by Timothy Lea
“I don’t like this,” says Minto, who has been staring fixedly at Mrs. Dent ever since he saw us. “She’s got a bump on the side of her head.”
“I told you: she fell in,” I say desperately, but Mrs. D. doesn’t help matters by redoubling her groan rate.
“I see what you mean,” says Sharp menacingly. “It’s not the first time something like this has happened up here.”
“Yes. There was that chap—what was his name? Medley? Smedley?”
“Bachelor. Strangled them and then—”
“—when he’d sexually assaulted them—”
“—he buried them in the bunkers.”
“That’s the one.”
They beam at each other like a couple of excited kids who have just landed a large minnow.
“You’re round the twist,” I say indignantly and start to pat Mrs. D.’s cheeks gently.
“Come on, love. You’re all right. Pull yourself together.”
To my relief, her groans start turning into words and she stretches out her arms for support.
“What happened? Where am I? Was there an accident?”
“No, no, it’s all right,” I say soothingly. “Everything is going to be fine.”
But it isn’t. Mrs. D.’s faltering fingers catch hold of her knickers and pull them out of my pocket.
The following few seconds seem like hours and then Mrs. D. drives the final nail into my coffin by uttering her first recognisable words in minutes.
“Those are my knickers,” she says, and her voice has just the right note of surprise and indignation to ensure that any judge worth his assault would have me inside for eleven years.
“Now wait—” I begin, but Sharp does not. Leaping into the bunker, he brandishes his putter like a club of the non-golf variety and throws a few words over his shoulder to Minto.
“You get the police. I’ll hang on to this bastard.”
“Don’t be wet,” I tell him. “You’ve behaving like an overgrown boy scout. I’m no more a sex maniac than you are. A bloody sight less if what I saw last night is anything to go by.”
Although constructed purely out of spite and imagination, this is a master stroke because Dawn has told me that the bird Sharp was with at the YCs dance was none other than Minto’s daughter and that they are practically engaged. Certainly Sharp’s interchange with Minto before my discovery has revealed a considerable familiarity. From the looks on both their faces I can see that this may well be a thing of the past, and I am not slow to follow up my advantage.
“I saw you in the car park with that dark-haired bird. Bloody good job the police didn’t. You want to get some blinds on the car if you’re going to carry on like that.”
“Shut your lying mouth,” howls Sharp, clenching his teeth and bringing back the head of the putter.
“Why? A bit close to home, is it? You don’t mind pointing the finger at other people, do you? But when it comes to—”
“Get the police!” snarls Sharp. “Can’t you see he’s trying to play for time? If we hadn’t got here when we did, he’d probably have killed that poor girl.”
“Just what I thought last night when I saw your friend’s feet wedged against the windscreen,” I go on. But I don’t get any further. Sharp takes a swing at me and the putter slices the air above my head. Before he can try another one I step forward and hook him hard to the pit of the stomach. His head jerks forward and my left swings in and catches him flush on the side of the jaw. They are as pretty a couple of punches as I have ever thrown and when my left whips into his mug I know it is going to need a crane to set him on his feet within five minutes.
At the sight of his mate biting the dust, Minto looks about as happy as a goldfish dropped into a tank of piranha, but he still tries to come cocky with it.
“Stay where you are,” he snaps, his voice quavering a bit. “Don’t try anything.”
“Piss off,” I say, because I am no stranger to the big bluster myself. “Get in my way and I’ll push your face in.”
I get my arms under Mrs. D. and haul her up until I can give her a fireman’s lift on to my shoulder. Sharp is beginning to stir but he is in no mood to cause anybody any problems and I step over him and out of the bunker like Edmund Hillary. Minto runs along beside me, jumping up like a Yorkshire terrier.
“I’ve warned you. You won’t get away with it. Put that woman down. I’ll fetch the police.”
“Why don’t you do that. I’ll lend you a soap box if you have trouble reaching the receiver.”
He splutters something and I keep walking. In fact, I have no idea what I am going to do apart from getting the hell away from the place. Fate obviously does not want me to become a driving instructor and after today’s little episode my career beside the wheel seems likely to become one of the shortest on record.
I stalk over to the car and pour Mrs. D. into the back seat whilst Minto makes an M.G.M. production of taking my number from a safe twenty yards.
“There’s three more on the seventh green,” I shout to him. “I cut them up into little pieces and poked them into the hole with the flag.” I throw in my mad laugh for good measure and he starts scuttling off down the road towards the clubhouse. Good luck to him.
I climb behind the wheel and jet off towards town, wondering what I am going to do with Mrs. D. I am supposed to take her back to the School but I don’t fancy that although I don’t know where she lives. I wish my mind would sort itself out and start thinking clearly, but it won’t.
Luckily, Mrs. D.’s mind is more helpful.
“Ooh, my God!” she groans. “What happened?”
“We were having a quick grope in a bunker when you caught a golf ball across the side of your nut.”
“Ouch!” She touches her temple gingerly. “My God, it feels like another head.”
“It’s not so bad. Just a bruise. You’ll be alright.”
“You don’t sound very worried. I might have been killed.”
“That’s just what my friends thought.”
“What are you on about?”
So I tell her and she makes a few clucking noises and tut-tuts a couple of times and then she actually laughs.
“I don’t see what you’re worried about,” she says finally, patting her hair into place.
“I’m worried about getting fifteen years nick, aren’t I?” I tell her.
“Well, that all depends on me, doesn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, they’re only going to be able to put you inside if you were assaulting me and I’m the only person who can say whether you were or weren’t.”
“Yeah, I see what you mean.” I look at her with new interest. “You’ll tell them it was an accident, of course. Better stick to my story. You know, how you fell into—”
“Turn left up this track,” she interrupts. “You’ll like the view.”
“Well—er—yes, alright.” I would be a mug to argue with her, wouldn’t I? We go along the track for fifty yards and then we are in the middle of a clump of trees with no way out except the one we came in by.
“Where do we go from here?” I ask.
“That’s up to you.” She turns and faces me with her elbow resting on the back of the seat.
“Are you feeling all right?”
She looks at me very levelly. “I’ve got a little pain you might try to kiss better.”
She is a game girl, isn’t she? Either that or a bit gaga after her bash on the bonce. Either way, it’s not in my interest to be less than co-operative, so I slide my arm round her shoulder and start pulling her mouth towards mine. To my surprise, she puts her hand on my lips and shakes her head.
“I thought you said you wanted me to kiss it better?”
“I did, but that’s not where it hurts.”
She stretches back in her seat and at the same time drops her hands and starts gently pulling up her skirt. My eyes go down and I don’t need crystal balls to see what I am expected to do.
> “Good boy,” she says, stroking the hair at the back of my neck. “I feel better just thinking about it… .”
Twenty minutes later I am driving Mrs. D. home when a police car roars up alongside me and I am crowded into the side of the road before you can say “All coppers are bastards”. Four fuzz pile out of it like it is on fire and one of them wrenches open my door and stands there breathing hard. He is about to grab a handful of me when he sees Mrs. D.
“Thank God!” he says. “Has this man attacked you?”
“No,” she says. “Have you got one that will?”
This is so clearly not the answer he was expecting that for a moment he is speechless.
“Were you up on Cromingham golf course with him about half an hour ago?”
“About that, yes.”
“And he attacked you in a bunker?”
“No, nothing of the kind. Look, let me tell you what really happened. Mr. Lea here was giving me a driving lesson and I felt a bit sick—something I’d had for lunch, I think—and he kindly stopped the car and walked me across the golf course for a few minutes deep breathing. I must have been a bit off colour because I stumbled and fell into a bunker and the next thing I know was Mr. Lea being menaced by a tall blond man who was threatening him with a golf club. It was horrible.”
Listening to her, I almost believe it.
“Luckily, Mr. Lea managed to overpower the fellow and we got away. There was another one, too. An ugly little red-faced man with a moustache like Gerald Nabarro’s. We were on our way to the police station to report the incident. Perhaps if you got up to the golf course you might still find them. They probably make a living robbing members whilst pretending to be them, if you know what I mean. What a blessing we bumped into you when we did!”
“Are you sure you’re all right, Madam?” The poor sod looks as miserable as Christmas Day with your in-laws.
“Positive, officer, thanks to Mr. Lea here. You will try to catch those men, won’t you?”
“We’ll certainly do all we can, Madam; you can rely on it,” he says grimly and I wish I could be a fly on the wall when he gets back to Sharp and Minto. “Sorry to have troubled you.” He throws a half-hearted salute and goes off talking furiously to his three mates. Four car doors slam in unison and they roar off up the road.
“Phew! That was close,” I gasp. “You were bloody good. Thanks.”
“A girl has to protect her reputation,” says Mrs. D. coolly. She smiles gently and feels in my pocket for her knickers.
CHAPTER SEVEN
After the Mrs. Dent incident, things quieten down a bit. Well, they have to, really, don’t they? It couldn’t go on like this without somebody having a hernia or a nervous breakdown, or something. Too exhausting for words, ducky! as Petal would say.
Garth comes back from holiday and takes Mrs. D. off my hands, amongst other things, and I go on with the likes of Miss Frankcom and the rest of the ‘halt and the lame’, as Crippsy calls them. No more is heard from the Major mob but I keep my eyes open because I know Sharp is not going to take the belting I gave him lightly. Dawn, who I have it away with occasionally, is more in touch with the Shermer Jet Set and she says that the whole of the side of his face is swollen up like a sockful of dough.
Days turn into weeks and during that time every A.D.I. in the School takes it in turn to supervise me occasionally like it says in the manual. Even Cronk comes out once or twice and I have the chance to find out what a lovable old cove he really is. Why he bothers with all that bullshit I don’t know, because anyone can see that behind all the huffing and puffing you could start cutting handkerchiefs out of his shirt tail and he wouldn’t say anything. I suppose it’s what they teach you in the army. Make the right noises and everybody will jump about for you—like the bloke I read about in a detective story once who had a safe that was operated by his voice saying ‘open shazam’ or something like that. What makes Cronk’s bustle and bluster more ridiculous is the scruffy bunch of blokes who operate for him. Crippsy looks like the ‘before’ part of a dandruff advertisement and the length of Garth’s hair would break a sergeant-major’s heart. Petal is a screaming pouf and Lester Hewett couldn’t see daylight between the springs of a chest expander. But somehow they do come over as a team, and they do look after each other. “Watch out for Flowers today,” Garth will say when Petal returns red-eyed from a weekend in London. “I think he’s having boyfriend trouble.” So everyone buys Petal tea and is sympathetic without bursting into tears when he comes into the room. Likewise, if Crippsy looks a bit the worse for wear, Petal or Lester will steer him off home and take over his stint with apologies for his unavoidable absence. It may just be their army background, but I think it’s something deeper than that. Over the weeks I discern that every A.D.I. in the School, apart from Cronk, was dishonourably discharged. They have all served with Cronk and he has obviously been the means of giving them a job in civvy street. Looking at them all, I come to the conclusion that failure can often bring closer together than success.
What they were all kicked out for I never find out. With Petal and Crippsy it is easy to guess, but with ‘Garth’ Williams and Lester Hewett it could be anything from pigeon toes to rape. Apart from asking them or feeding all the alternatives into the conversation and watching their faces, I can’t think of another way of knowing and I don’t fancy alternatives.
Almost before Cromingham’s excuse for a supermarket has stuck little pieces of cotton wool all over its windows, it is what Cronk calls ‘the fest-e-e-ve season’ and the E.C.D.S. holds an office party to prove how wrong he is. A great deal of South African sherry is drunk from chipped cups, Crippsy gets smashed and starts crying, Petal makes a pass at Garth, Lester pukes in the middle of Cronk’s message of Christian goodwill: “Backs to the wall, you play ball with me, and let’s all go forward to the promised land”; and I have it away with Dawn in the ‘out of order’ ladies’ on Cromingham station before I catch the three-thirty back to civilisation. Two things stick in mind about the whole pathetic business: some of the incredible things those birds had written on the bog walls and Dawn telling me she is three weeks overdue as the train pulls out of the station. Bloody nice Christmas present, isn’t it?
It doesn’t really need that to make Christmas with the folks as bloody as it is, but it helps. Sid and Rosie have gone to his parents, so I am left playing Wimbledon tennis between Mum and Dad, and going ape with the crystallised fruits which they have got because Mum remembers how much I used to like them when I was a kid. It makes it even sadder, somehow, the way they are so pleased to see me. I would like to be able to blame them for the whole turgid proceedings and it is a real effort having to watch the royal laugh riot from Sandringham without feeding it my usual chorus of eye-rolling yawns. Dad’s eyes close and he starts dribbling down the front of his new Marks and Sparks pullover, which he will change on Monday, whilst Mum’s expression registers the kind of blind devotion usually seen in dogs when it is getting near feeding time. I have been through the whole bad scene too many times and I can actually remember the first time I realised I was not enjoying it. I remember the feeling of guilt. It was like having a wank when you knew that it was an odds-on certainty that you would go blind if you did. This, and numerous other memories of past Christmases at the family Lea haunt me through the next few days until I can lie myself back to Liverpool Street Station with a carrier bag full of furry dates, burst figs and all the other rubbish that nobody else wants. I have told the parents that I have to work on New Year’s Eve but in fact I intend to go back to Cromingham and drown my sorrows between Mrs. Bendon’s legs. From a hundred and fifty miles away she has become a mixture of Marilyn Monroe and Silvano Manure, or whatever that big Italian bird’s name is, but, of course, when I get back I find a note explaining that she is still with her sister in Stockwell. Stockwell! I could weep. Three stations away on the Northern line and I have struggled all the bloody way back to living-death-on-sea. What a tragedy! I try to ring up Dawn but she ha
s been invited to the New Year’s Eve ball at the golf club so I don’t even know if there is still an infant Lea up the spout. Bloody marvellous way to see out the old year, isn’t it?
I’d like to be able to report that a raving nympho with a bottle of Scotch in her hand threatened to slash her wrists if I don’t belt the arse off her, but in fact I end up in the public bar of the Sailor’s Return watching a bunch of half-pissed old tits link arms and sing Auld Lang Syne thirty seconds before the landlord shovels them out into the street. Thank you and good night!
Luckily, Dawn is not in the pudding club, so I can breathe again there, but when Mrs. B. returns from London there is a noticeable change in her attitude which does not bode well. She keeps mentioning some bloke she has met. “I don’t think Mr. Greig would agree with you there,” and makes dark references to needing the spare room at some not too distant date. The crowning insult comes when I ask her out for a drink and she says no: “Thank you, dear, but I’ve got a bit of a chill and I think I’d better stay at home. Another time, perhaps?” Of course, all this makes her so desirable I nearly explode every time I see her and I could kick myself for not having got across it when I had the chance.
The arrival of her daughter, on whom I had set high hopes, is a bit of an anti-climax, too. I had imagined myself staggering from one to the other or indulging in some monster orgy with both of them on the white rug in front of the ‘Cumfiwarm living-flame log-effect gas fire’, but Jenny sweeps through on the way to stay with friends at Brancaster—which is apparently the only place to have friends—and looks at me as if I’m somebody who brings in the logs in a Victorian melodrama, the kind of thing the BBC put on the telly every Sunday teatime.
Putting it mildly, she is a right pain in the arse and I spend a frustrating night thinking of ‘Mummy’ and her lying there in the big bed and of all the things I could be doing to them both. She is pretty, too, which makes it even worse.
But, fortunately, even my life does have its occasional moments of pleasure, and about the time that the first snowdrops are trying to force their stupid way through the rock-hard earth, a really nice piece of nooky drops into my lap. ‘Drop’ is not quite the right word, because for some time I have been conscious that Dawn has a lot of control over the way the new learners are allocated and is using it to divert anything that approaches being a good-looking bint from yours truly. I accept this because I can understand any woman wanting to hang on to me, and you can’t always have your cake and heat it, as King Alfred found out to his cost. (Ugh! Ed.)
