It would be fair to say that Graham was having
kittens, not literally, but he couldn’t sit still and his behaviour was
indicating that two huge orderly’s dressed in white, and each with a syringe
full of Deazepam, should leap upon him and sedate him. Graham had been informed that there would be
a guest of honour at the party; The Duke of Norfolk was coming. That was it for Graham; everything was now
about the fecking Duke of Norfolk.
Graham tried to structure the evening, what time the Duke would arrive,
where he would sit, should he be given a tour of the new office? I thankfully had been dispatched by Ginny to
the butcher’s in the high street and was returning with a sack full of dead
animal carcasses.
As I came into the house I was faced with a gross
sight that was magical. How he had
managed it I shall never know but sitting in the middle of the hallway were twelve
boxes of the finest scotch whiskey, each with twelve bottles, a gross of whiskey.
I noticed that the advertising on the boxes stated that the whiskey was in celebration
of some world class yacht race, so how they ended up in Graham’s house in Wallingford
is a question I suppose only Graham could answer, and even then, if he did,
could you believe him? Graham was
running here there and everywhere as I helped Ginny in the kitchen. We were joking and larking about and Ginny
then began to explain to me that everyone would be dressed in a certain way
that evening.
Ginny explained that all the chaps would be wearing
blue denim jeans, but their shoes would be some Italian handmade job. The shirts would be a specific pattern, from
a tailor on Saville Row, and they would all have a jumper tied around their
neck. The chapesses would also be
wearing jeans but the shoes would be Gucci as would the handbags. The blouses would be a certain make, with a
ruffled collar, and each gal would be wearing strings of real pearls. And all the guys and gals would be wearing
Rolex watches. I didn’t for one moment
think that Ginny was as accomplished a bullshitter as Graham, and it was only
as the evening began to get some motion that I realised that not only were they
all dressed exactly, as Ginny had told me, but they all drove the same car,
same colour, same make, Mercedes, and once again as I opened the door for someone
I was told if I worked hard enough I could have my very own the following week.
Graham came into the kitchen in a bit of a
fluster, he had ordered pheasant but they hadn’t been plucked, what sort of an
idiot was the butcher. He asked if I
knew how to pluck a pheasant and I had to smile when I told him that I actually
was a member of the Pheasant Pluckers. Of
course the joke went straight over his head however I was dispatched to the
garden with four pheasants, two large rabbits and a very sharp knife. Graham came and stood beside me as I skinned
and gutted the rabbits. When I started
on the birds he left and I hoped he didn’t come back with a fecking sheep or
something now that he could see I actually knew what I was doing.
It was nice really to be so busy beforehand as
there was no waiting about wishing time to pass by. Ginny and I had a laugh as we worked our way
through the preparations, Graham ran about the place shouting at things, which
is probably what he thought people in charge of things did. Phillip Howard was of
course nowhere to be seen. The house
filled up pretty quickly and it must be the first time I ever found myself in a
room full of people and didn’t find one of them interesting. The whiskey was flowing well and people were
getting quite drunk. I was sat in a
corner of the living room watching and listening but I felt a shiver go through
me when a revolver began to be passed around the front room. I don’t like guns at the best of times but
when you have a handful of drunk, chinless wonders, and a live revolver it’s
time to leave the room.
I stepped out through the front door to find a
young lady sitting on the doorstep; she was smoking a cigarette, so I joined
her. A moment or two later her husband
joined us and we all three sat smoking. They
were not dressed in the uniform of the urban socialite so I imagined that they
were real human beings. We began to chat
and it turned out that they lived in a house directly opposite. They were musicians who worked on cruise
liners and just happened to be home for a week.
How the subject came about I’m not sure but they suggested that we all
three could go across the road to their house and smoke a spliff. There was no need to twist my arm so the
three of us went to their house and their front room. I’ve only ever walked in to a couple of rooms
in my whole life where I had immediately felt comfortable and safe. This front room was one of them.
Every inch of wall space was covered with books,
the shelves bending and sagging with the weight of the knowledge and adventure
that rested there. There were two enormous
sofas, huge things that looked soft and comfortable and slack and in the centre
of the room a solid wooden coffee table.
No television or radio. We sat
down and a bag of marijuana was produced.
The bag was about the size of a football so God only knows how much was
in it. They joked and laughed that this
was only one of the benefits of being a musician on a cruise liner. A spliff was created and we puffed our way
into dreamland. It was lovely to be
sitting in such a safe and quiet environment while across the road a bunch of
crazy people tried to out posh each other.
Despite the fact that we were as high as kites, and each relaxed as a fart,
I was still listening out for a gunshot.
We wandered off to the Wallingford Bridge and
leaning over, watched and wondered about the shopping trolley that was languishing
in the River Thames, beneath us. Three people
standing on a bridge, laughing at a submerged shopping trolley is infinitely
better than standing in a room with a bunch of upper class twits. Why were we laughing at the shopping trolley,
I haven’t a clue, but I can still see it in my mind. I can still hear Graham too, shouting and
bellowing at me. “What are you
doing? Why are you all here? Why are you
all laughing at me?" I don’t think we had
the time, nor the inclination, to answer the third question. “You must come with me, his grace, the Duke of
Norfolk want to meet you." Again,
hindsight is a great thing and what Graham said was in fact true, the Duke of
Norfolk wanted to meet me, I couldn’t have cared less if I met him, he may have
been the premier Duke in the United Kingdom and I believe he was also the premier
Earl too, I wondered if I gave him a can of beer would that make him a premier
inn?
I told myself not to make any reference to Gene
chandler’s song, The Duke of Earl. Had I known then that I was to become the
High King of Ireland then I would have understood why such an important fellow
would want to meet me. As we walked back
Graham was giving me a lecture on how I should address the chap, I should call him
“Your grace”. After smoking so much marijuana
I found this extremely funny that I should be calling a fellow Grace. We came into the house and there stood
standing in the hallway was the Duke of Earl; well; the Duke of Norfolk. Graham led me along and stopped beside him. "I found him, your grace,” says Graham, fawning like a fecking fairy. “Hello,” says the Duke, stretching out his hand. I took it and shook it but wasn’t impressed as
he had a handshake like a wet cabbage.
Then Graham said something which changed my view of him forever, because
he was guffawing while he said it. ”This is the Irishman who is in Mensa.”
I promise you, pure anger flushed through my
veins and I was disheartened that Graham should prove to be a closet racist. The Duke of Norfolk smiled, but I felt that the
smile mocked me. “So are you not in
Mensa? I asked, purposely forgetting to call him Gracie or whatever it was that
Graham had told me to call him. “No,”
laughed the Duke. “I’m not in Mensa.” “Why’s that then?” I heard myself say, in an accent that would
tell anyone listening that my heart had never left the fields of Ireland. “Are you fecking stupid?” I’m sure it’s not the first time the fellow
has been insulted, but Graham grabbed me by the shoulders and while apologising
to Gracie, manoeuvred me away and into the kitchen. “You can’t say things like that!” shrieked Graham.
“That’s the Duke of Norfolk.” I only wish that I knew then what I know now,
because the best possible answer would have been. “So what, he’s only a Duke, I’m
the King of Ireland.”
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