by John Elliott
Rafael: Batiste’s father.
Guillermina: Batiste’s mother.
Jacinta: Batiste’s sister.
Paca Ceret: a tavern owner.
Thérèse: a French traveller to Miranda.
Sula Darshel: Agnes’s mother.
Hallie Briggs: Emmet’s wife.
Harvard Smith: a Chance Company manager.
Evangeline Simpson (the second): Harvard’s ex-lover and opponent of Chance Company.
Evangeline Simpson: her mother and co-founder of Chance Company.
Selly Rycart: Chance Company co-founder and father of Evangeline (the second).
Walter Sembele: a political fixer.
Lucas Jones: a serial client of Chance Company.
Jacky Millom: a procurer of illegal firearms.
Monserrat ‘Monse’ Selle: a music professor.
Albert Roig: an owner of a printing firm. Monse’s husband.
Wilson Loumans: a pianist.
Leo Manners: a Chance Company part-timer.
Taji Mohammed: a former court musician.
ORISHAS
Ogun: the spirit of the forge.
Olokun: the spirit of rivers and sea.
Elegba: the messenger of God to humans. The embodiment of Creativity and Chaos.
Ifa: the bringer of the ‘logos’ to humans.
THE AUTHOR TAKES HIS LEAVE
On this page, his traces may linger in Glasgow, Kilmarnock, Auchmithie, Barcelona, Peñiscola, Granada, Paris, Hammersmith, Battersea, Bromley and Twickenham.
By happy chance, Eric Dolphy, Thad Jones, Johnny Griffin, Teddy Wilson, Leslie Caron, Barbara Bray and Patrick Magee spoke to him. He was fortunate to speak back with them.
Workmates aver he was a relatively civil—unlike Brian O’Nolan—civil servant in Unemployment Benefit Offices, union meetings and training rooms. Others claim to have witnessed him in antiquated telephone exchanges and film-cutting cubbyholes.
Years, wasted or burnished in pubs, bars, picture houses and at racetracks, slid away imperceptibly, while Stendhal and Dickens remained his two stalwart guardian angels, and John Huston’s movie, The Asphalt Jungle, provided the blueprint for all he wrote or would write.
Food intake largely consisting of fish and chips, relishing the memory—with older readers in mind—of Alf Tupper, The Tough of the Track, who will surely win Olympic gold provided Wilson doesn't turn up. Also, following the preference of Leopold Bloom, offal was appreciated, especially tripe—callos picante—and Scots black pudding.
So, all in all, a serious scribbler, worthy or unworthy of your attention, who, if he didn't exist, might entice someone, Quentin S Crisp perhaps, to invent him.
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Table of Contents
One
Two
Three
Appendix
The Author Takes His Leave
