A Bit of a Do

by David Nobbs

  Ted and Liz sat at a table beside the artificial log fire.

  ‘It’s been a fiasco,’ said Ted. ‘It has. I mean … it has. A total fiasco.’

  ‘Not total,’ said Liz. ‘You made a brave speech. Not everyone could admit something like that with so much dignity. I was proud of you.’

  ‘Oh heck,’ said Ted, partly because Liz was proud of him, partly because Elvis was approaching.

  ‘Right. I’m off,’ said Elvis, clutching his trophy. “Night, Dad.’

  He went towards the door. Ted hurried after him.

  ‘Elvis!’ he said. ‘There’s twenty-nine minutes of the extension unexpired.’

  ‘I’m going down the Plough,’ said Elvis. ‘You can drink late there without an extension.’

  ‘Elvis! Have a drink with us.’

  ‘I told some of the lads I’d go,’ said Elvis. ‘They’re getting one in for me. They’re the sort that only enjoy late drinking if it’s illegal. They were CB fanatics till it was legalized. Make vandalism compulsory and you’d wipe it out overnight. ‘Night, Dad.’

  ‘Elvis!’ Ted looked over his shoulder at Liz, hoping she didn’t realize that he was imploring Elvis to stay. ‘Never mind them. You’re my son.’

  ‘I can’t cope with all this, Dad,’ said Elvis. ‘Tonight. Everything. I don’t know if I admire you or despise you. I don’t know if I love you or hate you.’

  ‘And this is what your three years of philosophy have taught you!’

  ‘Yes! I’ve learnt how impossible it is to know anything. ‘Night, Dad.’

  ‘Say good night to Liz! Please!’ implored Ted, dropping his voice to a whisper.

  ‘’Night, Liz,’ called out the cynical Elvis, without turning round. He raised his right arm, waggled it casually, in a parody of a farewell, and hurried off towards the Plough. All evening he had felt that something was missing. Only now had he realized what it was. It was Simon Rodenhurst, of Trellis, Trellis, Openshaw and Finch. He just hadn’t found anybody he enjoyed insulting so much.

  Ted returned slowly to his lover.

  ‘Sorry about that,’ he said. ‘Families! Who’d have them? Oh God!’

  Kevin Loudwater was coming over to speak to them.

  ‘I suppose you think you’ve won, don’t you?’ said the blackmailing pork butcher with the crinkly perm. ‘I’ve lost anyroad. I’m to be expelled from the club if I don’t resign. Bloody Pete Ferris playing God again. And how am I going to get my roof repaired now?’ He moved off. Ted breathed a sigh of relief. Too soon! Kevin Loudwater returned! ‘You invited the vegetarian, didn’t you?’ he said. ‘It’s the thin end of the wedge. You’ll be flooding the town with them. Pork butcher? I’m living in the past. So bollocks to you both.’

  Kevin Loudwater’s tight buttocks didn’t look so complacent as he swung out of the bar. Just angry.

  ‘What did he mean about being expelled?’ said Liz. ‘What did he mean about his roof?’

  Ted didn’t reply.

  ‘What’s been going on, Ted?’

  Ted sighed.

  ‘Oh hell!’ he said. ‘Oh, bloody hell, Liz. I wasn’t being brave. You’ve no cause to be proud of me. I mean … you see … oh Lord … I only admitted what I’d done because Kev saw it. He blackmailed me in the car park.’

  Lester Griddle dropped a glass. Ted jumped. Mavis Griddle scowled.

  ‘Why did you do it?’ said Liz.

  ‘God knows!’ Ted bent forwards, towards the artificial log fire. He felt colder, older. ‘Well! … I suppose … Kev thinks it’s because I resent Elvis because he’s got a third-class degree in a useless subject at a new university and I’ve got nothing. Maybe I do, but I don’t think so. It’s been my hobby for nearly forty years, and I’ve never won anything. Other people are good at their hobbies. Suddenly I saw my chance. I mean … simple as that. End of story. What a hero.’

  Liz kissed him on the lips. Her tongue made its way into his mouth. Lester Griddle almost dropped another glass. Ted was astounded. Astounded that she still cared for him. Astounded that she could kiss him like that, in front of people. Then he realized that nobody was there except the Griddles, and people like Liz didn’t think of people like the Griddles as people. Landlords, waiters, shop assistants, they were part of life’s furniture. Ted felt guilty about thinking such things while Liz’s tongue was inside his mouth. The truth was, he couldn’t respond. He was too tired. He had only one need. Drink.

  At last the kiss ended.

  ‘Let’s go home,’ said Liz.

  ‘There’s twenty-six minutes of the extension unexpired.’

  ‘The failure of the evening is no longer your responsibility. You’ve resigned.’

  ‘I know, but I need a drink. Just one, love. After that ordeal. Because it was.’ He called out, ‘Same again, please, Lester,’ and then they noticed that Norman Penfold was still there. He looked even smaller than usual when he was asleep.

  ‘Let’s dance,’ said Liz.

  He had won over the question of going home. He would have to concede in the matter of the dance. He shook Norman Penfold, who woke up with a start and immediately began playing an Irish jig.

  Ted and Liz danced dreamily, romantically, wearily, slowly, in a manner utterly unsuited to the accompaniment of an Irish jig. The wind rattled and the lights flickered and Lester Griddle plonked their drinks on the bar lugubriously and the rain beat against the windows like late drinkers requesting entry diffidently. Norman Penfold jigged. The cardboard angels swung gently in the breeze that Ted and Liz created as they smooched across the old, stained, gold-and-brown carpet, from the decorated half of the bar to the undecorated half and back again.

  ‘Thank you for standing by me,’ said Ted. ‘A lot of people are going to have to eat their words.’

  ‘What on earth do you mean?’ said Liz.

  ‘Oh heck. They say you’re … oh heck.’

  ‘They say I’m what?’

  ‘They say you’re … well … shallow and self-centred and … you know … out for what you can get and … I mean … Liz … I know you aren’t. Oh heck.’

  Ted kissed her, and began to feel amorous at last.

  ‘You don’t like it when I take the initiative, do you, Mr Macho-Man?’ said Liz. ‘You like to remain in control.’

  ‘Rubbish. Rubbish, Liz. It’s rubbish, is that. I mean … it is.’

  ‘Methinks the man doth protest too much.’

  ‘Liz!’

  ‘When we get home I’m going to take the initiative, and if you don’t like it you can lump it,’ said Liz. ‘I’m going to start by taking all your clothes off, very very slowly.’

  ‘Me too,’ said Ted. ‘Yours, I mean. Oh Liz!’

  ‘Look at him,’ said Lester Griddle. ‘I don’t know how he bloody does it, excuse my French.’

  ‘Does what?’ said Mavis Griddle, as sour as a bad pint, impatient to close down now that only three customers remained.

  ‘Dancing!’ said Lester Griddle lugubriously. ‘As if he hasn’t got a care in the world. And he’s been paying VAT for years.’

  Fourth Do

  April:

  The Charity Horse-Racing Evening

  The long picture windows of the golf club restaurant and bar faced west across the gently rolling hills on which the golf course had been built. The sun was dipping below the distant Pennines, and the last golfers were walking up the eighteenth fairway.

  Behind the clubhouse lay the untidy sheds and converted hangars of the Wartley Industrial Estate. The windows of the kitchens and lavatories faced that way.

  Graham Wintergreen, the manager, a bluff, egg-shaped man with a small bald head and a pot-belly, surveyed his kingdom uneasily. His bloodshot eyes roamed briskly over the panelled walls, engraved with the names of the winners of the various ‘inhouse’ competitions since the year dot, over the beige carpet, the varnished tables and adequately elegant chairs, over the well-stocked bar run by the dapper, ageless Eric Siddall, barman supreme. Everything was spotless. In
the centre of the room there was a huge, false, stone chimney breast. The golfing prints and cartoons which adorned the chimney breast and the panelled walls were free of dust and hanging straight.

  His gaze travelled up the short flight of stairs to the restaurant area. Tonight there was to be a fork supper, and the tables had not been laid. The place mats, with more golfing scenes, were stacked in a cupboard. So were the menus, on which starters were described as ‘drives’, main courses as ‘iron shots’, desserts as ‘putts’.

  Everything was in order, but Graham Wintergreen’s uneasiness remained. When he had agreed to hold a horse-racing evening to raise money for the Theatre Royal, he hadn’t been worried. It had seemed a good idea to mark the thirtieth anniversary of that great day when the town had at last been put on the world’s theatrical and cultural maps, when the Mayor and Mayoress and all the councillors had attended, and Agatha Christie herself had sent a very nice letter regretting that she couldn’t see the production of her play, due to ‘unavoidable archeological commitments’. He had even invited an actor as guest of honour tonight. Harvey Wedgewood was one of the few surviving members of that opening cast. He was apparently well thought of ‘in the business’. Graham Wintergreen, whose interests were golf, drink, food and women, in that order, had imagined a cheery, extrovert type, good company apart from his theatrical ‘tales’. Then the blow had fallen. He had been asked to provide ‘some vegetarian meals’.

  Vegetarians, in the golf club! It would be the thin end of the wedge! The tip of the iceberg! Now he expected Harvey Wedgewood to be a revolutionary socialist homosexual intellectual. In place of his normal clientele, who swapped golfing boasts, risqué stories and, just occasionally, wives, there would be weirdos, poofters, intellectuals, Marxists. Possibly even people of an ethnic nature.

  How he wished that the club professional, Harry Hopworth, was here to give him moral support. But Hopper, as he was known to his many friends, was far away, lying twenty-seventh in the Tunisian Open, and looking set for his best result on foreign soil for five years.

  Imagine the relief of the uncharacteristically edgy clubhouse manager when the first to arrive was Ted Simcock! No Marxist revolutionary here!

  Nevertheless, Graham Wintergreen’s relief was mixed with embarrassment. He had no idea what to say to Ted. Yet he couldn’t just ignore what had happened.

  ‘Hello, Ted,’ he said.

  ‘Hello, Graham,’ said Ted.

  So far so good! Graham Wintergreen thought of following up this opening gambit with ‘How are you?’ But Ted might tell him! To talk about the weather seemed cowardly. Golf? That might seem callous, under the circumstances.

  ‘I was sorry about … er …’ he said gruffly.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Ted equally gruffly, moving off towards the bar.

  A wave of relief swept over Graham Wintergreen. He had handled the situation in masterly fashion. He had expressed his sympathy, without touching on hurtful or unpleasant matters, and had elicited the information that Ted didn’t want to talk about them either.

  Graham Wintergreen battened onto the next arrivals gratefully. He knew where he was with Rodney Sillitoe, the big wheel behind Cock-A-Doodle Chickens, and his wife Betty, who was over-adorned as usual.

  ‘Large Scottish wine,’ said Eric Siddall, barman supreme. He was a small man with an elegant, polka-dotted bow tie. ‘Certainly, sir. Just the job. Tickety-boo. No problem. Here we go.’ He hesitated, as if about to make a personal remark. Then the dangerous moment passed, and he poured Ted’s large whisky. He was one of the few men who have ever told their careers officer that they wanted to be a barman. After a searching apprenticeship on lesserknown cruise liners he had been in charge of the golf club bar for seventeen years. In that time he had never served a bad drink, given the wrong change, been at a loss for an exotic cocktail, or made a personal remark. He seemed untouched by age, but over the years an increasing collection of catch-phrases had adhered to him. They poured out, as if beyond his control. Perhaps he didn’t even realize that he was saying them. ‘Same again of water, sir? Very good. That’s the ticket. There you go, sir. A fiver? No problem.’

  ‘No, I’ll get that,’ said Rodney Sillitoe, hurrying over in his crumpled Harris Tweed jacket.

  ‘I’m not broke yet,’ said Ted.

  ‘Ted! You’re my guest. That’s all I meant.’ Rodney ordered his and Betty’s drinks with some dismay. He’d felt that he must invite Ted, under the circumstances, but he’d had a sneaking hope that Ted wouldn’t be able to face up to coming. ‘You’re early,’ he said.

  ‘I wasn’t sure if I could face walking into a crowded room,’ said Ted.

  ‘Nobody’ll gloat,’ said Rodney. ‘We aren’t like that. You’ll have the sympathy of every man and woman in this room.’

  ‘It’s worse than gloating, is sympathy,’ said Ted. ‘It’s a bugger, is sympathy.’

  ‘Gin and tonic, ice and a slice, one Scottish wine, just the job, tickety-boo, there you go. A fiver? No problem,’ said the dapper, ageless Eric Siddall.

  ‘Thanks.’ Rodney hesitated. There was a little matter which he wanted to raise with the barman before Betty returned from her titivations. Did it matter if Ted witnessed it? He didn’t really think it did. ‘Can you do me a favour, Alec?’ he asked.

  ‘Eric, sir.’

  ‘Eric! Sorry! Can you do me a favour, Eric?’

  ‘If I can, sir. What can be done will be done. Have no fear.’

  ‘Thanks. If my wife … er … if you think she’s having a bit too much at any stage … let’s face it, she has been known to, bless her … could you try and catch my eye, and signal to me?’

  ‘Signal to you, Mr Sillitoe?’

  ‘Yes. Say … er … oh … raise your right arm high above your head with a glass in it.’

  Rodney indicated the gesture by raising his right arm with a glass in it.

  ‘Certainly, sir,’ said Eric Siddall. ‘Can do. No problem. No snags anticipated.’

  Damn! Laurence was approaching, and he’d seen Rodney raising his right arm, and he was looking faintly surprised.

  ‘Touch of rheumatism,’ Rodney Sillitoe explained, raising his arm again and flexing it. He offered Laurence a drink. Laurence asked if Eric had such a thing as a really dry white wine. Eric’s reply suggested that he did indeed, he anticipated no problem, indeed he seemed confident that it would be just the job, thoroughly tickety, and probably boo as well.

  Ted Simcock and Laurence Rodenhurst greeted each other cautiously. Their eyes met, weren’t quite sure what they saw, and slid away from the contact.

  ‘Is Betty not here?’ said Laurence, who was wearing a very smart suit.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Rodney. ‘We must all help to save our theatre, mustn’t we? It’ll be a tragic loss to the town if it goes under.’

  ‘Tragic,’ agreed Laurence. ‘It’s a nice little theatre, isn’t it?’

  ‘Well, we’ve never actually been,’ admitted Rodney. Like many people in the town, the Sillitoes went to London at least once a year, stayed at the Strand Palace, Went on a Shopping Spree, Had a Slap-up Dinner, Took in a Show, and spent a small fortune. Like many people in the town, they were loth to spend eight pounds for two seats in their own theatre, especially when you had to add in the cost of the programme and the drinks in the interval.

  ‘Oh, you should. You must,’ said Laurence. ‘It’s very attractive. You’d never know it was built on the site of an abattoir.’

  ‘How’s Liz?’ said Ted suddenly, as if he couldn’t bear to avoid the subject any longer.

  ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ said Laurence. ‘I haven’t seen her.’

  ‘Oh!’ Ted seemed surprised.

  ‘No. I haven’t heard a word,’ said Laurence.

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘Ah!’ said Rodney Sillitoe, welcoming with relief the arrival of Betty, who was over-titivated as usual. She was wearing a white trouser suit, with her best pearls, her second-best pearls, two rings, a silver broo
ch and a gold necklace.

  ‘Hello, Ted, love,’ she said, giving him a warm kiss which said everything. It’s so much easier to sympathize with somebody if they’re of the opposite sex.

  ‘Hello, Betty,’ said Laurence. ‘You look … er …’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Betty, choosing to assume that if Laurence had felt able to finish his sentence he would have said something complimentary, although it wasn’t clear why, if he had been going to say something complimentary, he hadn’t been able to finish his sentence. ‘It’s the teeth,’ she said, flashing him a bright smile. ‘I’ve decided not to sue you after all. I’d have had to keep them as you left them for months, and mumble at everybody. I’ve had the bridge redone on the National Health. Half the cost and twice as good.’

  ‘Betty!’ said Rodney. Women, even wonderfully sociable women like Betty, didn’t always seem to understand the value of social decorum, of club rules, of applied hypocrisy.

  ‘How’s Rita?’ asked Betty, ignoring Rodney’s rebuke.

  ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ said Ted. ‘I haven’t seen her.’

  ‘Oh!’ Betty seemed surprised.

  Ted didn’t feel like telling them that he’d written Rita three letters and torn them up, that he’d phoned her and rung off when he’d heard her voice, that he’d gone to Tescos twenty-three times and bought one item each time, braving the strange looks of the check-out girls and the suspicious eyes of the store detective, in the hope that he would bump into her.

  ‘You’ll see her tonight,’ said Betty.

  ‘What?’ His heart was thumping.

  ‘Neville’s bringing her.’

  ‘Neville!!!’

  ‘He’s giving her a lift. It’s on his way.’

  Ted wished he hadn’t said ‘Neville!!!’ with three exclamation marks. He knew, really, that there couldn’t possibly be anything between Rita and Neville Badger or indeed anybody but especially somebody like Neville Badger which could justify one exclamation mark, let alone three!!