S.O.S.

by Joseph Connolly

  And here he was now – face aglow and eyes alight: the flush that came over him with a well done good job firmly under his belt.

  ‘All cargo shipshape and Bristol fashion, Captain Honey-bunch!’ he reported quite impishly – and ohhhh … look at him, look: saluting her like that, and standing to attention. ‘Come on, Aggie – let’s get sat.’

  ‘Oh Nobby – I’m so excited.’

  ‘Gets better, doesn’t it? Every single time it gets better and better. Listen up, Aggie: where will we be? Two hours’ time?’

  Aggie squeezed his fingers, and her face was taut and shiny.

  ‘On our ship, Nobby – on our ship.’

  ‘You’re right, Captain Honeybunch – you’re dead on the money. Here – you take the window seat, love.’

  ‘Oh no, Nobby – I don’t mind.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, love – here, get yourself in. Here’s your Woman’s Realm. And tell me, Captain – what’ll it be when we get to cabin number four-oh-two-oh, Six Deck?’

  Aggie just held his hand and felt her eyes prick with the spike of tears as they glittered with happiness and the wash of peace at being with Nobby, and going to their ship.

  ‘All plain sailing, Nobby. From there on in.’

  Nobby slumped down on to the seat beside her, just as the train began to inch forward. He patted her hand.

  ‘You’re not wrong, Aggie. You’re not wrong, lass.’

  *

  Dwight was finding it pretty hard to get his mind around this here – hard, you know, to believe that these two dumb carrot juices, my one tuh-mayto juice and some kinda take on a non-alco bullshot could be costing me, sheesh, pretty much twenny of your British pounds sterling. That’s what’re we talking? Thirty bucks? Maybe more. On board the ship, everything’s in dollars, yeah? You’re hip to the deal. But in London – and I ain’t been here since when? Not since Suki was born, that’s for goddam sure – you gotta get used to their pounds, and plus you gotta say stuff like ten peas and not crack up, you know what I’m saying? OK – so we’re in Harrods? Big deal: I know, sure, Harrods ain’t known to be nobody’s patsy when it comes down to stacking up the chips time: we ain’t talking thrift shop – but hey, get real! Thirty bucks for a buncha liquidized salad? Hell, I didn’t even want no damned tuh-mayto juice – but it’s Charlene and the kids, they dragged me here. Charlene says it’s good for my bowels, the tuh-mayto (and easy on the War-sister-shire soss) – she says it all the time; it’s like my bowels are getting to be a kinda thing with her? She’s talking innards so darn much I guess I ain’t even hearing the half of it – and then you see the face on some guy, like right now, sitting around this crazy juice bar, and you’re going inside Ay Caramba! – she’s doing it again. Me, I said to them – hey guys, they got here this Green Man? Like – old traditional London pub? Mo was telling me, back home one time. Maybe we could grab us a couple glasses of their bitter beer? Enough, already (Charlene, right?): last night you’re making with the Jack Daniel’s like there ain’t no dawn about to rise. What you’re needing, Dwight – you hear me? – is fresh-squeezed fruit. You gotta be kind to your bowels, Dwight: your time of life, you gotta be thinking of your bowels, boy. Yeah right – and like, Charlene, maybe you should try and get your head around some other damn thing once in a while, OK? But hey: Charlene’s Charlene – what can I tell ya?

  ‘Hey, Dad?’

  ‘What’s on your mind, Earl? You wannanother juice you can just forget about it, kay? These prices I could buy me up a ranch – mash up my own damn carrots.’

  ‘Naw – I was just kinda wondering, now we’re in the Harrods store? Can we take in, like, the sportswear? Like I need these real neat – ’

  ‘You don’t need nothing, Earl.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Suki. ‘Damn right.’

  ‘Hey!’ gasped out a deep-affronted Earl, clutching his chest as if he’d just met with a soft-nosed slug from a Magnum .45. ‘Give me a break, here, OK?’

  ‘Your sister’s right – listen to your father,’ said Charlene (Gee, thought Dwight – she’s agreeing with me: what is this? Thanksgiving?). ‘What about all that buncha stuff from Hong Kong?’

  ‘Yehhhh,’ sneered Suki. ‘What are we, Earl? Some kind of a catwalk model? You wanna get a facial?’

  The edges of Earl’s mouth turned down flat, and his eyes went dull.

  ‘Suki – listen, OK? Like – take a hike?’

  ‘And Capetown,’ went on Charlene. ‘Miss? Miss? Excuse me? Can I get a toothpick? I thank you. In Capetown too, Earl, you recall? Whole pie-la stuff. So enough, already – kay? Just cool it.’

  ‘Aw c’mon, Mom …!’

  ‘You heard your mother,’ concluded Dwight. ‘C’mon, guys – we got maybe, what? Couple hours before the train. What say we take in some sights? One week we’re back in New York – last chance saloon, guys.’

  ‘We’re in Harrods, right?’ checked Suki. ‘Like – I thought this was the sight? Like – this is it, no?’

  ‘C’mon! Hey, Suki!’ And Dwight was really looking deep at her, you know? Like, really needing an answer, here? ‘You gotta be kidding me, right? There’s … jeez, what is there? There’s London Castle and Big Ben’s clock and Her Majesty’s Palace and some kinda other thing – oh no, that’s maybe in Edinborrow, that thing I’m thinking. Anyways, all I’m saying is there’s like two thousand years of heredity here.’

  ‘Yeh well,’ said Suki. ‘We ain’t about to do two thousand years in a couple hours, right?’

  ‘Yeh – right,’ agreed Earl. ‘So why don’t we just check out the sportswear, man? Why you guys giving me such a hard time?’

  ‘Enough, already, with the sportswear, Earl,’ said Charlene, with emphasis. ‘One thing I do want, though, Dwight sweetie – I gotta just take in the paddery.’

  And both Suki and Earl hurled up their eyes and heads to the gorgeously decorated ceiling above them and groaned out loud, and with real true feeling – Suki branching out on her own towards the close of it, and tacking on a selection of retching noises, as her eyes were crossing and her cheeks billowed out. Dwight was silent, but he was tapping an impatient finger on the edge of his billfold (I’m waiting for change, here, and I don’t believe I’m in the mood for leaving no gratooity).

  ‘Aw Godsake, Mom!’ roared out Earl.

  ‘Earl! Keep it down,’ cautioned Charlene. ‘Like – people are looking?’

  ‘Dad – you tell her,’ Earl went on – I suppose, yeah, a couple decibels down. ‘Everyplace we’ve been, right, Mom’s with the paddery. Every time we got offa that ship it’s, like – paddery time? We got – in Hong Kong, right? How much goddam paddery we get in Hong Kong? And Bangkok? It’s like the ship is gonna sink with all the paddery we got.’

  ‘They’re lovely pieces,’ put in Charlene.

  ‘Yeh but Mom,’ Suki eagerly interjected – her eyes wide with What-is-she? Nuts? And flipping all her fingers, as if to cool them down or dry them off. ‘How many – oh my God I’m gonna, like, barf – lovely pieces can one home stand? You know? Like – that vace, yeah? From Thailand? It’s taller than I am, Mom! Be real, here.’

  ‘Maybe, Charlene,’ said Dwight, quietly, ‘enough with the paddery, huh?’

  ‘Oh but Dwight, honey – it’s Harrods we’re in now, yeah? It’s a whole different ball game – like, major league? I mean, England – they’re into real high-class paddery big time. There’s the Wedgwood and the Royal War-sister-shire – ’

  ‘What?’ queried Suki. ‘Like in what? Kinda soss bowls?’

  Charlene was maybe thrown just a tad. ‘Kinda,’ she briskly agreed, before resuming the barrage of must-haves. ‘And Doolton – that’s Royal Doolton, guys, like in the Queen? And is it Spood?’

  ‘I reckon,’ reckoned Dwight, ‘it’s Spade, no?’

  ‘Maybe,’ growled Earl with mischief, ‘we’re talking Speed here, yeh?’

  ‘Earl!’ was all Charlene was going to say. ‘Don’t laugh, Suki. It ain’t funny. So what say, gang
? Just, like, we look it over real fast, yeah? Kay?’

  ‘Waaaaal … OK …’ agreed Dwight; well of course Dwight agreed – what was he gonna do? Like, maybe – disagree? Sure – he could go down that route, but look at it – any which way, baby, and they were due to take in the English paddery, and you better depend on it. ‘OK – quiet, Earl; quit with the pukey noises, Suki. OK, Charlene – we check it out …’ but Godsake, huh? Keep it small, OK? Like – eggcups? Believe me, honey – read my lips: we gadda ladda paddery.’

  ‘Sure. I can pre-shate that. Hey, kids – let’s hit it. You got the check, Dwight?’

  Dwight nodded. ‘Waiting for my change.’

  ‘Oh Godsake, Dwight? Leave the girl the few cents! What’re we? Poor all of a sudden?’

  ‘We will be,’ grunted Dwight, ‘once it’s you with the English paddery.’

  ‘Naw!’ guffawed Earl. ‘Like, Mom’s getting just this one real cool little eggcup – right, Mom?’

  ‘We’ll see,’ rejoined Charlene, quite primly. ‘Dwight – you didn’t drink your tuh-mayto.’

  ‘The tuh-mayto I don’t need.’

  ‘Your bowels are needing it, Dwight – you gotta treat’ em real good.’

  ‘I’ll treat you real good instead, Charlene. OK, people – c’mon: let’s do this thing. We make with the paddery, and then we hit the road.’

  (And it ain’t, Charlene, just a few cents: we’re talking one pound and toward ninety of your lousy goddam British peas.)

  *

  Sammy was hunkered down, squaring his shoulders and bracing his knees, ready to hoist up and stow another case of Gevrey-Chambertin 1997; it’s on the list as ’96, but God – all that vanished in no time: I don’t think too many people will notice (query it, anyway). The ’97’s good too, though maybe not so forward.

  ‘I like a lot about this job,’ he muttered, swinging aloft the case and shelving it – leaving it to Jilly to neaten things up and nudge it over to meet its neighbour. ‘But by this stage, you know – I’ve really had enough of the heaving.’

  ‘Last leg,’ smiled Jilly. ‘Well – till Jamaica, anyway.’

  Sammy smiled as he leant across to kiss her.

  ‘OK – let’s start in on the champagne. It’s amazing, isn’t it? Amazes me, anyway – amount of booze these people put away.’

  ‘They’re on holiday. Off the leash.’

  ‘I suppose it’s that. But Christ – every time I think I’ve got the bar packed solid, I turn around and the bloody thing’s empty again. And this week’s always the worst. It’s the English contingent.’

  ‘Well it’s a kind of a trip of a lifetime, isn’t it? They don’t want it to end. It’s all farewells and toasts and ‘let’s have another bottle’ stuff, isn’t it? And remember, some of these people have been here right from the very beginning – must be like home, in some weird way. I think they’re crazy, quite frankly. I mean, OK – so have we, but we’re paid to, aren’t we? It’s our job. But why do you want to spend nearly four months stuck on a ship? It’s crazy, isn’t it? And the funny thing is – have you noticed, Sammy? The funny thing is that the posher the, you know – cabin, and everything, the less likely they ever are to leave. That, what are they? Egyptian family up in the King’s Suite – ’

  ‘Oh them. Apparently they own half the country, or something.’

  ‘Yeh – I heard that. Anyway – them. They haven’t disembarked once, pretty sure. That’s what Jaffa told me. All these amazing places we’ve docked in and all they do is just sit there, ordering up room service. I mean – they can do that in Egypt, can’t they? I think they must be mad. Is there any more Heidsieck, Sammy? Only we’ve got room for, don’t know – five, maybe half a dozen more.’

  ‘We’ve got Red Label, yeah. Well – no danger of all that ever happening to us, is there Jilly? Not on what we earn.’

  ‘Money’s not bad, Sammy. Best thing is, when you’re cooped up on board all the time, there’s nowhere to spend it. We’ll have just zillions by the end.’

  ‘Yeh but look – we agreed, didn’t we?’

  ‘Oh Sammy – don’t be a drag.’

  ‘We agreed. Didn’t we, Jilly? Agree?’

  ‘Yesssss …’

  ‘Well then. If we don’t save – ’

  ‘I know, I know, I know – we’ll never get our foot on the first rung of the property ladder. I know, Sammy – I know. What I don’t get is why it’s so bloody important: why can’t we just rent? In France – ’

  ‘Because if you just rent – oh God, Jilly: you know all this. If you just rent, well – you’re throwing away good money, aren’t you? End up with nothing.’

  ‘Except maybe a bloody good time instead of a thirty-year mortgage.’

  Sammy shoved across a case of Heidsieck, and grinned at her as he laid one flat hand across his heart.

  ‘One day, sweet damsel, when you are my wife of forty summers – you, our ten children and frankly countless and teeming grandchildren – ’

  ‘Oh Sammy!’ shrieked Jilly, her eyes glistening – two fingers just touching the tip of her nose.

  ‘Then, my dear – as you survey the moated castle and its extensive and landscaped grounds, you will thank me, most humbly.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Right. That’s a date. And in the meantime?’

  ‘In the meantime? In the meantime we hump these bloody cases of wine and store up our pennies like squirrels.’

  ‘Squirrels are cleverer – they don’t care about pennies. Live in trees.’

  ‘Nuts. Think of your pennies as nuts.’

  ‘You’re nuts, Sammy. You know that? You’re completely barking crazy.’

  ‘That’s why you love me. I’ve got one more case down here and then that’s the end of it. Then we do the gin and vodka.’

  ‘You know what Jaffa was telling me?’ piped up Jilly, quite brightly.

  ‘No – what? Actually, Jilly – why do you always call him that?’

  ‘Stewart? Because he’s always got that orange face on. His dopey fake suntan. You know, I think he actually believes that people see him as some sort of, I don’t know – Bondi Beach Adonis, or something. All bronzed and sun-bleached blond. Looks more like a poodle, I think.’

  ‘Stewart’s all right. Or at least he will be if he makes it. I think sometimes, you know, he’s headed for some kind of breakdown, or something. Have you ever seen him when he’s grinning like mad with the punters and giving out balloons and dancing away with all those ancient women – and then he suddenly turns away and, Christ – the look on his face, it’s so … don’t really know how to describe it …’

  ‘Dark? Sort of scowling? Yeh – I’ve seen that.’

  ‘Murderous, more like … Real sort of Jekyll and Hyde do.’

  ‘Jesus, Sammy – you’re scaring me, now. I have to work with him, remember.’

  ‘Oh – he’s safe enough. Anyway – not long now. If he can survive over three months of this, another couple of weeks won’t kill him.’

  ‘So long as he doesn’t take it into his head to go around killing anyone else. Like me, for instance.’

  ‘Nah,’ joshed Sammy. ‘I’d kill him if he did.’

  ‘Oh gee shucks thanks. How much gin is there?’

  ‘Bout … twenty cases, looks like.’

  ‘Oh yeh – that’s what I was going to say. Old Jaffa-face Stewart was giving me the rundown on how much of all this stuff we actually go through on one of these cruises. It’s just unbelievable!’

  ‘Nothing would amaze me. I seem to be pouring drinks non-stop all day and all night. It’s almost as if they feel it’s all got to be used up, or something. And it’s not exactly cheap, is it? I mean the mark-up’s just wicked. And it’s not like the food – I mean I know they never stop stuffing themselves with food, but that’s all in with the ticket, isn’t it? Drink isn’t, that’s for sure. God, you know – apart from the meals … John in cabin service was telling me, one time – you know John?’

  ‘Oh yeah – tall guy? Goofy
ears?’

  ‘No no – my height. Ginger hair. Think you’re thinking of Cyril, pretty sure his name is. Anyway – John was saying that there is just no such thing as a quiet time, down there. Twenty-four hours a day, that phone is ringing – tea, sandwiches, steaks, pasta … one bloke orders a whole bloody lobster at three a.m., every single night, if you can believe it. And José – José, yes? Duchess Grill? Anyway, according to José, that’s exactly what the guy has for his dinner! I’m telling you, we’re afloat with a shipful of loonies.’

  ‘It does sometimes seem like that. But that’s exactly what I mean about all the booze. Jaffa says the whole ship gets through about two hundred bottles of champagne every single day.’

  ‘That doesn’t actually seem that much, to me. Sixteen hundred passengers, after all. How much beer?’

  ‘Oh God – something like three thousand bottles of that, pretty sure. You wonder where they put it all. And a thousand packets of fags. We’re talking every day, Sammy – can you believe it? Bloody expensive route to suicide, these cruises.’

  ‘Mm. The cost of dying. But tastefully done,’ smiled Sammy. ‘Right. Let’s do the vodka – about eight million gallons of that and then, God – I’d really love a cuppa.’

  Jilly was thoughtful. ‘Oh yes – ever so tastefully done …’ she agreed. ‘Here – that’s another thing Jaffa was telling me: do you know what we go through most of? Over two million, every single year?’

  ‘Two million? Blimey. Dunno. Tea bags?’

  ‘Not close. Nowhere near.’

  ‘Assistant Cruise Directors?’

  ‘Silly! Be serious.’

  ‘OK. Eggs?’

  ‘Eggs are far less – quarter of a million, tops. Give up?’

  ‘Yeh – go on, then: stun me.’

  Jilly leaned forward and held on to Sammy’s forearms: her eyes were urging him to listen and learn.