Blame It on the Bossa Nova

by James Brodie

  “And who’s your team?”

  “Crystal Palace,” their gruff voices rising slightly with the pride of association.

  “Great. Good luck to you, I hope they win.” As the last of the group passed him Chris gave him a comradely pat on the back. We took our drinks back to one of the darkened alcoves that encircled the bar, gloomy even in the midday sun. Between us and the bar was an expanse of carpet big enough to be used as a training pitch by a formation dance team. Perhaps at night it was crowded - now it was deserted. Each alcove contained two tables, about six green leather padded chairs and four Victorian hunting prints. The principal source of illumination was the reflection from the copper cooking utensils fixed to the timber beam above our heads. At the next table a girl who wasn’t half bad looking was sitting in silence with a bloke of about thirty. He had a pint mug in front of him and she had a tomato juice. I saw Chris look at them quickly and noticed his face tense up for a second, so I gathered he was interested. I wondered if he was going to make a move. He was forced to remain within the sphere of our conversation for quite a while however by the drive and verve of Pascale who to me seemed almost hysterically determined to make it a weekend to remember. But my perceptions of Pascale’s behaviour were scarcely objective and Chris seemed happy enough to develop the intimate understanding that had begun at Pavilion Road. As I’ve said before she was very good at making people like her a lot, and she’d quickly judged the sort of pseudo-sophisticated glibness that would attract Christopher. One of its essential elements was to trivialise and ridicule any subject which was in danger of being taken seriously - Thalidomide babies, the OAS attempt to assassinate De Gaulle, the Berlin Wall - All were treated to the same immaculate bad taste in a self-congratulatory duet that seemed to flow as effortlessly as the drinks. We kept them coming, doubles and trebles to save time re-ordering. I think we were all determined to be well oiled by the time we arrived at Drone Acres.

  I’d heard all this sick stuff better done on Lenny Bruce LPs so to pass the time I half closed my eyes and tried to see what colours were retained: violets and yellows, and then opening them suddenly: reds, and then slamming them closed: deep indigo. I was experimenting on whether this varied greatly with constant repetition when Pascale got up to go to the lavatory. Christopher turned to me smiling.

  “Alex, what other friends have you been hiding from me, she’s terrific?”

  “I’m glad you get on together.” I was convinced at that moment that he was totally captivated by her and oblivious to everything else but he had a surprise in store for me, for he suddenly leaned back away from me and addressed the couple sitting next to us.

  “Have you any idea how far it is from here to Chichester?”

  The bloke replied that it was about fifty miles.

  “Same road all the way.”

  The bloke gave him some advice on the best road to take and the girl looked up lethargically to observe the intruder into her boredom. Christopher twinkled his eyes at her and drew a slight response. Seconds later he was introducing himself, seconds later he was signalling to the bar for drinks for our new friends and I was returning to the world of reds, yellows and deep indigos.

  “This is Alex,” I heard him say.” I opened my eyes to a blaze of cinnamon and vermilion and acknowledged them. By the time Pascale came back everything was very matey, particularly between Chris and the girl, whose name we found out was Pauline. I could see Pascale was a bit put-out by this intrusion - it served no useful purpose in her scheme of things - and in truth it amused me slightly. The finely honed wit she had been purveying earlier sat ill at ease in a conversation that under Christopher’s guidance had broadened considerably to accommodate the new participants. She was forced temporarily to sit, like me, in silence. Pauline and Chris were hitting it off famously, he was doing his famous impersonation of himself and she was lapping up every last drop. I looked across to her boyfriend, Roger, and saw he was getting very pissed off.

  “Look you two,” said Christopher suddenly, addressing both of them but fixing Roger with a look that tried to convey he was Chris’s best mate in the whole wide world, “... we’re off to a party, down in Hampshire. Why don’t you both come, it’s going to be a whole lot of fun.” He was talking to Roger because he knew Pauline was already in the bag. But Roger looked doubtful.

  “Come on Rog, let’s go,” said Pauline. “... Your mum won’t mind if we don’t go round and see her tonight.”

  “What d’you say Rog?” said Christopher, perfectly capturing the required mood of cajolement. But Roger was not to be budged, and as his intransigence manifested itself more and more clearly, so too did Pauline begin to lose patience with him.

  “Come on Rog,” she pleaded. “... We never do anything exciting. This sounds really great.”

  “It will be,” promised Chris dutifully. But still he remained obdurate and soon she lost all patience.

  “Well I’m going anyway. You can do what you want.”

  At this Roger showed signs of panic, repeating her name in imploring tones, but the more pathetic he became the more resolute grew her determination to come with us. So close to victory, Chris could now afford a moment’s satirical parody: “Come on Rog,” he echoed, “... it’ll be fab.” But shortly afterwards with clinical timing he briskly stood up and said that we really must be on our way, in fact that we were already behind time.

  “Rog – Pauline - What’s it to be?”

  “I’m coming anyway,” she declared and marched out with us, leaving the dejected Rog alone amid a sea of empty shorts glasses, a sadder and a wiser man.

  Then there was the road, the crazy road, the A3 taking us westward, and Chris at the wheel hugging the cats’ eyes, playing the trash music on the radio, and sitting next to him Pascale, still brooding but beauteous in her sulkiness. Once Chris turned to flip the dial of the radio and we all caught the sound of an announcer saying something about Cuba, but Pascale flipped it back saying that was for the birds and we were out to have a good time... and in the back me and Pauline... Pauline soft and big-titted and snuggling up to me and letting me play with her gently so that she giggled softly and told me to stop it but let me continue.

  The Kemps were an old English family, but no one had paid them much attention until the Henrician Reformation, they’d done rather well out of that. As one of Henry’s new class of civil servants Thomas Kemp had acquired landed property and power. Later generations had become titled - something to do with the way they accepted the Hanoverian Succession - and, as is often the case with Whig aristocracy, things had just kept on getting better and better. The peak of overt political power came to the family in the nineteenth century when for a very short period a Kemp was foreign secretary. But in the twentieth century a subtler role was ordained. The rise of the media was superintended in certain key sectors by Kemps, and sometimes the current Lord appeared on ‘Any Questions’.

  Their home, Cathcart House, had been built at a low ebb in the fortunes of English architecture; a century spent trying to grasp the nettle of classicism had produced a number of blistered hands but very few memorable buildings. By the time things had begun to settle down after the battle of Waterloo the patient was in a critical condition. Any imposed rational discipline tends to give the British a headache after a time and while everyone hung around counting off the decades to the Gothic revival the final emasculated examples of the old style revealed a carelessly concealed death-wish. Cathcart House was a case in point.

  Christopher had parked the Daimler casually askew on the gravelled drive in front of the house and we all crawled out and those of us new to the place leaned on the bonnet and looked at it. It’s size made it impressive. In the centre of the facade was a portico with a flight of steps a storey high leading to it, seven giant order Corinthian columns were capped by a crude pediment - it was too dark to examine the reliefs inside it. On either side of the portico were six bays with ground floor rusticated but apart from that hardly any articul
ation, terminated by a balustrade. The effect was uninspired, unpleasing, but as I say impressive. It impressed Pauline.

  “Is this your place Chris?” she gasped. He smiled with proprietorial pride. In his mind to have introduced us to it made it his place. Pascale too was impressed, I could see, her silence was eloquent, and also the fact that for a few seconds the almost permanent expression of fathomless introspection was replaced on her face by one of surprise.

  The whole elevation was ablaze with light coming from almost every window and we could see people moving about inside. In my mind I made the clichéd comparison with a stage set. The light was thrown out onto the forecourt and I looked at the watch on my wrist and then across at the faces of the others in naive fascination of the effect.

  “Are we going in, or shall we stay here?” said Chris. We dutifully fell in behind him and climbed the steps. The exterior had balanced mediocrity with grandeur but inside bad taste took over completely. The everyday objects of life in the second half of the twentieth century sat ill at ease next to suits of armour, themselves uncomfortable in quasi-classical surroundings.

  I must have lost concentration for a second or two while transmitting the sense-data to my memory bank, for I suddenly noticed that Chris had disappeared and that Pascale also was no longer with us. Pauline hung nervously on my arm like a non-swimmer in a public swimming pool full of noisy louts.

  “Let’s find out where they keep the drinks,” I said and went through a door to our left. She followed closely behind. A few people were standing around talking. One guy seemed familiar and after a second or two I recognised him as a television journalist on a nightly news magazine type programme. His television style was quirky, moralising, egocentric, posturing and I had never managed to develop an affection for his persona. He was without the tools of his trade that night, outrageous check jackets and matching hats, and he was chatting up a sexy looking blonde girl whom I recognised, again after a few seconds, as the one with whom I had nearly made it on the sofa at the Earls Court party. I looked round the room and sure enough, leaning on the mantelpiece was the fat slob. Pauline and I approached the chatting couple. I was surprised to find that the blonde remembered me. She didn’t actually say hello, but looked at me in a way that implied previous knowledge of my existence.

  “Hello,” I said. “... How are you?”

  “Great,” she said and I saw her give Pauline the once over.

  “Where are the drinks?” I asked.

  “Everywhere,” she replied and when I looked I saw that there were bottles full of drink nearly all over the room - literally hundreds.

  “Better than Long Life,” I said and she emitted a humourless chuckle to show that she appreciated the reference. I could sense that this was doing no good to the TV man’s ego so I hung around for a minute or two making more esoteric conversation before pushing off with Pauline to get some drink.

  “What d’you want?” I asked her.

  “I dunno. Anything.”

  “Try this.”

  “What is it?”

  “Twelve year old malt whisky.”

  She sipped it. “Is it supposed to be special?”

  By this time one or two more faces had lit up tiny light bulbs in my mind, and some had lit up bigger ones. A familiar figure loomed in front of me. Frank Hough, another refugee from the Earls Court party, and more recent acquaintance. If I’d been doing my job I would have kept Pascale close to me. I remembered I was there to get them together…..Fuck it. He hadn’t appeared to recognise me, anyway.

  It was gone ten by now and Pauline and I wandered slowly, drinks in hand, through the inter-connecting rooms. In one of them I saw Sandie, the dark haired girl with the beautiful legs, who I had also met at the Earls Court do. She was chatting to a well-known member of the House of Lords, one of the self-publicist variety who is never averse to doing something stupid to get his picture in the Daily Express. I wondered whether her black boyfriend Winston would approve of the liaison and if not whether he would saw off the lord’s head with a butcher’s knife and chuck it out of the window - that would be worth a column and a photo. She too recognised me and I enquired if Ronnie Forsythe was at the party. She looked at me archly as if to say I shouldn’t ask such questions. She asked if Chris was there. I told her we had come together and she said it was all right for some. But as Pauline and I continued our progression there was no sign of Chris to be seen. Pauline was continuously pulling on my arm pointing out ageing American film stars and rising hopes of the British film industry. I tried to tell her to cool it, that it wasn’t the sort of party where you got out your autograph book, but there was no way of stopping her. I decided to lose Pauline and told her I was going to have a piss. I stayed in the lavatory for an inordinate length of time, amusing myself by looking at the gallery of past members of the family and the notes relating their individual performances in the Eton v Harrow match at Lords. It was immaculately presented, each oval photograph was accompanied by a short report: “First innings, 37 not out. Second innings, 92, caught on boundary going for a six.” Know your enemy. I wondered what Pascale would have made of them.

  When I cautiously emerged Pauline wasn’t there and I quickly slipped into another room, a library. Again groups of people chatting, one group laughing loudly and vulgarly. Framed by a couple of pilasters I espied Pascale in the centre of that group which also included Frank. ‘Job Done’, as they say in the Boy Scouts. I started chatting to a girl who said she’d been a Rank Starlet. She could talk all the studio jargon and was so boring I felt it must be true. I detached myself from her and found myself hovering on the edge of Pascale’s group. I was surprised that Frank was even at the party, the way things were going over Cuba, but his thoughts were a million miles from that.

  “I tell you it’s the greatest sport on earth. You should see the drinking that gets done the night of the Army-Navy game. Wow!”

  “... Could you please be ever so kind and pass me that bottle.” It was Pascale. “This one here?” I heaved it over.

  “Isn’t this a lovely party?” she said in a naive voice.

  “It’s OK.”

  “Why the fuck aren’t you keeping an eye on Bryant? Where is he, do you know?” - all this in a tense whisper.

  “No.”

  “Find him. See what he’s up to.”

  “That wasn’t part of the deal.”

  “Find him......”

  Screams on the stairs announced that things were beginning to warm up. Those of us who rushed out were just in time to see the girl of genus ‘Rank Starlet’ being dragged upstairs by some Hooray Henrys in evening dress. She was protesting but it was the sort of performance that made you realize why Rank went to the wall. She disappeared from view shrieking and kicking and leaving her shoes halfway down the stairs. Simultaneously a P.A. system of gigantic power began blasting out music. But it was only Mike Sarne inviting us to ‘Come Outside’. I followed the sound to see what sort of action was going. The amplification had its source back in one of the rooms I’d already been through. It wasn’t a good dance record and anyway in that year dancing had been all wiped out by the twist. It wasn’t even a good twist record, but the milord wasn’t to know and he had set about making a fool of himself with a will that was heart-warming. Sarne’s painfully pseudo-working class tones faded into oblivion and were replaced by the ‘instrumental’ Telstar, which I had always thought had a more appropriate role as background music for an afternoon session at Streatham Ice Rink. It certainly wasn’t conducive for co-ordination of bodily movement, but he tried, how he tried, bless him. I could see Sandie getting distinctly bored by his lack of style, not that it was causing general amusement. I let him perspire his way to the bitter end and then stepped in neatly as I recognised the exhilarating opening chords of ‘The Locomotion’, a great dance record by any standards. It was a nice feeling, giving him the old Saturday Night at the Palais brush off and seeing his surprised angry face.

  “Take a breath
er, granddad,” I commented as if in fun and, taking a leaf out of Christopher’s book, slapped him on the back, two sailors on shore leave - Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly. I don’t think he got the joke. It was then I started to enjoy the party. A couple of crypto rockers, ‘Breaking Up Is Hard To Do’ and ‘It’ll Be Me - the Cliff Richard version, were followed by a whole series of smooch numbers – ‘Sealed With A Kiss’, ‘Stranger On The Shore’, ‘She’s Not You’ - the lights went low, the drink kept pumping round my body and Sandie and I just moulded together. But Old Bones wasn’t dead yet. As Sandie and I broke, as I thought reluctantly and temporarily, in he stepped and before I knew what had happened he was doing some completely new variations on the twist to ‘She Taught Me How to Yodel’. I looked at Sandie to exchange glances of exasperation but she had eyes only for the aged one, eyes that told me I was booked to play Donald O’Connor. But it didn’t bother me, I went and filled my glass, I was flying, there wasn’t anybody going to bring me down. A voice speaking at tongue length range into my left ear brought me to a temporary ceiling and postponed further ascent for a few moments.

  “Hey. Palomine... Buddy-Boy. Where is he?”

  “I take it you mean Bryant.”

  “Hole in one Buddy-Boy.”

  “It’s OK. It’s all under control. I know just where he is. There’s nothing doing.”

  “Just as long as you keep him covered.”

  “He can’t move without me knowing it.”

  “I’m glad to hear it... Where is he?”

  “Relax Frank. If anything breaks you’ll be the first to know. I promise.....” It irritated me to think that sooner or later I would have to start looking for Chris. I hoped it wouldn’t cramp my style.

  Things were shaking. I saw new guests who had not been present when I made my first inventory. A couple of gorgeous black girls, dressed up to look like twins, in tight satin trousers gave the scene cosmopolitan sophistication. They had the look of very westernised African princesses though the effect was slightly tarnished by them being pissed out of their minds and trying to pull the trousers off a guy who someone told me was our host, the Belted Earl himself. He was an Earl anyway. There seemed to be no immediate password to integrate me into their merry-making so I walked off, not enjoying the spectacle of such beautiful bodies so freely available, but not to me..... The music kept crashing through, some of it great sounds. The Isley Brothers ‘Twist and Shout’, its backbeat and arrangement so crude to our protected ears it sounded as if it had been produced by cavemen. Ray Charles’ syrupy ‘I Can’t Stop Loving You’, which seemed appropriately to go on and on, The Crystals – ‘He’s a Rebel’. The combination of music and alcohol is a potent one; soon we were all up there at different levels. The Rank Starlet came back into my life for ten minutes. She too was, as they say, fuckable, but I had this wonderful feeling that it was a night when there would be prizes for everybody - it wasn’t necessary to grab at the first opportunity, far better to savour the developments. One development was the arrival of Forsythe. I didn’t see him arrive but once when I looked up I saw him in earnest conversation with Sandie by a table full of drinks. It didn’t look like he was asking her how she liked her Amaretto di Saronno.