Low life
Chapel Street blues
Jeffrey Bernard
Well, here we are in trendy, socialist, swinging Islington. This is the first time in years that somebody has had to be kind enough to put me up as opposed to putting up with me and I had forgotten all about the anxiety generated by trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. So far I haven't even made a cup of tea. One could always make it in the wrong pot or drink it out of the wrong cup. So it's up and out to Ted's Snacks around the corner, a café approp- riately about the size of a coffin. I gather that I have the honour to share the same street as Alan Watkins to say nothing of the Draper's Arms which is a sort of touring company of the Coach and Horses. But the next move has to be the last. Already this morning I have needed to refer to no less than four books which I have had to leave behind me in Great Portland Street and being unobtrusive means being cut off from the telephone. I must apologise for going on and on about the accommodation situation but it is all I can think about at the moment and I may have to go out into the garden in a minute just to scream.
That is one good thing. A garden. The other is the sight of the positively stunning houses around here. Contemporary Eng- lish architects should hang their heads in shame at the perfection of proportion and the basic simple beauty of them. So should the builders of today who would be lost without pre-mixed concrete. Why didn't someone tell me years ago, when I left school, to work hard and buy a house? They probably did and I couldn't hear for wondering whether or not Lavandin could win the Derby. The amount of spilt milk one could cry over would float a Cunarder.
Anyway, dear old Charlie who used to sell satsumas in Berwick Street market and drink in the Coach has got a stall in Chapel Street market just around the corner and he is equally good company for both moaning and laughing with. Also I bumped into two very nice Cockney villains I used to drink with ten years ago and it makes me feel cosy to know that I have `minders' close at hand. Do I attract these people or do they attract me? Both, I suppose. Taken in short, sharp doses they can be great fun and they have a marvellous awareness lacking, say, in a member of the Arts Council or Poetry Society.
But apart from the horror of moving 20 pairs of underpants and 30 pairs of socks in two carrier bags the week was also spoilt by a famous Fleet Street cartoonist. I was having a gentle gargle one evening and a man had just asked me who declared war on Germany in 1939 and when I said Chamberlain he told me no and said it was Vera Lynn's agent, when this buffoon walked in and did his usual stuff about how much money he earned and how many women he had been to bed with. Tiresome stuff. Then he picked up my large vodka and poured it into an ash-tray. That is what I expect from a teenager interested in football, not a supposedly intelligent 50- year-old. It annoyed me so I threw the combined ash, dog-ends and vodka at him. Perhaps I shouldn't have and it made a friend of mine I very much wanted to talk to walk out. But worse was to follow. An obscenity. He pulled some money out of his pocket and started to tear it up. That is a very nasty gesture of contempt. There used to be a rich queer in the Colony Room Club who would take rough trade up there and eat £5 and £10 notes in front of them. It is a bit like throwing a shovelful of caviare at a dole queue.
That man is still with us by the way and I can only wonder what inflation has done to his digestive system. I know mine isn't up to much and I fear I shall have to consult the sainted Dr Kurtz at the Middlesex Hospital any day. Last week I was down to 8st. 121bs. She who would iron 14 shirts at one standing says that I look anorexic and Norman thinks I've got cancer. I eat very well in fact but I would like to have Mrs Thatcher's pancreas. That would be good for the country too. Neil Kinnock's right lung and Sebastian Coe's legs would com- plete it. The other parts are now spare parts. Well, it's goodbye from me as I am off to the Draper's Arms before transfer- ring to the West End and limelit tinsel of the Coach and Horses. God help us all.
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