by stan graham
I just can’t get enough of Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman they make such a lovely couple, and Peter Lorre, such a sinister little man. As you must realise by now I am a terrible film buff.
The DVD player was delivered without any problems yesterday, I called into Argos this morning and thanked the salesman for taking the effort to see that I got it delivered okay, I told him I am so looking forward to watching Humphrey Bogart.
He seemed quite surprised to see me but as I always say good manners costs nothing, I gave him fifty pence for his trouble and told him to treat himself.
Tonight I watched Casablanca. It made me cry so I drank half a bottle of sherry and ate all of the box of chocolates that I had meant to last me over the weekend.
Do you know they give loads of DVD’s away with the newspapers? I have collected about fifteen. Love stories, thrillers, documentaries, I could learn Spanish if I want, I probably won’t need to ever buy another one.
I am rereading ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’ by Arthur Conan Doyle. Really exciting and you learn how the mind of a master detective works. I have always liked him and have read nearly all his books, including this one which I have already read several times. You can never get tired of reading his books though. Every time I learn something new.
Mr Pope called round and told me that he had seen a Range Rover in the town car park with all it’s tyres deflated. It cheered me up no end. I told him that it probably wasn’t the same one but he said that didn’t matter as all these people with big cars are the same. They think they own the road. I didn’t tell him that I had kept the vehicle numberplate in my notebook. If the car is still there tomorrow I will go and check it out.
Yes it is. Fancy that, there is a god after all.
It’s a sunny day, so much for St Swithin.
A small officious looking man called and said he was a plumber and had called to check my boiler. I refused to let him in at first and he went and got Smythe.
“Mrs Bond I am afraid that allowing the plumber to check your boiler is a condition of your tenancy.”
“I am well aware of that Captain Smythe but how do I know he is genuine, he could be anyone.”
“Perhaps the overalls stating the company he comes from and the card he states that he showed you might have supplied a clue Mrs Bond. Anyway I can assure you that he is genuine. Now will you allow the poor gentleman to do his work?”
“Of course but you must realise one can’t be too careful can one. Mind that you wipe your feet.”
He spent about half an hour checking the boiler, as I suspected there was nothing wrong with it. Just an excuse to waste time. I would normally have offered a cup of tea but I didn’t like his attitude. He even had the nerve to tell me how my kitchen should be reorganised so that his job would be easier next time he called.
“If you moved this cupboard and replaced it with that one it would be so much easier to service the boiler Mrs. I could do it now for you for a small charge.”
“Don’t be so impertinent I can’t be having my cupboards moved,” I told him. ”Just pack up your tools and leave, trying to take advantage of a poor widow woman.”
Did I mention that Mr Imself is now Prime Minister? Not the George Brown that apparently used to live in my flat but Imself Mr Whateverhisnameis’s best friend.
***********
Chapter 6. AUGUST
I really do worry about that Smythe. I met him in the courtyard and he said to me. “Hello Mrs Bond. Just been checking my Premium Bonds, nothing again, never mind eh.”
I am sure he knows that I have some. If he thinks I am going to share any winnings I get he has another think coming. I wonder if the postman tips him off when people get letters. Anyway I put him off “I don’t believe in gambling Captain Smythe and I am surprised that as an ex-officer you do either,” I said..
When Jane phoned I asked her if she could get Peter to bring my Queen Anne table that was stored in his garage. She sounded quite surprised.
“Mother you said that I could have that. I’ve got it in my dining room, and it looks very nice there.”
“I never meant for you to keep it.”
“Well if that’s the case I will ask him right away.”
“There is no need to take umbrage. I am sure it looks very nice where it is so you had better keep it then.” I knew very well I had never told her she could keep it, I’ve had it since we first got married. Lovely piece of workmanship it is too. Still I expect she can put it to better use than me but I do wish they would ask first.
Mike and Doris Peters have lived at Paradise Lodge for 20 years.
A few months before their arrival, Smythe’s wife Grace had arrived to take over the job of warden, dragging him in tow. Grace had been all right, but neither Mike nor Doris had any time for Smythe, whom they quite justly considered as an interfering busybody.
Mike is eighty four and Doris the girl next door and his childhood sweetheart is eighty one, their relationship had by now settled into that of many couples who have lived together forever, quiet tolerance of each others foibles while a razor sharp tongue noted the faults of others.
Whenever a new tenant arrived Mike would be one of the first to approach them and find out all he could about them, pumping them for information to establish their place in the pecking order. Mind you it wasn't all one way way, as many tenants could vouch, for like many lonely old people, he could bore for England.
This September will be their Golden Wedding anniversary and Doris had hinted that she was expecting something special. Well he had booked a dinner at the local pub, The White Hart. Bob Haskins the landlord had promised to make something special for them when Mike had asked him if he could cater for a small do. Just the two of them.
Today Mike and Dave Tontine sit outside putting the world to rights.
"Still taking the Humphrey Bogart pills Mike?"
"Pills, don’t talk to me about pills. I have fourteen a day, Statins last thing at night, for my cholesterol, blood pressure pills, blood thinners, diabetes pills that I take four times a day before meals, pills to go to sleep and pills to wake me up, pills to stop water retention. I'm surprised I don't rattle when I walk. It's only the medical profession that keeps me alive. I still play cricket every Sunday, well I umpire nowadays if the truth be told, but I used to be a wicked spin bowler. Took out seven of the opposition once when we played Tooson Park back in 79."
"See there was another one died," Dave stifled a yawn while watching two funeral attendants from the Co-op with their trolley, enter Wellington block, and exit 10 minutes later with a full body bag.
"Yes, Betty Mitchell. Expected though, would have been ninety-two next week. She was looking forward to her birthday as well. Still she had a good innings."
"That's four in the last three months, we ought to start a sweepstake as to who will be next. Pity it ain’t old Smythe.”
“You be careful with what you say I don't want my Doris getting upset.”
“We should be aright, it's only the good die young ", chuckled Dave. “Hey do you think her daughter will sell me the old lady’s invalid trolley?”
“Don’t see why not but what do you want it for?”
“Just thought it might come in handy. I fancy a bit of mobility. You and Doris going to the funeral?"
"No, too close to home, I'd be worried that it wasn't worth coming back again."
“Do you think he will be going?”
“Who Smythe? No I asked him once before and he told me it wasn’t in his job description. He said he only worked here that they weren’t his friends.”
“Mean old bastard, still I suppose he’s got a point if he started for one he would always be going. Do you believe in ghosts?"
"Cor you don’t half change the subject, mind like a butterfly you have. You haven’t been watching those Harry Potter films again have you? You know how the last one gave you a funny turn."
"No, I haven’t and I wish you wouldn’t keep bringing it up.”
“What like you did?”
“Be serious, no what I mean is that when you die do you think you can come back."
"Like reincarnation, being born again?"
"No I mean like spooks."
"Well I've never told anybody because I was afraid people might start laughing at me, I’ve never seen a ghost but I heard one once."
"Yes."
"It was like this. During the war I was in Burma with the Special Forces and deep in the jungle we came across a compound that the Nips had deserted. Just a collection of wooden huts. One of them that were larger than the others, probably the headman’s hut before the Japs killed him, had bloodstains splattered all over it. Well I was on guard that night. Our Captain had decided that we should stay put as they weren't likely to come back.
About two in the morning I heard a noise like groans and I called me mate and we went over to what had been the headman’s hut. The noises seemed to be coming from within. I gestured to Jack to back me up and then I threw open the door."
"And."
"Nothing, the place was bare and silent. I heard later that the hut had been used to torture prisoners in. Both me and Jack Berle reported it to our Sergeant but he told us to forget it. I swear to this day that that was the ghosts of the prisoners that we heard. Anyway the next day we found the bodies of a Japanese patrol, with their heads cut off. Renown for their head hunting the natives are over there. Just drift away like ghosts afterwards. Why are you so interested, seen something have you?"
"As it happens I was in France after the war and me and this French geezer, Bernard was walking down this lane to the village pub. It was dark, no street lights in them days. We passed a wood, they call them Bois, and this bird with long hair down to her waist, though to tell the truth I couldn't say what colour it was, came running out in front of us an up towards the village. The thing is she was barefoot and wearing what looked like a white night-dress. Bernard went pale as a sheet and insisted that we go back and abandoned the idea of a drink. I wasn't to keen but I could see he was scared, hands trembling. When we got back to where we was staying, he told me that to see the white lady meant someone was going to die. Two days later he got run down by a lorry."
"Ha, ha, and you think you might be next?"
"No, I'm not daft. Wish I'd never mentioned it."
“Makes you think though, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah but what about them three that spends all their time conjuring up spirits and whatnot with one of those Ouija boards.”
“Sooner them than me. I don’t want to be talking with the dead. Bad enough having to talk to the living.”
“Yea I suppose here they are the living dead. Ha ha.”
“Nice one Dave. You should be on the stage,” he paused, “sweeping it. Seriously though do you think they can, talk with the dead like?”
“Shouldn’t think so, most of them got nothing worth listening to when they were alive so why would they suddenly get clever just because they died?”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought, don’t want the missus coming back and haunting me.”
“She’s got to be dead first you silly bugger.”
“Oh yes I forgot.”
“I’m going to tell her you forgot she wasn’t dead. Wishful thinking I call it.”
“You do and it will be the last thing you do. I don’t need you stirring things thank you very much. The next dead person I speak to will be you. I wouldn’t know what to do without her.”
“Only joking, where’s your sense of humour.”
“Women don’t think like what we do, they take everything too seriously.”
“You are right there. Do you know I asked the Widow Bond if she was related to James and she bit my head off.”
“I expect she’s heard that joke a hundred times before that’s why.”
“Well I thought it was funny.”
“Yes but you think Harry Potter is funny. That’s what I mean you have a childish sense of humour sometimes.”
“You thought it was funny when came I back from that fancy dress party dressed up as Death in a black cape with a rubber scythe and scared the life out of them in the community room.”
“Maybe but some of them have never got over that.”
“Yeah I know, ha, ha. Your Doris still gives me a dirty look when she sees me”.
“She’s got over it now but it was a bit dangerous, someone could have had a heart attack.”
I've heard of stories like that before but if they were groaning then they wouldn't be dead. I reckon some places get an imprint in the stones and soil when something violent or traumatic like that occurs. A sort of photographic print or memory if you like. Crowley told me that most of that seances and ouija board stuff is just nonsense, nobody has managed to bring him back he said and he wouldn’t talk through a dirty old glass either.
It’s starting to get crowded here. Although they don't usually stay for long. Who would, I'm only here for Janice. Angry ghosts that can't understand when it's finally time to go. They tend to be confused and ask if they are in heaven or hell, so I just tell them that they can go wherever they like. This seems to annoy them I suppose it makes all those years of being good a waste of time if you get to choose at the end. Not everyone chooses heaven. I won’t not now I've seen those that choose to go upstairs. It’s funny though, I would have expected people to go in the winter months with hypothermia but a lot of them seem to hang on until Spring or Summer. I think most people go when they are ready and have had enough of life. As for them two they are like an old married couple the way they squabble together. They are the best of friends really. I have heard that joke hundreds of times also and it is still just as boring. I always said “Yes my uncle actually.” That usually shut them up.
Another hot and sunny day, this morning the gardener, if you can call him that
has cut the grass, and it has gone from thick, long and lush, where he had hardly bothered, to dry and parched looking where he has cut it too short.
I met a new lady yesterday, Peggy, she pushes one of those three wheeled Zimmer frame type things and we got to talking on the way back from the shops.
“Where do you live,” she asked?
“Paradise Lodge.”
“Oh I’ve never seen you before, how long have you been there?”
“About six months.”
“I’ve been there for five years. We had a three bedroom house but when my Charlie died I found myself rattling around in the place so I moved here.”
“Oh yes my position was much the same.”
“They are like an old coat or a dog, they look scruffy and always get under your feet but you miss them when you lose them.”
“Well I know I miss my Arthur. Never thought I would but I do.”
“How come we haven’t met before don’t you go to the community centre?”
“Not very much.”
“Not much of a mixer are you? You really should come we have such a jolly time. Strawberry tarts with cream last Monday. You would have loved it.”
“I am not really a cake person, I prefer more savoury things.”
“Well everyone’s different aren’t they love. Smythe only charges for what you have, a cup of tea is only 30p and coffee is only 40p so it’s very good value, especially when you see what they charge you in the town. The last time I went in one of them I had a cola and a sandwich and it cost me nearly half my pension. Even the cake and strawberries was only £1.20p.Well got to go, don’t want to miss anything. If you are sure you don’t want to come with me? See you bye.”
Deal or No Deal has started back on the Television but I can’t be bothered to watch it now. I think the break has put me off it. Can’t really see why I ever watched it, such a silly programme glorifying greed.
It’s another hot sunny day and I am having to drag myself around in the heat, they got the forecast wrong again as usual. Even with the fan going full blast I am perspiring. I never slept a wink last night; I ju
st lay on top of the bed and tried to keep cool.
There is the most awful smell in my kitchen. It smells like urine. I complained to Smythe but he just said that was to be expected with all the old people living here. It's not fair, I just got rid of the tobacco smell and now I have this one. I tried bleach on it but it hasn’t moved. I even tried leaving the window open but it just seems to have got worse.
I barely slept last night what with the heat and the stink coming from the kitchen. I don’t know what to do. I spoke to Pamela and asked her advice.
“I had that trouble once, it’s caused by a build up of negative energy. Go to the Magic and Meditation Centre in Trelorn Street, they supplied me with a Sage Smudge stick which I burnt and it cleared the problem.”
I went there at once. A strange shop where they sold all sorts of things like incense and books on astrology, Buddhist statues and stuff. I asked the lady behind the counter and she knew exactly what I wanted.
“Cleaning your home of negativity is it. This is just the job, my clients swear by it. That will be £6.95 thank you.”
So expensive however I paid for it and took it home. Lets hope I get a respite now.
I burnt the sage last night before bed and wafted it all through the flat. The smell seems to have gone but perhaps it’s just masked by the smell of sage. Anyway the main thing is that I got a good nights sleep despite the heat, it must have been exhaustion but I feel much better this morning.
