Confessions from a Luxury Liner

‘What a lot I slot,’ she breathes, easing herself down with a sigh.

‘All right, are you?’ Trust Sid to have a horn in – not literally, thank goodness – at such a moment of private ecstasy. I have been sparing sensitive readers a description of the noises wafting up from behind the settee but it is as clear as the sweat pouring off Sid’s boat race that sexual intercourse of a very energetic kind has just come to an end.

‘Piss off, Sid!’ I say. ‘Go and read the TV Times.’

‘Fancy a drink?’ says Sid. ‘There’s a lot of this champagne left.’ He takes a swig from the bottle and pours some over my belly. I jump about six inches into the air and Natalie cops the benefit.

‘Ooh! That’s cold.’

‘Stop messing about, Sid!’

‘I can’t help it. I always feel chirpy after a bit of the other. Where’s that record player?’

‘Don’t worry about me, will you?’ says Gloria, rising up from behind the sofa and picking some carpet fluff off her generous knockers – ‘Oh no! You’re lying on my dress! Do you mind!’ She leans across the back of the settee to get at her dress and I can’t resist giving one of her pink Manchesters a nibble.

‘Dirty sod!’ says Natalie.

‘Let’s get on the floor,’ I say. ‘The springs are cutting into my bum.’ I give Gloria’s grumble a tickle and by the time that Sid has put on the Confessions LP – available from all high-class record shops, folks – I have sunk to the carpet with both our new friends. This time, I am on top and I drive into Natalie like she is the last berth on a crowded car ferry. Gloria is doing something very naughty to me from behind and Sid turns up the volume on the record player and takes another hefty swig from the champagne bottle.

‘Ride ’er cowboy!’ he shouts. ‘Up the blues!’

‘Do give over!’ says Gloria. ‘You’ll wake all the neighbours.’

At that very instant, there is a loud thumping on the wall and Natalie groans. ‘That’s Mrs Burgess,’ she says.

‘Shut up, you old bag!’ Sid puts his mouth against the wall beside the fireplace and shouts at the top of his voice.

It is clear that he is pissed out of his mind. It is so inconsiderate. How can I be expected to perform in these circumstances? I grit my teeth and try and work up a measured rhythm. Thump! Thump! Thump! I am not certain whether it is me, Sid or Mrs Burgess. Everybody is dishing it out.

‘Come here!’ Sid pulls Gloria to her feet and starts having it off with her against the wall that separates us from Mrs Burgess’s front room. The noise is diabolical and a couple of bits of plaster fall down. The light is swinging backwards and forwards like a pendulum.

‘OOOH!’ Natalie has closed her eyes and her mouth is opening wider with every O. I am glad that she is coming because I have the feeling that the evening cannot go on like this much longer. I am all for a party atmosphere but this is getting ridiculous. Judging my moment like a surfer picking a wave I hug Natalie to me and roar in on the crest of a breaker.

‘AAAARGh!’ The white tip curls and I wipe out in a froth of honeyed warmth. Sid, too, is steaming up one of the china ducks with his knackered breath and I sense that he has just enjoyed a similar pleasure to myself.

‘That was lovely,’ says Natalie, giving me a squeeze. ‘Be a doll and turn the record player down.’

I stagger to my feet and kick over the champagne bottle. It does not matter because it is now empty.

‘Don’t turn it off,’ says Sid. ‘I like a bit of music.’ He starts dancing round, stark bollock naked. ‘Oh, a life on the ocean wave, a life on the ocean wave—!!’

I look across to the window and see that there is a gap where the curtains have not been drawn properly. ‘Weigh, hey, up she rises! Weigh, hey, up she rises. How do you fancy a hornpipe, darling?’ Sid starts giggling and climbs on to the settee.

I have never seen him so Chopin. The banging from next door starts again and Sid leans forward to turn up the record player. He pitches forward and knocks a pile of records on the floor. I help him up on my way to the window and glance out before pulling the curtains closed. What I see makes my blood run colder than a penguin’s chuff. Two blokes are coming up the garden path carrying suitcases.

‘Sid!’ I scream, diving for my pants. ‘There’s someone coming.’

Sid starts to bounce up and down on the settee like a chimp on a trampoline. ‘It’s not me,’ he says. ‘I couldn’t. I’m knackered. Rule Britannia! Britannia rules the waves. Britains never, never will be – good evening.’

The two men framed in the doorway do not answer Sid. They are breathing heavily and certainly, when I glimpsed them, they were hurrying towards the front door. You can almost hear their eyeballs clicking as they take in the scene. I manage to get my second leg into my Y-fronts and pull them up round my waist. The girls snatch at whatever lies handy and hold it in front of them.

‘Welcome ashore, maties,’ says Sid. ‘You have a good trip, did you? I’m glad you’ve shown up because there are a few things my friend wants to ask you. I’ve got to—’

‘You bastard!’

‘No need to get excited,’ squeaks Sid. ‘We were only playing charades – ooh!’ He stops talking when one of the herberts belts him in the Newingtons. The girls start screaming, Mrs Burgess is still trying to bash the wall down and the record player packs it in with a shriek of agony second only to that of the geezer who cops both Sid’s plates in his mug as our hero swings from the light fitting and lashes out with his tootsies. It is very Errol Flynn, with the subtle difference that the light fitting stayed in the ceiling when Errol swung from it. This one comes down with a blinding flash and a cloud of plaster. The room is plunged into darkness and all that can be heard are screams and thuds as Sid and I try to avoid copping an Irish face-lift.

In fact, we do rather better than that and by the time the police car arrives (Mrs Burgess must have rung for it) both the homecoming mariners are stretched out on the floor taking forty blinks and Natalie is having hysterics.

‘Oh, Henry! Henry!’ she screams. ‘Why did you have to hit him with the coal scuttle?’

‘Because he was trying to rearrange my cluster with a poker!’ shouts Sid. ‘Control yourself, woman! A few stitches can only improve that Jem Mace. Get out there and stall those bules.’

At the same instant there is a banging on the side door and both Sid and I put a foot in the same trouser leg.

‘We’ve got to get out of here!’ says Sid unnecessarily. ‘Grab your clobber and follow me.’

‘Supposing there’s someone waiting at the back?’ I say.

‘There won’t be,’ says Sid. ‘Ta ta, Gloria. Thanks for everything.’

Gloria is cradling the nut of one of the blokes who is groaning on the ground. ‘You bastard!’ she says. ‘What am I going to tell him?’

‘Tell him you love him,’ says Sid.

CHAPTER TWO

Sid is right. There is no one waiting outside the back door. We are over the wall, through the cucumber frame and two streets away before I realise that I have taken the wrong jacket.

‘That’s marvellous,’ I say. ‘They’ll get me for thieving now. What a wonderful end to an evening. We must do this more often.’

‘You’re not nice when you’re sarcastic,’ says Sid. ‘What’s it got in it, anything worth nicking?’

‘They’re going to trace us from the car,’ I bleat. ‘Oh my gawd. Why didn’t I stop at home and watch World in Agony? I can’t stand doing any more bird.’

‘Fifty quid!’ says Sid, thumbing through a bundle of notes he has produced from one of the pockets of the jacket. ‘Blimey, he must have been planning to buy Britain.’

‘We’ll have to send it back,’ I say, getting desperate. ‘I don’t want to get lumbered with that.’

‘Umm,’ says Sid. ‘We’ll have to see.’ He puts the money in his back pocket and produces another piece of paper. ‘This is interesting. “Memo to cabin staff. Owing to the breakdown of the refrigeration system, the ship will call at Southampton for repairs. Crew members who obtain passes from me will be allowed ashore until 0600 hours on the 24th. P.Pervis, Purser. SS Tern”.’

‘Lucky swines,’ I say. ‘That’s where we ought to be.’

‘Just what I was thinking,’ says Sid thoughtfully. ‘It’s Waterloo for Southampton, isn’t it?’

‘What are you on about?’ I say. ‘You’re not thinking of taking their places, are you?’

‘This seems like as good a time as any to take our leave of the old country,’ says Sid. ‘I can always send Rosie a postcard from Port Said.’

‘But what about when the other blokes roll up?’ I say. ‘The police aren’t going to hold them, are they?’

‘I don’t know so much,’ says Sid. ‘One of their suitcases burst open during our little frackarse and I couldn’t help clocking a butcher’s at the contents.’

‘Three month’s dirty washing?’ I say.

‘Not so much as a soiled cuff let alone an unmentionable stain,’ says Sid. ‘Watches.’ He dives a hand into his pocket and produces a flash job with a metal bracelet and enough dials to launch a space probe. ‘Handsome, isn’t it? There were about two hundred like that.’

‘And you nicked one, Sid? That’s downright dishonest. You don’t have any scruples, do you?’

‘I got one for you as well,’ says Sid.

‘Oh.’ It’s difficult to know what to say, isn’t it? I don’t want to hurt Sid’s feelings even though he has been naughty. A generous impulse should not be punished, especially when in Sid’s case it may never be repeated. I shove the watch deep into my pocket and clear my throat. ‘Ta, Sid. You think they were – er, half-inched, do you?’

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.