by Greg Keen
My parents gave me the bollocking of a lifetime in the hope it would put me off the fleshpots forever. It didn’t. On the day I had been scheduled to settle into my student digs, I moved into the spare room of Raoul’s flat in Berwick Street. By then Raoul had confessed to being a waiter called Brian Hartley. It wasn’t the first time things in Soho would turn out to be other than they’d initially seemed.
My appalled father left me in no doubt that I was on my own financially. Over the next couple of weeks I worked as a builder’s labourer, a sceneshifter at the Palace Theatre and a potboy in a snooker hall. When the latter closed down, the woman in the employment agency sent me for a job as a barman at the Galaxy Club on Frith Street.
I expected the kind of low-rent shebeen where I’d been spending the small hours with Brian et al. Big surprise. Silk paper covered the walls and a large chandelier hung from the ceiling. Maroon leather chairs had been buffed to high lustre. I sat on a bar stool for a while and checked out dozens of bottles and rows of immaculate glasses. Not the place to order an after-hours Double Diamond or a bag of ready salted.
Ten minutes after my interview was scheduled to start, the front door opened and closed. A bass voice exchanged pleasantries with the cleaner and Frank Parr entered my life for the first time. I estimated that he was six foot two inches tall and twenty years my senior. I was bang on with the height but a decade long on the age.
Partly this was due to the dark three-piece suit and the neatly clipped hair. But if Frank had walked in sporting a kaftan and a bubble perm he would still have had the gravitas of a man twice his age. ‘You must be Kenneth Gabriel,’ he said, holding out a manicured hand with a chunky signet ring on it.
‘It’s Kenny,’ I said.
Frank introduced himself and we took a seat at one of the tables. He produced a pigskin cigarette case and a tortoiseshell lighter.
‘Smoke?’
‘Thanks.’
‘Shirley sent me your details,’ he said after lighting us both. ‘To be honest I ain’t had time to read ’em.’
‘Sounds like you’re busy.’
He nodded and said, ‘What d’you reckon to the place?’
‘Very classy,’ I said, which clearly pleased him.
‘We live in vulgar times, Kenny.’
‘Do you own the club?’ I asked.
‘Used to be my old man’s. He passed a few years ago. Spent a bleedin’ fortune having the place done up.’ Frank looked around approvingly, as though the job had only recently been completed. ‘I’m told you’ve had bar experience.’
‘I’ve been working at the Top Deck snooker club.’
‘Before then?’
‘Mostly temporary stuff.’
‘Qualifications?’
‘Eight O levels and three A levels.’
‘Not interested in university?’
I shook my head. Frank mulled this over.
‘To be honest, I’m looking for someone with a bit more experience,’ he said. ‘It’s not just about pulling pints and emptying ashtrays. Phil’s the bloke in charge but he’s not always gonna have time to hold your hand.’
‘I don’t need hand-holding.’
‘So you say. But working at the Top Deck don’t prove much.’
‘You’ll need to change your Jameson’s and your Gilbey’s pretty soon,’ I said. ‘There’s only a couple of shots left in them. You’re okay for ginger ale but you’re running low on tonic and you either don’t stock bitter lemon or you’ve run out completely. Oh, and there’s only five maraschino cherries left in the bottle. Phil ought to open a new one, what with it getting close to Christmas.’
Frank’s eyes widened slightly and he peered over my shoulder.
‘Or it might be six,’ I added.
‘What kinda vodka we stock?’ he asked.
‘Smirnoff on the optic; Finlandia on the shelf. You’re okay for both.’
Frank chuckled. ‘Your memory work like that on everything or just booze?’
‘Pretty much everything.’
‘That’s all well and good,’ he said, ‘but sometimes it’s about forgetting stuff if you’re working in here.’
‘I know how to be discreet, if that’s what you mean.’
Frank nodded as though it was exactly what he’d meant. ‘That your only whistle?’ he asked, after consulting his watch.
‘Er, yeah,’ I said, not wanting to admit the suit was borrowed.
‘You’ll need a new one.’
‘Actually, I’m a bit . . .’
‘Go to Manny Mohan in Kingly Street. Tell him I sent you. You can pay me back a bit at a time out of your wages.’
‘The job’s mine?’
‘Why wouldn’t it be?’
‘It’s just that . . . most of my interviews have tended to be a bit longer.’
Frank crushed out his cigarette in a crystal ashtray. ‘Something you’ll find out about me, Kenny, is that I make my mind up quickly about people.’
‘What if you’re wrong?’ I asked.
‘Then I take action accordingly,’ he said. ‘Welcome to the Galaxy.’
The club’s members were an eclectic bunch. Most nights there were a couple of Chelsea players in, and at least one representative of the constabulary drinking in the bar. Frank was keen to curry favour with the Met and even more delighted to see a politician signing the book. They weren’t exactly arriving in squadrons, but occasionally a shadow cabinet minister would pop in after lunch in the Gay Hussar.
And so, for the next few months, I poured and mixed for gangsters, coppers, footballers, politicians and the occasional pop star. Frank had an office at the top of the building and was in most days. His dad had run a couple of dirty bookshops and this was the part of the business that interested him most. Not the shops so much as the printing of the magazines they sold. The Galaxy was just a place where he could meet potential business partners and keep his ear to the ground for opportunities or trouble.
The only person I didn’t get on with was Farrelly. None of the other staff members knew much about the Galaxy’s head doorman, although there was no shortage of rumours. One had it that he had been dishonourably discharged from the paras after beating an IRA member to death, another that he’d skipped bail after being charged with football hooliganism. I could have believed them both.
I’d been on the payroll for a few months when Frank asked to see me at the end of my shift. The refurb job he’d conducted after his father died hadn’t extended to his office. Its walls were whitewashed and the floorboards bare. Furniture was confined to a knackered sofa and a rickety desk strewn with papers.
Frank held a finger up to signify that he wouldn’t be long. He crunched another entry on the machine before swivelling in his seat and checking his watch. ‘Blimey, that the time already?’
‘D’you want me to come back?’ I asked.
‘Course not,’ he said. ‘I can leave this bollocks ’til tomorrow. Fancy a Scotch?’
I nodded and Frank pulled out a bottle of Bowmore from one of the desk drawers. Into each of a pair of glasses went a decent shot.
‘You’ve been here a while now, Kenny,’ he said, handing one to me. ‘Enjoying it?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Which probably means you make a fair few quid on tips.’
‘I do okay,’ I said, cautiously.
‘Still, I bet you could always do with a bit extra.’ Frank pulled five tenners from a money clip and held them out. ‘Take your bird out on me.’
‘Frank, I can’t . . .’
‘Course you can.’
‘It’s too much.’
He leant over and tucked the notes into the breast pocket of my jacket. ‘D’you know what money’s for, Kenny?’
‘Spending?’
‘It’s for keeping score. Every April I tot up how much I’ve got and that tells me how well I’ve played the game that year. People get too emotionally attached to cash. Makes ’em scared to try anything new.’ Frank took a hit
on his drink. ‘What d’you want, Kenny?’ he asked.
‘How d’you mean?’
‘Out of life. What’s your goal?’
‘Dunno,’ I said. ‘Have a few laughs, I suppose.’
‘I meant longer-term.’
‘I wouldn’t mind writing a novel one day.’
‘About what?’ he asked. Nothing sprang to mind, nor would it for the next thirty-eight years. ‘You know what Peter Channing does?’ he continued.
‘He’s the maître d’.’
‘D’you think he’s any good at it?’
‘Excellent.’
‘I agree. Trouble is he’s leaving next month, which means I’ll need a replacement.’ Frank knocked back his drink. ‘What d’you reckon?’
‘To what?’
‘The job. Do you wanna do it?’
I laughed. Frank didn’t.
‘Seriously?’ He nodded. ‘No offence, Frank, but most of the members are old enough to be my dad.’
‘So what? Young blokes like it when older blokes give them the oil; older blokes like it the other way round. Makes them think they’re still with it.’
‘Yeah, but even still . . .’
‘And it’s not about how old you are, Kenny, it’s about how you make people feel. Everyone in the club thinks you’re his best mate.’
‘Apart from Farrelly.’
‘Farrelly don’t count.’
‘Won’t they think it’s a bit weird I was working behind the bar last week?’
Frank smiled and said, ‘No one remembers what a barman looks like, Kenny. But if it makes you feel any better, take a couple of weeks off and when you come back I absolutely guarantee none of the punters will recognise you. What d’you say?’
I had my doubts, but if Frank wanted you to do something then you usually ended up doing it. And it wasn’t as though I had much to lose.
‘How about a trial period?’ I suggested.
‘Okay,’ Frank said. ‘If it works out I’ll double the money you’re on now. Stick with me and you’ll go a long way.’
‘I’d like that,’ I told him.
The skill set required to be maître d’ at the club included boundless affability and a good memory for faces and names. I was adept at both. Within a month of my first ‘Hello, sir, and how are we tonight?’, I felt as though I’d been blowing smoke up people’s arses for years.
What with the increased hours, I began to see less of my usual crowd. Eventually, I moved out of Brian’s flat and into a place in Holborn. Frank took on a separate office near Marble Arch, but still put in regular appearances at the Galaxy. On the last night I worked for him, he arrived at ten and went straight upstairs.
For the last month he’d been in a pissy mood. I’d put it down to pressure of work, or difficulties at home. Frank had married his accountant’s daughter and there were rumours that it wasn’t a happy union. Whatever had put his nose out of joint, he didn’t mention it at our weekly meetings when we’d review the staff rota, and Frank would ask who’d been in of any note.
Also on the agenda had been pilfering. Half a dozen cases of Scotch had walked out of the stockroom. Frank delivered a lecture about running a tight ship and instructed me to find the culprit. It hadn’t been hard. Around the time the thefts had ramped up, we’d taken on a guy called Eddie Jenkins. When I went through his coat pockets, I found a copy of the key.
If I’d torn a strip off Eddie and handed him his cards, things might have panned out a whole lot better for both of us. Instead I asked Frank if he wanted me to sack him or involve the police. He told me to send him up after we closed, and that he’d attend to it personally.
Something about his tone set off warning bells. At the end of the night I was about to tell Eddie to leg it when Farrelly materialised like a malign imp. He told Eddie that Frank wanted to see him, adding that I could fuck off whenever I felt like it.
I picked up my jacket and left.
I’d been in my flat twenty minutes when I decided to return to the club. Eddie deserved a slap, but something told me he was going to get a whole lot more. I felt responsible for grassing him up and guilty that I hadn’t dealt with it myself. Hopefully I’d arrive at the Galaxy to find it empty and locked.
I entered the kitchen through the back door. Fluorescent strips blinked several times before kicking in. Harsh light bounced off the polished steel of tables, pots and racks of knives, emphasising the emptiness of the usually bustling room.
In the clubroom, dirty glasses littered the tables and cigarette smoke hung in the air. I resisted the urge to down the remains of a brandy and crossed the room. At the side of the stage were the doors that led to the stairs. I’d made it to the first landing when I heard Eddie scream. I took the next flight in three bounds, and knocked on the door. A few seconds and then I heard Farrelly’s voice.
‘Who is it?’
‘Kenny.’
‘Fuck do you want?’
‘I need to see Eddie.’
‘Piss off.’
‘Just for a couple of minutes.’
‘Don’t make me tell you again . . .’
I took a deep breath and opened the door.
Eddie’s ankles and wrists were gaffer-taped to a chair. He was unconscious and there was a mess of crimson on his shirt. Cables of blood and saliva trailed from his mouth. Two small lumps of bone and gristle lay on the floor.
Almost as shocking was the state of Frank. Three hours ago he’d been immaculate in a tailored suit. Now his shirtsleeves were rolled to the elbows and his hair was damp with sweat. In his right hand was a pair of pliers. You didn’t have to be Einstein to make the connection between these and the items on the floor.
‘You fucking arsehole,’ Farrelly said, getting up from the chair by Frank’s desk.
‘Best leave, Kenny,’ Frank said, raising a hand to stop him. Farrelly bridled like a junkyard dog forbidden a discarded sirloin.
‘All this for less than two hundred quid?’ I said.
‘He needed to be told,’ Farrelly replied.
‘I’d call this a bit more than being told.’
‘No one gives a toss what you think.’
‘At least I’ve got a brain to do some thinking with.’
I didn’t see Farrelly’s hand move until it was clamped around my throat. ‘Say that again,’ he said, peppering my face with spittle. ‘Because you’re one smart-arsed comment away from making that sorry cunt look like he cut himself shaving.’
Anxiety at what might be happening to Eddie turned into the gut-curdling fear of what could happen to me. Farrelly looked as though he was going to waive the need for another smart-arsed comment when Eddie spluttered and groaned. It took a few seconds for him to recall where he was and what had happened to him.
‘I’m . . . sorry . . . Frank,’ he said. ‘I swear to Christ . . . I’ll pay it back.’
Farrelly uncurled his fingers from my throat. As he crossed the room one of Eddie’s teeth skeetered off his boot and ricocheted against the skirting board.
‘Is that right?’ he said, crouching next to him. ‘Or will you just piss off back to Taffy land and that’s the last we’ll ever see of you?’
‘No,’ Eddie said, tears rolling down his puffy cheeks.
‘Because if a wanker like you gets away with it, they’ll all be queuing up to take the piss. A tooth for every case is all we want. Fair’s fucking fair, son.’
‘Take the money out of my wages, Frank,’ I said.
I hoped that paying back what Eddie had stolen might appeal to Frank’s sense of proportion.
‘Go home, Kenny,’ he said. ‘Take tomorrow off and forget about it.’
‘Not without Eddie.’
Farrelly produced something that I thought was a lighter until he pressed a catch and a four-inch blade shot out.
‘If you want to take your boyfriend home, you’ll need to cut him loose,’ he said. ‘And if you’ve got the bottle to come for this, then I guess I’ll have to let you have it.�
��
Farrelly might have handed the knife over. Or by ‘letting me have it’ did he mean point-first into the eye? Tough to tell, as his face was as blank as weathered stone.
‘Changed your mind?’ he asked. ‘Then you’d best leave before I change mine.’
‘What if I tell someone what’s going on up here?’
Farrelly shrugged as though I’d asked him what might happen if I leapt off the roof of the Swiss Centre.
‘So I’m just meant to leave you to torture him, am I?’
‘Or stick around and watch,’ he said.
‘If I go, that’s it. I’m not coming back. Not tomorrow, not ever.’
Frank said nothing. Farrelly smirked and folded up his knife. My only option was to get out, which would have been a whole lot easier if Eddie hadn’t whimpered, ‘Please don’t go, Kenny’, like a six-year-old begging not to be left in the dark.
‘It’s your own fault,’ I snapped. ‘None of this would be happening if you hadn’t nicked the fucking booze.’
I descended the stairs and retraced my steps back into the kitchen. After locking the door, I walked into the street and threw up into a drain. Then I dropped the keys through its puke-spattered bars. A passing brass tut-tutted. I told her to fuck off and she returned the compliment before tottering off towards Old Compton Street.
I wiped my mouth, took a couple of deep breaths, and began walking in the opposite direction.
After leaving the Galaxy, I went on a forty-eight-hour bender that took me another forty-eight to recover from. The same agency that had placed me with Frank found me a job as a barman in a Bloomsbury hotel. Its concierge wasn’t constantly reminding me what a cunt I was and the guests didn’t carry concealed weapons.
Sometimes it’s the little things you miss.
After shifts, I found myself drifting towards Soho like a rudderless schooner. Before long I ran into Brian and took up where I’d left off. Within a fortnight I’d been late for work twice and the manager gave me my cards. I kidded myself that it was all for the best and that I could concentrate on writing my first novel.
