LITMIR.BIZ

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order to protect her mouth. Tinker and Dickers descend on it hungrily and make sure that their hands do not feel left out of things. They grope clumsily as if there is more pleasure in being seen to grope rather than the actual groping.

      One of the wives–this one must be a wife–looks very cute in her long sleeveless leather jacket, and I catch her eye as she turns away wearily from the hearty reunions going on around her. She raises a finger and I move to her side.

      ‘Have you got a programme of what’s on in the town?’ she says.

      ‘Yes, I expect so. It’s probably a bit out of date, though. You’d be better off with the local paper. I’ll see if I can find you one.’

      ‘That’s very kind of you.’ She has a nice smile. ‘If you find one can you stick it in my pigeon hole? Number forty-two.’ A quick glance at her tidy little body and full lips confirms the coarse thought that I would not be at all averse to sticking it in her pigeon hole.

      ‘Yes, of course,’ I say. ‘Going to make a real weekend of it, are you?’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘I mean you’ll be taking in some of the local entertainment as well as the rugby, will you?’

      ‘What do you mean “as well as”?’ she says. ‘Have you ever seen this lot on tour before? Unless you can drink your own weight in beer every evening you might as well buy a season ticket to the local chamber concerts, if you’re lucky enough to find any. I don’t expect to see Adrian again until Tuesday morning.’

      I begin to see what she means when by six o’clock they have drunk Dennis out of beer. It is the only thing they are interested in. As if there is some prize being offered they stand shoulder to shoulder pouring the stuff down their throats and threatening each other with physical violence in order to pay for the next round. With Dennis rushing around trying to find some more beer, they switch to shorts and so by supper time are in a decidedly jovial mood. It must be the first time in the history of the Cromby that forty-two male guests have marched into the dining room whistling ‘Colonel Bogey’.

      Some of the ladies, including my friend in forty-two, obviously find it less than amusing, but their menfolk sit down joyfully and immediately start pelting each other with bridge rolls and unscrew the top of the pepper pot so that their mates will pour the whole lot into their soup. Some joker has brought a farting cushion and this provides an endless source of amusement, especially when Sid comes out to try and restore some order. Every word he says is greeted by a loud raspberry. Senor Luigi tries to make headway with the bowing and scraping but when everybody jumps out of his chair and rests his chin on his chest every time he says anything, he eventually realises that they are taking the piss.

      Only Mrs Caitley knows how to handle the bastards. She storms out of the kitchen and tells them that she will stop serving any more food if they don’t belt up. They give her a loud cheer, take a good butcher’s at the expression on her mush, and belt up.

      After supper it is back to the bar and when I go to bed most of them are still at it. One or two of the younger birds stay with them but most of the wives watch telly, read a book or knit. I go into the telly lounge and ask if they would like anything.

      ‘Yes, a husband,’ says one of them and the others laugh.

      ‘Don’t hang around here too long,’ says another cute little number who deserves better things, i.e. me. ‘Frustration might get the better of us.’

      I leave them, thinking that the wrong type of bloke could easily be tempted to do himself a bit of good in the circumstances and retire to my room. By chance, Carmen drops by to see if I have any brown boot polish and in the ensuing search for a tin all thoughts of other ladies in the hotel are driven rhythmically from my mind.

      The next morning I wake up to find that one of the rooms has been burned out, due to a drunken Rottingfestrian falling asleep with a burning cigarette in his mitt. Numerous jokers have thrown up all over the hotel, and a running battle with fire buckets and soda syphons has kept most of the non-rugby-playing guests awake half the night. There is an angry queue forming outside Sidney’s office and their pointed chatter is loud enough to be heard above the noise of the Rottingfestrians pouring cornflakes over each other in the dining room.

      It is while explaining to the narked guests that Sidney will be along in a minute that I notice one of the birds who was in the TV lounge, coming down to breakfast. She is a bit older than the others and wearing a green silk trouser suit that does not have enough spare room in it to store a postage stamp. She looks a very cool lady and sweeps her eyes over me like they are the lashes on a pair of windscreen wipers brushing aside an insect. Five minutes later Sidney comes along and the rugby hearties start pouring out of breakfast.

      ‘OK chaps,’ trills one of them, ‘time for training.’ Thank God, I think, now for a little peace. But not a bit of it! They march straight across to the bar and demand pints all round. Dennis does not come on duty till eleven o’clock and I try to point out this fact.

      ‘Come off it!’ snarls one of them, bigger and uglier than the rest. ‘This is a hotel, isn’t it? The bar should be open all the time.’

      ‘I’d have thought you would have had enough last night,’ I say. Fatso does not like this.

      ‘It’s not your place to comment on my drinking habits,’ he yelps. ‘You do as you’re told and get this bar open. Otherwise I’ll report you to the BTA.’

      ‘You can report me to the RSPCA if you like but the bar doesn’t open till eleven.’

      ‘Damned cheek.’

      ‘Piss off.’

      ‘Grab him!’

      Before I can lift a finger, or, more relevant to the situation, a boot, I am seized by half a dozen pairs of strong hands and pressed back against the wall.

      ‘What shall we do with him?’

      ‘Chuck him in the briny.’

      ‘No, I’ve got a better idea.’

      Five minutes later Sidney comes into the bar in answer to my shouts and looks around him inquiringly.

      ‘I’m up here, Sid.’

      ‘Blimey!!’ Sid has probably never seen me sitting astride a bison’s head fifteen feet from the ground, and the hint of surprise in his voice is understandable.

      ‘How long have you been up there?’

      ‘Ever since they put me up here. Sid, you’re going to have to get rid of them, you know.’

      ‘I can’t afford to, Timmo.’

      ‘And Sid.’

      ‘Yes, Timmo.’

      ‘Get us a ladder before you piss off.’

      ‘Oh, sorry. OK. Yeah. I’ll do that.’ Sid seems to be in a daze as he wanders out of the room. My own feeling is of a deeper and more primitive nature. I am going to get even with those bastards if it is the last thing I do. You probably remember the movie. I was staked out on an anthill at the time and Yukon Pete and that sidewinding sidekick of his, the Mexican with the easy smile and the fast knife in the back pocket, had just lifted my stake in the Eldorado Gold Mine. That, after I had dug them both out of a roof-fall with my bare hands. Little did they know that three days later when I had gnawed through the buffalo hide thongs–‘Ahem,’ the bird in the green trouser suit has succeeded in attracting my attention. ‘What were you thinking about?’

      ‘Nothing,’ I gulp. ‘I was just thinking.’

      ‘It makes a refreshing change, even if it was about nothing. What are you doing this afternoon?’

      ‘I’m serving afternoon teas.’

      ‘I’d like you to serve me as well.’ The lady has not batted an eyelid–not that I would probably be able to tell if she had. I mean, do you know how to bat an eyelid?

      ‘Come

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