Death's Sweet Echo

by Maynard Sims

  The trouble he had with it being on the floor now was that he had lost it years ago.

  It could only have been his mystery visitor who had put it there. He went over and picked it up. The glass was smashed. The face, his face, was scratched out, as if someone had run a sharp knife over it time and time again. The incisions went deep into the card backing of the frame, obliterating the man who had smiled back for the camera.

  He put it down gently onto the Formica worktop of the kitchen and pressed the switch to the kettle. He needed tea.

  There was one mirror in the room, on the wall by the door. There was just a shared bathroom, along the landing. He avoided looking in the smeared glass of the mirror. He had glanced at it once since he’d come into the room, and he was sure it was the young man who had looked back out at him.

  The kettle boiled, and he made himself a cup of strong tea. Settling back at the cheap table, he sipped his tea and rubbed his hands over the book. In many ways, it was his most precious possession. He seemed to remember the fuss when Bob Monkhouse had lost his joke books many years ago. Robbie could understand how bereft the man must have felt. This was his livelihood, in these wrinkled pages. Though for how much longer, with dwindling audiences, and less gigs than he used to have.

  With a mouthful of tea, he opened the page at random. Ah, this was good – a few pages of one-liners, some of them even written by him. ‘Which sexual position produces the ugliest children? Ask your mother.’ Nicked that one from an act at Bournemouth. ‘What's the difference between love, true love, and showing off? Spitting, swallowing, and gargling.’ Used that in the second series but got a rap over the knuckles for it after viewer complaints. ‘What is the biggest problem for an atheist? No one to talk to during orgasm.’ He still liked that one, he might use it tonight. He checked his watch – he didn’t want to keep Rita waiting. ‘Who is the most popular guy at the nudist colony? The guy who can carry a cup of coffee in each hand and a dozen donuts. Who is the most popular girl at the nudist colony? The one who can eat the last donut.’ That was from a season in Margate, the pier, happy days. Now, this one he would tell Rita, get her in the mood. ‘The three words women hate to hear most during sex: Honey, I'm home!’

  The book suddenly slammed shut, with such force that he spilled tea over the cover.

  ‘What the–’

  He tried to avoid looking, but he was drawn to it. The mirror looked clear, the surface free from the usual pockmarks and smudges. Staring back at him, fire of anger in the eyes, was his own face. Not the one he owned nowadays, but the face of his twenties, his happy days, his prime. Before the big time, it was true, but before it all went wrong as well.

  He stood, knocking the chair to the floor. He wanted to tear his eyes away from the face, but he couldn’t. It held him like a butterfly pinned to a board. It was drawing him in, beckoning with the eyes. He couldn’t stand it. He didn’t need to be reminded of who he used to be.

  He picked up the cup and threw it at the mirror. The glass cracked as the broken cup fell down, and then the mirror shattered as he threw the saucer at it.

  His feet crunched over the debris as he opened the door to leave. It slammed shut behind him, and as he marched down the stairs he wondered if he would have the courage to return.

  The Black Lion was quite crowded for early on a Wednesday. The good weather had brought a lot of people out of doors. Many spilled out onto the pavement where a makeshift assembly of assorted tables and chairs had grown. Rita wasn’t outside; he hadn’t expected her to be anywhere other than where he found her.

  Gambling was in her blood, and she was leaned against the slot machine, feeding in coins as he joined her. He nodded at her glass, and without breaking concentration on the machine she nodded back. At the bar he waited for a family man to order drinks and food for his brood that seemed cowered against the far wall, as if this was some kind of bandit country they had entered.

  Robbie took the two drinks back to Rita and waited patiently while she ran out of coins and out of luck.

  ‘There’s a table over there,’ he said, and made a dive for it just before it could be snapped up by three women, office workers by the looks of them. He ignored the ugly looks and pushed back a chair with his leg so that Rita could sit.

  ‘They let all sorts in here these days,’ she said.

  ‘They seemed all right.’

  ‘I didn’t mean the women from the tax office. The likes of him.’ She jutted her chin out in the general direction of the bar. ‘Student types.’

  Robbie didn’t need to look to know who he would see. Sure enough, as cool as the breeze, standing alone in the saloon bar, with a pint of beer in one hand and something else in the other, was the young hippie-type who had been stalking him all day.

  ‘You can see him?’ Robbie said. If Rita could see him as well, perhaps it wasn’t as bad as he imagined. There must be an explanation.

  ‘See who?’

  ‘The boy, well, young man, over there with the pint. Long hair and tie-dyed T-shirt.’

  Rita made a performance of craning her neck to get a good look.

  She shook her head. ‘No one like that, Robbie boy. How many of those have you had? No, I mean that lot by the snooker table.’

  Robbie looked across, and the group of young people there could easily be described as ‘student types’, although they were just as likely to be unemployed these days.

  When he looked back into the saloon, the young man had gone.

  Rita got the next round, then Robbie, and by the time it was Rita’s turn again, Robbie was starting to feel the effects and his internal warning system was sounding alarm bells; he needed to slow down if he was to go on stage later.

  They shared some crisps and that soaked the alcohol a little. After a while, a man approached their table.

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said. ‘Are you Robbie Press?’

  Robbie smiled, and inwardly gave a loud cheer. It used to happen, requests for autographs when he was recognised. Not so often these days.

  ‘I am. Autograph, is it?’

  The man looked confused. ‘No, why… no, the young man asked me to give you this.’ With that, the man scuttled away.

  ‘What is it?’ Rita said.

  Robbie held it in his hands, rolling it between his fingers, caressing it with his palms. It was the letter he’d received terminating his television contract with immediate effect. It was midway through the third series, and he seemed to remember they’d replaced him at short notice with Jack Dee.

  He’d had warnings about his drinking. The gambling forays were tolerated because they didn’t impinge on his performances in front of camera, apart from the time the heavies came knocking at the studio door looking for a lump-sum payment. The dalliances with the females were frowned on, but everyone was at it then; the freedom of the sixties was fully alight by the late eighties and early nineties. No, it was the allegations about some of them being underage that did for him. He swore, and would do until the day he died, that there was no truth to the rumours, but someone had it in for him. He was out and never invited back. He still waited with trepidation for the knock at the door, the way the police were looking at old cases.

  ‘How did…’

  ‘You all right? You look as white as a sheet.’

  Robbie swallowed his drink and coughed as it caught in the back of his throat. ‘Yes, just unexpected, that’s all.’

  ‘Can I see?’

  ‘No, I mean, it’s nothing.’ He stuffed the letter into his pocket, and stood from the table. ‘I’d better get off. I’m on at ten and I need to get ready.’

  He left the noisy pub and walked out into the diminishing sunshine.

  He didn’t need a crystal ball to tell him that his days in the game were numbered. It was a young person’s business now; they were even letting women in, not like when he started out. It was all Michael McIntyre and road-shows, formulaic quiz shows, Peter Kay and huge concert
audiences. The days of the pier theatres, variety clubs and the like had gone.

  His agent was far too old, should have retired years ago. His contacts were at least ten years out of date. What work Robbie did get was down to his own resourcefulness, and pity from some who had known him in better times. It was low-level clubs and holiday camps now, and the future that beckoned did so with rheumy eyes and an arthritic finger. Even the owners of the Roadside Club had been embarrassed when they told him they may have to let him go come the autumn.

  He was getting too old, and not yet sixty. He just didn’t feel it any more, he didn’t feel funny. It used to be said that someone like Tommy Cooper, or Eric Morecombe, could just walk on stage and people would be laughing even before they said a word. Robbie had never had that kind of charisma, but he had a gift of holding the audience in his hand. He could direct them to the punch-line without signposting it. He could gently string out a gag until he had milked it for everything it was worth, even if it was worth very little to begin with.

  He wasn’t the man he used to be.

  ‘Thor, the Viking God of Thunder, and his pal Odin were up in Valhalla, when suddenly Thor says to Odin, “It's been a long time now. I really need to have sex.” Odin stands and ponders for a while, before replying, “Go to Earth, O Thor, and find thyself that they call a 'lady of joy' and treat her to your manly pleasures.” And this Thor did. The next day, he comes back up to see Odin, and tells him about the previous night's events. “My friend,” he says, grinning from ear to ear, “it was wonderful. We had passionate sex 37 times.”’

  ‘More than I get from my wife.’ The heckling started early that night.

  ‘“37 times!” exclaims Odin. “That poor woman! Mere mortals cannot endure such treatment. You must go and apologize this instant!” So Thor goes back down to earth and finds the aforementioned prostitute, and he says, “I'm sorry about last night, but you see, I'm Thor...”’

  ‘Heard it before.’

  ‘And it goes like this – “You're Thor?” shouts the girl with a lisp. “You're Thor? What about me? I'm tho thor I can hardly pith!”’

  ‘Rubbish, get off.’

  When Robbie got to the club from the pub he was greeted by Eric, the doorman.

  ‘Someone been asking for you, Robbie.’

  Robbie’s heart sank.

  ‘Nice young fellow. Said he used to know you.’

  ‘Where is he now?’

  Eric could tell from the tone of voice that Robbie wasn’t pleased to hear about his visitor. Oh well, too late now. ‘Showed him through to your dressing room.’

  Dressing room? That was a laugh. Robbie shared a broom cupboard with whatever other acts were on the bill. This week it was a ventriloquist with a stutter, and two strippers who spoke no English and weren’t much younger than poor Rita.

  Eric looked concerned. ‘Did I do wrong? Only he said he knew you way back.’

  A long way back, thought Robbie. Far too long. Back when the future was laid out with some hope, before the dreams turned to sand and were washed away by the tide of his own vices.

  He hurried across the main room and slipped behind the curtain to the area backstage. There was a narrow corridor that led to the side rooms, one of which was his ‘dressing room’. He pushed at the door, unsurprised to find it open.

  ‘Hello,’ he called out, more from fear of who he might find than from politeness in case one of the other performers was there. There was no reply.

  He inched his way into the small room. Sniffing, he found traces of the familiar smell from his boarding room, and he put one hand against the wall as a sudden sharpness pierced his chest. He clamped a hand against the place where he vaguely thought his heart was. It was beating, and he breathed more easily.

  Further into the room, he caught sight of his reflection in the cracked mirror. Standing beside him, slightly to the left, was the young man he had seen all day. Long hair flicked back as he shifted position. It was him. It was Robbie. There was no mistaking it. The clothes were ones he had worn, could even remember where he had bought the jeans – a shop in Oxford Street.

  ‘Who… no, I know who. Why? How?’

  The young man in the glass put his finger to Robbie’s lips and smiled.

  As Robbie watched, scared to move, the man began to fade. ‘No! Wait!’

  It was too late, and had been for a long time. The two images caught in the mirror merged as one, and all that was left was the Robbie of the present day: tired, worn out, defeated and dulled.

  Later, nearer ten than nine, he was called on stage.

  The spotlights did their usual trick of disruption, and it took him a few seconds to adjust his eyes.

  ‘A nun and a priest are crossing the Sahara desert on a camel. On the third day out, the camel suddenly drops dead, without warning, stone cold dead. After dusting themselves off, the nun and the priest take a look around. After a while, the priest says, “Well, Sister, this looks pretty grim.”’

  ‘Like this place.’ A lone voice, but backed up by grunts of agreement.

  ‘”I know, Father. In fact, I don't think we can survive more than a day or two.” “I agree,” says the father. “Sister, since it’s unlikely we will make it out of here alive, would you do something for me?” “Anything, Father.” “I have never seen a woman's breasts, and I was wondering if I might see yours.” “Well, under the circumstances, I don't see that it would do any harm.”’

  ‘Bring the strippers back on.’

  ‘The nun opens her habit and the priest enjoys the sight of her shapely breasts, gorgeous they are, a real handful, and he comments on their beauty. “Sister, would you mind if I touched them?” She nods shyly. “Okay.” And he fondles them for several minutes. After a while the nun says, “Father, could I ask something of you?” “Yes, Sister?” “I have never seen a man's penis. Could I see yours?” “I suppose that would be ok,” the priest says, and lifts his robe. “Oh, Father, may I touch it?” The priest says “All right,” and after a few minutes of fondling he was sporting a huge erection. Massive dick.’

  ‘Like the one standing up there.’

  Robbie felt it like a kick in the ribs. He knew what it was immediately – he’d had enough warnings, unheeded and ignored like so much of his life these days.

  ‘“Sister, you know that if I insert my penis in the right place, it can give life.” “Is that true, Father?” “Yes, it is, Sister.” And it goes like this – “Oh, Father, that's wonderful... stick it in the camel and let's get the fuck out of here!”’

  There was laughter, fading into the distance; he heard it as he fell.

  ‘What’s he doing?’

  No one rushed on stage straight away; they never knew with Robbie if it was all part of the act or not.

  ‘Is he messing around?’

  Robbie felt warm breath on his face and looked up at Doru, who had seen his father suffer a similar attack. He pressed down on Robbie’s chest and began a rhythm that he had used before.

  Before Robbie closed his eyes, the pain getting worse, he looked out into the audience. There was only one face he could make out from the blurred and shadowed shapes.

  It was a young man with long hair. He was standing, and without looking back, he was walking away.

  SILVER

  The Drysdale Clinic stood in five acres of picturesque Hertfordshire countryside, reached by an uneven road that set my teeth on edge. I swung in through the high wrought iron gates and took the curving four-hundred-yard gravel drive to the front door slowly, thankful to be on a comparatively smooth driving surface.

  The man who lent the clinic his name and, until recently, funded it, was Tom Drysdale, nineteen-nineties music mogul turned millionaire philanthropist. Spurred on by the death of his guitarist son from a drug overdose, he bought the beautiful Regency building, equipped it and hired a well-respected psychologist, a Doctor Susan Reynolds, to oversee the rehabilitation programs. Since its inception,
more than three hundred drug- and alcohol-dependent individuals had passed through those wrought iron gates in a, for some, last-ditch effort to get their lives back on track.

  The nurse at the reception desk had a kind face, and a professionally kind manner.

  'Mr Turner, good to see you again. Keeping well?'

  'I’m good, Janet,' I said. 'Is Maria in her room?'

  Janet consulted the computer screen on her desk. 'No,' she said, and then noticing the look of alarm on my face, added quickly, 'She’s outside, getting some air. You’ll probably find her down by the lake. It’s 3.15. Your daughter normally spends her afternoons down there.'

  'Ah, I see. May I go down to see her?'

  'Of course. Do you know the way?'

  I nodded. 'Yes. Dr Reynolds took me down there when I first came to…' I was going to say check out the place, but I didn’t like the way that sounded.

  'Of course,' Janet said again, quickly, saving me from embarrassment. 'She gave you the grand tour. She likes to do that with the families of prospective… guests.' She placed emphasis on the word, making sure I realized she was using the term euphemistically. 'Well, you go ahead. There’s always a member of staff nearby, in case you or your daughter should need anything.'

  I thanked her and walked back out through the double oak doors, through the car park, and across the neatly manicured and sloping lawn. A stand of silver birch trees formed a natural barrier between the clinic and the surrounding woodland.

  Of all the rehab clinics I had checked out in my search to find the right one for Maria, the Drysdale scored high on my checklist. As I said, the clinic was an elegant Regency building with comfortably furnished rooms, large enough to accommodate over thirty guests, but not big enough to give it the feel of an institution. Security was subtle but effective, and the members of staff that I’d come into contact with were, like Janet, polite and efficient: a testament to Susan Reynolds’ philosophy that rehabilitation should not be a punishment, but a pleasure.

  I walked past the silver birches and carried on along a bark-chipped path down to the lake.