Low life
Back to nature
Jeffrey Bernard
Typing, like eating, at a table in a sun- shine-filled garden is nearly always im- practicable. I am blinded by the whiteness of the paper, and wind rips the bottom half of it back into the keys and there is alwaysa wasp lurking behind me, like a sadistic schoolmaster, wanting to see what I've writ- ten. I eat my lunch by the herbaceous border and am joined by every insect In Kingsclere. The merest of breezes cools that which should be hot, before the first bite. My Earl Grey tea is cold before I take the first sip and the bluebottle swimming on the surface is living proof of it. In desperatio0! switch to vodka and the ice melts away as quickly as a man you've helped. Hacks should work in smoke-filled unventilated rooms, beneath an Anglepoise. Even the charm of the rustic soundtrack begins t° grate. The church bells, at first reminiscent of the Elegy and all that, go on for just that bit too long and the vicar next door has been giving his lawn a short back and sides for three hours and the motor movie; begins to sound like one of those wretched
Motorbikes in London ridden by psycho- pathic messenger boys.
But of course it is all very lovely. The only nagging in my mind is that the friends I'm caretaking and cat-sitting for — they're gorging themselves on fruits de mer in and around Honfleur — should return unex- Pectedly and catch me with a dirty ashtray. Consequently I leap from garden to house every five minutes to wipe a surface or wash V a cup and glass. Apart from Great Portland Street not being outside the bedroom window, another bonus is the Crown in Kingsclere. It has just about the best pub food I've come across. Unfor- tunately, a recommendation from the likes of Egon Ronay and not me tends to fill a Place with tourists, or passing trade as they are called. But the landlord's heart is in the right place and I go there every day to un- wind. Actually, I don't, and I don't under- stand that phrase. I drink to wind up.
Between the Crown and writing to you, dear reader, my other work is making splen- did and rapid progress. I speak, of course, of my long-awaited autobiography. Last week, when I arrived, I wrote my name at the top left-hand corner of a piece of paper and the very next day I wrote the figure '1' oPposite. Sometimes my grim determina- tion frightens me. Luckily I have enough self-discipline to stop when all work and no Play makes Jack a dull boy and I took irlYself to Newbury races last Saturday to have another look at the human race. I took tnY brand new binoculars with me — Rus- sian made, excellent and extraordinarily Cheap — and beheld strange things through them. Firstly, a measure poured out by the racing caterers, Ring & Brymer, and secondly the wintry smile of experience on rtlY ex-wife's face, easily the most attractive face there. She's got a new gimmick now. She keeps brushing non-existent dandruff from rqy shoulders. This is one of the best and simplest put-downs I know of. The Other is to say to someone of me within my earshot, 'He's very sweet really'. It's the elnPhasis on the word 'really' that gets me; You might just as well say it to console a Postman who has just had his leg bitten off by your Doberman. But it was nice to back a couple of winners after an excellent pic- nic, even though all or most of the good 'faces' like Peter Walwyn were away at Keeneland in the USA for the sales.
And now it's back to the grindstone, although the vicar has just decided to hoover the inside of his car. Twixt autobiographical paragraphs of tear- jerking sensitivity and sips of vodka and Warm ice I have to write a piece for a women's magazine on 'Women in Pubs'. At least it's something I know about. But how on earth can I concentrate on anything in view of the recent events at this journal in Doughty Street? Next week I Shall reveal how the Spectator was rocked to its very foundations when security staff discovered that No. 56 is full of heterosex- uals. Expect heads to roll. I could kick InYself for Mimi (500 old francs, Mont- Parnasse, 1949). How did they find out?
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