The following Saturday evening these strongly felt views were briefly put aside, when that same anglophile, one eye on Lieutenant Uhura, ever fiddling with her numerous knobs and switches 'All hailing frequencies open, Captain' - and the other eye, sizing up the possible chances of landing a cute little number called Sam.
And so it came to pass that the young and inexperienced Gary (not Sam) started to look up to, and respect, the relatively sophisticated and relatively well travelled Simeon Hogg who came across as cultured and cosmopolitan.
Gary Mackenzie lived with Mom and Dad and the four ignorant boorish brothers he hated in 'dullsville', commonplace, suburban Allen Park. Quite naturally, there would have been no hate at all had Gary been limited to their conventional 'All American', clean livin', root-beer and hamburger, baseball, cars, cars, cars, girls, girls, girls - lifestyle. But Gary Mackenzie had discovered wider horizons. By sheer chance, five weeks before, in Hudson's Department Store, on the mezzanine ...
well, in certain quarters, Hudson's mezzanine had quite a reputation. On this occasion Gary met two older men who changed his life forever.
The two introduced him to another two - and so on. A whole new wonderful world opened up. Professionals who went to the opera, to the ballet, to classical concerts spoke to him with respect and treated him as an equal. He was entertained, wined and dined, by well paid executives who lived in beautiful and expensive apartments furnished in antiques. It was all a very long way from 7681 Roosevelt Avenue, Allen Park, Michigan.
During the Mackenzie family dinner, the day before Joe's party, one of the uncouth boys was in baiting mood. Sensitive to Gary's new found values and high aspirations, Chuck Mackenzie engineered an argument about music and said -
"Beethoven's a load a crap!"
The effect, as expected, was verbally explosive. Vicious insults were exchanged over the cheap K-Mart kitchen table. Among a barrage of several other un-manly barbs, Chuck called Gary a 'stuck up ponce' and Gary hit back with his entire stock of words which described rough young hoods with low taste. A few of these critical terms, those known to Chuck, hit their mark. Unfortunately, Gary's most powerful verbal missile 'parochial lout' - missed, because Chuck was not sure of the meaning of the word 'parochial'. Finally, when the two combatants rose to their feet, it started to look as if the angry words would turn to blows. This is when Mom Mackenzie also stood up and stopped play.
Such regular 'sport' was only possible due to the volatile nature of Gary Mackenzie's frenetic personality. He was so easy to wind up when you knew which buttons to push - and his brothers knew all the right buttons. After one of his urbane friends had taken him to see a Shakespearean play in Detroit, Gary developed a morbid hatred of the television set, particularly the popular soaps and endless day-time quiz shows which were littered with frequent banal commercials. So it was now possible to irritate Gary by telling him how he looked just like 'Lurch', a tall gangling creepy butler to the 'Adams Family' - and so on.
Meeting Simeon Hogg was yet another stage in Gary's new education. He listened with admiration when told of educational documentaries, the excellent 'Panorama' programme, serious improving plays and rejoiced when Simeon told him that the English had never even heard of 'Lurch'.
As the years passed by, this original boundary between the respectful younger pupil and the older complacent master became blurred. The deference gradually dissolved and gave way to a slowly creeping equality as the friendship gained a firmer and more sound footing.
Gary Mackenzie had an ever increasing appetite to meet and mingle with the avant-garde, to rub shoulders (or whatever) with the international chic, to soak up more and more high culture. He and Simeon spent time together in New York and London, but Gary extended his travelling to Paris, Rome and Vienna. During one long vacation he stayed in France and learned the language. Gary became a francophile whilst Simeon the tenacious anglophile was, and remained, a francophobe and in general terms - a confirmed xenophobe. This entrenched prejudice aggravated the manic and short fused Gary Mackenzie. He was annoyed with his friend for refusing to holiday in France. Simeon's reasons made Gary furious -
"No! Why should I spend my hard earned money only to have outrageously expensive muddy coffee thrown at me by an insolent anglophobe. Anyway, I want tea. I need tea, but they won't serve tea. They take delight in not serving tea. And why, pray, why should I be mugged each time I hail a taxi in Paris? Now Allen's taxis in Belper ..."
"Oh, for God's sake! Give me strength! Who the hell wants a taxi in Belper? I could scream!" He often did. "You are so narrow minded. Your biased, bigoted world is so pathetically small. When I think of the hours I've wasted waiting for you: you, stooped over a bottomless tea pot, taking endless sips in boring tea shops. And then some stupid old peasant comes shuffling up -
'Shall ya 'ave a drop more 'ot water, dook?'
Then I have to suffer another 20 minutes watching that cup kissin' that irritating, insular, smug, dozy, dopey face ... "
Such tantrums seemed to accompany a sort of frenzied dance of storming to and fro with flaying long arms. Yet, amazingly, the friendship endured throughout the many years surviving these regular dramas which were precipitated by the vast gulf of temperament between the calm and stolid Hogg and the impatient gesticulating Mackenzie. Gary was all go. He was all energy and highly sexed. Simeon could sleep for eight hours and more. Gary, ever busy hunting, clocking up the tricks, had little time for sleep and accused Simeon of wasting his time in the safe bath houses in which there were -
"... too many creepy old men, and so God awful depressing. Why the hell can't you go to the bars like any normal guy - or live a little. Get ya ass to Palmer Park ..."
"Oh yes, where Marie was arrested last year!"
"Marie's a slut, she'd been there five hours ... So what! Police raid, once in a while, an occupational hazard."
"You seem to forget that my occupation is that of a teacher, not a taxi driver."
"This is Detroit! This is not Derbyshire. Get your head into Detroit. Three murders a day. The newspapers have more important things to report. Palmer Park. Go there tonight. It's the vice squad's night off - trust me. In bed at 10.30! That's ridiculous. That's pathetic. That is sad! Swing on that bar under the Henry Ford statue - great stuff: or go to the 'meat rack'. Live some. Life is passing you by, Simeon. In three years time you'll be 30. Who'll want to touch you then? Are you listening? Is anybody there? Oh, what's the use!"
Behind these lively exchanges, there was a subtle reason why acrimony never actually boiled over into real resentment. It was so subtle that neither party was really conscious of it. It was this: Simeon was entertained by the tantrums. Simeon enjoyed winding up Gary and watching him whirl around the room with fire coming out of his mouth and steam coming out of his ears. On the other hand, Simeon was a rock of stability in Gary's fast and precarious life. Simeon Hogg was always there for him.
One day the secretary of a proctologist phoned up Mrs Mackenzie complaining about her son's unpaid medical bills. It did not take long for Mom to find out what a 'proctologist' did, and a can of worms was opened at 7681 Roosevelt Ave, a 'Christian house', which resulted in the swift ejection of one 'degenerate son'. Simeon was there to receive the suddenly homeless Gary, but Gary knew that he would not be welcome for very long, especially, after the 'Tom Cruise look-a-like' incident. This was a typical Mackenzie one-night-stand, a gorgeous Canadian hunk who made himself very agreeable and displayed oodles of charm at the dinner table. Unfortunately he took it into his head to leave Gary's bed and Simeon's home in the dead of night, but, alas, did not leave Simeon's wallet. Under extreme duress, Gary quickly found himself a small cheap apartment in north Highland Park which was very handy for frequent visits into Palmer Park.
" ... So quit ya broodin'." ranted Gary in his new home. "I'll never hear the end of this one. Thank God he didn't take ya precious Cadillac. That thing's an affront to common-sense and the ecology ... an you rushin' to ya Billy Fury records.
What a joke. Who the hell's ever heard of Billy Fury anyway, as if that guy would want one!"
Gary always remained a taxi driver. If he never went to college, it was not for want of intelligence, it was for the want of concentration and staying power. His nocturnal activities always came first. Gary was self educated. He tried to educate Simeon Hogg into an appreciation of fine art. These attempts usually ended in failure and biting recriminations -
" ... and I was horribly embarrassed in front of Hank and Randy when you thought that Nureyev was a Russian car! You were bored out of your skull last Tuesday sittin' through that Fellini movie."
"You didn't understand it either!" snapped Simeon. "Oh no, don't deny it. That was amply demonstrated at the start when there was no sound. Of course the folks around us thought there was a technical fault and were ever likely to start to grumble. But you didn't have to attack them and call them 'a bunch of ignorant peasants' insisting that it was supposed to be silent. And what happened next?"
"Well, we can all make mistakes ..."
"It flashed on the screen - 'We apologise for the temporary loss of sound' - my turn to be embarrassed. I thought those teenage girls would never stop giggling. And another thing, I'm through with your high-brow obscure composers. Who was that appalling guy I had to suffer for two hours?"
"Bartok," said Gary, "Bela Bartok."
"Oh well, if I must be afflicted by another wretched concert with Hank and Randy, let it be at least a composer I've heard of - Bach or Handel, I can just about cope with Baroque."
"'Pearls cast before swine'! That's you isn't it? Don't think Hank didn't notice you fidgeting, yawning and sighing. So God-awful rude. Baroque! You can't be serious? Martha and the Vandellas is more your speed."
Chapter 21
Butch Numbers and Bitchy Queens
Two old friends sat facing each other: the younger sad, the older elated. Gary Mackenzie was sorry to be losing the companion who had been around for most of his adult life. Over dinner, the talk was about the immediate future in which Simeon Hogg became nostalgic about his English past, boyhood friends and a lost world of green hills, wooded valleys and lush dales. Throughout the years, Gary had occasionally heard about the intriguing mysterious disappearance of Brian Forrester and now, once again, his ever home-sick British friend agonised over the various possibilities. Impulsive as ever, Gary blurted out a suggestion which was aimed at keeping him in the company of his friend for some time longer.
"Why don't we go over there together and look for Brian?"
This proposition was startling in its simplicity, but designed to conform with Simeon's present mood to leave the USA as soon as possible. During the last three decades at the same Detroit taxi company, Gary had proved reliable and built up a strong tenure with his employer who had come to accept the demands for long summer vacations at short notice. Each spring it was understood that Gary would 'quit', but each fall he was always re-hired. Gary was valuable. Regarding the vast expanse of Metropolitan Detroit, he certainly had 'the knowledge' - in more ways than one. He was a good and experienced driver (if somewhat aggressive at times) who could be relied upon to safely convey his passengers near and far: even as far as any major hotel in Chicago or New York. Driving through Manhattan filled Simeon Hogg with horror; it filled Gary with joy.
Gary argued that his imagination, bravery and radical thinking could be useful at this critical moment in his more cautious friend's life. Furthermore, both men were Agatha Christie fans. Here was an opportunity for adventure.
"Why not? We're as good as the next guy! Let's live a little. Let's poke around and see what we can turn up. You've always wanted to show me Derbyshire."
During July and August, typically, Gary would allocate three or four weeks for UK touring with his friend, but this had never included the Peak District. London usually received the lion's share, and most of that in nocturnal adventures on Hampstead Heath which animated and exhilarated the over sexed taxi driver - but left the respectable schoolmaster a nervous wreck! Notwithstanding, the latter honestly admitting being pleasurably drained by a great time, but, at the unacceptable cost of a good night's sleep, dodging the CID and any marauding homophobic yobs.
During the balance of the summer recess, Gary would 'tear up' The Continent and, as usual, Simeon Hogg based himself in 'the sticks' with his Aunty Joyce at Bog Hole in Horsley Woodhouse. This he had done nearly every year since 1965. After the excitement and sophistication of Gary and London, the humble rustic village of Simeon's coal mining heritage was comfortable and safe. Here in this quiet old fashioned backwater of southern Derbyshire, where stress was apparently unknown, he recharged his batteries in order to face the fast moving United States and the students and staff of Dwight D Eisenhower High School in September.
By 1965, Joyce Hogg, a maiden lady, was alone, very much alone having lost her aged parents. Simeon's visits to Grandma and Granddad in the 1950's were a form of sanctuary in the gentle company of a primeval trio. In this cosy, kind, contented narrow habitat he was, for a time, safe: safe from the ongoing cruelties and horrors of Mundy Street Boys School to which, eventually, he would have to return.
Grandma's face under her grizzled hair was deeply etched in leathery wrinkles, rather like the wizened apples she occasionally offered. Granddad was affectionately recalled as a great ancient man, deeply settled in a shapeless comfortable easy chair, amid a haze of blue smoke emitting a nostalgic smell from that old pipe. A well earned rest following a lifetime labouring in the bowels of the earth. After a smile of greeting he had very little to say to his young visitor.
At 78, Joyce Hogg was very old, but then she had always been old. Back in 1955 at the age of 30, she was old. Never seen with make-up, dressed in a dowdy old fashioned style, she absorbed the influences and old thinking of her parents, spoke and moved slowly with a slight stoop. Not actually stupid, but her mind had never been challenged having such limited experiences of people, travel and the wider world. Apart from an annual holiday with her parents to Skegness or Blackpool, perhaps an odd Saturday afternoon in Derby, Joyce Hogg had hardly been out of Horsley Woodhouse - indeed she had hardly been outside of Bog Hole. Joyce was old, but Joyce was loved by her grateful nephew. He had been generously provided with an annual comfortable summer home for the previous thirty eight years. The back bedroom, once occupied by her beloved parents, was now referred to as 'Arr Simeon's Room', and had a pleasant view over to the village of Denby and beyond to the more distant hills of the north.
Bog Hole or Bog 'ole, (as it was called locally) sounded like a slum, but it was not a slum. It was a row of six terraced houses just to the north of the village centre which had always been dominated by the Hogg family. The accommodation was a simple Victorian 'two up, two down' design, purpose built by a coal owner for his colliers.
Gary's desire to take an early vacation with a view to solving a 43 year old enigma appealed to the newly liberated teacher. Simeon was genuinely fond of his energetic, permanently over-wound friend and was touched by this sudden demonstration of affection. However, the staid old schoolmaster was not too naive to recognise within himself, elements of the mischievous schoolboy. Like the evil scientist, he desired to bring together dissimilar substances to enjoy an explosive effect. The outgoing, forward-looking, forward-thinking Gary Mackenzie, eager to grasp the 21st century, could not have been more different from the insular, backward-looking, backward-thinking inhabitants of Bog Hole, eager to cling onto the values of the 19th century. Inwardly, Simeon rubbed his hands with malicious pleasure at the prospect of Gary meeting such types as Aunty Joyce, Uncle Wilf and Aunty Nelly and, best of all ... the Ducks!
This impish streak had long since existed in the relationship between the two. Gary had a horror of outrageous effeminate men which, in turn, tempted Simeon to engineer roguish methods to bring his intolerant companion into the camp of the camp. The Saugatuck incident was a good example. At this well known very active resort, near Chicago on the east side of Lake Mic
higan, somewhere in the dunes, Simeon fished out, as Gary would term - " ... one of your freaks."
This turned out to be a screaming little black queen known as 'Bun Bun' who frequently referred to herself as 'This Lady!' From Simeon's point of view, shaking with laughter, the introduction was a huge success. There was poor Gary, of stony countenance, sitting on his towel on the main beach, helplessly watching this 'attention grabbing' hullabaloo - a one queen mini circus. Bun Bun danced and pranced around him, wriggling her back side, thrusting out her already prominent begging buttocks, yelling out in a thick Negroid accent -
"Yea Babe! You is some sweet meat! Ooo oo oo! Hunky honky. Tasty honky. Ooo, This Lady - she hungry - yeah. This Lady is one hot slut! Bun Bun ready for action. She want fillin' - yeah! Ooo oo oo!!"
The outrageous trollop continued to caper and orbited Gary's towel about three more times in her bizarre war-dance-come-love-dance, pre-sex ritual. Diplomacy was the only defence. Bun Bun was thanked for her kind interest but this particular 'hunk' was resting after a busy morning combing the dunes -
"Perhaps some other time?"
The retreating figure of a disappointed little Bun Bun, moving just ahead of her eye-catching, protrusive, rhythmic rump, minced across the sand and disappeared into the deep shadows of a thicket of coarse shrubbery - ever onwards, ever hunting, ever hopeful to find Prince Charming. This is when the volcano erupted.
"How dare you! How dare you bring that vile excrescence near my person." Gary had heard the word 'excrescence' for the first time just an hour before. It was used by a cultured gentleman he had come across during his wanderings around the dunes. The bawling-out continued -
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