Memoirs 06 - Peace Work

  That visit over, we found a very up-market Kaffeehaus – das Café Sperl, where the inevitable string trio are playing Viennese salon music. They sell a great range of coffees. I glance down the bill of fare: ah, I’ll have ein Einspdnner. This is coffee with a touch of perversion – whipped cream. Toni has ein Kleiner Mokka – like Joe Louis, strong, pungent and black. Toni, avis-like, is sipping the scalding drink. I am looking at her and I am thinking, does she belong to me? This petite creature, is she really mine or on loan?

  “Why you look like that?” she says.

  “Tu set mio amore,” I say in my best Italian.

  She smiles. It’s quite lovely – even lovelier, Toni paid the bill.

  “Danke, mein Herr,” says the Herr Ober with a slight, stiff bow. How courteous they all were, not at all like English waiters who pick their noses when taking your order.

  It’s late afternoon when our fiacre drops us back at the hotel. Toni wants a lie-down: can I lie with her? No, no, no, she wants a sleep. I tell her I won’t wake her up, she won’t even know it’s happened. No, no, no, I am very naughty. Never mind, I can hold out. While I’m holding it out, time is passing. I press on with the Mrs Gaskell book on the Brontes. I’m up to where Branwell Bronte, on his last night alive, is in a drugged state (laudanum); he’s having dinner with a friend at his favourite piss-up pub, the Black Bull. He turns up ‘wild-eyed and drugged and demanded a brandy’. Next day Branwell dies, something that the whole family specialized in. One by one, until only the Reverend Patrick Bronte survives. How lonely must have been his last years.

  Immersed in the book, I forget the time. There’s a thunderous Lieutenant Priest. “Come on, we’re all in the bloody Charabong. Don’t tell me you’re getting Hall’s disease.” I grab my guitar case and follow him to the waiting vehicle. “The new Bill Hall,” announces Priest as I board.

  “Where you been, Terree?” says Toni. I explain. “Ah, Bronte sisters, I know, I read in Italian book – very sad story.”

  Bornheim walks up and leans over us. “What you do today?” I told him; what did he do? He did three vests, three underpants and all his socks.

  “Why didn’t you give ‘em to the laundry?”

  Ah, he is trying to save money. Aren’t we all?

  ∗

  It’s a packed house again, great. I make sure I’m wearing underpants. That experience the previous night was to haunt me all my days I was with the Trio. Some girls stood hopefully in the wings, hoping for an encore. My God, in the front row it’s that Marlene Dietrich that I screwed. After the show, she comes looking for me. She comes to the dressing-room; they hide me in the shower. I hear her saying this is her telephone number, will I phone her. Helppppp!! Thank God, Toni isn’t around. Marlene isn’t easily put off; Bornheim comes in and tells us that she’s waiting outside the stage door!! I smuggle myself out the front of the theatre and get a taxi back to the hotel. How do I explain this to Toni? When I arrive everyone is at dinner.

  “Terr-ee, where you been?” says Toni. Well, I tell her the truth. “Why she come for you?” she inquires. I daren’t tell her because I was very good at it; no, I say I don’t know. “You tell the truth?”

  “Yes, Toni.”

  She left it at that but the atmosphere was distinctly cool. I order: “Herr Ober, ein Komenymag Leves Nokedival.” I don’t know what it is, but it sounds magnificent. It turns out to be Caraway Seed Soup! There must be some mistake, I distinctly ordered Komenymag Leves Nokedival. What? That means Caraway Seed Soup? I should sue them through the Trade Descriptions Act! It’s been a wearing day, so, after a fond goodnight at Toni’s door, I go to bed, steaming with desire.

  ∗

  We come to our last day in Vienna sausage. It starts with a disaster for Johnny Bornheim: he left his shoes outside his room for the Boots to clean and someone has pinched them. “The thieving bastards,” he rages. He reports the theft to the manager, a short, fat, bald, puffing Austrian with pebble-glass spectacles.

  “Hi am zo zorry, mein Herr.”

  He is full of profuse apologies and halitosis. He, in turn, phones the police and, duly, an Austrian plain-clothes policeman arrives and takes details. What colour were the shoes? Brown. How old were they? About seven years. The detective tries to stifle a laugh. Bornheim knows he hasn’t a hope in hell of getting them back and, until he buys a new pair, has the embarrassment of wearing white plimsolls. He looked a real Charlie as he came down to breakfast. “Anyone for tennis?” ribbed Mulgrew.

  “They were my best pair,” moaned Bornheim. He could have fooled me.

  He spends the morning along with me and Toni, shopping for a new pair. In post-war Vienna, there isn’t much of a choice and the quality is very poor. Bornheim buys a cheap pair that seem to be made of reinforced brown paper with cardboard soles. To buy them, he has to borrow money from Mulgrew who goes faint at the thought. On this, our last day, Toni, Mulgrew and Bornheim, with his new shoes, decide to visit the Schatzkammer. It contains a dazzling display of the old Holy Roman Empire. I was stunned at the Imperial Crown of pure gold set with pearls and unpolished emeralds, sapphires and rubies – that, and the actual sword used by Charlemagne plus the lance that is supposed to have pierced Christ on the Cross. As I recall, this is about the tenth that I’ve seen! There was so much gold everything seemed to be made of it except Bornheim’s new shoes, whose newness has started to hurt his feet. “I must have a rest,” he says.

  We repair to an adjacent coffee house and take refreshment. It’s out on the street and we watch the passing of humans in concert, while busy Herr Obers move among the pavement tables. “This is the life,” says Mulgrew, emitting a stream of smoke. Indeed, yes – it was a sunny day, I was in love, Bornheim had new shoes and Mulgrew was going to charge him interest on the money he lent him.

  “I tell you,” said Toni, nibbling a pastry, “Austrians make better cake than Italy. Terr-ee, do you have places like this in England?”

  “Oh, yes. There’s Lyons Corner House with Welsh rarebits.”

  I have to explain what Welsh rarebits are.

  “They not sweet,” she says.

  “No, they savoury.”

  “What is savoury?”

  “Well, the opposite of sweet.”

  “Ah,” she says. “Gustoso!”

  Yes, if she says so – gustoso.

  Bornheim is feeling his new shoes.

  “Are they hurting?” I said.

  “Just a bit. They’ll be all right when I’ve broken them in.”

  Mulgrew warns him, “Don’t let water get on them, they’ll melt.”

  Bornheim shoots him a meaningful stare, whereof I’m sure Mulgrew knew not the meaning.

  “Toni! That’s the fourth cake you’ve had; you’ll get fat.”

  No, never, she says; she’ll never get fat. “No one in my family fat.” Dare I tell her that when she was forty I would be able to roll her home?

  “Wieviel kostet das?” I say to the Herr Ober with the aid of a phrase book. With a grin he tots up the bill. I split it three ways: “That’s five schillings each.”

  “I’m skint,” says Bornheim.

  “He’s had the last of my money,” says Mulgrew, so I am lumbered.

  Dutifully, I pay up with a sickly grin. More expense is on the way: Bornheim can’t walk back, his shoes hurt. No, no, we will have to take a taxi. I love the ‘we’ bit. So, ‘we’ get a taxi and ‘we’ all get in and ‘we’ drive to the hotel; ‘we’ get out, but ‘I’ pay.

  Toni has some mending to do, so I spend the afternoon room-bound, reading the Brontes book, occasionally drifting into a shallow sleep. Bored, I put new strings on my guitar and practise some chords. I accompany myself: boo boo da de dum, love in bloom – all wasted on four hotel walls. Boredom should be a cardinal sin. I was bored. I lay on the bed, put my Brontes book aside, stared up at the ceiling. I stared at the wall opposite; I returned to the ceiling, fixing me gaze on the light fitting. I close one eye – this makes the light jump to the
right. I close the other eye and it appears to jump to the left. I close eyes alternately, making the light jump back and forth. I cross my eyes and get two lights. So far, so good. By squinting, I make the light into a blur; by opening both eyes and swivelling my eyeballs left and right, I make the light move back and forth across the ceiling. Boo boo da de dum, love in bloom. I examine my fingernails; they don’t need cutting, so I put them aside. I look down at my feet; I wiggle my toes. I give a giant yawn and nearly dislocate my jaw. By grinding my teeth, I can make the sound of a train on the inside of my eardrum. By wiggling my ears, I can make my scalp move backward and forward. Boo boo da de dum, love in bloom. By closing my eyes and pressing on them with my hands, I can see lots of different flashing lights and patterns. My house phone buzzes. It’s Toni, what am I doing? I tell her I am pressing my eyes to see flashing lights. She doesn’t understand. I tell her not to worry, neither can I. Do I want to come up and order tea in her room? Before she can put the phone down, I’m tapping on her door.

  She’s in the middle of her mending. “We have nice tea, eh, Terr-ee?” Yes, but first embrace her and give her a head-swirling kiss. No, no, Terr-ee, not now. She orders tea and sandwiches. A very old waiter with watery blue eyes and a red nose brings in the tray and shakily puts it down. For his trouble, Toni gives him a tip.

  He groaned ‘Danke, Frduleiri and went out – to die, I think.

  The sandwiches are cut in small triangles, ten of them make one sandwich. I wolf down what I think is the requisite amount to stall hunger.

  “Terr-ee, you eat lot of food but you always thin.”

  “Yes, I am thin.”

  “You must have some, how you say, tonica?”

  Tonic, yes, I’ve tried it. I drank Horlicks and Sanatogen but nothing happened except the price of their shares went up. She feels my arm and shakes her head as if the sleeve is empty, which it nearly is. After tea I try to – but, no, no, Toni has more mending to do. I must leave without it.

  It’s not long to departure for the show-time. I seek out Bornheim, who has been trying to massage his shoes into a more pliable state. Sitting there on a magnificent four-poster bed with tapestry swags, massaging dubbin into his shoes is a culture shock. Have I heard? Lieutenant Priest has bought a radio! Great, must borrow it, I’m desperate to hear some jazz. I dash up to his room: yes, I can borrow it, but not just now – he’s listening in for football results from the BBC General Forces programme. General Forces? Never heard of him. Priest says I can borrow it tonight. Great, I know from the Union Jack that there’s Duke Ellington at half-ten tonight – just about the time we get back, goody! The thought of hearing Ellington was so exciting. In those days, was I that simple?

  ∗

  The last night, full house again – show goes extremely well. There is an after-the-show drink on stage with Lieutenant Priest. Chalky White and his helpers are starting to dismantle the set and load it on to lorries. Back to the hotel. It’s half-past ten, I borrow Priest’s little radio and take it to my room. Bornheim and Mulgrew join me. We sit and smoke as the programme is announced. “A Date with the Duke,” says the announcer to the strains of ‘The ‘A’ Train’. I can’t remember now the tunes he played after that, but it went on till eleven-thirty when the station closed down. I have missed dinner; I go down and inquire if there’s anything to eat. Ahgggggggggggg, Cold Collation!

  PADUA YET AGAIN

  PADUA YET AGAIN

  The long journey back starts. We all board the Charabong at nine o’clock. Our destination is Rome, nearly nine hundred miles away. We will be staging tonight at Padua. It’s going to be a long haul; none of us are looking forward to it. When we arrive in Rome, we are to do another week of the show at the Argentina Theatre. Toni says if I like, I can stay part of the time at her home in the Via Appennini.

  ∗

  We are now watching all the ground we travelled in reverse. There are occasional reminders of the war – the burnt-out tank or an abandoned artillery piece, fading military signs, DUST MEANS DEATH.

  We journey throughout the day. As we travel south to a lower altitude, the weather gets warmer. Spirits are kept up by Hall and myself playing some jazz. Our Italians sing native songs and in between we talk in bursts, then sit silent. Some doze. By one o’clock, we are on the outskirts of Trieste. We pull over to the verge near a ruined castle. The sandwiches are distributed. Made back at the hotel, they are still these tiny triangular things. The lunch over, I and Toni explore the castle. Built of monumental stone blocks it is very haunting. Near the keep is a hole in the ground that I recognize as the oubliette. “What is oubliette, Terr-ee?” I explain it means forget in French. This is where they dropped prisoners that were to be forgotten. Nasty! I wonder when archers last stood at these cruciform slits in the wall. All life would have been here: feasting, romance, battles, intrigue. What happened? Who was the last person to leave this place, and why? So many questions and no answers.

  “Oi,” Priest is calling us from below. “You two lovebirds come on down. We’re leaving.”

  We scramble back into the Charabong and take our customary seats.

  “Wot you two been doin’ up the castle, eh?” says Bill Hall, full of innuendo, and I think ‘shit!’

  We drive off into the city of Trieste. It’s still got partisans walking round the streets. We see one or two agitators addressing a crowd. They are red in the face and gesticulating wildly.

  “I don’t know what they see in Communism,” says Hall. “After all those bloody long-faced Russians we saw in Vienna, ‘oo wants to be a Commie?”

  “Ah,” says Mulgrew, “they did laugh at our act.”

  “Oh, yes,” said Hall, “but they were generals. They can bloody well afford to laugh.”

  Off they go on the merits of Communism. Both retire unbowed with Communism still safe in Russia.

  “Oh, Terr-ee, it takes so long,” complains Toni about the journey. It is hot and dusty and I’m bloody bored as well. I give her hand a squeeze and give her an understanding smile, which is a lot of bloody help.

  Toni has fallen asleep on my shoulder. All the morning exuberance has gone. Window-gazing, I take in the Italian countryside. I wonder what happened to my battery. It is, I know, somewhere in Holland. I wonder if they think of me. Do Harry Edgington, Alf Fildes and Doug Kidgell still play together, I wonder. I miss them; I miss playing in the band, I miss my pre-war days. What a convulsion in my life Hitler has caused. Mind you, it seemed to be for the better. Only time would tell.

  Oh, Christ, this is all we need. We are slowing down as the radiator is boiling. We stop. With a rag, Luigi gingerly removes the radiator cap and lets forth a great gusher of steam. It was something I wished I could do when I got steamed up about Toni. Priest assures us it’s not serious: “We’ll just have to wait till she cools down.” Meanwhile, Luigi has run across the road to some peasant’s house and borrowed a bucket of water which he proceeds to pour over the radiator. He is obliterated in clouds of steam.

  “For his next trick,” says Bornheim, “he will appear as Ben Hur.”

  We take the opportunity to get out and stretch our legs. It’s now evening and much cooler. A rough calculation tells us we have another four hours to Padua. Luigi continues to pour buckets of cold water over the radiator. After about half an hour, which seemed like eternity, we are off again.

  “Keep yer fingers crossed,” says Lieutenant Priest as we start.

  The long journey continues with a fresh burst of energy from the Italians, who give off with a few Italian marching songs, including the banned ‘Giovinezza’ a Fascist hymn; then a long silence; then, without warning, Bill Hall sings:

  What is a dill doll, daddy,

  Said my little daughter aged nine.

  A dill doll, my chick,

  Is a property prick

  Six times the size of mine.

  Your mother bought one for Christmas,

  Straight off the Christmas tree.

  She’s used it but twice
,

  She’s found it so nice,

  She’s no bloody use for me.

  All together! Those of us who knew it gave it another chorus. Not for a moment do the Italians know what we are on about (I was on about ten pounds a week).

  “What this song?” says Toni. “Why you laugh?” I have not the courage to tell her. “Ah,” she suspects, “it is something caltivo, yes?” Yes, it’s molto cattivo.

  This last effort, however, was the last effort during the trip. It’s dark now and we’ve lapsed into silence. A great full moon appears on the skyline, looking – at this level – very big and the colour of custard. Finally we pass the city sign ‘Padua 3 chilometri’. Thank God! We all give a cheer.

  Toni wakes up, “What’s the cheering for?”

  “It’s for Padua, they are cheering Padua.”

  At eight of the clock, our Charabong lurches to a halt outside the Leone Bianco and we wearily de-bus. All I want is a bath, some dinner and bed – preferably with Toni. We are all allocated to our rooms. By coincidence, I have the same one as previously. The hotel is pretty empty so we all have a room on our own. Ahhhh! I exclaim, as I dip myself into a hot bath. I had taken many baths in my time and this was one of them. Ahhhh! The bath has a shower attachment. The shower rose is in the shape of a blossom. People say a shower is cleaner than a bath – wrong! I turn this one on. The shower rose falls off and hits me square on the head. A lump appears on my head. I had had many lumps in my time and this was one of them. Dressing at speed, I hasten down to the dining-room, where everyone is tucking in. I order a double portion of spaghetti Neapolitan. In no time I had caught up with the rest of them, passed them and gone into the lead.