Chess Game

This week we are very sad to tell you all that the talented poet and author Jill Gardiner passed away recently. Jill was a prolific writer, a meticulous researcher and a generous friend. She will be missed by all. In her honour, we are reposting one of her remarkable poems. 

Jill once explained what inspired today's poem: 'Early on in our relationship, when we could not wait to get our hands on each other, we also used to play a lot of chess. My partner, a past contestant in London chess tournaments, would almost always win, but I still enjoyed the challenge. As the game is so often viewed as a mainly male preserve, this autobiographical story also appealed to me as a metaphor for seduction.'

 

Chess Game

Shall we play chess or go to bed?

We can’t make up our minds

so you get the chess set,

I fetch the wine, and we both

slip out of our clothes.

This bed is big enough for all of us:

you, propped up on a pillow

too far away to reach:

between us, queens and kings,

their armies of retainers.

A clock ticks.  Your pawns advance.

My knight prepares to pounce.

The curve of your hip.  Two moves

and I’ll have you in check.  Too late.

What is your bishop doing down there?

You tell me I’m beautiful: this is not 

the time, now you’ve swiped my pawn, 

gone up a piece.  Oh your skin

and you so at ease in it

as if you went naked everywhere.

I must concentrate, this is serious.

Your breath so close, your body

out of reach.  I could stretch...

You must be joking.  Not my queen.

Your breasts.  I resign, I concede.

This poem appears in With Some Wild Woman – Poems 1989-2019 (Tollington Press), described by Rosie Bailey as ‘a real page-turner’ and by Jackie Wills as ‘starting with bosoms, bras and crushes, it explores all aspects of lesbian love’.

Jill Gardiner was also a social historian, author of From the Closet to the Screen – Women at the Gateways Club 1945-85 (Pandora Press). A former Chair of Brighton Poets, her poems were published in various journals, including Artemis, and commended in competitions, including by Jackie Kay in the Cardiff International.

I saved the afterbirths...

This week we're very proud to showcase another rich, complex poem from After Babel by Christine Webb. Hope you all enjoy a bit of juicy dark humour - we certainly do, but we're inclined to agree about the grapes.

The Midwife’s Tale

I saved the afterbirths for Mr FitzHughes –

Don’t forget, Sister, whenever you’ve time –

plum-purple, plum-plush-soft… though what with blood,

water, cries (some women shriek like pigs –

It’s good pain, I tell them) and then the soft

head appearing, screwed up face, the tiny

soles of the feet… and that first high wail

strung out on a breath like the bloody cord –

there’s enough to do without packing up placentas

for Mr Mighty FitzHughes. But I usually did.

It’s his research, I thought, important, maybe.

Twenty years he was there. You must come to tea,

Sister, when I’ve retired. Not many say that:

flattered, I admit. And the house – full of small 

expensive things. Now, Sister, the greenhouse

(while his wife made tea) – I especially 

want to show you the grapes. Black, full –

cut me a fistful.  Try these, Sister… and look

down: see that rich soil? Fertile, aren’t they,

those afterbirths you saved? Foot of every vine –

nothing beats them. 

The grapes were almost

bursting in my hand – purple-red, swollen.

I thought, Mrs Jones’s placenta… Never

fancied grapes since.

 

by Christine Webb,

from After Babel, pub. Peterloo, 2004

Hello again, Dave

This week we're delighted to host an extract from the new novel by Betty Valentine. Betty is a writer and also the '15 minute poet' (check out her Wordpress site!) living in the Channel Islands.

'1958' is the diary ('Dave') of George Potter, written 1958-2012. He is a stuttering henpecked little man, who finds escape from his dull life and his bossy wife in the shed on his allotment. Life changes for George when the Mullers, Henry and Clara, move in next door. They are German refugees, and Henry runs a bookshop. George and Henry become the best of friends and later on they become lovers; they stay that way for the next 50 years.

This snippet comes from 1961, just after their first weekend together. Eileen is George's wife and Eric is Eileen's terminally dim pug.

Hello again Dave

Things have settled a little. Eileen is no longer narked with me because I brought her roses from the allotment. It always cheers her up when I do that.

Henry is back home because he has a new tenant. Creepy Derek the assistant has moved in upstairs at the bookshop, he has fallen out with his mother who is a war widow, over her new boyfriend. He had nowhere else to go to that he could afford, so Henry said he could use the flat, but just until he found somewhere else. So we have to content ourselves with furtive kisses in the shed and the odd passionate moment when Eileen’s back is turned.

It is not ideal. I realised in the flat with Henry that lovemaking is an entirely different thing when both partners truly want each other. That probably sounds naieve but my only previous experience has been with a woman who would rather not bother, so I assumed that that was the way it was meant to be. 

Now I know different, I want so much more and I am not getting it! It’s a funny thing for a middle aged man to find himself falling in love for the first time. Finding yourself really wanting someone else when you are over 40 is a strange new feeling. It is a physical need, I burn to be with him and he burns to be with me, that need is not being satisfied which is making us both irritable with the people around us.

I have been a little short with Eileen, she keeps asking me if I need something to sort out my bowels because I am being bad tempered, branflakes keep appearing on the breakfast table. I loathe branflakes which is not helping at all.

Dear Dave

I am a much happier boy

Henry surprised me today and sent creepy Derek out for an early lunch break as the shop was quiet. He told him to call in at the stationers and to go to the bank to get some change on the way back. As soon as he was gone Henry locked the door and pretty much dragged me into the office to have his evil way with me, as he put it. 

Not that I was complaining because I was more than keen. Something inside me has woken up after all the years of being starved of affection both physical and mental. Sometimes the madness of this little affair of ours seems utterly reckless and abandoned, but neither of us seems to be able to do a thing about it.

After a glorious time together we emerged smirking and very much happier, only to find a furious Derek standing on the doorstep in the rain because the bank was shut for early closing. Thank goodness he had forgotten his keys!

When I got back to the office one of my colleagues asked if I was ok because I seemed a little flushed. I went scarlet and mentioned that I had a slight headache. I shut the office door and bent over my papers.

When I was working in the garden before dinner, we stopped and chatted politely across the fence for a few minutes, like neighbours do. Just about how the roses have done this year, pretty tame stuff considering the two of us had spent lunchtime in each others arms, and I don’t mean doing the fox-trot!

Comrade Dave

Yes it is catch a ‘Commie’ week down here at the allotments, seriously it really is. Reg Braithewaite our fearless leader [he thinks] has joined the Civil Defence Corps and is now obsessed with hunting down the red menace, he sees communists everywhere!

Most people think he is a bit loopy and ignore him, or tell him to go cool his head under the tap, or worse, but he is relentless in rooting out what he thinks are ‘Red’s’ under the vegetable beds.

What he expects to find the Lord only knows, but extreme vigilance is called for in case we are infiltrated. 

There have been several humorous suggestions that he may be looking for Commie Carrots or Pinko Parsnips, Henry suggested Bolshie Beets.

It is ruddy hilarious.

He wants us to mount nightly patrols to stop the Communists from running riot during the darkened hours. 

Nobody has signed up of course, but I might just do it. Not because I want to help him in his lunatic scheme you understand, it’s just that he will have to be nice to me all night, which will really annoy him!

Regards Tovarisch Dave

Comrade George

My Dearest Holmes: an extract from Rohase Piercy's groundbreaking novel.

'My Dearest Holmes' is a novel of two halves. Part I, entitled 'A Discreet Investigation',

tells the story of an unconventional client's search for her missing companion – a quest

that Sherlock Holmes embarks on with enthusiasm and solves with relative ease. The

denoument of the case, however, has less to do with the resolution of Miss Anne

D'Arcy's dilemma than with Watson's admission, forced out of him by the circumstances

of the investigation, of his feelings for the great detective and his determination to seek a

'marriage of convenience' in order to protect them both from suspicion and scandal.

Part II, entitled 'The Final Problem' and set three years later, follows the same sequence

of events as the original Conan Doyle story of that name (in which Holmes plunges to

his death over the Reichanbach Falls in Switzerland, locked in the arms of his arch-

enemy Professor Moriarty) and carries the reader forward to the events of 'The Adventure

Of The Empty House' in which Doyle, finally bowing to public pressure, 'resurrects' his

hero and returns him to 221B Baker Street and to a conveniently-widowed Watson. In

other words, my version of 'The Final Problem' is an attempt to give an alternative

explanation for the fabled 'Great Hiatus'.

Those of you familiar with the original stories will recognise the setting of this extract,

in which Holmes and Watson, having excaped Moriarty's gang in London, travel across

France and Belgium towards Switzerland. My conceit, however, is that Conan Doyle

failed to disclose the real reason for their flight: Moriarty's threat to expose Watson's

homosexual lifestyle and bring down upon him the full rigour of the 1885 Criminal Law

Amendment Act - the same law under which Oscar Wilde was to be convicted and

sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour just a few years later.

Hobbinol

To celebrate this midwinter, we're proud to share Jay Taverner's Prologue to Rebellion. 'In a feudal world of aristocrats and peasants, The Lady Isabella and her gamekeeper's daughter, Hope, are girls of sixteen. From high society through highway robbery and alongside the perils of war, Hope and Isabella share a passionate coming-of-age.'

'

The candles leapt and guttered, and they were in the room. 

Bell shivered. She had been afraid of the horned men all her life. When she was a tiny girl, Sir Walter had tossed her into the arms of their leader, laughing, asking a blessing on his youngest, and she had smelt the village smells of soot and dirt, and over them the strange acrid herbs of the face paints, and the rot of ancient fur. The horned man had grinned at her, and his teeth were huge as the antlers branching out of his eyes. 

She looked for him now; but there was no man amongst them so large as Jack Smith. She had found out he was really the smith long ago, but it made no difference to the terror he carried in his horns and huge, ribboned skirts when he came at the turn of each New Year. Now the six dancers stamped their clogs on the flags, and horns and ribbons shook.

They were masked strangers. 

Their piper stood in the doorway, and began the dancing tune; as they tilted their heads and brought stiff hands to their waists, the piper ran in small and lithe, and began to step a way between them, round them, and then out in a sinuous line to weave the spectators into their spell. The pipe shrilled. Bell watched the line pass behind the servants in the flickering dark under the gallery: Ben and Matt, John Dickson, Mistress Johnson, Dolly - the piper was no taller than the women of the household, but strange, in white breeches and shirt stiff with ancient embroidery; and flesh all green. 

The inhuman face came slowly towards her, down the line of her kin, ducking in front of Sir Walter, but not with deference, no bow, more as if daring the family to answer the music's call. She tightened her hands in her lap. The piping tune came to her, passed close in a wisp of air warmed by the prancing body, danced behind her, shrilling, mocking. She held her neck rigid as a board. The little winding melody came close; in the corner of her eye the green head and hands reappeared – leaning over her shoulder, playing right into her face, then whisking away. Bell gasped; she had been holding her breath. As the tune retreated, the piper dancing, leading the others towards the far door, she found she wanted them to turn and come back. As if called, the green face turned towards her, and stood still. The dance was over, the stamping and the music stopped; the pipe was lowered.

Sir Walter applauded and called for drink for the Mossmen of the Moor. Benchley carried in the big old wassail bowl, and the Lord touched it to his lips, and handed it to the dancers. They were half themselves again now, villagers standing awkwardly in the Manor hall; but still the pride was in them and their horns. The piper drank last, and carried the bowl back to the household. Sir Walter said, 'Do you offer it to my family, Hobbinol: all mine shall drink with you.'

Bell saw James's lip twitch in disgust, but he could not refuse the custom; he smoothed his ruffles down and touched his fingers to the bowl, and his lip to the brim opposite the place where their paint had spread an oily half-moon. As he let go, his eyes flicked suddenly at the green face; the piper turned quickly and came to Bell. Their eyes met. The surge of response came up in her belly again; but it was not fright, as when the smith had enveloped her in his strangeness, nor did she share her brother's distaste.  She put out her hands, and held those that held the bowl, drawing them towards her. She could scarcely swallow the warm cider.

The spell was quickly broken by James's snicker, and a whisper to Alistair at his side; the piper swiftly bowed, leaving the bowl in her hands, and darted away into the darkness outside the candles; the dancers with a final clatter of clogs trooped out. 'I see our sister is spellbound,' said James in his low voice, 'Perhaps a good thing Hobbinol was a wench this year.'

The Gateways Club

The Gateways Club, just off Chelsea’s Kings Road in London, was the longest surviving lesbian club of the 20th century, open from 1931 to 1985. It also became the most famous, when it featured in the 1968 Hollywood movie, The Killing of Sister George, where real life club members came out on screen, dancing cheek to cheek in front of millions, before gay liberation ever hit the headlines.

In her book, From the Closet to the Screen - Women at the Gateways Club 1945-85, Jill Gardiner shares the stories of 80 women who went there. They include the author, Maureen Duffy, whose best-selling 1966 novel The Microcosm, immortalised the club, and grew out of interviews with its members; Maggi Hambling, the artist, who arrived on New Year's Eve, dressed as Bonnie, then changed her costume to Clyde at midnight; sociologist Mary McIntosh, who wrote 'The Homosexual Role', and Pat Arrowsmith, the peace campaigner, who listed the Gateways as her club in Who’s Who.

But how did anyone ever find the Gateways in the early days when clubs didn’t advertise and many a young woman grew up thinking she was the only one in the world who felt this way?

It was 1963. I hadn’t identified myself as a lesbian. I persuaded my boyfriend to go to this weird pub in Soho full of drag queens. There was this woman sitting opposite me with her boyfriend. A couple of drinks later, I suddenly found myself asking her if she had ever wanted to go to a queer club. She said, ‘Funnily enough, yeah.’ Our boyfriends looked pretty gob-smacked. The next week, she and I went back to Soho and found the Huntsman in Berwick Street. It was an eye-opener to me, full of people boasting how much they’d nicked that day. At about 3am an axe came through the door. There was some sort of gang conflict going on. It was mayhem, and the police arrived, at which point all the same-sex partners dancing switched to the opposite sex. I found myself dancing with a bloke called Bobby.   -  Marion

Through her visit to the Huntsman, Marion found the Gateways.

That was my introduction to the gay world, and although it was exciting I knew I wasn’t going to meet anyone like me. A lot of the women in the Huntsman said they’d been in children’s homes and were living off the streets. The femmes were often on the game and one of the aspirations of the younger butchy types was to become a pimp.

The Huntsman during the day became an ordinary cafe called the Coffee Pot. After we’d had a big raving session one night, I was still there in the morning, having a pot of coffee when this young woman came in, Sasha, and she knew some of the people I was with. She was gay: I couldn’t believe it. She was setting up her own business as a couturier and had been to a material shop nearby, and she knew some of the people I was with. She had lots of eye make-up and bouffanted dark hair and was dressed very trendily.

Sasha introduced me to the Gateways. I remember Gina [one of the owners] sitting at the bottom of the stairs, in a black dress, and I was impressed that she looked very sophisticated. There was a man in a suit behind the bar, and Greta said, ‘That’s Ted, that’s Gina’s husband’, and I just couldn’t work it out. Smithy [often assumed to be Gina’s lover] was there too, a woman with fair cropped hair, polishing glasses.

I was excited that there must be lots of people like myself around who had ordinary jobs. I was struck by the ordinariness of everybody - they just looked like a cross section of women you would see walking around the streets. I identified as a hippy at the time. I had long hair, jeans and purple boots with Cuban heels: slightly more ‘unisex’ than most people there.

Someone came up to me and said that blonde Archie had sent her over. Archie was  very good-looking but a bit frightening. She’d sent over to find out if I was butch or femme. I said I didn’t know and I got a message back saying, that I ought to make my mind up soon or I might find myself in a bit of trouble.   -  Marion 

© Jill Gardiner

From the Closet to the Screen is available at:

Gay’s the Word bookshop in London (who deliver almost anywhere worldwide)

City Books in Hove   

BFI Shop 

The War Memorial

It's Remembrance Sunday here in the UK and round the Commonwealth. Sylvia Daly has kindly allowed us to share this thoughtful poem from her new anthology Before I Go...

THE WAR MEMORIAL

It says “For the Fallen” –
as if they had stumbled
in their haste to reach the enemy.
How silly they were 
to have lost their balance -
no mention here of chaos,
gore, carnage, slaughter.

It says “They Gave Their Lives” –
wrapped in cheap khaki, this
precious gift prepared by
grieving mothers.
Grand theft from
a generation that would
never recover from such generosity.

“Age Shall Not Wither Them” –
Their figures should be used
to scream
“We were abused!
Never do this again.”
Their dying cry,
breathing peace with their last sigh.

Something that wasn't allowed

We're so pleased to have a further instalment of The Incident by Maggie Redding to share with you today. If you'd like to read the preceding episodes, just check for Maggie's tag and they'll show up in the archive. Intriguing stuff is developing over coffee in the staff room of Hill Common School...

Elin Lewis Jones was visiting Hill Common School again the following morning. Vida saw her as soon as she went into the staff-room.  With that hair, she was recognizable from far away and wearing a turquoise top, she could hardly be missed..  Vida’s instinct was to withdraw but she was too late.  She’d been spotted.  Elin strode over to greet her.

‘Good to see you again,’ she said. ‘Shall we sort out some coffee and continue our chat?’

‘Our chat?  What about?’  Vida frowned.  She was less than eager.

‘You were telling me how you came into teaching.’

‘I don’t recall telling you much.’

‘Exactly. I’d like to hear more, about your mother wanting you to be a teacher, for instance.’

Elin spotted the two upright chairs, in a corner, unoccupied.  She led the way over to them. 

‘My mother,’ Vida began as she sat down, ’she was a machinist, in the fashion industry, in north London.  She and her friend were fast, highly skilled, much in demand, well-paid, too.  That was some time ago. We weren’t poor, but life was difficult for her.’  

She looked at Elin and had to look away again, not knowing why.  ‘Mum wanted a better future for me, you see.  A job that’s non-manual, she used to say. Actually, me being mixed race, she wanted to be able to show off about me, not be ashamed, as I think she was.  But she wasn’t prepared to make the required effort.’ 

‘But, teaching?  Was she right?’  Elin leaned forward a little. ‘Was it a good move?’ She seemed not to want to know the reason for her hardly veiled bitterness about her mother’s ambitions for her.

‘I have grave doubts now.’  She gazed out of the tall window. An unblemished blue sky evoked memories of past late spring days, free of all that trapped her now.  Yet there had been other traps in those days.  She preferred not to dwell on those. ‘It breaks my heart, at times,’ she said, all caution dismissed in the presence of someone who understood, ‘the way the pupils are spoken about. And spoken to.  I don't know whether it's ever too late to help anybody.’    She glanced at Elin shyly.  Could she trust her with confidences?  Would Elin laugh at her ideas?  This was an intense conversation to have with a complete stranger.   She hoped none of the staff around them heard the exchange. She guessed that Kelly would have little sympathy for her views. They seethed, her colleagues, they floundered in the staff-room, like a restless sea, their repressed rage justified by a confidence, an arrogance. The room was stuffy. The windows were all closed to keep out the noise of unconstrained pupils yelling in the grounds.  

‘You're an optimist about the pupils, then,’ Elin said.  ‘Or maybe the whole of humankind?  However, in my case, with my job, the gesture of helping them, trying to remove impediments to learning, has to be made. The poor little sods are thoroughly fucked up by both parents and teachers by the time they get to secondary school, if not before that.  Then it’s too late to help, I think.’  Elin turned to look at her with a relaxed, friendly expression. ‘What do you think?’

‘Not being a parent myself, I don't feel qualified to blame them.  I’m frankly not impressed with the way some teachers treat pupils.’  

‘I have never wondered where bullying in schools originates.’  Elin spoke with satisfaction before taking a sip of coffee. 

‘You mean with us, with the teachers?’

  She nodded then made an impatient movement with her whole body. ‘I've a good mind to bugger off to Wales, to live on fresh air and views.  Starvation can't be worse than the expectations put on me.’  She glanced at Vida, smiling again.  Her eyes were soft, warm, a pale green, interesting, interested, all-seeing eyes. Her eyelashes, paler than her hair, were barely visible.  

‘Excuse the language,’ Elin was saying, ‘frustration, poor vocabulary plus a healthy dose of your previous Head of Department‘s cynicism.  How long have you been teaching?’ 

‘Nearly ten years in total.  It feels like a lifetime.  I had a break when I looked after my mother before she died.  But what else can I do?’

‘Become an Ed. Psych?’

‘You’ve just put me off that.  Besides, I like the kids.’

Elin was kind, she encouraged her to talk.  She understood her attitude to teaching, to the school, to the pupils.

‘You could always foster children,’ she said.

‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ Vida said as an image of Peter rose in her mind. Peter was not keen on children. To her relief, further discussion was avoided by the bell for the end of break, destroying the peace of mind of anyone in the room who had that rare commodity. Harassed faces with set jaws were sucked to far reaches of the campus, as the staff abandoned mugs, biscuit crumbs, strewn papers, and books on every surface. Chairs were left in disarray.

Uneasy, now that she’d revealed herself in a way she’d never done before, Vida wandered to a classroom full of, as yet, mostly unspoiled, twelve-year-olds. She’d opened-up, to Elin.  She was as comfortable as if she had been naked. She wished she hadn’t spoken so freely. Her own opinions were disturbing to her, as though she’d said something that wasn’t allowed.

Despite this private angst, the exchange with Elin Lewis Jones was the most pleasant encounter since she’d joined the school. Kelly was lovely, but someone to be wary of when it came to views on education. Elin wasn’t part of the staff-room politics that so bothered Vida.  She had an easy-going manner, Elin did. 

Veil of Tweed

We're re-posting this wonderful poem by Maria Jastrzębska today, as Maria has a new anthology coming out in October 2022, Small Odysseys (click the title to order a copy from Waterloo Press). She's a Polish-British poet, editor and translator, the author of sell-out drama Dementia Diaries and a founding member of Queer Writing South. The poem is from her collection Everyday Angels.

Maria says: 'Can you imagine, or do you remember how little information (let alone anything like positive images) there was about the lives of women who loved other women (or women generally) back in the 60s and 70s when I was growing up? This poem references two classics: The Killing of Sister George a play from 1964 about a “slightly sadistic masculine woman” adapted into a film in 1968 and made nastier and also more explicitly lesbian and Les Biches a French film from 1968 about bisexuality, “tortured” relationships, etc.'

VEIL OF TWEED

 

 

Behind a veil of tweed, through a smoke-screen 

of bravado I know too well, pouring out gin 

in your jodhpurs or PVC, Sister George

you don’t scare me, but you did once.

 

I fled from you into the arms of a biche

with long lashes, sulky lips. At least 

her hair was long, even though it all ended 

in tears. It might as well have been me 

 

slumped, sobbing face pressed 

against a bathroom door, behind which 

Anouk Aimée made love with a real man.

I wouldn’t cut my hair. Wore a frock 

 

to the hairdressers in case I looked like you 

when I walked out. At eighteen 

how afraid I was of being mistaken 

for a man. How afraid of being old.

Maria Jastrzębska

from Everyday Angels (Waterloo Press 2009)

 

www.mariajastrzebska.wordpress.com

What I did when I got back

We're very excited today to be able to share this evocative prose poem by Maria Jastrzębska. It has, as she says, a 'kind of end of summer' feel. It's from her new anthology Small Odysseys, due to be published in October. Really looking forward to reading more. Order your copies from Waterloo Press  

What I did when I got back

Plucked the tufts above my eyebrows. Made myself coffee but it didn’t seem worth boiling the milk. Separated my clothes into colours and delicates. Remembered to take out the handwash jumper.  Put one wash on.  Fed the cat, brushed her. Put Kőln Concert on full volume. Emptied the sand out of my smaller bag outside the back door. Wandered down into the garden where I saw the leaves were all yellow, started making a list of what needed doing – something had eaten through the gooseberry. I texted friends. J got back to me straight away, didn’t say much, just still quite low. H must have been at work. Took the overtly lesbian bits out of a poem and called it Pines Broken Below Marina Baja. It sounded edgy with, I thought, a degree of gravitas at the same time. Unpacked my books and papers, left them lying on the floor. Since I had the shower to myself I stayed under for what seemed like days. Ran downstairs naked because I’d forgotten to get a clean towel. Dressed in the softest fabrics I could find, old jeans, faded baggy cotton and linen top, aquamarine. Put the lesbian bits back in the poem. Called it Pining. 

Maria Jastrzębska is a key Anglo-Polish and European poet and no stranger to exploring heritage and archetypal figures of family. In this new work she widens her gaze. Unable – or unwilling – to settle, her speakers are nomadic. The personal is always political, the political – unmistakably human. Whether crossing borders, both literal and intangible, queering or reimagining histories, these poems urgently question the present, startle and illuminate. She is equally fluent in prose poem or lyric as well as the extraordinary and quizzical language of Ponglish. 

From Small Odysseys published by Waterloo Press October 2022

https://waterloopress.co.uk/books/small-odysseys-2022/

A chance encounter with Dr Watson

We're delighted to have an extract from Rohase Piercy and Charlie Raven's A Case of Domestic Pilfering today, a light-hearted detective story set in the world of Sherlock Holmes. Enjoy a hot day, a walk in the park and a chance encounter with Dr Watson.

The park was cool in the shade.  The huge trees exhaled a faint green aroma, sweet and calm.  Max and Guy had stopped together, looking across the scorched grass to where white parasols and floating silhouettes passed like a mirage in the sunlight.

'Hot, isn't it?'  said Guy taking off his hat.  The hair was dark on his glistening forehead.  Max fanned him with his hat rim.

'It's just as well we're not going to your mother's,' he said.  'It's too hot to be out at all, really. I vote we gather ourselves for a quick sprint across the grass to an arbour of refreshment, and deal with a couple of ice-cold hock-and-seltzers.'

'I second that,' murmured Guy. He leaned ostentatiously against the tree, closed his eyes and muttered 'Water, water – I mean, hock, hock-and-seltzer!'

In his light suit and straw hat he should be on the river, thought Max.  In a punt.  Just he and I.  Cool, green, glassy waters.  He put out a hand and quietly touched his arm.

'Guy.'

Guy opened his eyes and smiled.  He has the face of a  Sun God, thought Max.

'Guy, you look just like Phoebus Apollo.'

Guy glanced quickly round.  'Oh Maxy, you are sweet.  If I'm Apollo then who can you be?  Daphne?'

They both shouted with laughter as they walked arm in arm into the sunlight.

Inside the bar the air was cool.  A breeze slid through the open windows, and the waiters looked clean in their starched white aprons.  Max was sitting back, trying not to scrutinise his own reflection in the enormous gilt mirror on the opposite wall.  He lit a cigarette from his new black-and-silver case a little self-consciously.  He watched the effect out of the corner of his eye.

Guy had ordered a bowl of ice cubes and was pretending to cool his face and hands at them, like a fire in reverse.  The waiter who brought their drinks looked bored.  It struck Max how foolish they must think their customers.  They had seen it all; they remained unimpressed.  What must it be like, to be a waiter?

'Your mother wasn't expecting us, was she?'

'No, no.  Not in the slightest.  Well, I do sometimes drop in on her at this time of day.  But it isn't expected.  Just once a week usually.  On a Tuesday.

'But it is Tuesday!'

'Is it?  Ah well.  She won't worry.  She'll look at the weather, and she'll think of me, and she'll say to Davies, 'No cucumber sandwiches today, Davies.  Master Guy is drinking hock-and- seltzer with his friend Maximilian, that nice boy from the country who is such a good influence,' and – I declare!  It's my turfy fellow!'

Max looked round, following Guy's stare.  A gentleman had entered and was glancing round for a table.  Guy sprang up impetuously and dashed over;  Max groaned inwardly as he watched him flash his most charming smile, and indicate the way to their table.  The man gave an answering smile in which Max detected some amusement, and approached their quiet corner.  Max rose.

'Look who's come to sit with us Maxy!'  Guy's face was alight with naughtiness, and a flush bloomed on his cheek. 'Max, Max, I must present you.  Oh, I'm sorry, I haven't introduced myself  yet - and I don't know your name either - in fact, I can't do the honours at all!  This is most irregular. What on earth shall we do?'

The gentleman laughed pleasantly.  'I suggest we overleap convention.  My name is Dr John Watson, and I am charmed by your invitation to join you both.  My thanks to you – the thanks of a thirsty man on a thirsty day.'

Max smiled.  He liked the man immediately.  He liked his wavy hair and the crinkles at the side of his frank blue eyes and the gentle voice which held the hint of a laugh.  He is in his late thirties, decided Max as they shook hands.

'Max Fareham.  Pleased to meet you, sir.'

'And I am Guy Clements,' interjected Guy; 'And we have met before!'

They all sat down, and Dr Watson gave his order to the waiter.  'So you mentioned, Mr Clements,' he said, 'but I cannot recall the meeting, I'm sorry to say.'

'Ah, but I can.  It was at the races, and you gave me a lot of excellent advice, which I ignored assiduously.  I lost an enormous, princely sum.'

'Ah!'  Dr Watson's eyes lit up and the pleasant crinkles became more pronounced as he smiled.  'The young man with a taste for champagne!  Of course.  I hope you don't mind my mentioning that,' he added, glancing at Max.

'Ooh la la!  Of course not!' cried Guy delightedly.  

Dr Watson chuckled.  'As a medical man,' he said in his warm, friendly voice, 'I recommend champagne as a universal pick-me-up.'

'In that case,' commented Max drily, 'Guy here is in the very pink and bloom of health.'

'And so I am!' said Guy severely.

'And so I trust you both are, and will long remain,' said Dr Watson, raising his glass.

They look so young, thought Watson; and so happy.  His heart went out to them, sitting in their new summer suits in the high-ceilinged room, looking slender and fresh and rather awkward.  He wished Holmes had come with him.  Good-humoured, outgoing youth might help him.  He thought of his friend's rooms, and the darkling figure lying on the couch, fretting against enforced idleness or weaving his drug-induced dreams.  Sunlight; he wished he could take Holmes some sunlight.  He sighed, and put down his glass, suddenly aware that Max was talking about the delights of the seaside in summer.

'At least one always enjoys a breeze there ...'

'Oh indeed,' agreed Dr Watson.  'My wife is at the seaside now.  So pleasant for her.'

'I suppose your practice keeps you in town?' asked Max.  He could not disguise the flat note that crept into his voice at the mention of a wife.   

'Yes, my practice – well, it's not a very demanding practice at the best of times,' said the doctor with a conspiratorial wink.  'And I have a friend who sometimes needs me.'

Guy stopped playing with the melting ice cubes, and Max hastily offered the Doctor a cigarette. Was this wife at the seaside sophisticated and understanding, he wondered, or just ignorant and rather dense?

'Thank you Mr Fareham,' said Watson, accepting.  'Also, I have work to clear which must be completed shortly, as I'm bound by contract.'

'How tedious for you,' murmured Guy.

'Medical work by contract, sir?' asked Max politely; 'I didn't know that was the custom – is it so many patients per month, or something?'

Dr Watson laughed heartily.  'Dear me, no!  What an interesting proposition – a sort of piece work, you mean?  A bushel of measles equals a week's rent?  No, I'm afraid it's nothing so lucrative.  I write a little.'

'Really?' asked Max.

'For the Lancet!' said Guy, putting his forefingers to his temples and speaking in a mediumistic monotone.  'I see a medical magazine.  I see an article on - let's see now - on bunions ...'

'Shut up, Guy!' said Max, resting his chin on his hand and sighing.  'Is he right?' he asked their companion.

'Not exactly.  It's a little less highbrow than that.  For magazines, certainly – Lippincott's, The Strand, even Beeton's.'

'How interesting! Do you make up the stories out of your own head?'

'Not at all.'  Dr Watson looked rather rueful, as though he regretted mentioning the subject.  'I may fudge the issues, but the cases are true enough.'

'Dr Watson!' exclaimed Max suddenly.  'Oh, good Lord!  Of course!  The weather must have hard-boiled my brain.  Good grief, sir, I can't tell you how honoured I am to make your acquaintance!'  He leapt to his feet, and pumped the amused Doctor's hand for a second time.  

Guy looked from one to the other, agog.  'What am I missing here?' 

Max's face was flushed, and his eyes shone with excitement.  'Guy, this is the Dr Watson – the friend of – of Mr Holmes.  You know.'  He nodded quickly at his friend, half embarrassed.

'Oh, good Lord!' echoed Guy, his voice rising up the scale.  'You mean the one you're madly – the one you admire so much?  My dear sir,' he said turning to the Doctor, 'You're hardly likely to escape with your life in tact now.  There is but one thing in the world that Max Fareham lives for, and that is the chance to kiss the ground that Mr Sherlock Holmes walks on.'

Dr Watson laughed.  'Oh dear!' he said.

'Shall we have another drink?  Please, Doctor, you can't possibly go now!'  Max ordered more drinks, eagerness overcoming his natural shyness.  'Do you know,' he said, 'I've read everything you've ever written about Mr Holmes.  Tell me, is he – is he like you say he is?'

'How do you mean?' asked Dr Watson, his blue eyes twinkling.

'A – a genius.  I supposed that's what I mean.'

'Well, yes.  I can confirm that opinion.  I've never written less than my true evaluation of my friend's genius.  He is extraordinary.'

Max nodded encouragingly.

'But what's he like when he's not being a genius?' asked Guy rather insolently.  'Does he go out?  Mother could invite you both to dinner, and then Maxy could swoon at his feet.'

'Be quiet!' hissed Max.

Dr Watson chuckled.  'What a kind offer.  But I'm afraid he rarely dines out, and never goes into company if he can help it.'

'Ah, a recluse. How tedious he must find all this adulation,' said Guy, shaking his head sympathetically.  'But doesn't he get bored, in between cases?'

'H'mmm.  Yes.  I'm afraid he does.'

Dr Watson then deftly changed the subject.  Max tried his best to steer it back to Sherlock Holmes, but the Doctor firmly resisted all attempts to probe.

'I must be going,' he said after a while, pulling out his watch.

'Oh, we'll walk along together,' said Guy sweetly, smiling significantly at Max.

'Well … ' Dr Watson eyed them for a moment and then smiled.  'If you like,' he said.