Some Trick: Thirteen Stories

by Helen Dewitt

  Gayatri says: Crikey. Well done you!

  She says: If they contest you might need witnesses, but as far as the language goes this is the business.

  We can reveal that Darren and Stewart had spent many hours analysing the source of Sting’s wealth, which derives not least from the fact that he is the author of record of such classics as ‘Every Breath You Take’, ‘Roxanne’, ‘Message in a Bottle’, and ‘Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic’, such that he receives a fee in the region of $.08 (as of time of writing) every time said songs get air time, years or even decades after the songs slipped off the charts never to return. Whilst the other members of Police get bugger all. The result being that Darren and Stewart had spent many hours arguing over credits for the songs of Missing Lynx, while Sean on keyboards and Keith on drums were never even conceivably going to be in a position to buy an island in the Caribbean. Such that Keith had lost valuable time that might have been spent hitting things absorbing the Language of the Suits by osmosis. Which stood him in good stead when he needed to transfer copyright to a song on a cocktail napkin.

  So yeah, needless to say Darren and Stewart were not going to take this lying down, but Marc’s newfound mates at the Oranges and Lemons rallied round, and Sean the keyboardist unexpectedly refused to remember that the song had been more of a thing they had all done together than something any one person could take credit for, and Marc was quids in.

  You can’t always get what you want.

  Pa Pa Pa PAAAAAAAAAAAAA Pa.

  In Which Nick Buys a Harley for 16k Having Once Been Young

  In 1970 they had their one and only legendary US tour.

  The Breaks played 100 gigs in 110 days. They played their five hits the way the hits sounded on the record. They played their six other songs so they sounded like their five hits. They were in America, which was where they had all dreamed of going, except they didn’t see it. They saw hotel rooms and stages and the inside of a bus.

  The tour was not going well, because before they left their manager had brought out their new LP. The last time they had talked about the cover Pete had had some Op Art-like ideas and their manager had said it was interesting and now here it was.

  The artwork was a rip-off of Yellow Submarine with cartoons of the lads in bell-bottoms and boots and it was called Groovin On Down. There was an unpleasant scene because Pete said he was not going to America to be associated with an album called Groovin On Down. His manager said he did not see and Pete said bitterly that they should call themselves the Berks and a bystanding American asked enlightenment and was told that a berk was the kind of person who thought it was groovy to call an album Groovin On Down. Wee Willie Wanker and His Wallies he said, and he said Well at least they can’t do anything to

  There was something about the way Steve’s expression stayed exactly the same so smiling and friendly there was something in the way he said agreeing Exactly, it’s the music the fans care about, slipping in the word ‘fans’.

  Pete said Well let’s hear it, and there was something about the way he was too eager. He slipped the silky black disc from its sleeve and put it on the turntable.

  Some of the record was old material and some was new material going in a different direction from the old material which now sounded exactly like the old material.

  The three other Breaks jumped him before he could kill their manager and their manager explained that they had just made some very minor adjustments because you didn’t want to disappoint your fans.

  For a while it seemed that Pete would not go but someone had the bright idea of calling his father who made an uplifting speech about Shirley Temple, that little girl had more spunk in her little finger was the general tenor of the argument, look at Julie Andrews he went on to say, do you think Miss Andrews found it easy to work with a man who imagined he had mastered Cockney? These people are professionals, he explained, it’s not all glamour, it’s a tough life but the show must go on.

  Pete hung up and relayed the comment about Shirley Temple to the rest of the band.

  The Beatles had staff to do their autographing but the Breaks wouldn’t do that to their fans. Every manager has to find his own way of dealing with temperament. What Steve did was he talked to the lads before the tour, he said it meant a lot to the fans to have a signed copy of the album, Pete, he said, as they all knew, he said, had a big following amongst the fans, but he knew Pete was not as happy as he had hoped with the album, he respected that, if Pete was not comfortable with signing the album he could just sign pix and Mike, Nick and Dave could sign albums on Pete’s behalf but he naturally hoped that in the cold light of day Pete would see his way to doing something that would mean so much to the fans. At the end of the day they were all professionals.

  Pete didn’t say anything. There were four stacks of pix of the lads, and a stack of Groovin On Down. Mike, Nick and Dave each took twenty copies of Groovin On Down. Pete said Well, if it means that much to the fans, and he took twenty copies of Groovin On Down and started signing.

  So Steve had the lads signing pix and LPs for a couple of hours a day before the gigs. By the second week of the tour three of the songs on the album were in the Top 10. The three hits were all from the new material that had been toned down to be more like the old material.

  Steve did not expect gratitude because he was just doing his job, which was to see they did not disappoint the fans.

  Luckily at the gigs the lads were not really able to replicate the sound effects Pete had been aiming at in the studio, so the three new hits sounded even more like the five old hits than they did on the record.

  One day they were doing a Break-tastic group signing. Nick had to leave the room so Mike took some albums signed Mike and Dave over to Pete and when Nick came back he found he had a stack of albums signed Mike, Dave and Willy the Wanker.

  It was only too clear that Pete had failed to live up to the standard of professionalism set by Miss Temple and Miss Andrews.

  Steve said it wasn’t for himself that he minded, it was the fans, he thought they were all professionals, but if that was the way it had to be so be it.

  What it meant was that in later years any copy of Groovin On Down signed Mike Nick Dave and Pete was automatically worthless, because Pete had only ever signed the album Willy the Wanker, Wee Willie Wanker, and Shirley, and the only ones signed Pete dated from the point at which Steve had brought in a girl to sign on Pete’s behalf. The Willy the Wanker albums were worth about $1,000, and a complete Willy the Wanker–Wee Willie Wanker–Shirley set was worth about $15,000, because Pete only signed them for about a month before Nick left the room. There were twenty albums signed only by Mike, Dave and Willy the Wanker, and they were real collector’s items because of the limited number and association with a historic occasion. Steve confiscated them at the time, and he was able to laugh about it later when he saw what they went for.

  Halfway through the tour the fans stormed the stage. There was a lot of confusion. Nick, Mike and Dave made it to the car and they assumed Pete was in another car. So they got back to the hotel and there was no sign of Pete. All night there was no sign of Pete. In the morning there was still no sign of Pete.

  What had happened was that Pete had managed to hide in the van of one of the roadies. After a while the van took off. When it stopped Pete got out. He started walking and after a while he reached a street with some stores. There was a drugstore, and a liquor store, and a store called Five and Dime — all very American. Every once in a while someone would look at him, and twice someone screamed PETE!!!!!!! and asked for an autograph.

  He kept walking down the street, looking at the stores and the people and the American cars. He had the feeling that the world was very quiet, that he was hidden in a part of the world that was just quietly going on while Steve imploded.

  He had a hundred-dollar bill in his boot, which was the only item of clothing that could not easil
y get ripped off by a fan. He went into the Five and Dime and bought a check shirt and a pair of straight-legged jeans. He put on the new clothes and threw away the old ones, and now not so many people looked at him. Then he went into a barbershop that looked like the kind of place his father went, and he asked for the kind of haircut his father always asked for, and when he went back out into the street no one looked at him.

  He walked out of town and put out his thumb, and he was picked up by a man in a white Chevy pick-up truck. There was still that quietness in the world.

  The road stretched straight out ahead looking just the way he always thought an American road would look. The radio was on. The driver appeared not to be one of his fans.

  Well I know I’ll be blue

  If my true love’s untrue

  I don’t think I could ever bear to part

  Don’t you walk out the door tomorrow

  Leaving me to grief and sorrow

  Cause I’ll beg or steal or borrow back your heart

  The world was so quiet. Eat your heart out, Paul McCartney.

  And that was the end of the Breaks. Pete kept going east on Route 66. People would stop and he would open his mouth and they’d say You’re English, aren’t you? and nothing was too good for him. Sometimes they’d drive through a town past a record store and he’d see pristine copies of Groovin On Down in the window and they’d just keep going. After a while he went south and it was just as American though different and he saw places where you’d see tarantulas hopping down the road and people would actually say Howdy and he never got tired of hearing it. In one place he bought a harmonica, an instrument that is a lot harder than you might think. He spent a lot of time going MWA mwa MWA mwa getting the hang of it. He would never be anonymous again.

  In 1998 Bike Magazine had a special Harley Davidson issue with an insert including a piece on the Harley Owners Group (HOG). It really is a way of life, said a member, with any other motorcycle you pay up at the shop, buy the bike and that’s it, but with a Harley that’s just the start. He said it was all to do with meeting likeminded people who knew that you didn’t need to do 160 mph everywhere to get a buzz. He said you ended up with friends all over Europe, the tours meant that you met people with the same biking interests as you, but with varied backgrounds.

  I said

  The berimbau is a unique percussive instrument, consisting of a gourd with a single string. Played with a bow, it produces tone with a beat! Much used in Brazil, the berimbau will add that unmistakable ‘samba’ sound to your music, and will make you the envy of all your friends.

  We are sending you this remarkable instrument in the hope that you will sponsor Anya, daughter of a former musician. Anya, a hardworking student, is keen to go to college. Sadly, Anya’s father Nick is unable to help Anya achieve her goals. That’s why we need people like you. People who remember all the pleasure musicians like Nick have given in the past. People who want to give the younger generation a chance.

  We hope you’ll help Anya, Pete. But whether or not you choose to help this deserving young student, the berimbau is yours to keep.

  Pete said What the fuck?

  I put the berimbau and the bow on his keyboard.

  I said I want to be a banker. I want to make six figures. I don’t want to sell shit on a market stall.

  Pete said And Nick won’t give you the dosh? The mean bastard.

  I said I’ll pay you back. It’s three years and a year in Egypt.

  I explained the connection between Arabic and six figures. I said I needed four figures a year.

  Pete said Is that all? He dug under a lot of papers and he took out a chequebook and he wrote a cheque for five figures.

  He said Hey! hey! hey! Anya! Don’t cry! hey! hey!

  He said Let’s see how this little fucker works.

  He took the bow and bounced it softly on the string and he sang

  O I can’t do the boogie woogie

  I can do the oogie doogie

  O won’t you oogie doogie with me?

  Oogie woogie doogie

  Oogie woogie doogie

  Oogie doogie baby with me

  He looked up and he said You know Nick

  He said

  Nick, you know, he was into that rock thing, people watching, the money

  He said

  You know, just before our US tour we were in Gibraltar and I went over to Africa ’cause I didn’t think it would take that long to get back. It was just after our second album came out, and Steve had changed a lot of shit to make it like the first album. And that album was really popular, the fans didn’t notice, so I felt like the fans were total wankers. I felt betrayed. And Steve had booked us for a whole year of gigs, just playing the same shit the same way every time.

  So I walked along the beach, and I didn’t know what to do. I thought it would be better just to walk into the water and die than go through the year, and I couldn’t understand how they could do it. They turned my life into something worse than nothing, into this torture, for the sake of extra sales, well couldn’t we just have had enough sales and something in it for me? And how could they just decide like that that my life didn’t matter, it didn’t matter if I was in, like, agony. But the thing is they didn’t know they were doing it. They didn’t know what they were taking away because they never had anything real to know what it was like when everything was a fake. They could get a lot of money and blag about the business. The money was the only thing there could be for them, and they’d never have anything else.

  He said

  Don’t get so you can’t have anything but money, Anya. You don’t want to be like Steve.

  He said

  But what the fuck, do what you want.

  He said

  Booga dooga dooga

  De white man sucks

  Booga dooga dooga

  He really sucks

  He said

  I like this baby. Hey!

  Trevor

  ‘It is really a very sobering thought,’ said Trevor, ‘and one which the local talent, I’m afraid hasn’t quite cottoned on to, that a painting of a beautiful subject is almost invariably a rotten picture. Guaranteed kitsch, in fact, don’t you think?’

  Lily and Trevor were sauntering along the Cherwell in the University Parks; it was late afternoon in early July, and the drowsy calm of the sky, the languid sway of the trees, the deep shadows cutting sharply across the grass, all so fondly, so lamentably repeated on a dozen or so canvases, did seem to bear him out. The faintest, merest, tenderest hint of a blush in the sky reminded, with beautiful delicacy, that evening was coming on; several paintings gestured at this moment, but even the least little touch of pink gave them an air of digging an elbow in the side of the spectator, of announcing ‘the approach of even’ in a carrying stage whisper.

  ‘It just goes to show that a little pink really does go an awfully long way,’ said Trevor.

  ‘And how,’ said Lily. She spent most of her conversations with Trevor agreeing with Trevor, so much so in fact that the conversations were at times positively Socratic — at least in the variety of ways Lily found to express assent. But as they stood looking back across the park (they had reached the duck pond) she was struck by the unity of tone of the pale hot sky, the pale trees moving on the hot air: the wonderful tranquillity of the scene seemed to owe something to its evocation of sketches in chalk or pastel. And those stands of trees in open ground or clustered by the river — those lovely masses of foliage — for Lily, at least (but then she was American), part of their charm lay in being so very much the sort of thing she had admired in the Constables in the Ashmolean. That did not, of course, mean that the principle was wrong. There were all those wrecked ships by moonlight, naked girls with dabs of impasto at the nipple, all those sunsets over the desert to sustain it.

  But then, she pursue
d doggedly, what about Botticelli? Did one not suppose him — had he not supposed himself — to have been painting beautiful paintings of beautiful subjects? Venus? Primavera? Was it perhaps simply a sign of our time that it was impossible to be Botticelli — that now painting the beautiful remained firmly within the province of Maxfield Parrish? So that the relation of painting to beauty was perhaps something that must be referred ultimately to socioeconomic factors: and all because Botticelli was not kitsch. Or perhaps — and here she nearly stopped in her tracks at the audacity, the sophistication which she fathomed, suddenly, in Trevor’s aperçu — perhaps an argument could be made, taking a larger view, that by certain lights Botticelli was kitsch.

  And it was only at this point that her speculations, at first a mere trickle which might as well flow subterraneously as not, swelled to a stream which must come to the surface sooner or later, ought indeed to have been out in the open all along.

  ‘Was Botticelli kitsch, would you say?’ she ventured. Who can say what Meno or Polus was thinking underground, to give themselves such an appearance of being incapable of proper argument?

  ‘Oh,’ Trevor exclaimed now, ‘if everyone were a Botticelli . . .’ a little impatiently, for his own stream of remarks had been gurgling and chattering in the sunlight briskly on, and had just been coursing down a little cascade of cheery murmurs about tea, so that the abrupt cessation of the agreeable warm undercurrent of consent, the eruption of an earlier current of conversation in a geyser at the foot of the fall, were chilly, unwelcome surprises. They had turned up the avenue which runs parallel to Norham Gardens (Trevor lived at the top of a mustard-coloured house overlooking the park), and after a brief pause (the waters eddied furiously around the intrusion),

  ‘What shall it be?’ Trevor resumed genially. ‘Shall we go back to my place? Or shall we try a tea shoppe?’

  Lily weighed disagreeables: Trevor’s square tea of St Michael’s Tea Assortment, the longer walk to the nearest tea room.