Rosie Dixon - Confessions from a Package Tour

‘Comfort stops’, as they are known, are a problem and I do feel that the situation would be made much easier if a certain male element amongst the passengers did not load half a dozen crates of beer on to the coach every morning. It would probably also cut down on the singing which seems to offend some members of the party.

‘Eee! That’s a weight off my “mind your father”’ says Mr Arkright playfully, as he resumes his seat and feels in the crate for another bottle.

‘Er – yes,’ I say. ‘It’s a pity we haven’t got time to see Cologne Cathedral, isn’t it?’

‘Oh yes, most decidedly.’ Mr Arkright belches noisily.

‘Manners, Don!’ says his wife, Janine.

I turn away and look out of the window to where Sid Betts is organising a roadside fry-up. Mr Betts is not in my good books at the moment. It was very naughty of him to light a fire in his hotel room – there was no fireplace for one thing. If he wanted to heat up a tin of baked beans he should not have used the foot bath as a brazier. Incidentally, Penny tells me that the floor level font is not a foot bath. It is a bidet – pronounced B-Day as in D-Day – and used for washing very intimate parts of your body in a squatting position. I find the whole idea rather disgusting and highly embarrassing. I mean, the very idea of cold-bloodedly and single-mindedly setting out to wash yourselves there! It’s unhealthy, isn’t it? Much better to give your parts a casual slosh about when you are washing something else – sort of, almost as if you did not know they were there. To do anything else suggests that you actually expect, or even intend, to do naughty things with them. You see these bidets all over the Continent and it just shows that the inhabitants think of nothing apart from you know what.

It would not have been so bad if the bidet in Mr Betts’s room had not cracked under the heat. He tried to put the fire out by turning on the taps and then the whole thing fell apart. Inferior foreign workmanship, you see. There was a terrible flood but fortunately Mrs Lapes was sleeping in the room underneath, so we were able to keep it in the family, so to speak. I believe that the Second Mate of the SS Foreskeen was very grateful for the commotion because it allowed him to escape from Mrs Lapes’s over-zealous attentions. She is certainly revealing a different side to her nature since tasting foreign climes.

One couple who have reverted to their old selves are our newlyweds, Tyrone and Deirdre Thoroughgood. They had a little tiff on the cattle boat coming over but have now made the back seat of the coach their own again – frankly I don’t think that anyone else would want the back seat now. I do wish they would not behave like that. Especially when people are trying to eat their Germütletoasties.

‘Hi there, gorgeous. What happened to you last night?’ The husky voice trying over-hard to be sexy belongs to the odious Jimmy Wilson. I wonder whether it would put him off if I told him that I had sexual relations with fifteen men, give or take half a dozen, and decide that it probably wouldn’t. Quite the reverse in fact. ‘I looked for you everywhere. Out on the tiles, were you?’

‘Not exactly,’ I say, wishing that I smoked so that I could apply the end of a cigarette to the hand that is surreptitiously stroking my bottom. ‘I had an early night.’

‘Good idea.’ Wilson tries to tuck his fingers underneath my skirt and I dig my nails into the back of his wrist. ‘That means that we can make a little whoopee tonight. Let’s get sloshed at the Schloss.’

‘That’s brilliant,’ I say. ‘Did you think of that all by yourself?’

Wilson is obviously a slouch when it comes to perceiving sarcasm. ‘Do you think so?’ he says. ‘People used to say I was very funny at school.’

‘They were right,’ I say. ‘Do you think you could move your right hand? I think it might go to sleep if I hit you over the head with my bag.’

‘What do you mean?’ says Wilson. ‘Are you trying to get a rise out of me? We had a date last night, remember? You made me a promise.’

‘That promise isn’t worth a plugged pickle!’ I say. ‘You were blackmailing me. I only played with your balls – I mean, I only played ball with you because I wanted to spare my parents pain and distress. Anybody who would take advantage of an innocent girl in that situation doesn’t deserve to be allowed to take advantage of her again. Now, if you’ll excuse me –’ I have just seen Hammerchick and Mrs Lapes disappearing behind a pile of coal. I remember them saying that they were going to look for Edelweiss. This is ridiculous! I cannot think of a worse combination than Jaroslov Hammerchick and Mrs Lapes in her present mood. Nations may crumble if I don’t get there in time.

I detach myself from Jimmy Wilson – by hand – and clamber over the low fence. There is no immediate sign of our driver and Mrs Lapes but I soon hear the familiar sound of his guttural utterances. ‘… So I get the Focker in my sights and Boom! Boom! Boom!’ Oh dear, there he goes, boring everybody to death with his experiences as a thirteen-year-old boy in the Polish Air Force – or Polish Air Violence as I believe they were known.

‘Oh,’ says Mrs Lapes – then ‘Oh!’ A thin trickle of coal dust begins to run down one of the stacks and I know that I have found my man.

‘Ah hem,’ I say. ‘I think we’d better get back on the job, Jaroslov. May I remind you that this stop is supposed to be for food and drink?’

‘This is foodski and drinkski for me,’ says the licentious Latvian, sulkily.

Mrs Lapes pulls down her skirt and glares at me with hate in her eyes. ‘Fancy him yourself, do you?’ she says accusingly.

I pretend I do not hear her ridiculous remark and make my way back to the coach. Readers of Lady Courier will not need to be reminded of the exceptionally distressing incident at a garage in Neasden which makes a mockery of her jibe. As I climb into the coach I feel glad that I left her to pick the pieces of coke out of her own knickers.

Morning gives way to afternoon as is its wont and our coach points its steaming nose southwards. It is noticeable that the terrain is getting hillier and the passengers begin to respond with excitement to the sight of the occasional castle guarding some seemingly remote hilltop. The only depressing feature is the weather. As we leave the autobahn, the sky darkens and it seems likely that we are in for a storm.

‘Gosh! It is spooky, isn’t it?’ says Penny as we stare out of the window. ‘Rather impressive though. I think the gloom suits this place. How much further to Bad-schweinfart?’

‘Over there on hillski.’ We follow Hammerchick’s stubby black finger and see an intimidating structure dominating the summit of a steep escarpment. The walls are high and drawn in like the waist of a dress and there is a confusing jumble of towers and spires.

‘Blimey!’ says Sid Betts. ‘Colditz!’

‘It is a bit grim, isn’t it?’ echoes Penny. ‘What are those birds circling over the battlements?’

‘They must be eagles,’ I say. It is funny but, though I don’t like to say anything, they look rather like giant bats to me. ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ I say, turning to the passengers. I sense that some of the weaker spirits may share my forebodings and need reassurance.

‘Are we staying there?’ says Janine Arkwright, sounding less than one hundred per cent enthusiastic. ‘It looks very old-fashioned.’

‘That’s part of its charm, isn’t it?’ says Penny. ‘Like that old gibbet by the roadside.’

‘Yes, but did you see?’ says a worried Mrs Arkwright. ‘There was a skeleton hanging from it.’

‘I don’t expect that it’s a real one,’ soothes Penny. ‘It’s probably there to attract tourists.’