Watching the Wheels Come Off

by Mike Hodges

  ‘Even me?’

  ‘Even you, Mark. You will almost certainly have a talent for swallowing things.’

  Snazell obviously likes that. He smiles and points an accusing finger at Mark, who drags his eyes back to Cyril. ‘Let me just repeat the current record.’ He again faces the auditorium: ‘Louts and lassies, the current record for sinking lager stands at 20.79 litres in sixty minutes. Am I right, Cyril?’

  ‘You are, Mark.’

  ‘Held by?’

  ‘Wolfgang Pretorius. Since June 1968.’

  ‘Wolfgang, eh? A German?’

  No sooner has he said it than the puss of nationalism wells up from a bundle of shaved heads with faces as purple and blotchy as turnips. They start to scream ‘Sieg Heil’, stamp their boots and shoot their arms out in the Nazi salute. A regimented chant reminiscent of Nuremberg rapidly sweeps through the hall.

  Mark catches Cyril’s arm to stop him doing a runner, whilst himself barking into the microphone.

  ‘Who said it couldn’t happen here?’ His eyes blaze with memories of orgiastic SS officers overacting in war movies on late-night television. He grabs one of the pints lined up for Cyril and shouts: ‘Ja, ja, meine Kinder! If you swallow Nazism, you’ll swallow anything.’ He raises the mug in a toast: ‘To Adolf.’

  The hall falls silent as the golden liquid slips smoothly down his gullet. With a flourish, he tosses the empty mug to an assistant while cheering replaces the jeering. A fickle creature is the crowd, rabble, mob. Mark bows most graciously before turning back to Cyril.

  ‘Good luck, Cyril. Girls, please.’

  One of the assistants holds out a full mug to the quaking contender. Sadly the earlier blitzkrieg has had an adverse effect on Cyril’s nerves. With a supreme effort he steadies his hand and takes the lager offered.

  Mark is now in overdrive. ‘Stand by the clock, girls.’

  Cyril rests the glass on his bottom lip.

  ‘A ready… and a steady… and a GO!’

  A switch is thrown and the tacky chronometer shudders into action. Within seconds the mug is empty. One assistant takes it from Cyril, while the other stands by with a replacement.

  Mark shows his middle finger to the audience. ‘One!’

  Then he walks into the wings.

  ‘Two!’

  ‘Three!’

  He can hear the regular chant all the way to the stage door.

  Cyril is off to a cracking start.

  * * *

  Seemingly in situ at the stage door since the theatre first opened seven decades ago is Charlie. No one could recollect ever seeing Charlie arrive or leave; he was just there. A permanent fixture. A much-loved but useless pet no one has had the heart to put down.

  ‘Has my guest arrived, Charlie?’

  Mark has to repeat the question three times, since Charlie’s faculties bottomed out years ago. When Mark finally catches his wavering attention, the old man says: ‘Okey-dokey, Mark?’

  That’s all Charlie ever says.

  Mark sees that the old man is clutching a pass in his shaking hands. Through the window, Mark points to it; ‘His name is Rodney Cole. When he gets here, give that pass to him, Charlie. And tell him I’m in the Manhattan.’

  ‘Okey-dokey.’

  * * *

  Mark has recently persuaded the owners of the theatre to allow students from the local art school to carry out, under his personal supervision, a makeover of the extensive bar. His chosen theme had been the Manhattan Skyline.

  Unfortunately it soon became apparent that painting and draughtsmanship were not actually the school’s strong points, so the end result is a hideous mixture of installation art and an excruciating mural. Any vestige of talent is sadly not in evidence.

  But Mark, himself, is happy: ‘Meet me in the Manhattan’ sounds cool. Besides, the new décor, and the ambience that came with it, have one redeeming feature. It is like being on the set of the worst American B-movie ever made. This, in turn, has generated a very curious phenomenon: a retro dream time. As the young punters get more and more pissed so they seem to slip into the roles conjured up in the pulp fiction on which these films were based many decades before. A sort of trompe l’oeil of déjà vu.

  Alone, in a long black dress on a tall black bar stool, sits Ursula Letts. Everything about her, from the cut of her hair to the shape of her shoes, radiates flair and originality. Even the stigma of a lazy right eye suits her quirky style. Ursula is a primary-school teacher. She also has the dubious honour of being Mark’s childhood sweetheart and very first lover. Unfortunately for her, the affair won’t quite lie down and die.

  ‘How are you, sugar?’

  Mark kisses her on the back of the neck. No sexual shiver there. She icily sips her cocktail and casts a jaundiced eye over the mural.

  ‘That your idea?’

  ‘Isn’t it great?’

  ‘Where’s it meant to be?’

  ‘New York.’

  ‘New York, America?

  ‘It’s Manhattan, sugar.’

  ‘Don’t call me sugar. I’m not feeling sweet tonight.’

  She sinks her drink in one, and drums the bar top with black-lacquered nails. ‘Art is whatever shit you can get away with: that’s the motto for art schools now. Fuck any skills. You didn’t pay the useless pricks, did you?’

  ‘Beer money.’

  ‘Oblivion as a currency, I like that.’

  Her bleak humour always cheers him up. It’s very American stand-up.

  ‘Same again?’ he asks.

  ‘Why not?’

  Mark signals the barman, who deliberately turns the other way.

  ‘Shit! Did you see that?’

  ‘Maybe the décor’s struck him blind?’

  She sticks two fingers in her mouth, letting rip a whistle worthy of any doorman in New York. The barman swings around.

  ‘Blind but not deaf it seems.’

  She smiles sweetly when he arrives and waits as he wipes the bar top with a sodden tea towel while emptying the ashtray full of butt ends with her lipstick traces. He

  takes his time. When he finally looks up at her, she speaks: ‘Same again.’

  The barman stares at her with pupils smaller than sheep shit. This guy has seen a lot of Spaghetti Westerns. But so has Ursula. She plucks a cigarette from the pack, fires up her lighter, inhales, blows a smoke ring and only then says: ‘Please.’

  A sneer plays on the barman’s mouth. He smacks the wet towel over his shoulder with a loud crack and turns very slowly to face Mark. Unfortunately Mark is in a different film. His order comes fast, too fast and, worse, it’s soft.

  ‘Orange juice.’

  The barman tries to retrieve the scene. He lets his long arms drop to imaginary holsters and doesn’t make a further move. He doesn’t speak either. He just lets his black sheep-shit pupils bore into Mark. Mark returns the stare. One…two…three… and Mark blinks. Then he capitulates: ‘Please.’

  The barman shakes his head sadly and shuffles off. Meanwhile he gathers his long greasy black hair into a ponytail, slipping a rubber band over it. Mark watches him uneasily until he’s out of earshot.

  ‘Where does he think he is? Tombstone City? The cunt hasn’t even noticed he’s supposed to be in Manhattan. Can you believe it?’

  ‘Easily.’

  Mark, now troubled, ponders some more.

  ‘Did he seem psychotic to you?’

  ‘Not anything that exciting, I’m afraid. Somebody obviously pulled his ponytail and flushed his brains out through his arse.’

  Mark keeps shaking his head, while looking nervously at the barman: ‘Jesus, there are crazy people everywhere. Did you hear what happened to Reg?’

  ‘Of course I did, and it didn’t surprise me.’ She blows another smoke ring. ‘Reg had the IQ of a haddock. Anyway, he made the front pages, which is what he always wanted.’

  ‘Trouble is he’s not around to read them. And I wish I could say his nearest and dearest were a little more appreciative.
One of them – a fucking giant one at that – has actually threatened to kill me.’

  ‘Good. I love funerals.’

  ‘Only because you look sexy in black.’

  ‘Do I?’

  ‘You were in black when I first fell for you.’

  ‘Was it the school uniform? Or what was inside it?’

  ‘You haven’t still got that uniform, have you?’

  ‘I’ll wear it to your funeral.’

  ‘Not before?’

  ‘Not before.’

  ‘An erection isn’t much use when you’re dead.’

  ‘God will take care of it. After all, he’s been busy jerking us off ever since we invented him.’

  Mark has stopped listening. His mind is on other matters than God, or even gods. Hare’s threat is still banging around his brain like an angry wasp.

  ‘You’re good at pub quizzes. How old was Mozart when he died?’

  ‘Thirty-four.’

  ‘You’re kidding?’

  ‘Your age exactly.’

  Mark is visibly shaken. He peers anxiously over her shoulder towards the entrance.

  She turns to look; ‘Are you expecting somebody?’

  ‘Rodney Cole.’

  ‘That drip? I thought you couldn’t stand him.’

  ‘I can’t. Unfortunately I need his help.’

  ‘How?’

  Mark tenses, seeing his quarry entering behind her: ‘I’ll tell you later.’

  A tall man has entered from the auditorium. Rodney Cole possesses all the charisma of a tailor’s dummy. Indeed he even looks like one in his immaculate sky-blue suit, pink shirt and matching tie. Huge black-suede shoes seem to keep him upright.

  Shifting his focus beyond the new arrival, Mark can just see Cyril, on stage, disposing of another pint. Most of it runs down his shirt, as his long legs begin to buckle like an aircraft’s landing gear.

  The mob roars, willing him on.

  Distaste features on Rodney’s face as he surveys the bar. An estate agent specialising in gentrified country properties, he is not used to such venues. Although Mark’s offer of an acquiescent scrubber, and the prospect of fucking her on top of Buckingham Palace, was initially tempting, that is now out of the question. When Rodney sees Mark approaching him, he signals to somebody unseen out in the main hall.

  ‘Tried to escape, dear boy, but I’m afraid the little woman has the genes of a limpet.’

  Mark groans when he observes Susan Cole, Rodney’s wife, struggling to reach them through the crowd cramming the dance floor. Bobbing up and down in her red jacket, she could just as well be riding to hounds. Indeed, Susan is well known in equestrian circles. Word has it that over half the county’s gentry had ridden her by the time Rodney got his hands on her reins. Her father then happily gave her away, along with a healthy slice of his property portfolio. After pecking her on both cheeks, Mark leads them, like the host on a television talk show, to a table elsewhere in the bar.

  * * *

  Rodney stretches his long, sharply creased trouser legs under the table and drones on relentlessly, much as he was doing on the phone earlier that evening.

  ‘The London venue proved to be unsuitable. That’s when I thought of you. The PII are very grateful for the deal you did for them at the Grand Atlantic.’ He sips his wine. ‘Why the sudden interest in the London course?’

  As he speaks, he glances nervously at his wife. Mark misses nothing: his eyes are as alert as a eagle’s.

  ‘I’m thinking that maybe I should enrol on that course. Dr Herman Temple comes highly recommended.’

  Susan Cole chimes in: ‘The course will change your life forever, Mark.’ She speaks with the fervour of an evangelist: ‘It’s like shampooing your soul. Herman forces you to face your destiny and give up being a has-been or never-was. He will turn you into a leader. Frankly, if you’d done the course earlier, the trouble you’re in now with that Reg what’s-his-name, the supposed escapologist, would never have happened.’

  Mark can’t hide his astonishment. ‘You’ve done the course, Susan? Where?’

  ‘In London. Same time as Rodney. They run a parallel course for women.’

  Mark turns to Rodney. ‘What happens on it?’

  Rodney’s expression, unsettled by his wife’s intervention, now re-settles like cement. ‘Usual stuff: modules, lectures, logos, games, graphs and lots of bullets.’ He laughs nervously. ‘Bullets, as I’m sure you’re aware, are thoughts fired into your head. All very boring.’

  ‘That’s not true, Rodney.’ Susan is adamant: ‘Herman thinks the world is suffering from a famine of leaders, meaning people who can inspire… guide… rule. The PII is dedicated to finding those special persons, Mark.’

  Rodney can’t bear this. ‘Susan, it’s simply not Mark’s style.’ His raised voice causes her to turn red. It’s very unusual for him to be this dominant.

  Mark waits before applying the scalpel. ‘Did anything go wrong on your own course in London, Rodney?’

  Rodney’s whole body goes rigid. ‘What do you mean, wrong?’

  ‘Did anyone freak out? Break down? Collapse? Die? Disappear? After all, it’s not every day one becomes a leader of men.’

  ‘Of course not.’

  Rodney’s fist, the one holding his red wine, tightens into a white knot. ‘Why do you ask?’

  Susan bites her lip.

  ‘Loosen up, Rodney,’ Mark continues. ‘Becoming a leader seems to have made you a bit tense. The reason I ask is that a source of mine tells me one of the students….’

  The question is never completed.

  A huge roar of disgust erupts in the auditorium, followed by a loud crash, shouting, the unmistakable noise of a brawl igniting. And, as if to cap that explosive sound mix, fire alarms start going off like the bells of hell.

  Mark jumps up. ‘What the fuck’s happened?’ The blood has already deserted his face.

  Rodney leans back to fully enjoy this moment. ‘Loosen up, Mark.’

  But Mark is already sprinting for the auditorium, shouting: ‘Don’t go! I’ll be back.’ When he does get back some thirty minutes later, they have gone. Their unfinished drinks are still on the table. He proceeds to ring them several times the next day. Each time an answering machine kicks in.

  They don’t return his calls.

  * * *

  Ursula, still sitting at the bar, witnessed the chain of events occurring in the main hall.

  Once Mark had left her to join the Coles, the barman made sure her glass was always charged. She never asked; he never spoke. As she slid slowly into inebriation, the antics of Cyril and his audience made for perfect entertainment.

  It all happened very suddenly.

  Cyril was on course for achieving the record, despite the increasing elasticity in his legs, when he abruptly lurched backwards, then forwards and spewed up over the baying crowd. Unfortunately most of it splattered the neo-Nazis. That done, he reversed into the trolley of glasses, which were smashed to smithereens. The three assistants panicked, started screaming and one of them, while running from the stage, tripped and knocked over one of the beer barrels. This barrel, in turn, hit the other one and together they rolled in every direction, spewing lager as they went.

  Meanwhile Cyril had staggered back to the footlights, where he teetered momentarily on the edge. One of the barrels took him from behind, catapulting him straight into the rabble. Boozed to the gills, they had been waiting for any excuse to move from rabble to mob. Now they had it.

  Battle lines formed with surprising speed between those with shaved heads and those with hair – any hair. It was like a rerun of the English Civil War. Tattooed arms and fists hammered away like steam pistons – one of which hit a fire alarm.

  Ursula switched her gaze to Mark, as he left the Coles and ran into the hall. There, a scene evoking Hieronymus Bosch awaited him. He steadied himself before making a dash for the stage. Ursula meanwhile turned back in time to see Rodney and Susan fleeing through the fire-exit doors.


  Then something magical happened, or so it seemed in her alcoholic haze. It started to rain. She held out her hand to see if this was real. It was.

  She looked up, almost expecting to find the roof sliding back to reveal billowing clouds and maybe even a rainbow. But life isn’t like that for Ursula. Ugly reality haunts her every moment.

  The sprinklers had been activated.

  * * *

  Tempers are instantly cooled in the ensuing downpour.

  Neo-Nazis and bikers are no different to the rest of us when it comes to sartorial matters. They, too, like to look nice in their butch uniforms. Who knows what the chemical spray will do to their leathers and chains?

  So the hall empties in no time.

  From the stage, Mark thanks the drenched stragglers for coming, announcing that he’s hoping to bring a ‘Bed of Nails’ attraction to this venue in the near future.

  He finds Ursula still in the now deserted bar. The sprinklers continue to play over her but she makes no attempt to move. Her wet black dress glistens like jet.

  She appears to be weeping.

  But it’s difficult to tell.

  nine

  Waves crash over the sea wall on to the esplanade. Two small figures, huddled in winter coats, make their way along on the leeward side, passing through hoops of light thrown by the street lamps. Mark has his arm around Ursula. She sings to herself while Mark talks to himself.

  ‘Rodney was lying. The shit was hiding something, I know it. I had him right in my sights when that arsehole Cyril chose to fuck everything up.’

  Ursula’s rendering of ‘Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours’ is barely audible now.

  Mark raises his voice in an effort to convince himself. ‘My gut tells me that something went seriously wrong on that course.’

  ‘So what?’ Ursula has ceased singing.

  Mark cannot believe his ears. He stops, turns her towards him and looks angrily into her bleary eyes. ‘So what? So a reward of five thousand pounds, that’s what.’ He shivers and not just from the cold wind. ‘Enough to get Reg’s ugly relative off my back.’