Captain Cat

by David Shaw

an idiot. How about taking a walk outside?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  (intrigued)

  Sure, OK.

  DAVE DAVENPORT - NARRATION

  We went out into the hospital grounds together, side by side, arm in arm but definitely not holding hands. Not even when we walked into the trees. There was far too much risk of being seen indulging in what the Army would definitely have called 'inappropriate' behaviour between different ranks.

  (FX: wind in trees, birds singing)

  MARIE LEE

  Your time here in this hospital is almost finished, Dave. You know that. And I can't help you through the next step. Moving back into civilian life and getting a job.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  (rather sadly)

  Yes, I know.

  MARIE LEE

  But maybe I can make a suggestion. Even if it sounds pretty wild. I suppose you're wondering why I've been talking about perfumes so much?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Well, now you mention it: hell,yes.

  MARIE LEE

  OK, it's because you're young, personable, good looking and this thing you're developing with poetry can sometimes be very effective. Romantic even, when it comes from a wounded warrior. Do you get what I'm saying?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  No. It all sounds great, mind, the way you're telling it, but I don't get your point.

  MARIE LEE

  Dave, the point is that I can see you being pretty successful as a salesman for female orientated products. And since you're sense of smell is developing so much, maybe you should think about selling perfumes and scents.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  (Sounding stunned}

  Duh!

  DAVE DAVENPORT -- NARRATION

  I was completely gob smacked. I'd heard some pretty strange ideas in my time but this was about as weird as becoming a professional big game hunter in Regent's Park.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Me, a perfume salesman?

  MARIE LEE

  Of course you'd have to learn about the technical background as well as memorising a whole catalogue of smells. You know, the same way a wine taster learns the taste of lots of different wines. But I think you could do it -- if you really wanted to.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Are we talking door to door selling here?Or out on the street with a tray around my neck and a sign 'Ex-soldier with guide dog to support'.

  MARIE LEE

  Drop the self pity, Dave. I don't want to hear it. What I'm saying is that women, rich fashionable women, they go to experts for advice on their clothes, their cosmetics, their shoes, their hairstyles. Why wouldn't they go to an expert for advice on their perfumes and scents?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Women coming to me? Well, that sounds a lot better than sitting at a factory bench all day putting disabled worker stickers on hand made toothbrush holders.

  Marie, you really think it might work out? I know there are male hairdressers and male fashion designers, but I thought they were mostly gay. I guess that's how they can work out what woman want to spend their money on. But with my background?

  MARIE LEE

  Don't worry, there are probably a lot of women around who'd enjoy meeting you. The desperate ones, anyway.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Mad, and ready to be madly mated, maybe?

  MARIE LEE

  In your dreams, boy. So are you ready to give it a try?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Yeah, sure. All I have to is to fill out the necessary forms under the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act of 2004. I, Dave Davenport, hereby resign from the Special Air Service in order to learn all about female body odours, both natural and simulated. Please give me my full payout so I can become the full bottle on perfumes. Yours sincerely, the resident nut case in ward five.

  MARIE LEE

  Don't worry about the red tape, sire, I have a cunning plan.

  DAVE DAVENPORT -- NARRATION

  Well, did she ever! Marie read me a notice next day, one she'd written for the staff bulletin board at the hospital. All about how I wanted to become quote a fragrance expert unquote. I felt like curling up in embarrassment at the thought of that getting around the place. But that was only the thin end of it because the second half of the message asked the nurses to pass on any almost empty perfume bottles they had to me! So I could sniff them, memorise the smells and compare them to what was on the bottles' labels.

  If it had been anyone else but Marie telling me this, telling me she was were going to put up this guff for everybody to read, I'd have gone ballistic. My water jug would have got thrown around instead of a bunch of grapes.

  But I couldn't spit the dummy with Marie. Not after everything she'd done for me. So I sat there and smiled and told her I thought it was a brilliant idea. The only faint hope I had of toning her down a bit was to warn her that maybe just talking to the other nurses would be smarter than putting up a notice. The Army isn't fond of people generating paperwork about unconventional ideas. Not on its premises, anyway.

  Marie did let me talk her around on that, at least. So, no notice but she would put the bite on the nurses for some bottles I could wave around underneath my nose and get dreamy about. So many scents, so many women.

  Put that way, it didn't seem such a bad idea after all.

  Of course, at that stage I didn't even know if it was possible to memorise smells. I mean, everybody does remember smells, but mostly we don't know we've remembered them until we get a whiff of them again. If that makes sense. It's not an area where words work very well. Everybody knows the difference between the aroma of a bunch of lavender and frying bacon, but how could you describe the difference to somebody who'd never smelt either?

  No, I've no idea either. So it was all completely new territory for me. Double new, because Marie arranged to have each scent bottle label transposed into braille, so I was learning to read with my fingers at the same time I was trying to allocate some brain cells to each different blend of fragrances.

  You'd think that would make it harder but actually it helped, learning the two skills together. I guess what gave me confidence though was how I soon learned to do the same thing with some of the other nurses that I could do with Marie. One sniff and I knew which one it was, her name and everything. No braille training allowed with them though, more's the pity.

  Mind you, I soon realised some of the nurses were deliberately making it easier for me by putting on a few extra dabs before they came near me. Which became the first lesson I learnt for myself about scent: too much perfume is definitely too much perfume

  Anyway, all that learning and remembering business suddenly got pushed to one side within a week. Because what neither Marie nor I had ever suspected was that she'd started a fire in a fireworks factory. What happened, we found out later, was that one or two of the nurses began phoning friends who were nurses in the big civilian hospitals in the city. And what did they do when they phoned but ask for more perfume bottles for Dave Davenport to sample?

  So the story about the crazy ex-soldier who wanted to become a perfume expert soon got around the city medical profession . The media picked up on it in about ten seconds. Which was why I got a phone call out of the blue asking me to do an on-screen interview for Channel Eleven TV.

  The big problem was that the TV guys had heard all about Marie as well. They wanted to know if it was true that the perfume business had really been Captain Lee's idea. That was tricky.

  Sure, I wanted to tell the truth about Marie. I'd have been happy to tell the whole world that she was a woman and a nurse in a million. The problem was that the Army is a total control freak organization when it comes to publicity. Especially the kind of publicity that doesn't fit into any standard PR template. So I just said that I couldn't say anything about anybody else without their permission.

  As it turned out Marie was contacted by Channel 11 the same time I was and immediately agreed to do a joint interview with me. Her attit
ude was that as long as we both said what a wonderful job the military was doing in looking after me, there'd be no problems with the Army brass.

  Which was good enough for me, because I was scared witless at the idea of appearing on TV. I was going to need the best nursemaid I could get, and that described Marie exactly. As I found out as soon as we started talking about our little TV gig.

  MARIE LEE

  What are you going to wear for the interview, Dave? Have you got a suit?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  A suit? No, T-shirts and jeans are the only civilian clothes that I've got right now.

  MARIE LEE

  Well, they won't do. If you're hoping to get into the fashion business you'll need to look the part. You don't have to worry though, I've already got things organised.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Organised?

  MARIE LEE

  There's an hotel next to the TV building. I've booked a room in it for tonight. This afternoon we'll go to the hire shop, get what you need, and then we can change in the hotel in comfort before walking next door. I've spoken to the Commanding Officer and he thinks it best if I wear my uniform for the interview.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Well, I've always had a thing about women in uniform myself. But you shouldn't be wasting all this time on me.

  MARIE LEE

  I'm just following orders, Trooper Davenport. The Army doesn't want you turning up at Channel Eleven looking like a derelict and it's my job to make sure you don't.

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  Yes, Ma'am.

  MARIE LEE

  We'd have to be talking a dark navy or grey two piece semi-formal business suit, matching belt, white dress shirt, and a smart tie with a Windsor knot. New shoes as well, of course. What do you think?

  DAVE DAVENPORT

  I haven't got