Forever Young Page 12

  Because of the long hours of overtime the boys were working they did not get many opportunities to meet the girls socially or even to rehearse, but their pay was put to good use in the shape of new expensive guitars and new suits. Michael was not convinced that they needed stage suits for performing in clubs and bars when they reached London. But James had insisted they have an acceptable image to encourage the record companies. He had already planned everything.

  To prepare for the cricket club dance both boys had given good notice that they wished to take all that Saturday off from work, and had met in James’s garden in the early afternoon to routine some new songs for this their first adult audience. Both tanned from weeks in the sun, and with a new self-confidence born out of becoming wage earners, they looked suddenly older. Work had performed a transfiguration in the appearances of Maureen and Alison, too, who were waiting for them at the entrance to the marquee. Maureen’s job on the cosmetic counter of Boots had led to her experimenting with eye make-up which gave her an aura of worldliness. While Alison, for so long rather dowdy, had developed a small town fashion sense during her weeks in a dress shop. The four young people who met that evening were no longer overgrown schoolchildren.

  Inside the marquee it was already hot and stuffy when they met at eight o’clock, and the two boys made straight for the bar which was in the corner furthest from the low stage.

  ‘And how are you two getting on?’ A familiar voice cut across the din of trad jazz as they waited for their drinks. It was Brother Amedy from school. Inwardly James groaned, but Michael greeted the teacher with some enthusiasm. If Michael had one failing, James thought not for the first time, it was that he was too nice, particularly to the clerics who had taught them. But then Michael still believed. ‘He’ll learn,’ thought James, ‘just as soon as he gets to London, he’ll learn.’

  Making the girls the excuse James struggled back across the marquee with a couple of glasses of lemonade shandy for Maureen and Alison. A short time later Michael followed bearing a couple of pints of beer.

  ‘You know that guy gives me the creeps,’ grumbled James as he gulped for air following a large swallow of beer.

  ‘Oh, he’s all right. He wished us well in the future, and said we should both get As in history if there’s any justice in this world.’

  ‘Well, since he’s a historian he ought to know that there isn’t,’ carried on James. Brother Amedy’s presence had cast a cloud over him for the moment.

  Maureen changed the subject. ‘Did you find out what they’re paying you?’ she asked.

  ‘Five pounds between us,’ said James, grinning.

  Maureen’s eyes widened. ‘Just for the interval?’ She had done a full week’s work for not a lot more than that.

  ‘It’s a very long interval,’ came in Michael.

  ‘And we’re very good,’ reminded James.

  ‘I know but …’ Maureen stopped.

  Michael was smiling at her. ‘You’ll be glad you knew us one day when we’re big stars,’ he said.

  Maureen looked towards James. He had turned away and, ever the diplomat, was busy pretending an interest in cricket with one of the town stars. ‘I’m glad I know you now,’ she said softly to Michael.

  18

  Cathy did not know how she felt about her mother’s obvious infatuation with James: that that was what it was she had no doubts. Although Mary chose to be careful not to mention James herself she did not discourage Cathy from teasing her, and that to Cathy was a sure sign that her mother secretly wished to talk about him. For some time Cathy had wished that her mother would find a suitable man and begin to have a life outside the family, if for no other reason that it would ease the burden of responsibility that she felt towards her mother. In many ways she envied the emotional freedom enjoyed by Suzie who, with a sharp reply to her parents, could cut without leaving any permanent damage. Cathy knew that her mother was too easily wounded, too vulnerable for her own peace of mind, and certainly for Cathy’s.

  ‘You shouldn’t let her bully you,’ said Suzie as they walked home together one afternoon. ‘I never let my parents push me around.’

  ‘It isn’t the same for you,’ said Cathy. She had just told her friend of her mother’s reaction when she had suggested that she and Suzie go on a separate camping holiday the following summer. ‘My mother looks forward to family holidays. It’s the best two weeks of the year for her. I suppose she thinks it wouldn’t be the same if she only had Paul to go with.’

  ‘Yes, but you can’t spend the rest of your life just doing things because your mother wants you to. You’ve got your own life to lead. I never let my mother push me around with all that emotional blackmail stuff.’

  ‘But you’ve got a father.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘It’s different. When they’re by themselves they seem to take everything so much more personally.’

  Suzie shrugged. ‘Suit yourself. Perhaps Helen Harrison will be able to come. Her parents don’t care what she does.’

  They walked on in silence. Helen Harrison was the grenade Suzie always tossed at Cathy whenever she was aggravated.

  ‘How’s she getting on with the rave from the grave, anyway?’ Suzie asked after a moment. James’s knowledge of the American Top Forty of 1953 had impressed neither of them.

  Cathy tried a shrug. ‘Oh, you know,’ she murmured vaguely. She really didn’t want to discuss her mother with Suzie.

  ‘I always used to think the Rocking Reverend quite fancied her. He used to hang around a lot, trying to pretend he was friendly with Paul, but he didn’t fool me.’

  Loyalty demanded that Cathy protect her mother’s reputation. ‘Oh, I’m sure she never even noticed if he did. I don’t think she ever thinks about it, to be honest. I suppose my dad must have put her off it for life.’

  Sensing the edge which had crept into Cathy’s voice as she had discussed her mother Suzie decided now to build bridges back into favour. ‘Do you want to come riding with us on Saturday morning?’ she asked. Despite her appearance and knowledge of the ways of the world Suzie had not quite graduated from a childhood craze on horses. ‘We’re going at seven o’clock, so if you like you could stay the night after the dance.’

  ‘I’d love to.’ Cathy enjoyed these expeditions out into the Cotswolds, despite the insufferable silliness of Suzie’s father who had discovered horses at about the same time as he had discovered that he was an environmentalist.

  ‘Right then. Let’s hope your mother doesn’t have any objections.’

  ‘Riding? Very nice. Of course you can go,’ said Mary that night. She always felt guilty, usually needlessly so, because there seemed too many activities which for financial reasons she could not encourage in her children. ‘You must insist upon paying for your horse though, Cathy.’

  Cathy nodded. ‘I’ll try, but I know now he won’t take the money. You know how proud Suzie’s father is.’

  Mary conjured a picture of John sitting astride a horse, all nuts-in-May pomp and circumstantial silliness. It would obviously be beneath his dignity to allow Cathy to pay for herself. ‘Well try, anyway,’ she said, before adding, ‘and don’t wear your best boots. You ruined the last pair you had. Take my old Wellies.’ Cathy threw a reply over her shoulder and went off to learn her lines for Othello. Mary returned to her son.

  ‘Don’t you ever have any friends you’d like to go and stay with or who might want to come here for a few days?’ she asked.

  ‘No, not really,’ said Paul. ‘What about this one, mum? It’s a Hadrian.’

  They were sitting crouched over a book on Roman coins which Paul had borrowed from the library. All evening he had been locked into the book trying to identify his coin, but was only now discovering that the Romans minted so many different coins it might well have come from the time of any one of several emperors. Mary took the coin from him and examined it. Despite Father Michael’s advice Paul had not been able to prevent himself polishing it slightly so that it shone ju
st a little bit. Now cleaned it almost looked too new to be two thousand years old and the head stood out from the coin giving the emperor a rather bulbous appearance.

  ‘It’s very clear, isn’t it? Are you sure it’s Roman?’ she teased.

  ‘Of course it is.’ Paul was rightly indignant.

  ‘I think you’d better take it to the police then. It belongs to the Queen, you know.’

  Paul was ready for her. ‘No, you don’t have to when you only find one. Father Michael says it isn’t really dishonest not to give it in as Treasure Trove, because they get hundreds every year and they only give them back to you.’

  ‘That’s nice advice for a priest to give. Finders keepers. He’ll be telling you to go and pinch lead off the roofs of houses and getting you to help in bank robberies before you know where you are.’

  Paul giggled. Mary looked at him. He was such an innocent, guileless child. And she wondered how long he would remain that way.

  James’s presence in the town lay like a spell over the waking thoughts of Father Michael. He could not simply ignore his presence even though their first meeting had ended in acrimony and bitter recriminations. They shared ten years of boyhood and too many fond dreams for that. He wanted, more than anything, for them to be able to be occasional friends. James had been with him as a spiritual companion during his lonely years. Now they had met again he wished to retain his company and build their friendship.

  After trying unsuccessfully several times to reach him at the hall of residence where he was staying the priest eventually caught up with James sitting alone with his books in the college library.

  As he approached across the polished floor James looked up at him with an expression which suggested relief. ‘I think you’ll find Aquinas upstairs, Father,’ James joked quietly as Father Michael sat down alongside him.

  The priest returned the levity. ‘What’s all this?’ he said, feeling the weight of the books stacked on the desk. ‘You in detention or something?’

  ‘More like spring cleaning. I’m having to dust off my brains. I don’t seem to be able to remember quotes the way I used to do. I suspect it’s a symptom of rapidly approaching senility.’

  ‘Perhaps we could get two bath chairs and join them together like the old tandem we used to ride,’ suggested the priest, happy to float along on such whimsical, harmless conversation, relieved that the bitterness of their first meeting appeared to have evaporated with their hangovers.

  ‘I wonder what happened to that tandem,’ said James. ‘D’you remember that time we tried to put floats on to it and nearly drowned ourselves?’

  They both laughed aloud at the memory of the escapade, and then smothered their humour as a passing librarian looked daggers at them.

  Father Michael came to the point. ‘Listen, I don’t know whether you’re interested, but tomorrow night, if you’ve nothing better to do …’ he hesitated. James waited for him to carry on. ‘… well, it’s the 706 Union again, and I’ve been thinking that it would be really wonderful if you could join me on stage for a few numbers.’

  James could hardly have looked more surprised. ‘Oh, no, I’m sorry, Mike, I couldn’t do that. Not now, I wouldn’t know …’

  The priest cut him short. ‘Why not? Of course you could. You can still sing, can’t you? And I know you still know the words.’

  James shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, honestly, but, well … thanks for the thought.’

  ‘Oh come on,’ Father Michael was determined not to let go so easily. ‘It’ll be just like old times. You and me and a few old songs. Please, Jimmy, I really want you to do it. Tell me you will.’

  ‘I haven’t even got a guitar.’

  The priest smiled. He knew he’d won. ‘That’s no problem. Just leave that to me. Is that a deal then?’

  James nodded. ‘Well, all right.’

  Father Michael got up to go and then stopped. ‘ “Well, All Right!” Buddy Holly, nineteen fifty-nine.’

  ‘Nineteen fifty-eight actually,’ corrected James.

  ‘You know something? You’re a madman, Jimmy. A real madman.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said James, and watched while Father Michael stole quietly away out of the library, pausing at the desk to apologize to the librarian for the noise he had been making. He still knew how to butter up to authority.

  After that interruption work was impossible for James for the rest of the day. He was excited and yet terrified of what he now faced. It had been years since he had performed on stage, and he wondered now whether he knew, or could sing, any of the old harmonies he had once found so effortless.

  Leaving the library he took his sports car and drove deep into the Cotswolds. The scenery did not interest or attract him now. But the solitude of the hills suited his mood and pulling his car off the road he sat and remembered other times as the afternoon turned quickly into night. There was so much to remember.

  19

  August 1962

  The trad band played until ten o’clock, rude, beery noises of froth and wind which broke the blood vessels in the cheeks of the players and encouraged a kind of skip jiving among the cricketers and their women which brought derision from Maureen and Alison. It was, despite the presence of Brother Amedy, a grown up party of wives who flirted with their bodies and men too drunk to fully realize. It occured to James that it was slightly decadent and, despite his world-liness and his rejection of religion, he was aware that he was shocked to see the intimacy with which adults played when they could use the excuse of drink.

  It was a hot and clammy night, particularly inside the marquee, and long before Michael and James were due to play their shirts were damp with perspiration and anxiety. In the presence of such boisterous adults they were grateful for the little band of loyal supporters and friends of Maureen and Alison who had followed them there from the youth club.

  ‘All right, boys, this is your big moment.’ Derek, Alison’s stumpy wicket-keeping brother, brought the nervousness of waiting to an end. ‘Get up there and play until we tell you to stop.’ The band had retired to the bar and, as is the case in such places when there is no music, horseplay had begun to break out between the over energetic sportsmen and their ladies.

  ‘Good luck,’ whispered Maureen to Michael as he got up from his chair. Then more loudly she added to James, ‘Go on, Jimmy, you show them.’

  ‘Show them? We’ll kill them,’ he grinned and hurried ahead of Michael on to the small stage.

  Michael looked at Maureen. He had been aware of her eyes upon him all evening. She had been in his thoughts since the moment he had first met her. At first he had tried to put her out of his mind, telling himself that she was Jimmy’s girl. But he had always known that his only reason for encouraging Alison was so that he might join James and Maureen in double dates. Maureen had always been warm towards him, but he had assumed that to be because of his friendship with James. Tonight, however, the message she was giving was quite different.

  ‘Come on, Mike,’ hissed James excitedly from the stage. Michael pulled his thoughts away from Maureen and stepped up on to the rostrum.

  Derek the wicket-keeper was already at the single microphone the boys were to share. ‘Ladies and gentlemen and cricketers, we thought we’d try something a little different at this year’s dance, so will you all welcome the first professional appearance by a couple of local chaps some of you may know – the Holly Berries.’

  Maureen and company flew into enthusiastic applause. The rest of the people in the marquee yawned with indifference.

  ‘Okay?’ James looked at Michael. Michael nodded. Maureen was watching him, willing him to look at her. ‘One, two, three, four,’ he counted, beating his foot in rhythm, and with a flourish of chords the Holly Berries began their professional career.

  They were magnificent, as if all the years of playing and rehearsing had been especially for this single night. They played everything they knew, racing through their favourite songs of lost teenage love and adolescent proble
ms of school and parents. James felt he was singing for his future as the indifference of the adults turned into a grudging respect to match the excitement which Maureen and her friends were generating at the edge of the tiny stage. Even the traditional jazz band at the bar, bloated on ale, were seen to turn to one another and pass favourable comments. But for Michael there was an audience of only one. And, though she tried to disguise it by looking at James and applauding whenever he looked at her, Maureen’s eyes scarcely left Michael’s during the full hour they played.

  All too quickly for James the wicket-keeper gave them the sign that it was time that the trad band return, and the Holly Berries went into a rousing, stomping version of ‘Be-Bop A Lula’ for their final number. Then, almost before they knew it, they were being bathed in applause as the girls from the convent school mobbed them, as they had seen it done on television, and the rest of the marquee broke into generous and appreciative applause.

  Michael dragged James down off the stage. ‘Didn’t I tell you?’ gabbled James. ‘They loved us and this is only the beginning. Did you see how much they liked us?’

  ‘Can I have your autograph, please?’ One of the cricketing sisters had pushed through the group of regular admirers and was demanding a memento of the evening. Michael stepped aside to let the girl approach James. Again he found himself locked in a gaze with Maureen.

  ‘Here we go, my first autograph’, giggled James unable to contain his excitement. Then turning around to Maureen and her friends he issued an open invitation. ‘Any other lucky lady want a genuine, first edition collector’s item autograph. Hurry now while stocks last, and accept no substitute,’ he raced on, and infected by his enthusiasm other girls began to find and borrow scraps of paper and pencils and to thrust them before him.

  ‘That’s right. Step right up. Don’t delay. I can see it all now. Sell out performances at Carnegie Hall, coast to coast tours of America, appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show. This is it, Mike, we’re off and running.’