As you may imagine it was quite a relief to get into the
departure lounge at Venice airport. I was
one of the first through so managed to get a comfortable seat. You would think that I would relax and enjoy
the comfort of the soft seating, a great improvement on my wooden bench,
however I found myself to be most uncomfortable as there was a certain bad
smell that made me quite uneasy. I
checked about my area to see if perhaps a child, or a dog, had been sick, or
worse, but could see nothing that would cause such a pong. I moved seats as the departure lounge was still
quite empty. As I sat down I could still
sense the stench but I realised why the smell had followed me, because it was
me.
As quick as a flash I was into the toilets and, rather than
strip off and have a good scrub down at a sink, I grabbed two bars of soap from
the sinks and locked myself into a cubicle.
I removed the lid of the cistern and began to give myself as good a wash
as I could. At that stage of my life my
feet were quite healthy and didn’t half pong so I removed my socks and washed
them too. I waited as long as I could as
the only way I could dry myself was by air drying. My socks of course were a different matter and
rather than go sock less I pulled on the damp socks and squelched my way back
into the departure lounge. I must have
been away for a good forty minutes as the lounge was now full of people eager
to get on the aircraft.
Eventually we boarded the aircraft and I found myself sitting
by a window seat with a family stretched out to my right. Mum, dad and the two point four children. I was sitting next to their son, who must have
been nine or ten years of age. It was as
we got airborne that I relaxed and allowed myself to believe that I was actually
going back to the UK. I smiled as I
allowed the good times I had enjoyed run through my mind. Once we levelled out the crew began to dish
out in flight meals. My meal didn’t last
long and I was angry that the little boy next to me only played with his food
and didn’t eat it. I could have eaten
half a dozen of those.
We landed at Gatwick and I stood by the carousel waiting for
the bags to come out. I saw a porter,
with a trolley, waiting for some customers, rolling a cigarette. I hadn’t had a smoke for a couple of days so
went over to him and asked if he could spare me one. He very generously gave me a handmade cigarette.
I lit it and drew a decent lung full of cigarette smoke in. I must have coughed for at least four minutes
as my poor wee body wasn’t used to the huge hit of nicotine and gagging smoke.
I thanked the porter and took my time carefully enjoying the remainder
of the cigarette however I was dying to get through and buy some tailor made
ones. I grabbed my bag and shot off and
with my thirty bob Stirling went straight to a shop and bought twenty cigarettes. I couldn’t wait to rip the cellophane of and light
one up. As I began to smoke my first real
cigarette I realised that I was at Gatwick.
I had return tickets from Heathrow so I was now stuck at Gatwick. I didn’t really know much about Gatwick, I
had never been there before and I couldn’t picture its location in my mind.
I saw my porter friend pushing his bag laden trolley along
and went over to him. “How do I get out
of here?” I asked, as I offered him a tailor made cigarette. “Where do you want to go?” “I’m not sure,” I said. “Probably London?” He glanced about furtively and then
asked. “Didn’t you just come in from Venice?” “Yes,” I said. He grabbed my bag and threw it on top of the
bags and cases on his trolley. “Follow me,” he
said, looking very much like a man with a plan.
I did as he suggested and walked out to where a coach was waiting. “This coach is for some of the people off your
flight.” He explained. “So get on, say nothing,
pretend you don’t speak English or something, and it will take you to London.”
I stopped him putting my bag into the hold and took it with
me onto the coach. I found a seat near
the rear and crouched down, hoping to remain out of sight. The coach was only about one third full when
it set off. We left Gatwick and were soon
on a motorway. I hoped that if I was discovered
that I wouldn’t be thrown off. A stewardess
stood up and began to address all the passengers through a microphone. She spoke in Italian, then French and then
German. When she started to speak in English
I tried to make myself as small as I possibly could, for she announced that it
would cost thirty bob to travel into London.
She then, beginning at the front of the coach, worked her way along collecting
money from all of the passengers.
When she got to me I smiled and explained that I had no money. She sat down beside me and asked, “Are you
the fellow who has been stuck at Venice airport for a couple of days?” “Yes,” I smiled. “We were wondering how long you would be stuck
there,” she laughed. “You’re quite a
talking point.” I didn’t know whether to
be honoured or embarrassed. “Look,” she said.
“Just tell the driver where you want to go and he’ll drop you off.”
This of course was too good to be true so I nipped up to the driver
and told him that I wanted to go to Brixton.
He assured me that he was going nowhere near Brixton, and had no intention
of going there, but he would drop me off at a tube station where I could catch
a tube train to Brixton. It was quite late in the evening and I knew there
would be no trains to Norwich until the morning so I thought my best bet would
be to stay with Mervyn and the boys who had moved from Cricklewood to Brixton.
Luckily the tricks I had learned from my summer in London
with Finbar still worked and I was able to use the tube to get to Brixton and
not have to pay any money. I wandered
off up the hill and got to Mervyns. I borrowed
a couple of bob and went to use the public telephone. I rang Eastern and explained that I wasn't AWOL that I had been
stuck at Venice airport for a couple of days; if they didn’t believe me they
could contact the British embassy in Venice to validate my story.
It would appear that no one at Eastern could have cared less;
in fact it would have appeared that they didn’t even miss me, but then they were
air traffickers. I played for the sympathy
vote and explained that I was now broke and stuck in London and would probably
have to spend the night on a park bench.
I was told that the weather forecast for London that night was good so I
should have no problems. I explained that
I would be back the following day, if I wasn’t attacked and murdered to death
in some London park when I was told oh yeah, some fellow keeps calling up for
you. Says he wants his daughter back.
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