by David Nobbs
‘You aren’t listening to a word I say,’ said Elizabeth.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I was thinking. What were you saying?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Darling, I’m not one of those male chauvinist pigs who think that the conversation of women consists largely of idle chitter-chatter. I’m sure it was well worth hearing and I’d like to hear it. Now, what did you say?’
‘I said these corned beef.sandwiches aren’t too bad.’
‘Oh. No they aren’t, are they? Not too bad at all. Well, mine isn’t anyway. I can’t speak for yours. But if mine’s nice, it’s hardly likely that yours will be repulsive. Especially as you say it isn’t.’
It was three o’clock. The landlord opened both doors wide. Raw, damp air poured in.
‘What’s wrong?’ said Elizabeth.
‘I’ve had an idea,’ said Reggie. ‘This isn’t the time to tell you about it.’
It was one minute past three. The landlord switched the Xpelair fans on. Cold air blew down their necks.
‘When is the time?’ said Elizabeth.
‘Tonight, after a good dinner,’ said Reggie.
‘That sounds ominous,’ said Elizabeth. ‘Am I going to be so hostile to it?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘Tell me now, then.’
Reggie swallowed nervously.
‘In the bank just now there was an argument,’ he said. ‘I started to think about all the unnecessary hatred and anger and violence in the world.’
‘Come on you lot, haven’t you got homes to go to? What do you think it is? Christmas?’ yelled the landlord.
‘Thank you, landlord,’ Reggie called out. ‘An apt intervention!’
‘Well, go on,’ said Elizabeth. ‘What was your idea?’
Reggie swallowed again.
‘I intend to set up a community, where middle-aged, middle-class people like us can learn to live in love and faith and trust,’ he said.
‘I think that’s a marvellous idea,’ said Elizabeth.
‘People will be able to come for any length of time they like,’ said Reggie over the aforementioned burgundy, at the end of an excellent dinner in Soho. ‘They’ll be able to use it as a commune where they can live in peace and happiness, or as a therapy centre where our staff can help them to find the love and goodness that lurks inside them.’
Their brandies arrived.
‘Where will it be?’ said Elizabeth.
‘Cheers,’ said Reggie.
‘Cheers. It could be anywhere, I suppose.’
‘Absolutely.’
‘An old country house. An island. The Welsh hills. Anywhere.’
Reggie stretched his hand out under the table and patted Elizabeth’s knee affectionately. She had taken the idea of the community better than he had dared to hope, but this was going to be a bitter pill for her to swallow.
‘I’m sorry, old girl,’ he said. ‘But I want to live in an ordinary suburban house in an ordinary suburban street.’
‘Thank God for that,’ said Elizabeth. ‘So do I.’
2 The Recruitment
It didn’t take Reggie and Elizabeth long to realize that Number Twenty-One, Oslo Avenue, Botchley, was the ideal setting in which to begin their immense task. It was, in the eloquent words of Messrs Blunstone, Forrest and Stringer, a spacious detached residence of unusual desirability even for this exceptionally select area of Botchley.
‘Listen to this, darling,’ said Reggie as they entered the hall. ‘ “Accustomed as we are to inspecting three or four properties a day, we were, nevertheless, very greatly surprised on entering this residence to find such an astonishing sense of space, particularly within the Principal Reception Room, the Added Conservatory, the Master Bedroom and the Kitchen Area.” ’
‘Do you have to read from that thing?’ said Elizabeth. ‘Can’t we just look at it for ourselves?’
They walked briskly through the Genuine Hall, pausing only to observe the timbered wainscoting and double-doored integrated cloaks hanging cupboard, and entered the Principal Reception Room.
‘My word,’ said Reggie, ‘this room affords an unrivalled view over the terraced gardens, fringed by a verdant screen of trees that endows the said gardens with a sense of peacefulness which bestows the final accolade on this exceptionally characterful property.’
‘Reggie!’ said Elizabeth.
They admired the integrated double-glazed windows, noted the modern power circuitry with four conveniently sited power access points, and were impressed by the handsome integrated brick fireplace.
Then they entered the Dining Room.
‘Stap me!’ said Reggie. ‘More modern power circuitry, and if this isn’t an intimate yet surprisingly spacious setting for formal and informal dining, I’m the Queen of Sheba’s surprisingly spacious left tit.’
‘Reggie! Please!’ said Elizabeth. ‘I thought you were excited about buying the house.’
‘I am,’ said Reggie. ‘Almost as excited as Messrs Blunstone, Forrest and Stringer.’
They paused briefly to admire the low-level Royal Venton suite and integrated wash-basin in the spacious Separate Downstairs WC, the amply proportioned Study, the splendid Added Conservatory, and the exceptionally commodious kitchen with its Scandinavian-style traditional English fully integrated natural pine and chrome storage units and work surfaces.
Then they went upstairs to the Master Bedroom.
‘Here we find the same impression of spacious living as is afforded throughout the ground floor,’ said Reggie. ‘This handsome room enjoys integrated double-glazing with sliding units, and it is patently obvious that the unusually tasteful decorations are in absolutely pristine order, affording an elegant background to Scandinavian or traditional English sex activities both anal and oral with fully integrated manking about and doing exceptionally spacious naughty things.’
‘It doesn’t say that,’ said Elizabeth.
‘Of course it doesn’t.’
They laughed. Their lips met. A feeling of happiness and tenderness ran through them. For all they cared, the double-floored fully integrated floor-to-ceiling wardrobe units might not have existed.
It was approaching the end of January, and the weather was unseasonably mild. Fruit farmers felt the balmy winds morosely and worried about spring frosts. The going at Market Rasen and Plumpton was ‘good to firm’.
Reggie and Elizabeth took up residence in a relatively cheap hotel in one of the less fashionable parts of Hendon while they waited to move to Botchley.
‘We must husband our resources. I want to pay my staff good salaries,’ Reggie explained over their tagliatelle bolognese in one of the best Italian restaurants in Hendon.
‘What sort of staff are you looking for?’ asked Elizabeth.
‘People who are intelligent, mature, kind and trustworthy,’ said Reggie.
‘How will you find them?’ said Elizabeth.
‘Personal contacts,’ said Reggie. ‘Leave all that to me.’
‘And me?’ said Elizabeth. ‘Where do I come in?’
Reggie poured a little more of the rough carafe wine into Elizabeth’s glass. It was a placatory gesture.
‘I want you to be secretary,’ he said. ‘It’s a very important job. Taking bookings, allocating rooms, handling correspondence. A highly responsible post.’
Their escalopes and chips arrived. On top of each escalope there were three capers and half an inch of anchovy fillet. They each had fifteen chips.
‘I’ve always thought of secretaries of institutions as cool, hard, efficient, grey-haired, sexless,’ said Elizabeth.
‘You’ll be the exception that proves the rule,’ said Reggie.
‘You mean I’m not efficient?’ said Elizabeth.
‘No!’ said Reggie hastily.
She laughed. Both the other customers turned to look. The proprietor beamed.
‘I’m teasing you, darling,’ said Elizabeth.
‘Teasing?’ said Reggie.
‘I’d love to be secretary,’ she said.
Reggie’s recruitment of his first intelligent, mature, kind and trustworthy member of staff had been concluded.
He popped a caper into his mouth.
The recruitment of the second intelligent, mature, kind and trustworthy member of staff took longer.
It was C.J.
Reggie’s former boss at Sunshine Desserts lived at Blancmange Cottage, Godalming. Reggie phoned him from the only un -vandalized phone box in Hendon. It was outside the cemetery. Mrs C.J. answered.
‘I haven’t seen him since October,’ she said. ‘I understood he was last seen dressed as a tramp.’
‘Yes. You mean he . . . he hasn’t been . . . he’s still. . . good God!’
‘Yes. I had a letter from him at Christmas. Shall I read it to you?’
‘Please.’
‘Hang on.’
Light rain fell. A pale, harassed woman came out of the cemetery and stood anxiously outside the phone box. She looked at her wrist although she had no watch. Reggie shrugged. The pips went. He inserted l0p. The woman opened the door.
‘I won’t be long,’ he said.
‘But you aren’t talking,’ she said.
‘The person on the other end has gone to fetch something,’ said Reggie.
‘Only I’m ringing my friend, and she goes out.’
‘I won’t be long,’ said Reggie.
‘Only she’s not well.’
‘I’m very sorry.’
‘No, but it’s her leg, you see.’
‘I’m sorry about her leg, but what can I do?’
‘She’s not well, you see,’ said the woman.
The woman closed the door and waited impatiently. The pips went. Reggie inserted l0p. The woman made an angry gesture and set off down the road.
‘Hello,’ said Mrs C.J. ‘Are you still there?’
‘Yes,’ said Reggie.
‘Sorry to keep you. He says “Dear Mrs C.J. This is to wish you a happy Christmas. I wish I could send you something, but times are hard. I make a bit working the cinema queues. I haven’t much to say. Least said, soonest forgotten. With love, C.J.” ’
‘I see. Good . . . er . . . Good God!’
‘Yes.’
‘Have you tried to find him?’
‘No.’
‘Did you have a happy Christmas?’
‘Wonderful. I spent it with my friends in Luxembourg.’
When Reggie rang off, the harassed woman started to walk back towards the phone box.
A smooth young man got out of a taxi and stepped into the phone box just before she could reach it.
For four days Reggie trudged round the West End cinema queues. The buskers were most varied, but all had one thing in common. They weren’t C.J.
On the fifth day, his travels took him to a fringe cinema in North London. A few earnest young people were waiting to see a double bill of avant-garde West German films. One of them was called L and the other one was called The Amazing Social, Sexual and Political Awakening of the Elderly Widow Blumenthal. The avant-garde youngsters appeared to be mean, impecunious, and sound judges of music. None of them put any money in the cloth cap of the middle-aged man who was strumming his banjo so insensitively, and singing, stiffly and very flat, the following unusual words:
‘Love and marriage,
Love and marriage.
They go together like a horse and carriage.
Dad was told by mother:
I didn’t get where I am today without knowing that you
can’t have one without the other.’
‘It’s good to see you, Reggie,’ said C.J., when they were settled in the Lord Palmerston round the corner.
‘Really?’ said Reggie.
‘Of course,’ said C.J., downing his whisky rapidly. ‘You know what they say. Absence is better than a cure.’
‘Prevention makes the heart grow fonder,’ said Reggie.
‘In a nutshell, Reggie,’ said C.J. ‘Same again?’
‘I’ll get them.’
‘Please!’ said C.J. ‘It’s my round. A few people have been kind enough to reward my efforts with some pennies, enough to buy a whisky and a half of Guinness, anyway.’
Reggie smiled as he watched C.J. at the bar, trying to look dignified in his beggar’s rags. A woman with large holes in her tights thought he was smiling at her, and he stopped smiling rapidly.
‘Cheers’, said Reggie on C.J.’s return.
‘Bottoms up,’ said C.J.
Reggie’s lips felt carefully through the froth to the cool, dark, smooth beer below.
‘So, you’ve stuck at being a tramp, then?’ he said.
‘When I do a thing, I do it thoroughly,’ said C.J. ‘I see it through.’
‘You certainly do, C.J.’
C.J. glanced round the drab, run-down pub as if he feared that the three Irish labourers standing at the bar might be CIA agents.
‘I’ve had enough, Reggie,’ he said quietly. ‘Busking isn’t really my bag.’
‘I imagine not, C.J.’
Reggie took a long sip of his Guinness. He laid the glass down and looked C.J. straight in the eye.
‘I want to offer you a job,’ he said.
‘What is it this time? Another mad idea like Grot? More humiliations for your old boss? More farting chairs?’
‘Grot was a success, C.J., and you had a good job. But even that will be as nothing compared to your future work.’
A young man won the jackpot on the fruit machine.
Reggie described the community that he was going to form.
‘Where will it be? Some sunny off-shore island?’ asked C.J. hopefully.
Twenty-one, Oslo Avenue, Botchley.’
‘Oh.’
The barman came over to their table. He seemed angry.
‘You gave me the wrong money,’ he told C.J. scornfully. ‘You gave me thirty-five pee, three pesetas, two pfennigs and a shirt button.’
C.J. managed to find the correct money, and handed it to the barman.
‘You want to be careful of these types,’ the barman warned Reggie.
Thank you, I will,’ said Reggie.
C.J. pocketed the pesetas, the pfennigs and the shirt button.
‘Mean bloody unwashed long-haired louts,’ he grumbled.
That’s not the way you should talk about them, if you’re joining my community,’ said Reggie.
‘Oh. How should I talk about them if I’m joining your community?’
‘Fascinating, somewhat misguided, rather immature, socially confused excessively serious but potentially highly creative and absolutely delightful mean bloody unwashed long-haired louts,’ said Reggie.
He bought another round, the better to further his persuasion of C.J.
‘What sort of job do you have in mind for me?’ said C.J.
‘I’m not sure yet,’ said Reggie. ‘But I promise you it’ll be worthy of your talents. Come and give it a try. After all, the proof of the pudding is caviar to the general.’
That’s true,’ said C.J. That’s very true. I’m not sure if it’s my line of country, though.’
‘You’ll have board and lodging and a salary of eight thousand pounds a year.’
‘On the other hand, no doubt I could soon adjust to it,’ said C.J.
They shook hands, and Reggie bought another round.
‘When I’ve got my staff together,’ he said, ‘there’ll be a period of training,’
‘Training, Reggie?’
‘We’ll all have to learn how to be nice.’
‘Oh.’
C.J. gazed morosely at his whisky.
‘I didn’t get where I am today by being nice,’ he said.
‘You’ll get used to it,’ said Reggie. ‘Once you are nice, you’ll find that it’s really quite nice being nice.’
‘This free board and lodging, Reggie, where will that be?’
‘Erm . . . with us.’
‘With you? Ah!’
‘There won’t be room for everyone actually in the house,’ said Reggie. ‘Some of you’ll have to live under . . . er . . . canvas.’
CJ.’s hand shook slightly as he lifted the whisky to his lips.
‘Under canvas? You mean . . . in a tent?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good God.’
‘Yes.’
‘Eight thousand pounds?’
‘Yes.’
‘Not that I’d mind, Reggie. It’s Mrs C.J. She’s a different kettle of fish.’
‘She certainly is,’ said Reggie. ‘And you feel that she might be a different kettle of fish out of water?’
‘Exactly. By no stretch of the imagination can Mrs C.J. be described as a frontierswoman.’
‘No.’
‘She’s wedded to her creature comforts, Reggie.’
The eyes of the two men met.
‘I seem to recall that she has friends in Luxembourg,’ said Reggie.
‘Yes. Delightful people.’
‘Luxembourg is delightful.’
‘Absolutely delightful.’
‘All the charms of European civilization in microcosm.’
‘Well put, Reggie.’
Reggie smiled faintly.
‘Perhaps it would be a rather nice gesture if you were to sacrifice your marital pleasures and let her stay in Luxembourg for a while,’ he said.
‘What an excellent idea, Reggie. Just for a few months till we get things straight. You’re on. Consider me recruited.’
‘You’re the first person I’ve come to,’ said Reggie.
‘Ah!’
‘Start at the top.’
‘Quite! Thank you, Reggie.’
‘After Everest, the Mendips.’
‘Absolutely. What? Not quite with you, Reggie.’
‘Perfectly simple,’ said Reggie. ‘If I can make you nice, I can make anybody nice.’
The next intelligent, mature, kind and trustworthy recruit to be signed up by Reggie was Doc Morrissey.
It wasn’t difficult to trace the ageing ex-medico of Sunshine Desserts. Reggie soon discovered that he had installed himself in a bed-sitter in Southall.