Laurie Graham - Mr Starlight

‘Yeah?’ he said.

I said, ‘Where is Ceylon, exactly?’

‘Don’t know,’ he said, ‘and don’t care. The only boat I’m getting on is one going to New York.’

I said, ‘It might be nice to see some other places first. World travel is bound to give a man a certain something. It can’t help but give you more pull with the ladies.’

‘Yeah?’ he said.

He had several girls keen on him at that time, including his old school pal Vera Muddimer, but he didn’t seem inclined to make the kind of move they were hoping for. He knew the facts of life. I’d filled him in on all that. You pick up those kinds of things when you do military service, but of course that was an experience that had passed him by.

I said, ‘Don’t you like Vera?’

‘I love Vera,’ he said.

I said, ‘Then how come you haven’t got round to kissing her yet?’

He said, ‘I kiss her all the time.’

I said, ‘I don’t mean on the hand. That’s just fooling around. I mean kissing . On the lips.’

‘Bleeah!’ he said. ‘Germs!’

He was an oddity.

‘Cled,’ he said, ‘I hope you’re not expecting us to get booked for the same engagements? Just because we’re family doesn’t mean we’re joined at the neck. Ted’s business is getting the best he can for his artistes. He can’t be ruled by sentiment.’

I didn’t have any expectations. Once we were back in Ninevah Street it all seemed like a dream and anyway, I didn’t want to prejudice my position at Greely’s. I said to Mam, ‘Nothing may come of it. Sel talks as though it’s in the bag, but it’s not.’

But Mam said, ‘Of course it is. You’ll probably get a letter tomorrow.’

Uncle Teilo wasn’t so impressed. ‘Chugging back and forth on some tub,’ he said. ‘What if you get seasick?’

Mam said, ‘They won’t get seasick. They went on pleasure pedalos in Cannon Hill Park and they were as right as ninepence.’

Sel said, ‘Yes. And anyway, I might only have to chug forth. Some millionaire impresario might come aboard and discover me. Then I’ll be down that gangplank and on my way, first trip.’

No letter came the next day, nor even the next week, even though Sel had sent in a plain vanilla photo as instructed.

I said, ‘Looks like Ted Sibley was all talk. How about going back with Teilo? Put a bit of jingle in our pockets?’

‘Not me,’ he said. ‘ You go back with Teilo.’

But Uncle Teilo had got the hump.

When I asked him if he had anything for me he said, ‘Back from your world travels already? That didn’t last long. Well, I’ve got all the solo pianists I need just now, Cledwyn. I’ve got Winnie Skerritt and a nice steady boy from Coleshill, who knows which side his bread is buttered. So I’m afraid I can’t help you at the moment.’

I said to Sel, ‘Brilliant. We appear to have lost our shirts on Ted Sibley and now Teilo’s turned funny.’

‘Ask me,’ he said, ‘you’re better off staying at Greely’s. Clock in, clock out, pick up your wages every Friday. See if Norman Hewitt can get you something. But let’s face it, Cled, you haven’t got the balls for real show business.’

Then I came home from work the following Monday and there was a letter waiting for me, propped up in front of the mantelpiece.

Mam was banging about in the kitchen.

I said, ‘Well?’

‘Well what?’ she said.

I said, ‘Did Sel get New York?’

‘He’ll get his tomorrow,’ she said. ‘They send notices to bands-men first, then the soloists’ letters get posted the day after.’

Sel was out, eating Kunzel cakes with Vera Muddimer and pretending not to be bothered that he hadn’t heard anything.

When I was on the early shift Mam always kept my dinner for me till I came in, hot enough to take the roof off your mouth, but it was stone cold by the time I’d finished looking at that letter. Six transatlantic sailings with Cunard, subject to a medical examination. Contract renewable subject to my giving satisfaction. Terms of employment enclosed.

I said, ‘I’ve done it, Mam. I’ve got a job playing trumpet on the Queen Mary . I’ve ruddy well done it!’

‘Now, Cledwyn,’ she said. ‘I don’t want you crowing and upsetting your brother. It’s very hard on his nerves, all this waiting.’

‘I’m not bothered,’ he said, when he eventually turned up. ‘You need nerves of steel in this business and I’ve got them.’

Mam said, ‘You’ve got a very generous spirit, Selwyn. You deserve every success.’

Of course, he made sure she was out of earshot before he said anything else to me, whispering, trying to needle me. ‘You’ll only be a bandsman,’ he said. ‘You won’t get your name on the programme. And you’ll be kipping down in the depths,’ he said, ‘Down with the rats. If the boat sinks you won’t stand a chance. You’d better start practising “Nearer My God to Thee”.’

Then Mrs Edkins came in to borrow a shilling for the gas meter.

I said, ‘I’m sailing to New York, Mrs E.’

‘Subject to medical examination,’ Mam said.

Mrs E said, ‘I didn’t know you had it in you, Cledwyn. Now won’t it be a caution if Selwyn never gets a letter and you have to go without him?’

‘No,’ Mam said, ‘it won’t be a caution, it’ll be a clerical error. Now take your shilling, Connie Edkins, and stop bringing on Selwyn’s nervous tension.’

Of course, he did get a letter. It came the next day, offering him the same sailings I was on, as intermission singer. By the time I got home he’d been to the post office to draw money out and gone to Man about Birmingham to buy a blazer and two pairs of strides. ‘Hello, sailor,’ he said, when he saw me. ‘Splice the mainbrace!’

He was back in a good humour. ‘What did they say at Greely’s?’

I hadn’t actually got round to telling them. It was a big step, giving up my security and when it came to it, that morning, I’d had some doubts about going through with it. I’d proved I was a match for Sel and that was what mattered to me.

We had seven days to consider and send the papers back, and it was a funny thing made me do it in the end. They’d just brought something in at Greely’s called time and motion studies, which was a man with a clipboard, writing down every move you made including when you went to answer a call of nature. It was in the interests of greater efficiency and nobody liked it. Stan Walley, our shop steward, reckoned it was a Trojan horse got up by management, looking for ways to lay people off. I wasn’t a big union man myself but Stan turned out to be right and I’ve often wondered whether I’d have got the chop, if I’d stayed long enough to find out. As it was, something in me snapped that morning. Clicking his ballpoint pen, getting under my feet.

I said, ‘I’ve been offered work on a transatlantic luxury liner so you can stick that stopwatch up your arse.’

And that was that. I signed on the dotted line and then we waited to get our medicals. Arthur and Dilys thought I’d been hasty, giving my notice at Greely’s. Dilys said, ‘Sel failed for the RAF. What if he fails this time? You surely won’t go without him?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Maybe I will.’

But Sel’s weak back was of no concern to the Cunard doctor. We both passed A1 and when we came out on to the Marylebone Road it was still only half past twelve. We had the rest of the day ahead of us. The rest of our lives.

He said, ‘I’m going round the shops. Are you coming?’ He wanted to buy some sparkling cuff links and once Sel started shopping you could be there till they were cashing up and putting the lights out.

I said, ‘No. I think I’ll wend my way to a Corner House for cod and chips. I might go to the pictures.’