Publisher’s Note

The Confessions series of novels were written in the 1970s and some of the content may not be as politically correct as we might expect of material written today. We have, however, published these ebook editions without any changes to preserve the integrity of the original books. These are word for word how they first appeared.

Confessions of a Plumber’s Mate
by Timothy Lea

CONTENTS

Publisher’s Note

Title Page

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Also Available in the Confessions Series

About the Author

Also by Timothy Lea

Copyright

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

Forty-eight hours I am stuck inside Enid, give or take a few – and by the end of the experience I would rather give than take, I don’t mind telling you. Of course, I am referring to Enid, my lorry, and the length of time I spend in a snow drift on the Pennines, not to anything more unwholesome. Not that there is a lot more unwholesome than spending forty-eight hours on a load of uncured sheepskins. Of course, I do have Shirl – I have to laugh when I write that – have her? We practically write a new sex manual together. What a woman! Once she gets to like you she is no slouch in finding ways of demonstrating the fact. One thing about those sheepskins, they are warm – I mean, the sheep wouldn’t wear them if they weren’t, would they? – and snuggled up together in the middle of them it is easy for the natural curtain of modesty that separates two young people to be drawn aside to reveal the elementary life force that surges like a mighty torrent beyond the cottage window. Sorry about that but when you’re stuck in a snowdrift with a randy bird, a Worcester Pearmain and a bar of fruit and nut, your mind does tend to go off into the poetical. I mean, as an experience it can have its longueurs. Don’t get me wrong. As regular readers will know, I am not averse to a spot of in and out. The trouble is that after forty-eight hours I am all-in and ready for the out.

It would have been even worse if the bloke from the sports car had not joined us. At first I think it is one of the Long Horns that has been sheltering against the back of the lorry – as it turns out, I am not so far wrong. I don’t want to go into details because I find it too humiliating but he and Shirl strike up an instant understanding. I don’t mind too much because I am able to get stuck into his barley sugar. Without that, I think I might be in a worse way than I am. By the time they get us out I am noshing the caster sugar at the bottom of the tin.

No doubt you recall the build-up to these incidents? I describe it in an account of my experiences as a lorry driver entitled, perhaps not altogether surprisingly, Confessions of a Long Distance Lorry Driver. Readers of that tome will recall that Lady Luck has not risked a hernia through bearing me large slices of good fortune of late. The load of glasses I was carrying north went west and there is a strong likelihood of extreme unpleasantness with brother-in-law and partner, Sidney Noggett, when I eventually limp back to the Smoke.

When the snow plough gets to us, Shirl decides to travel with the bloke in the sports car. Simon Masterton is what I think his name is. He plays no further part in the story but I thought you might like to say goodbye to him. Shirl clearly reckons that they have something very big going for them and I think I have already alluded to what that might be. As far as I am concerned, Shirl turns off faster than the time switch on a Scotsman’s central heating system and once again I am shocked by the changeability of women. They are like the weather. You never know what they are going to do next. I thought I was the best thing that had ever happened to her until Simon Jumbo-Parts shoved his long conk over the tailboard.

I have more bother when I get to Hull where I am supposed to be delivering the skins. At first they refuse to take them. I am not a little narked because I have spent a lot of time fluffing them out. It is a bit insulting, isn’t it? I mean, they are not supposed to be cured and they niffed more than a bit when I took charge of them. Maybe I ought to change the Cologne I use. It makes a mockery of one’s programme of personal freshness. Frankly, I can’t see what the bloke is getting so worked up about. The sheep have it away in them, don’t they? I would like to point this out but I can’t give too much away about those two torrid – and rather horrid – nights without weakening my position.

In the end I threaten to shove them through the office letterbox one by one and the bloke throws in the sponge. Once I have used it to his satisfaction, he agrees to accept the skins.

As I drive back to London, a fresh worry invades my already over-occupied mind: the effect that my unexpected absence will have had on Mum and Dad. We say a few harsh words to each other but basically we are very close. I expect that Mum will be nearly distraught with worry and that Dad will be having to struggle to keep a grip on his emotions. I had better postpone my showdown with Sid and get straight round to 17 Scraggs Lane, the ancestral home of the Leas in the burrow of Clapham – that’s what we call our street now because of all the high-rise flats around it. You feel as it you are underground. I park the lorry beyond the line of abandoned cars that starts outside our front door – actually, a lot of them aren’t abandoned. Sid has borrowed them to come and see us and nobody has found them yet. Sid does have the Rover but it is always in the garage having the dents taken out of it – I keep telling him that he shouldn’t drive at the traffic wardens like that.

I hope that Mum does not burst into tears or anything. Of course, it would be quite understandable if she did. Her only son snatched back from the living hell of the north; the new ice age denied another victim, and all that – but I still hope she does not do it. It might start Dad off. He is not as reserved as people think. I remember him crying when Nobby Stiles took out his false teeth after the 1966 World Cup – I mean, of course, when Nobby Stiles took out his own false teeth. He never had a go at Dad’s – though I wouldn’t have put it past him if Dad had looked like scoring. Then again, when Bambi’s mother copped it in the film of the same name. You couldn’t blame him for that. I don’t reckon anyone could sit through that and not start feeling for something to blow his nose on – that is what I told Carol Farmer at the time, anyway, though she still had me thrown out of the cinema. She was a funny girl. Her right hand never knew what her left hand was doing and always seemed surprised to find out.

I press the front door bell and listen to the silence. Dad brought home a Multi-Vibe Temple Chime from the lost property office where he goes to sleep during the day but he has clearly not got around to fixing it up yet. Wait a minute! I tell a lie. There, nailed to one of the peeling door jambs is the aforementioned M-V TC looking like a rusty xylophone. Beside it hangs a mallet. I can imagine the whole thing appealing to Dad’s sense of refinement and grandeur. Although a convicted socialist – I have never been able to find out what all the convictions were for – he nicks Country Life from the doctor’s and on one occasion even made a toilet paper holder out of a cover. He would get an upper class thrill out of wiping his bum on the contents pages if they were not so shiny.

Feeling like the geezer who bashes the gong at the start of those old J Arthur movies I have a go at the Temple Chime and step smartly to one side as it crashes to the ground. Hardly has the first note rung out and the third piece of piping bounced halfway across the street than the front door bursts open and I find myself face to face with Dad. His bloodshot eyes gaze deep into mine and I see a look of haunted anguish that makes my worst fears come true. Here is a man living on the very edge of reason. A man practically unhinged by the return of a well-loved child given up for lost. ‘Dad!’ I say, throwing my arms around him.

‘Get off me, you git-faced twit!’ shouts my father. ‘Have you gone round the twist? Look what you’ve done. Do you know how much those things cost in the shops? Oh my Gawd!’

So saying, he casts himself on the ground and begins trying to retrieve pieces of the Temple Chime. Much as the thought distresses me, it is clear that its multi-vibes will never again be harnessed into one glorious ringing note.

‘I’m all right, Dad,’ I say, comfortingly.

‘You’re all right?’ screams Dad. ‘Who told you that? Let me know and I’ll have him certified. You’re not all right! You’re the most destructive little sod that ever drew breath and unemployment benefit.’

‘Dad! Please!’ I say. ‘Think of your heart.’

Dad shakes his head. ‘Every time I look at you, I wish I’d listened to your mother.’

‘Why Dad? What did she say?’

‘She told me to stop it!’ says Dad bitterly.

Before I can decide whether to question Dad more closely on this delicate subject, Mum appears carrying a dustpan and brush. She, at least, looks as if she has got her feelings under control. It is strange, but I have often noticed how women, who are supposed to be the weaker sex, can often show tremendous resolution in times of stress.

‘It’s fallen down again, has it?’ says Mum. ‘I told you it should have been fixed up properly. You ought to have got an electrician in.’

‘I’m back, Mum,’ I say.

‘I’m not made of bleeding money,’ says Dad. ‘Those blokes cost a fortune. It would have been quite all right if clumsy clot here hadn’t laid his lazy, no good hands on it.’

‘I’m back, Mum,’ I repeat. ‘From the snowdrift.’

‘You can’t blame him, Walter,’ says Mum. ‘The milkman had it down as well. It shouldn’t be hanging there, that’s the long and short of it.’

‘From the snowdrift on the desolate Pennine Hills,’ I say. ‘Mickle Fell.’

‘My bleeding door chimes fell, and all!’ says Dad. ‘What’s the matter with you? Why can’t you think of other people for a change?’

I am beginning to understand that concern for his door chimes has temporarily blinded my father to my absence. It is sad but not totally unexpected. I swallow my disappointment and turn to my mother. ‘Mum,’ I say. ‘I don’t wish to appear melodramatic but I have been lost for two nights in one of the worst blizzards the north of England has known. Have you at any time during that period experienced any feelings of what I might describe as unease?’ I watch my mother’s face consider the question for a moment and then shape itself into an expression of extreme distress. Perhaps I was too blunt.

‘Oh!’ she says. ‘Oh, no!’

Immediately, I feel guilt-stricken. I should have bided my time; let her come to terms with my return in her own way. ‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ I say. ‘I didn’t mean –’

‘What’s the matter now?’ says Dad peevishly.

‘His supper’s been in the oven for three days,’ says Mum.

I would not mind so much if she did not still expect me to eat it! I mean, I never reckoned her corn beef fritters much at the best of times. After three days in the oven they taste like coke butties. One thing I will say for them, they don’t crumble in your pocket – they rip the lining to pieces but they don’t crumble. I smuggle two out and I can’t force them between the bars of the drain they are so tough.

One thing I am surprised to learn, when Dad has stopped fretting about his chimes, is that we have been invited to supper by sister Rosie and brother-in-law, Sid. Not only supper but during a weekday, too. What is more, Rosie refers to the meal as dinner and thoroughly confuses everybody. Dad does put in a token appearance at the lost property office, most days, to see if there is anything worth nicking and Mum is quite likely to be queuing up for her favourite seat at the bingo during what we call dinnertime.

Of course, it turns out that Rosie is being toffee-nosed and referring to supper. She is not the girl she was when we were all living together in Scraggs Lane. The success of the boutiques and wine bars has gone to her head. Now she lives in Vauxhall, or East Westminster as she chooses to call it, she has become all classless and stripped pine. I even saw her with a ‘Vote Liberal’ sticker on her Fiat. Mum and Dad don’t know what to make of her and Sid has his problems. While she has gone from excess to success, he has floundered. None of his recent business ventures has prospered and I reckon that he must have sunk every penny he had in Noggett Transport. My load of glasses being written off could be the last straw. Poor Sid. How am I going to tell him? Well, not while I am by myself for a start. Just in case he turns nasty. It has been known to happen. If I wait till we go to supper then I will have Mum and Dad to back me up, or at least, get in the way if he starts throwing things. Then there is Rosie. She can always be relied upon to side with anyone against Sid. Yes, I will put off the evil moment until the evening.

Mum and Dad are very agitated about the forthcoming event. Dad even takes the day off from work to prepare for it. It is strange because he is always saying what a sponging git-face Sid is, yet, when he gets an invitation to his home, he doesn’t want to go.

‘We’d better take something, I suppose,’ says Mum.

‘Yeah, bicarbonate of soda,’ says Dad.

‘What do you mean?’ says Mum, all worked up. ‘I taught Rosie everything I know about cooking.’

‘That’s what worries me,’ says Dad.

Mum looks at him coldly. ‘I was referring to a gift. You have to take something when you go out to supper with people. It’s manners.’

‘Well, you buy them something,’ says Dad. ‘I can’t afford to. It seems stupid to me. What’s the point of receiving hospitality if you have to pay for it?’

‘Some of those mints,’ says Mum. ‘They’d be nice. I’ve seen them on the telly.’

‘They’re not on the telly now,’ says Dad.

‘I mean, advertised on the telly!’ says Mum. ‘Really, Walter, I don’t know how you hold down that job of yours sometimes.’

Mum keeps on at him and in the end he grumbles off to the newsagent’s. He is gone a long time so I know that he has been having a browse through the girlie magazines. The way his mince pies have gone all pink gives the game away as well.

‘Well, did you get them?’ says Mum, looking at his empty hands expectantly.

Dad dives one of his mitts into his raincoat pocket and produces a roll of mints. ‘Extra strong,’ he says proudly.

‘I didn’t mean them!’ screams Mum. ‘I meant the wafer thin ones. You can’t give those to people!’

‘Well I’ll have them, then,’ says Dad.

By the time six o’clock comes and Mum reckons it is time for us to leave, she is in a right flap. ‘Make sure you go to the toilet before we leave, Walter,’ she says.

‘What are you on about?’ says Dad. ‘They’ve got a toilet there, haven’t they?’

‘Yes, but I’d rather you used this one. I know what you’re like!’

‘Mum, please!’ I say. ‘Do you have to? It’s so embarrassing.’

‘It’s embarrassing for me, too,’ says Mum. ‘I have to clean up after him.’

‘I don’t know why we have to leave now,’ says Dad. ‘It’s not going to take us two hours to get there.’

‘You never know, with the buses the way they are,’ says Mum, pressing shut the studs on her flower-motifed Packy-Macky – it looks like a shower curtain. ‘They travel in convoys. If you miss one you can wait for hours.’

‘It’s them sambos,’ says Dad. ‘They’re all used to living in tribes so they stick together. You never see a white bus conductor, these days.’

‘We want to get there a bit early, anyway,’ says Mum. ‘Eight o’clock is too late for supper. I’m surprised at Rosie.’

‘You’re right,’ says Dad. ‘I’ll think I’ll pop into the kitchen and make a bacon sandwich to tide me over. Do you fancy one, son?’

‘Oh no you don’t!’ says Mum. ‘I’m not having you ruining your appetite and getting your fingers all greasy. I want you to do Rosie’s meal justice.’

Of course, we end up getting a bus almost immediately and arriving on Rosie’s doorstep just after seven. I know that my sister is not going to be very glad to see us but at least it will give me time to sort out my business with Sid.

It is the man himself who wrenches open the front door. ‘Blimey,’ he says. ‘It’s you. I thought it was the food.’

‘The food?’ says Mum.

‘Rosie’s having one of her Chinese evenings,’ says Sid. ‘It’s brought up from Limehouse.’

‘A lot of it’s brought up in Limehouse, so I hear,’ says Dad. ‘Oh dear, I’ve never been very partial to chink nosh. It comes out the way it goes in if you know what I mean.’

‘Walter, please! Don’t let’s have any of your distasteful remarks at this stage of the evening,’ says Mum. ‘Well, Sidney. Are we going to be allowed to cross the threshold?’

Sid steps to one side hurriedly. ‘Of course, Mum. Come inside. I’ll get you a drink.’

‘I must have a word with you,’ I hiss to Sid.

‘Yes I know,’ says Sid. ‘In a minute.’ He follows Mum and Dad into the house, leaving me to wonder how he could have found out my guilty secret so soon.

‘Tell them to put it on the table,’ shouts my sister’s voice from upstairs. ‘I wouldn’t put it past Mum to roll up in a minute. Anything free has them round faster than –’

‘Ah hem!’ hollers Sid. ‘The family are here, dear. I’m just giving them a drink.’

‘I’ll be right down!’ Rosie’s voice changes so that it flows down the stairs like a torrent of treacle.

‘What would you like, Mum?’ says Sid.

‘A sherry would be nice,’ says Mum. ‘I see you still haven’t got the settee covered.’

I knew Mum would pick on that. I have always thought it was strange, myself. I don’t know how they can stand that bare leather. It looks so unfinished.

‘It’s meant to be like that,’ says Sid, handing Mum a glass.

‘That’s not very generous, Sidney,’ says Dad. ‘You might give your mother-in-law a decent tumblerful. It’s not often we’re invited here.’

‘That’s a special sherry glass,’ I say. ‘You have to have it in that.’

‘That’s right,’ says Mum. ‘Don’t you know nothing, Walter? I can always have another one.’ She hands Sid back her now empty glass. ‘Try to develop a little couth, dear.’

‘I’m thinking of you, that’s what I’m doing,’ grumbles Dad. ‘You’re my wife and I’m standing up for you.’

‘You’ve left it a bit late for that,’ sniffs Mum. I am not quite certain what she means by that remark and less than eager to find out.

‘What are you having, Dad? Scotch?’ says Sid.

‘Just a large one,’ says Dad, looking round the room, eager to see everyone laughing at his joke.

‘Why do you always have to say that, Walter?’ says Mum. ‘Why can’t you think of something original?’

‘Being offered a scotch by this geezer is original enough for one evening,’ says Dad.

‘I’ll have a scotch, too,’ I say.

‘I’ve got some light ale in for you.’ Sid nods towards a crate in the corner.

‘No thanks, I’ll still have the scotch.’ I would rather have the light ale but I don’t like the thought of having such unsociable tastes that they have to be specially catered for. I remember how Dad used to grumble about getting a bottle of peppermint cordial in for Gran when she used to spend Christmas with us. I expect she misses it where she has gone.

Sid catches my eye. ‘It’s a disaster, isn’t it?’ I think he is talking about this evening and nod. ‘At least she got out alive, that’s the main thing.’

‘You could look at it like that,’ I say – reckoning that he is talking about my ordeal in the snow. Frankly, his words puzzle me. Having first-hand experience of Shirl’s insatiable appetites I would say that it was I and the other bloke who were lucky to get out alive. Shirl’s survival potential was never in doubt.

‘I mean, what’s a lorry compared to a human life?’

What is Sid on about? There is nothing wrong with Enid. It occurs to me that he may be talking about something else. That would account for him not having thumped me round the earhole the minute I came through the door. Perhaps he doesn’t know anything about the broken glasses. ‘Sid –’ I begin.

‘I must have nudged it out of gear with my backside,’ he says. ‘I’d put the hand brake on I’ll swear to it. I got my head up for a second and there it was, slipping backwards.’

‘Your head?’ I say.

‘No, you berk. The lorry. Thank goodness she could swim.’ Sid shakes his bonce. ‘Oh, I shudder every time I think about it.’

‘Sid,’ I say. ‘I think you imagine I know more than I do. Are you telling me that you were farting about with some bird in the cab of your lorry and managed to shunt the whole bleeding issue into the drink?’

‘Drink?’ says Dad. ‘Your mother and I wouldn’t say no. What are you two talking about?’

‘Where’s Rosie?’ says Mum. ‘She is expecting us, isn’t she? I want to see the children.’

‘Go up if you like,’ says Sid. ‘She won’t mind. She’s just putting on her cheongsam.’

‘Caught her at the awkward time of the month, have we?’ says Mum. ‘Never mind. ‘I’ll pop up and say goodnight to the children. How is Jerome’s bite?’

‘Very painful,’ says Sid. ‘Make sure he doesn’t get the chance to give you one.’ He pours Dad another scotch and turns back to me. ‘I thought you knew,’ he says. ‘It was in the papers.’

‘I didn’t see any papers where I was,’ I tell him. ‘Sid, this is terrible. Is the lorry all right?’

‘I don’t know,’ says Sid. ‘Since it sunk to the bottom of the Thames I haven’t seen it.’

‘Gordon Bennett!’ I say. ‘How did the bird take it?’

‘In the normal way,’ says Sid. ‘As I recall it her feet were wedged against the dashboard and I was –’

‘I didn’t mean that!’ I say. Honestly, Sid is about as sensitive as a cast-iron sheath. ‘How did she react to such an awful experience?’

Sid closes his eyes and winces. ‘The whole thing was horrible. Screaming, fighting, struggling! I can hardly bear to think about it.’

‘But she came round in the end, did she?’

‘That wasn’t her, that was me!’ says Sid. ‘If it hadn’t been for her I wouldn’t be here now. She dragged me ashore with her teeth – my teeth as well, we didn’t lose anything.’

‘Except the lorry,’ I say, grimly. ‘At least it makes it easier to tell you my bad news.’

I tell Sid about the glasses and he buries his face in his hands. ‘That’s it!’ he says. ‘We’re ruined. Not to put too fine a point on it, we’re up shit creek without a paddle – in fact, we don’t even have a bleeding canoe!’

It is perhaps fortunate that at that moment Mum and Rosie start to come downstairs.

Dad takes one look at Rosie and puts down his glass. ‘Blimey, girl!’ he says. ‘Have you seen that dress you’re wearing?’

‘Of course I have,’ says Rosie. ‘I didn’t put it on in the dark.’

‘It’s new, is it?’ says Dad.

‘It is actually,’ says Rosie. ‘Don’t you like it?’

‘You want to take it back!’ says Dad. ‘It’s got a bleeding great slit up the side. Anyone can see straight up to your fundaments!’

‘Oh Dad!’ Rosie bites her lip in exasperation. ‘You never change, do you? It’s supposed to have a slit up the side. That’s the way the Chinese wear them. It goes with the evening, don’t you see?’

‘That’s right, dear,’ says Mum. ‘You’ve seen it on the telly. You remember that film with William Holden, The World of Suzie Wong?’

‘He didn’t wear one, did he?’ says Dad. ‘I thought I hadn’t seen much of him lately. That explains it.’

Before there can be any more explanations, the front doorbell rings. ‘That’ll probably be the food,’ says Rosie. ‘Show them in, Sidney, will you? I’ll help myself to a drink. It’s the only way I’ll get one.’

‘I wouldn’t mind another little drop,’ says Mum, putting down her sherry glass and picking up a tumbler.

‘Me neither,’ says Dad.

I can’t help noticing that Mum and Dad are knocking back the booze like there is a prize for it. I do hope that this is not going to lead to any unpleasantness later in the evening.

As Rosie deals with the drinks, the door opens and a really knock-out bird sails in. She is wearing a long black dress that hangs down from just beneath her knockers and touches the floor, and her blonde barnet flops beguilingly over one eye. Dad registers the newcomer and it is easy to see that he is impressed.

‘Blimey very muchee,’ he says. ‘You no lookee likee Chinese lady.’

Rosie looks embarrassed. ‘This is Imogen Fletcher, father,’ she says.

‘No soundee like Chinese lady,’ says Dad.

‘I no am Chinese lady, that’s why,’ says the bird in a very upper class drawl. ‘My husband and I have lived at Stockwell for three and a half years now. We’re practically natives.’

‘You’re not like most of the natives you see round here,’ says Dad. ‘Do you want a hand with the grub? I hope you don’t expect me to eat with those joss sticks. I have enough trouble with a spoon. I find the bean shoots get stuck between my dentures. Do you have –?’

Listening to Dad is like wanting to cry out when you are having a nightmare. You can see all the terrible things that are happening but when you open your mouth, nothing comes out. Fortunately, Rosie does not have my problems when it comes to basic communication.

‘Really, father!’ she says. ‘How can you be so stupid? Surely it’s obvious that Imogen and Crispin have nothing to do with the meal. They’re guests, like you.’

It occurs to me that Imogen is not a guest like Dad, and Crispin, when he comes into the room bears even less resemblance to my father – or anyone else’s father for that matter. He is wearing a kind of silk tank top with puff shoulders and sleeves and a chiffon scarf that comes down to his knee breeches. These are fastened by a diamanté buckle as are his black shiny shoes. It is a dead cert that he is not a New Zealand rugby player.

He stops in front of Dad and claps his hands together.

‘How quaint!’ he says. ‘I’ve never seen it done better.’

‘Your friends may be able to say the same about you,’ says Dad menacingly. ‘What are you on about?’

‘Look at those clothes, darling,’ pipes Crispin. ‘They’re so authentic, aren’t they? I wonder if his trousers are held up with string?’

‘Crispin’s terribly well known as an interior decorator,’ explains Rosie.

This news does not surprise me. I have no difficulty at all in imagining the creep decorating interiors. What does surprise me is that Rosie should fancy someone like that. It is because he is artistic, I suppose. She always reckons that she is a bit starved in that direction having Sid as a husband.

Crispin is still staring at Dad’s suit. ‘Where did you get it from?’ he croons. ‘Do you have pull at the Salvation Army?’

Actually, I think Crispin is being a bit unkind. Dad’s best suit is no worse than any other old geezer’s clobber. The stains round the front of the trousers aren’t very nice but the half inch of grey woollen underpant protruding above the belt and giving way to the frayed ends of the waistcoat dangling temptingly above it seems to have been with me since childhood. Maybe that is it. I am too used to Dad. Either that, or his cap is creating the wrong impression. I saw Mum trying to take it off him when they came through the front door but he wasn’t having any.

‘And that lovely dress,’ says Mrs Fletcher, turning to Mum. ‘Did you knit it yourself?’

‘No,’ says Mum with a funny half curtsey – I can understand why she does it. Imogen Fletcher does make you think that you are in the presence of royalty – ‘I got it at Marks and Spencers. I get all my stuff there. All my clothes, that is.’

‘They are marvellous, aren’t they?’ says Mrs F brightly. ‘I noticed they had avocados there the other day.’

‘Oh really?’ says Mum. ‘That is nice.’

‘What would you fancy to drink?’ says Sid.

Mrs Fletcher orders and turns to me. ‘You must be young Timothy,’ she says. ‘I’ve heard so much about you.’

‘Nothing too terrible, I hope,’ I simper. Mrs Fletcher is the kind of poised upper-class bird who reduces me to a shapeless, mumbling twit. There are tiny little valleys at the corners of her lovely soft cakehole and when she twitches her lips it is as if somebody has pulled a bit of string tied round my Willy Wonker. I nearly ice my birthday cake.

‘Quite the reverse,’ says the lady. ‘I believe you’ve been a tower of support to Sidders in his many business ventures.’

For a moment, I wonder what she is talking about. Then I get it. She means Sid. The upper classes are always messing about with names, aren’t they? Ronny is acceptable but with Ron you have practically kicked the bucket – or gone beyond the pail, as the nobs say.

‘I’ve done what I can,’ I say. ‘Tell me, how do you know Sid and Rosie?’

Mrs F accepts a drink and gestures me towards the settee. ‘It’s all to do with Crispin,’ she says, draping herself gracefully across the scuffed leather. ‘He had a hand in your sister’s venture.’

I am surprised at her coming out with it just like that but some of these posh bints don’t care what they say. That’s what makes them so exciting. On the surface all pure and untouchable, underneath raring to cop a snatchful of steaming hampton straight between the thighs. What does come as a bit of a shock is that Crispin is a furburger fan. I had reckoned him as being a bit of a ginger on the noisy. Just shows how you can’t make sweeping judgements about people.

‘Yes,’ continues Mrs F. ‘He was in at the start of the boutiques and did all the decor for the wine bars.’

‘Oh,’ I say as it occurs to me that I may have misunderstood the lady. ‘You mean the sawdust and that?’

‘Inspirational, wasn’t it?’ says Mrs Fletcher proudly.

‘Definitely,’ I say. ‘I know that Sid uses a lot of it for the kiddies’ ferrets.’ I see a look of doubt coming into Imogen’s eyes. ‘The sawdust, I mean,’ I say hurriedly.

‘Of yes,’ Mrs Fletcher looks round and then places one of her elegant, beautifully manicured Germans on top of mine. ‘Do you think you could coax a teensy weensy bit more gin into my glass? I’m a rather greedy girl, I’m afraid.’ The way she looks at me when she speaks, I would walk barefoot across a sea of white hot coals to fetch her a Kleenex. I stand up and she touches my jacket. ‘Some ice would be fantastic too.’ She winks at me and I have fallen in love. To think I was really not looking forward to this evening. The best things always happen when you least expect them.

I have just wrenched the stupid bird-motif measuring device off the top of the gin bottle and poured Imogen Fletcher a generous slug when Sid moves to my side.

‘Where’s the ice, Sid?’ I ask.

‘It’s in the – fuck!’ Everybody stops talking and Sid examines the front of his jacket. He had tipped up the gin bottle without looking at it and copped the rebound from the bottom of the glass he was filling. ‘Uxbridge!’ shouts Sid, ‘Just beyond the traffic lights. You can’t miss it.’ The threads of conversation are picked up again and Sid turns to me. ‘Did you do that, you stupid berk?’ he hisses.

‘Sorry, Sid,’ I say. ‘It pours so slow with that thing in it.’

‘That’s the idea, you prat! Just leave things alone.’

‘Just tell me where the ice is,’ I plead.

‘I didn’t get any out – I didn’t have time with you arriving an hour early!’

‘I’ll try the fridge,’ I say.

Mrs Fletcher gives me a melting look that would see off any lump of ice I had in my hand and I sear towards the kitchen. Crispin Fletcher tries to catch my eye as I speed past and, rejected, turns back to Dad. ‘That really is very interesting,’ I hear him say.

‘That’s just some of the stuff we get in,’ says Dad. ‘Then there’s walking sticks and shooting sticks and umbrellas – oh yes, we get a lot of umbrellas. The last time we counted we had –’

I whip into the kitchen and close the door behind me. It does not half have a lot of gadgets. When you look around, you can see that Rosie is doing all right. I don’t reckon that Sid bought too much of this lot. I have just opened the fridge and knocked a tub of cream over three storeys of food when Rosie rushes in.

‘It hasn’t come!’ she storms. ‘Little perishers. They promised it by eight.’

‘Oh, the food,’ I say, cottoning on to what she is rabbiting about. ‘Can’t you give them a ring?’

‘I don’t have the number. I called in on the way home.’

‘They must be in the book,’ I say.

‘I can’t remember the name. You know what they’re like: Hing Pong, Flung Dung – it could be anything.’

‘If you had a classified you could find out from the address.’

‘But I don’t!’ Rosie faces me angrily. ‘What’s the matter with you? Are you an undercover agent for the GPO or something?’

‘Calm yourself,’ I say. ‘We all have our problems. Where’s the ice?’

‘In the top. Oh no!’ Rosie looks inside the fridge. ‘Did you spill that?’

‘No, it was like that when I opened it.’

‘It must have been Sid,’ snarls Rosie. ‘I’ll kill him one of these days!’

‘You mustn’t be too hard on him,’ I say, holding the ice tray under the hot tap. ‘He’s had a lot on his mind, lately.’

‘A lot on it and nothing in it,’ spits Rosie. ‘I’ll have to give them something to tide them over. Don’t let Dad have another drink what ever you do. He’s pissed already.’ She puts a jar marked ‘cheese’ on the table as I look around for something to put the ice in. ‘I’ll give them a quick fondue.’

‘You’ll what?!’ I say.

‘Give them a fondue – a cheese dip.’

‘I thought you said you’d give them a quick fondle!’

I think the misunderstanding is quite funny but Rosie seems to have lost whatever sense of humour she once had. She accuses me of getting in her way and pushes me to one side while she puts on a saucepan. It is all I can do to tip the ice into a jar before she drives me out of the kitchen. When I get back to the lounge, Imogen is sitting where she was but her lovely mince pies shelter a look of reproach.

‘I thought you’d forgotten about me,’ she says.

‘I don’t think I could ever forget about you,’ I say.

‘How nice.’ Her lips twitch again like they did last summer and I feel percy preparing for a game of ‘Launch My Zeppelin’. ‘You got the ice, did you? I’m sorry to be such a terrible nuisance.’

I make a few mumbling noises and hand over her glass. When she looks at me like that it is difficult to think of things to say. I take the top off the jar and hold it out to her. It seems better mannered to let her help herself rather than cop a mittful of my germs. If I had thought about it I could have brought a pair of tongs but it is too late now. She is still holding my glance and I wonder if she knows what is passing through my mind – I hope her husband doesn’t. Possibly, she is feeling something of what I feel. Beautiful, mature women of the world do fall passionately in love with simple working class lads like me. Half the plays you turn over to on BBC2 for the juicy bits are about it.

Mrs Fletcher sticks her mitt in the jar and – ‘Oh!’ We both look down to see that her delicate digits are grasping what looks like a cube of parmesan cheese. Oh my gawd! In my confusion I must have tipped the ice cubes into the cheese jar. ‘How frightfully original,’ says Mrs F.

Rosie appears at my side. ‘You didn’t touch the –’ She takes a butcher’s at the object between Imogen’s fingers and squeaks.

‘I think, if you don’t mind –’ says the love of my life.

‘I’m very sorry,’ I say. ‘I didn’t mean –’

Rosie snatches the jar out of my hand. ‘Are you mad?!’ she says. ‘Are you stark raving mad?’

Before I can say any more, the front door bell rings. ‘It must be the nosh – I mean, food,’ I say. ‘I’ll let them in.’

As I head for the door, I hear Rosie explaining that both Sid and I have been under a lot of strain lately. It is noticeable that when she talks to the Fletchers her voice is a lot more refined than it is when she is parleying to the family.

‘– a hundred and forty-five with broken spokes. Of course, with them it’s touch and go as to whether they were lost or abandoned. That’s something only experience will tell you –’ Dad’s voice is still droning on as I open the front door.

‘Solly about delay. Go to wong address. Very tlying.’ The little bloke with the pile of containers is behind me before he has finished his sentence. I look out into the street in case there is any one else but there is only a large black cat running as fast as its legs will carry it. ‘Where you want?’

‘Well, I think everybody’s quite hungry now,’ says Rosie looking at Dad anxiously. ‘Can you lay it out on the table, please?’

‘Chinese food? How lovely!’ Imogen Fletcher drops the cheese-covered ice cube into an ashtray and rises to her feet.

‘Those cats were Kung Fu fighting,’ croons Dad. ‘I don’t reckon it myself, you know. I mean, look at him. He doesn’t come up to my chest.’

‘Neither does anyone else if they got any sense,’ says Mum. ‘Come on, Walter. Get a grip on yourself.’

The Chinese bloke is laying out lots of little cardboard boxes full of grub and taking no notice of Dad.

‘You hear what I say, Chinky Chops?’ goads Dad. ‘Show us a bit of the old martial arts. Bamboo stalk that bend in wind no support mighty pagoda. You savvy words of Oriental wisdom?’

‘You savvy punch up throat?’ says the small Chinese gentleman.

‘Stop it, Dad!’ says Mum. ‘Can’t you see you’re embarrassing everybody?’

Dad starts swaying and bobbing – he has been swaying for most of the evening. ‘Those cats were Kung Fu fighting,’ he chants. ‘Oh, it was most exciting – Come on, Ping Ling. Show us your muscles!’

The Chinaman places both hands together and bows towards Sid. ‘Food laid out,’ he says.

‘You know what you are?’ says Dad. ‘You’re yellow! All you Chinks are the same. You can’t even get a proper Chinaman to play one of you. That bloke in Kung Fu, he’s not Chinese. They pull his eyes back with sellotape.’ WHAM! CRASH! BANG! Dad turns a couple of somersaults – it may have been three, it happens so fast – and lands in an untidy heap on the settee.

The Chinaman gives Sid another bow. ‘Honourable gentleman laid out,’ he says.

‘Do something!’ screams Dad, scrambling to his feet and trying to hide behind Mum. ‘Don’t let him get away with it. Coming in here and assaulting innocent people. Ring for the police!’

‘Do shut up, Walter,’ says Mum. ‘You had it coming to you.’

‘Yes, Dad,’ says Sid. ‘Belt up!’

The Chinaman goes out and Dad immediately advances to the drinks tray and empties the remains of a bottle of brandy into a tumbler. ‘Soon saw him off, didn’t I?’ he says. ‘Didn’t take him long to see which way the wind was blowing. He could see what was going to happen – one carrotty chop on a vital nerve point and – pouf!’ – Crispin looks up sharply. ‘All the way back to Gerrard Street in a wheelbarrow.’

‘Talking of carrotty chops,’ says Sid, indicating the nosh. ‘We’d better get stuck into this lot before it gets cold.’

In fact, it is cold. And there is not much worse than cold Chinese food – though this stuff would probably run it close when it was hot. Crispin and Imogen send out a series of polite squeaks but Dad is blunt in his attitude to the fare provided. ‘I don’t mind the vinegar,’ he says. ‘That’s got more taste than the rest of it put together. I reckon it’s why they’re so small, these Chinks. You can’t build a man up on this, can you? It’s not like the roast beef of old England.’

‘The Roast Beef of Old England doesn’t seem to have got us very far at the moment, does it?’ says Crispin, carefully picking a bean shoot off his blouse.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ says Dad. ‘Don’t you fancy this country, then? Are you one of those knockers who’s always saying we’re not the greatest nation living on Earth?’

‘We will be living on earth if we go on at this rate,’ says Crispin.

‘Oh yes, darling. Very good,’ says the lovely Imogen.

‘What do you mean, very good?!’ says Dad ferociously. ‘That’s not very good, that’s bleeding awful! Are you a foreigner? Come over here to load yourself up with free specs and dentures on the National Health?!’

Oh dear. I can see that the demon liquor has once again unhinged Dad’s feeble mind. He always becomes unpleasant when he has had a few.

‘Dad –!’ says Sid.

‘Not so much of the Dad, sonny! Your relationship to me is one of marriage, not blood. You never sprung from my loins.’

‘He would if he had to get anywhere near them,’ sniffs Mum.

‘You shut your face!’ says Dad.

‘Really!’ bristles Imogen. ‘I think you’re the most unpleasant old man I’ve ever met!’

‘That’s because I’m a patriot!’ rants Dad. ‘Because I won’t stand to see my country run down by shameless hussies who want to show off their tits and inflame men’s natural appetites! If you’re so proud of them, let’s all see them!’ So saying, he lunges for the front of Imogen’s dress, loses his footing, and collapses on the imitation sheepskin rug.

‘That’s it!’ snaps Rosie. ‘I want him out of my house! I don’t care if he is my father. I never want to see him again!’

Mum stops hitting Dad over the bonce with her shoe. ‘What do you mean if? Of course he’s your father! You mind what you’re saying, my girl!’

‘Out!’ screams Rosie. ‘Out!’

Imogen Fletcher rises to her feet, her hand draped elegantly against her forehead. ‘Please don’t disturb your father,’ she says. ‘I think it’s better if I leave. I’m not feeling very well. Crispin –’

‘But you can’t leave yet,’ says Sid. ‘You’ve hardly touched your sweet and sour pork. Anyway, there’s something I want to talk to you both about. It’s been at the back of my mind for a long time.’

‘Well, I think if – er, Imogen isn’t feeling herself –’

‘I wouldn’t put it past her,’ says Dad from the floor. ‘Feeling herself, I mean.’

‘Shut up!’ Sid kicks Dad in the stomach and it is obvious that the evening is on the verge of boiling over into unpleasantness. ‘You stay, Crispin,’ begs Sid. ‘If Imogen doesn’t feel up to it, Timmy can drive her home. It won’t take a minute. I’ve got an idea I want to talk to you about.’

‘Er – well?’ Crispin looks at Imogen and I can see that he is about as keen to stay as he would be to substitute his cock for a piece of cheese in a rat trap. To my surprise, Imogen seems prepared to look upon the idea with less than total disfavour.

‘I’m certain Timothy doesn’t want to take me home,’ she says – is it my imagination or is that a pout at the corner of that delectable mouth?

‘It would be a pleasure,’ I say. ‘I mean – I wouldn’t mind at all.’ I tone my response down when I see the way Crispin is looking at me. Wary might be one way of describing it.

‘I think, maybe I’d better –’

‘That’s settled then,’ says Sid breezily. ‘I hope you feel better soon, Imogen. I’m sorry about my father-in-law. He becomes prone to these bouts of over-tiredness.’

There is a lot more ‘lovely evening!’ and ‘don’t mention it’ while Rosie fetches Imogen’s coat. Crispin has grudgingly given me his car keys and is staring at the jumbo-sized brandy Sid has just shoved in his mitt. ‘The reverse is up and away from you,’ he says.

‘Your wife knows the – yes, of course, she must do,’ I say, glad that I have prevented myself from asking if Imogen knows the way to her own home.

‘I’m ready,’ she calls to me from the front door. Her handbag clicks shut like a trap closing on its prey and she delivers a minute flare of the nostrils as she catches my eye. ‘Goodnight, Crispin,’ she says. ‘I’m going to take one of my pills, so I won’t be awake when you get home.’ Crispin says something sympathetic and blows her a kiss. They don’t have a proper Swiss Miss.

‘How do you feel?’ I say, once we are in the car and I am trying to find out how the lights work.

‘Tense,’ she says. She feels in her bag and brings out a packet of fags. ‘Do you use these?’

‘No,’ I say. I am wondering whether to do any more apologizing for the family. In the circumstances, it seems best to leave the subject alone. It could sound a bit like a German apologizing for Hitler. ‘Tell me where you want me to go, will you?’

‘Down the end of the street and turn left. It’s very near. I could have walked.’

‘Better not to, these days.’ I say in my best Dixon of Dock Green voice. ‘You might bump into a spot of bother.’

‘You mean, I might be raped?’ She drags in a lungful of smoke and blows it out so hard that I expect it to splinter the windscreen. ‘I should be so lucky.’

‘There’s one or two nutcases about,’ I say.

‘Lead me to them!’ Mrs Fletcher grits her teeth and rakes her finger nails down my thigh. I manage to keep the car off the pavement, but only just. ‘Poor Timothy,’ says my volatile passenger. ‘You must think I’m mad.’

‘Of course, I don’t,’ I say soothingly. ‘You’re just a bit unsettled, that’s all. The cheese on the ice-cubes and all that.’

‘You think it’s giving me nightmares?’ Imogen laughs. ‘Cheese is supposed to give you mightmares, isn’t it?’

‘You didn’t eat any, did you?’ I say soothingly.

Lovely Imogen Fletcher brushes some hair from her eye. ‘It’s often the things you don’t have that give the most trouble, isn’t it?’

‘I suppose it is,’ I say. I don’t have to get out my crystal balls to see that there is something troubling the lady. Something apart from Dad and the rest of the aggrochat. ‘Your family wear their hearts on their sleeves, don’t they?’ She gives a short laugh. ‘That father of yours practically wears his parts on his sleeve!’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I –’

Imogen touches my sleeve. ‘Turn right at the level crossing and it’s the third house on the right. Don’t apologise for your father. At least he comes out with what he thinks. Crispin and I are less honest.’

I take the car round the corner and pull up outside the third house. It is half a large semi-detached, painted white. I notice that they have new dustbins. ‘Here we are,’ I say.

Imogen pulls her coat across her Manchesters. ‘Come in and have a drink,’ she says. ‘A coffee, something like that.’ The way she says it, she sounds as if she means it. ‘You weren’t particularly enjoying the party, were you?’

‘I was enjoying being with you.’

Imogen waves a hand like a conjuror producing a handkerchief from her sleeve. ‘If you come in, you’ll continue to be with me.’

I hesitate for a moment while I think what her old man is going to say. Is he going to cut up rough if I don’t show up in a couple of minutes? Sid and Rosie haven’t exactly been responsible for the party of the year, so far. Am I going to put the kibosh on it even further?

‘Nobody will notice if you’re away for a few minutes.’ She is right, of course. When you’re pissed – and everybody at Rosie’s was pretty pissed – people can disappear for hours and it seems like minutes. I remember when Sid had it off with Gabriella Duke at Sandy Ponder’s party. I thought he’s only just gone into the karsi, yet, when they broke the door down they were both starkers and she was – it doesn’t really matter what she was doing. That has nothing to do with the time element. It didn’t half surprise me, though. Mainly because I was younger, I suppose.

‘Are you coming?’ Love Goddess is getting out of the car and tilting her flawless nut in my direction. It’s meeting a bird like this that makes me wish I’d been to Oxford University. It may seem a funny thing to come out with but it’s true. It’s all a question of communication. You have to have the same terms of reference if you are going to sustain a relationship. I don’t mean having money and talking posh. I mean approaching things in the same way. Having the same attitude of mind. If you don’t have that in common then you’re never going to get much further than humping the sack together. It doesn’t normally worry me overmuch. Only sometimes. Very rarely. Occasionally.

‘Crispin’s lucky,’ she says as she opens the front door. ‘He’s got his work. He finds that fulfilling,’ She waits for a moment in the darkness and then turns on the light. ‘I need something more.’

When I think about it, it seems that she was waiting for me to do something. She couldn’t have been – could she? I mean, if it had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have hesitated. But being her, all cool and refined and unattainable, the thought never entered my mind until the moment had gone.

‘You get involved in his work, don’t you?’ I say.

‘Only peripherally. I admire it. I give advice when I’m asked for it. But on the whole, Crispin keeps his work to himself. He keeps everything to himself.’

‘You don’t do anything?’

Mrs Fletcher runs one of her long fingers up my arm. ‘Tea or coffee? Oh, or there’s some Ovaltine if you’d prefer it?’

‘Tea, thanks,’ I say. ‘If you don’t mind me saying so, I think you ought to find something to do. Look at Rosie. You’ve no idea what she was like when she first married Sid. It wasn’t until she got bored and opened a boutique that she really started developing as a person.’

‘Developing what?’

The question throws me for a minute. ‘Well – er, self confidence and all that kind of thing. I hardly know her now.’

Mrs Fletcher gives another of her short laughs. ‘Crispin hardly knows me now. I don’t want the situation to get any worse.’

We have gone through to the mod kitchen and Mrs F throws off her coat and gets down to the teapot in a blaze of spotlights. It reminds me of one of those ads in the women’s monthly glossies. Birds always seem to be doing the housework in evening dresses.

Some might be surprised by the turn of events but it is amazing how people, especially women, suddenly start telling you their life history after a few moments’ acquaintance. I find it difficult to believe my ears sometimes.

‘I don’t think Crispin is very interested in women,’ continues Imogen, reaching for a very ancient-looking biscuit tin – blimey! I hope the biscuits aren’t that old. ‘Not sexually, I mean. Has your brother-in-law said anything to you about it?’

‘What? About your husband? No, why should he?’

‘I think Crispin finds him rather attractive.’

‘Sid?!’ The mind boggles. I never saw Clapham’s answer to Paul Newman as a lighthouse for gingers.

‘I think it’s latent, mind you.’

I look at my watch. ‘Yes, it is a bit, isn’t it?’

Mrs Fletcher shakes her head and pours the hot water into the pot. ‘You probably have no idea what I’m talking about. Your sister’s talked to me about you.’ The two remarks seem contradictory but I don’t say anything. I find that when birds are in this mood it is best to let them do the talking. ‘She intimated that you’d led a very protected childhood.’

I am not quite certain what Rosie could have meant by that. Maybe she was referring to the short period I spent giving Her Majesty pleasure at Bentworth Grange. I suppose I was protected then, though I seem to recall the beak saying that he was bent on protecting other people. I reckon he was bent himself, stupid old bleeder! Putting me away for helping in a slum clearance scheme – that’s what it was! I swear to this day that I never thought I was stealing when I helped take the lead off that old building. If anything, I was easing the load on the foundations. Of course, it could have been that Rosie was referring to my sexual innocence. It is amazing how your relations can fool themselves. Especially when they are like Rosie – ravers to the bitter end.

‘I wouldn’t say I was all that protected,’ I say. ‘Ta.’ I accept a cup of tea and Imogen pushes the sugar bowl towards me. ‘I have an artificial sweetener,’ she says. She smiles when she speaks as if enjoying a private joke. I wonder what she is talking about?

‘Come through to the sitting room.’ I do as I am told and follow her into a room with a big bay window and a huge circular lantern that goes up and down on a pulley. Some of the bits of sculpture I wouldn’t hang Dad’s collection of gas masks on, but it’s purely a question of taste. It goes to back up what I was saying earlier about terms of reference. ‘Is it a problem being a good boy?’ she says, patting the sofa beside her.

Now, I know I am going to appear stupid when I say this, but it has never occurred to me up till now that this smashing bird is looking for what I would only be too pleased to give her. I can’t reckon that a lovely tart like that could ever fancy me buttering her tea cake. Even now I am not certain.

‘I’m not very good,’ I say. You don’t want to believe everything Rosie tells you. Sisters don’t always know, you know.’ I try and take a crafty gander at my watch but she notices immediately. She doesn’t miss much, this bird.

‘Worried about getting back?’ she says. ‘Don’t bother yourself about Crispin. He’ll be quite happy talking about false walls or curtain lengths.’ It occurs to me that Imogen Fletcher is a lot more worried about Crispin Fletcher than I am. She never stops talking about the bloke.

‘I was thinking of Mum and Dad, actually,’ I say. ‘I expect they’ll want to be getting back soon. The last bus goes soon.’

‘You’re not going to take him on the bus?! Not in that condition?’

‘No, I suppose you’re right. Sid will have to run us home.’

‘Your father delivers a compliment very forceably.’ Mrs Fletcher touches the front of her dress thoughtfully.

‘Actions speak louder than words with Dad,’ I say. ‘At least, sometimes they do.’

‘At least you know you’re wanted.’

‘Er – yes,’ I gulp.

‘You’re not just a hollow clothes horse.’

‘Er – no.’ I gulp – I gulp easily in either direction. Mrs Fletcher takes the cup and saucer from my hand and pushes them under the settee. It is funny her doing that because I have not finished.

‘Will you do something for me before you go?’ she says.

Take the budgie for a walk? Wash up the tea things? ‘Yeah,’ I say.

‘Kiss me.’ My expression obviously shows her how startled I am. ‘Kiss me goodnight.’ She says it like the motivation will make it easier for me.

‘Of course I will.’ She turns her head to one side as she tucks her own teacup out of sight and then swings round so that her sensational mouth is hovering before mine. Once again I allow myself to be mesmerised by those dimples and that tonk-tweaking tremble of the roses (rose hips: lips. Ed). She rests a hand lightly against my shoulder and we kiss. And kiss. And kiss. I don’t know what the Guinness Book of Records says about kissing – probably nothing, knowing Ross and Truss – but this delicate and highly charged snog is more like a butterfly helping itself to pollen than an old fashioned lip-bashing. Very gentle and very satisfying – and very effective, too. I think I am more aroused by gentle snogging than the swallow-your-neighbour variety. Percy rises like one of those speeded-up films of the life cycle of a cucumber and if I walked out in the street the bulge in my trousers could get me arrested for carrying a deadly weapon. Oh, what a delicious north and south this bird has. It is like kissing a pitless crumpet. Soft and so, so warm. Honestly, it is tinglesville, folks.

While we kiss, her hand is crumpling up the lapel of my denim jacket and it is obvious that there are strong passions stirring beneath the surface – I could certainly lend them something to stir with, as I have already indicated. Not wishing that percy should keep the secret of his infatuation to himself, I pull Mrs Fletcher towards me and turn so that my love cosh is nuzzling her thigh through a couple of layers of unwanted material. If she does not know what is happening then she must reckon that I am smuggling baseball bats.

‘Oh!’ she says, closing her eyes and showing her teeth as she lets out a long shiver. ‘Do you feel it?’

I was about to ask her the same question but I keep quiet and nod my head up and down. ‘I think you’re very beautiful,’ I say.

‘Do you?’ She sounds really chuffed about the idea.

‘Yes.’ Nobody in their right mind or my position would say differently, would they?

‘I feel guilty about taking advantage of you to satisfy my needs.’

This statement does not surprise me. Birds have always got to go through a short period of self-accusation before they hit the sack with you for the first time. It doesn’t usually last long and can be made even shorter if you step in with the right measure of justification. ‘You’re not taking advantage of me,’ I say. ‘I’d love to make love to you.’ This is something of an understatement as my throbbing muffin-duffer will bear witness.

‘But you’re Rosie’s brother.’

‘I’m likely to be somebody’s brother,’ I say. ‘Ooh! You are beautiful!’

I kiss her again and let the palm of my hand plane her thigh. She slips her hand inside my jacket and slides it round my waist so that it rests in the small of my back. Pausing at knee level I start to tug up her long skirt while she hauls my shirt out of my waist-band. We might be working together to raise a curtain. I suppose, in a way, we are. Percy is certainly ready to hog the centre of the stage and after I have made a few preliminary passes along the inside of Imogen’s thighs it is obvious that the supporting cast are ready for the entrance of Super Star. There is certainly no danger of anyone drying up. Leaning back against the settee I whip down my zipper and let Show Stopper cop the limelight. Sometimes it is favourite to coax him in from the wings but there are moments when too much finesse can be a waste of time. This is clearly one of them. Imogen shows me the back of her neck before you can say ‘Roger Carpenter’ and I find myself digging my fingers deep between the cushions on the settee in an effort to keep a grip on myself. ‘Oh – no – OH!’ I gasp. It is like being plugged into a velvet light socket. Socket and see, is all I can say to those who wish to know more about the experience.

My desperate cries bring Imogen to my lips. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘I didn’t mean to shock you.’

‘It’s not that,’ I say. ‘It’s – oh, let’s get on the carpet!’

The lady is clearly suffering from nunga-hunger, there is no doubt about it. Whipping the lantern down to ground level so that the room is in semi-darkness, she reaches behind her and steps out of her dress in one movement. I don’t watch what happens next because I am bent double trying to get my shoes off. Isn’t it amazing how your shoe laces always foul up during those romantic moments? When I am next in a position to cop an eyeful of the glorious blonde creature she is stretched out beside the lantern, the pattern of its light tattooed over her naked body. ‘Take me!’ she moans.

In my present mood of reckless enthusiasm I could easily leave her a couple of feet behind but I control my impetuosity and enter her no faster than I would the last bus home if there was strong competition for places. Now comes the difficult part. To say that I am exceptionally aroused is to put it mildly but I am aware of the golden maxim: ‘Easy come, easy no get invited back for a second whack at the crack’. I must control myself. This lady is very, very beautiful and I must make the most of the privilege that Dame Fortune has conferred upon me.

‘Oh, lordy, lordy!’ she murmurs. ‘That’s good, that’s good!’ I get the feeling that this is her first appointment with the groin greyhound for some time, and the way she is clinging on to me lends weight to the thought. Her legs are crossed round the small of my back and I don’t think it is just for luck.

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