and I was grateful to Emily for all the happiness she had given me... and I cried.

  It was nearly three o’clock in the afternoon and I had interviewed another builder which meant we had forty two men working for us now and over thirty were trained whereas the remaining number were trainees and I could leave the office earlier than usual as I wanted to return to my work about six o’clock where I was due to interview a couple of shorthand typist. It was when I was sitting in the lounge listening to some classical music that Emily wanted to hear, that there was a knock on the door and who should it be coming to see us but Assim. He had four more hours before he had to get back to the hospital and he wanted to tell us of his visit to Gerard in his new surgery which was about five miles away from the hospital but he had his mobile phone with him, so distance didn’t matter so much as he could get a taxi if he was called to the hospital and the journey would be paid for as part of his duties. He sat with me on the settee so that I could hear what he had to say above the music, but after a few seconds, Emily turned the music down as she was anxious to hear what Assim had to say, just as much as I was and Assim was very anxious to tell us all he had learnt about Gerard’s new surgery “He seems to be settling down alright, but the work is so different to what he had been doing in Paris. The office that he occupies is a rather old building, but it is adequate for the work he has to do. Apparently the previous occupant had been a doctor too, but it was a female doctor and she was over retirement age and her method of dealing with patients was rather ‘old fashioned’ in so far as she wrote everything down in pencil and she never used a computer, presuming she was unable to use one due to her age, but Gerard was unable to find any references of previous patients and it made his work difficult when three patients had come to him already and he had to rely on everything they told him about their illnesses, where if that information had been stored in a computer, he would have been able to tell the patients what was further required in their treatment, but he couldn’t which meant he had to start from scratch...

  I could see how upset Emily was as she listened to what Assim was saying about the difficulties that her brother had to face in his new job, but then suddenly I saw a smile creep over her face “Have you told him about your own problem?” she asked with a grin and Assim stared at her not knowing what she meant until suddenly he grinned with her.

  “Every good doctor should have a female doctor creep into his bed,” he howled and I remembered the incident that had caused so much grief to Assim at the time when that female had told him that she fancied him and that he was the most handsome guy in her life... but that was something that he certainly would NEVER tell Gerard. Assim also went on to tell us that Gerard would require a computer for his work and he was surprised that this had not been offered to him when he went into the building as everything else seemed to be in place and then he made us think twice when he told us that the person from the council offices who was showing him around the place, told him that he had two bedrooms upstairs and added that it would be useful for Gerard’s children and when Gerard told him that he was unmarried and had no children, the council man simply sniffed and added just as he was leaving to go through the front door.

  “Well, there’s lots of pretty girls in these parts and you might just strike lucky. You’re not a bad looking guy.”

  Needless to say we All laughed at that, but somehow I thought that Assim didn’t think the remark was very funny.

  I left Assim talking to Emily as I had to get back to the office to interview those two secretary girls and I felt it was just a waste of time. We needed two girls who could type reasonably well and could do shorthand if we didn’t have the time to tell then exactly what we wanted and that didn’t need much brilliance, but by a strange coincidence, one of the girls I interviewed really did surprise me. She was a very fast typist and when I told her what I wanted her to write, she jotted my words down on a piece of paper as fast as she could. I was very pleased and the fact that she knew how to use a computer was an added bonus and I took her on immediately but the other girl wasn’t so very good and I told her I would contact her in a few days if we still needed someone with her qualifications and although I had really decided that this young girl was not what I wanted in the office, I could not help but see something in her face that puzzled me. It was as though she hated me for some strange reason and I could not understand why this was as the only face that I could remember... a face that showed me hatred was Sheba and she was nothing to look at when this young girl was at least pretty in her own fashion. She sniffed and looked at me as if I would be sure to get in touch with her as she was the ‘top of her league’ and she left her name and address behind when she left the office. When I got home that evening, Emily told me that Assim planned to go to Gerard’s new office at every opportunity he could in order to help him get his files in order and to help with the new computer which he didn’t tell us, he had bought for his friend.

  Everything seemed to be going according to plan and even Freddie seemed happier than I had ever seen him in recent times. He came into the office one morning whistling one of his favourite tunes and told me he was taking me round to see the other offices that he had bought and when I saw them as he drove me around in his Mercedes, I could only imagine that he had at last become a millionaire. Everything he did and touched was ‘sprinkled with gold’...

  Even young Milly could see the difference in Freddie’s attitude as she joined him in his favourite song when we came back into the office and had tea and biscuits ready for us on the nearby table. When I spoke to Emily about our visits to the new offices, she agreed with me that of all her brothers, Freddie was the one who had reached the millions. She thought that Gerard was the most ‘giving’ of her brothers, but her opinion of Steven left me guessing as he was the one who had been most helpful to me when I
had been in prison with him. I liked Steve, as indeed I liked all of my brothers in law, but Steven seemed to come up ‘tops’ when I thought about them all.

  It was one evening when I was playing ‘horses’ with Alfie and where he was astride on my back, regardless that he was nearly nineteen and I was in my fifties... as I crawled along the lounge floor that Assim came to see me as he had just come from Gerard’s surgery and he was a little alarmed. I listened to what Assim had to say, but he asked me to be sure that Emily was not around as what he had to say was certainly not for her ears. I didn’t know what was to come next and I asked Assim if what he wanted to say might be even better said to someone like himself, a doctor of medicine, but he shook his head and assured me that what I had suggested would be the best thing, if Gerard was just another doctor and not one of the family and I listened... as Assim went on...

  “I would NEVER EVER mention anything of what I am about to tell you Felix but I want you to know what stress Gerard is in at the moment. I had been sitting quietly with Gerard in his surgery awaiting the next patient and we realized that a receptionist would be a good person to have outside of our little room as it would avoid one person being seen before another came into the room for attention and I considered this to be an essential need, when suddenly the door flew open and a young man stood in the doorway. His eyes were wide and I could see that there was trouble afloat, but I didn’t want to interfere as this young man obviously had come to see a doctor and I was only a visitor.

  “I need some attention,” he called out, “There’s something wrong with my balls,” and I looked at Gerard as it was obviously his attention that was needed and I stepped aside to leave the room but as I was going, the young man put his arm out and stopped me, thinking that perhaps I was the doctor, but Gerard interfered telling the young man to drop his trousers and he would see what attention was needed to the parts in question.

  “I need some cream or something,” he shouted, “Something to soothe the itching. I’ve been like this for over a week now and I think I must have caught something,” I left the room and sat outside to await any attention that Gerard might need but everything went quiet and then all of a sudden a voice shouted again and this time it was very angry.

  “Yes, I am a fuckin’queer. I know that, but that’s my business and if you were a proper doctor you would know that queers get this sort of thing, but they need something to soothe it, as I have said,” and when I heard the abusive language in the surgery, I knocked on the door thinking that Gerard might need some assistance but the young man screamed all the more. “I can’t get a fuckin’ horn and my mate is leavin’ me.” he shouted and I went inside and put my hand on his shoulder to try to console him, telling him that I too was a doctor but that Gerard could do everything that was necessary and he sat down and started to cry.

  “It’s no fuckin’ use,” he sobbed, “I’d better go to the VD clinic. They would know what to do as all the fuckin’ doctors there are queers and they know All about it.”

  I told him to lie down on the couch and Gerard applied the necessary cream that would help by soothing and the young man tried to stop Gerard from touching him as if the treatment was more like a massage than anything else as he smiled up into Gerard’s face.

  “Youre getting’ a kick out of this, aint you mate,” he called out and I told him to get dressed and leave the surgery.

  I helped him to leave the place where he imagined he was being ‘assaulted’ and as he left the building, I could see that Gerard was shaking and his hands were trembling.

  “I think I should have stayed in Paris with the job I was good at as this is the last thing I need,” he said as he looked at me with sadness in his eyes. “I could hardly tell that young man that I could understand everything that was wrong with him as I am queer myself, could I?” but I put my arms around Gerard to assure him that the word ‘queer’ does not apply to everyone who may be homosexual and Felix, the only reason I am telling you this is I would like you to understand what Gerard is feeling and if you get any opportunity to speak to him about a similar matter as this, I think he would appreciate the understanding. The life of a good man who is homosexual is very, very difficult, Felix.”

  I was stunned at what Assim had told me and if I had heard this from anyone other than himself, I would have been disgusted and would have gone immediately to the police. I just did not know what to think of the matter and I realized perhaps for the first time what a doctor has to put up with in his treatment of ordinary people. I knew there was nothing I could do even if I met this young offender myself but I thought Assim’s and Gerard’s idea about a receptionist was the best yet and if they had a receptionist outside of the surgery itself, then that receptionist would be able to assess the necessity of someone being treated by the doctor or not... or having to be asked to wait whilst the doctor was busy.

  It was necessary now to advertise for a Receptionist before Gerard could take on any more patients and Assim said he would look into that as he made his way back to the hospital. When Emily came back home that evening I said nothing to her of the ‘happenings’ but I went to bed that night with a sorrow in my heart that I had never experienced for a long time. A young man studies to become a doctor because he wants to help his fellow creature and his fellow creature acts like an animal, was what I thought as I fell into a deep sleep, followed by many nightmares and I was beginning to hate the youth of our day.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Going to my work at the office was normally something that I accepted without question or doubt and yet as I set off in my BMW the morning after I had heard of Gerard’s experience, I felt quite sick. I had always regarded doctors as ‘special people’ with special qualifications to help others and yet I sat at my desk that morning and I hated the world...

  I considered myself to be totally unworthy of being a partner in Assim’s ‘empire’ and I reflected back on my own stupid youth when I thought that I would become a man if I joined a gang and handled a gun. Was I any better than the young man who went into Gerard’s office and demanded attention for something that he had brought on himself?

  Milly came in with a coffee and I tried to smile, but I think she realized that something was not quite right as I had always tried to hide my feelings to anyone around, especially if my feelings were in any way ‘sour’ and they certainly were that morning, but I drank my coffee and smiled at Milly as she left my office.

  The new secretary started her work with ‘gusto’ and took on a lot of old letters that I had written awaiting someone to type them for me and I was glad of that, but when Freddie came in a little later, smiling broadly across his handsome face, I just wanted to walk out of the office and take a long stroll in the park, but I knew I could never do that and I held my peace as Freddie started his happy whistling and looked at me as if the world was a perfect place. I knew that was the case for him and I also knew that I should not interrupt his joy, but when he told me that he thought that he was going to become a father soon, I could have screamed in anger and tell him to shut up.

  What was happening to me, I thought. I am usually a happy type of person, even when things are not going as they should be, but this morning, I was a different person. There was a devil in my soul and I felt as though I was an inhabitant of hell... A devil incarnate and a literal pain in the bloody arse’ to anyone around me... and I was glad that Emily should never know of the life that Gerard had to lead. Matters of that kind are best kept to yourself... and it was the business of no other bugger BUT yourself.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Just when I thought that the world was becoming somewhat sensible in a very restricted sort of sense, I got a telephone call from Celine to tell me that her little baby boy Syd had serious heart trouble and she and Steven were very concerned, but what was worse, Angus had been released from prison and had ganged up with some of the old members of the gang which inclu
ded Travis whom we thought had been converted to Christianity and had become a vicar and Sheba whom Celine knew had been living with some old gang member and had three children with him.

  It was Sheba who got in touch with Celine and Celine was terrified that if Angus found out that she had married Steven, he would go all out to get his revenge. Celine begged me not to give her address to Angus if he got in touch with me and she had already warned Sheba not to give her telephone number to anyone.

  I realized the responsibility I had with the knowledge that Celine had given me and I was careful with any telephone calls or computer mails that came to me by way of the office or otherwise and Emily and I set off to Freddie’s wedding as best man and bridesmaid where everything there was like a dream. Reality went out the window and love was paramount and I was so happy for Freddie. Georgie looked radiant in her wedding attire and I could see by the look on her face as she stood silently at the altar that she would make a wonderful wife and possibly an excellent mother

  Freddie said ‘I DO’ in a clear and happy voice and Georgia said her piece too with energy in abundance and I felt that everyone in that church knew joy and happiness all around.