'Hatful of Gladwin'

'Is that a cravat?' asked Archie.

'No, it's a scarf.'

I was showing Archie pictures of our family trip to the bleak tundra that is Edinburgh Zoo in late March.

'I am, of course, wearing a cravat under the scarf.'

Archie smiled and admirably feigned interest in the rest of the pictures.

We were catching up with Archie and Leap after a long estrangement. We were in a bar in town. It was one of the bars with fruity beers and an Italian name designed to justify its high prices and to distinguish it from the unashamedly Geordie bars: The Market Lane, The Beehive and (surprisingly still trading under the name) The Blackie Boy.

Archie and I have always enjoyed talking about music - ever since we lived in neighbouring bedsits. We were on the ground floor and one of Archie's sash windows didn't lock. If I was locked out I would climb through the window and probably borrow a cassette on my way through.

I could see that maintaining an enthusiasm for pictures of my children pointing at two bedraggled zebras who couldn't believe their bad luck at ending up on a Scottish hillside was becoming a strain for my old friend, so I moved the chat on.

‘I'd love to know what you think of my ideas for niche compilation albums. Original takes on songs we all know....'

‘I'm all ears...’

‘Do you remember Joe Gladwin?’

‘Of course.'

‘Well, though I say it myself, I do a really good impression of Joe Gladwin – nearly as good as my Max Wall. I also know enough chords now on the ukulele to put my uncanny Gladwin to music. It’s a concept album of ‘Joe’ singing Smiths songs: ‘Hatful of Gladwin’. The backing obviously wouldn’t be as elaborate as the originals – more strummy uke than jangly guitar.’

'I'm liking it.'

The twinkle had returned to Archie's eye. As he considered the Gladwin concept, he stroked his beard. I watched as fragments of crisp left the beard and danced in the mood lighting before they dived into his beer.

''I'm thinking of tracks that showcase Joe's trademark rolling of the 'R':

'Reel Around the Fountain'
'Girl Afraid'
'Miserable Lie'
'William, it was really nothing'

Arch struggled to hear my Gladwin rendition of 'Reel Around the Fountain' above the noise of the bar, but nodded and looked positive.

'Amazing! I love it. What are the other albums? You said 'concept albums'.'

‘Well, the other compilation album I was toying with is called ‘Now That’s What I call Fetish...........1'.

That one's not as well thought through, but I do have an opening track'

Archie's interest was now well and truly piqued. He leaned in to hear the title and his face glowed with approval as I whispered:

‘The First Time ever I soiled your face.’

The Look of Love

Sandy, Maude and me were all at college together and share many fond memories of academic life. Arch was something of an arriviste in the circle. Sandy and I shared rooms while we studied. Arch had misrepresented his qualifications in gnome-painting as ‘fine art’ to gain entrance to the lodgings and to become our neighbour. Our rooms were south-facing and benefited from a lovely set of French windows - in front of which we placed the desk. Sandy would arrange his books at one end of the desk and I would set mine at the other. We clubbed together for a typewriter and it sat in the centre. The arrangement worked well – as Sandy was nocturnal and would write his essays through a haze of cigarette smoke in the small hours. I would air the room in the morning and then use the desk myself. In moments of quiet study I would notice movement in the shrubs at the far end of the shared garden. At the time I took this to be a small animal.

Meanwhile, unbeknown to us, Archie was moving his way though the house. He had begun in a garret space (formerly a very cramped nursery). The landlord had been surprised at Archie’s willingness to live in such confinement - he usually showed the room as a small joke to amuse prospective tenants. He used it as a broom cupboard and would open the door on the ‘penthouse suite’ as more of an icebreaker than a genuine option.

‘I’ll take it! I’ll take it! It’s perfect!’

Archie had seen this as his chance to get into the house and break into what he took to be an intellectual atmosphere. He then strategically changed rooms as they became available, to achieve proximity to us.

Sandy and I had always been cordial to Arch, before we got to know him properly. The house had an old church pew in its entrance hall. The pew was very useful - it had a hinged lid under which was storage designed for prayer books. We used it for the post. Each morning the postman would cast the post into the pew and each scholar would appear, lift the lid and rifle through the envelopes in the hope of a cheque from home.

Some mornings Arch would be asleep in the pew.

After an evening out, Arch was often overwhelmed by the prospect of climbing the stairs back to his room – especially during the time when he lived in the ‘penthouse.’ He would choose, instead, to climb into the relative spaciousness of the pew and wait for the shower of post to rouse him in the morning. The postman and residents were all a little startled at first, but it was a liberal environment and allowances were made for the little chap. Some occupants took to throwing some loose change in at Archie’s feet after retrieving their letters.

If not asleep in the pew, Arch could often be found perched on it, swinging his legs and reading ‘difficult’ books. Sandy and I were leaving the house in a hurry one morning to catch a lecture and I saw that Archie was sat in his difficult book reading attitude. He was also wearing spectacles. I noticed that he rubbed one of his eyes by poking a finger through the frame – there were no lenses.

Sandy was oblivious to Archie’s presence and busied himself lighting his second cigarette of the day from the rapidly diminishing stub of his first cigarette of the day. As he did so, a shaft of winter sunlight poured in through the stained glass of the front door. The light penetrated the cloud of smoke and cast a halo around Sandy’s dishevelled, cherubic curls. Looking back, I suspect that this was the coup de foudre moment for Archie. The small one straightened his ‘glasses’ as though to get a better view and peered over the top of his book. He seemed to be drinking in every atom of this glowing vision of his idol – in its beatific morning glow. As Sandy grabbed his satchel of books and made for the door, Archie’s eyes followed his movement with a trancelike stare. Before I followed and closed the door behind me, I took the opportunity to pick the Samuel Becket novel from Archie’s grip and turn it the right way up.

¡Adiós!, ¡Hola!

For a full 2 years Archie and Leap had been talking about going to visit Sandy and Lola. Sandy went out to Barcelona to join his Catalan amour a couple of Easters ago.

Sandy began his Spanish career collecting the money after Lola’s troupe of street artists performed on the Ramblas. He then went through an assortment of casual jobs. For a while he was the oldest ball-boy at the Nou Camp, but Barcelona FC let him go when he was beaten to a ball by a disabled fan in a wheelchair (the years of Gauloise smoking had taken their toll on Sandy’s fitness).

Sandy’s relationship with Lola fused her Catalan feistiness and his dry Northern English wit. She enjoyed teaching him all the Spanish and Catalan he needed and they became regulars at many of the town’s livelier bars – Sandy reciprocated by educating her in the detail of British guitar bands from the last 25 years.

Sandy then saw a niche in the market for bookselling and began to hawk dog-eared English paperbacks from a handcart – targeting the university in the winter and the beach in summer. His doting mother, Doris, scoured the charity shops of northern England and sent the books in regular batches. On occasion the poor woman would be unable to source enough secondhand books and would buy new instead. She would then enlist her husband, Arnie, to read them – or at least handle them enough to make them look used.

For her part, Lola was not content to be a street performer for all her life and knew that she needed to move on. Stilt-walking had lost its appeal and instead she took an interview with a global communications company in her stride. Lola also began to realise that her education in the development of British pop music was probably complete.

So it was that Lola decided to spend a large chunk of her savings in a single morning at El Corte Ingles department store. Her hair extensions were removed and a business-like bob was introduced. A pinstripe suit replaced combats and t-shirts. The shoe department indulged her for 30 minutes as she trained herself to finish off the new look and walk smoothly, at ground level, on heels.

Sandy had endured a fruitless morning on the beach approaching baking tourists who he hoped might need a paperback. Responses ranged from ‘No, thank you’ to ‘Raus!’ and he was rapidly losing heart. Sandy had never really adapted his wardrobe to the Mediterranean heat. Lola had applied her talents as a seamstress to one of Arnie’s old suits on a visit to England. Sandy wore the outfit all the time – as a symbol of his love for both Lola and his father. On a warm summer’s day in Barcelona, a polyester suit did not create a feeling of wellbeing in a hungry immigrant trying to run what he described as his own ‘small business’.

Lola had a taxi waiting on the seafront. Her final purchases had been from the bookshop at El Corte Ingles: a title they both knew well and a pen for the inscription.

Sandy’s tarpaulin had been stolen a week earlier. He had used it protect his stock from sun damage and rain, but a homeless drinker had used it to create some shelter in a nearby park and Sandy did not have the heart to reclaim it. He removed his jacket and placed it as a makeshift cover on a collection of spines boasting many holiday reading favourites: The Naked Lunch, On The Road, Hangover Square and American Psycho. Sandy found a lamppost against which to lean in a Belmondo attitude. He tapped a cigarette out of his pack, lifted it to his lips and lit it in his timeworn fashion. As he exhaled the first acrid cloud of his smoking session, a businesswoman dashed from a waiting taxi and pushed a book-shaped package into his hand. As the smoke cleared he watched the taxi disappear into the chaos of the midday traffic. He opened the El Corte Ingles bag to expose the first new book he had seen in some time - a crisp new English edition of Kerouac’s On the Road. The inscription was pithy:

‘Adios, Lola. x’

Sandy realised that while he had been preoccupied in assuming his favourite film pose he had let real life jump in a taxi and leave him. He took a long, consolatory drag on his Gauloise. His smoke seemed to be merging into the smoke of others nearby. A sea breeze arrived to clear the conglomeration of fumes and stood before him were the small, smiling, haversacked figures of Archie and Leap.

Sandy was still in state of devastation and found it hard to feign enthusiasm for the sudden arrival of his old friends.

‘It’s me, Sand!’ Archie jumped a little to emphasise his presence.

‘I think he’s a little upset’, whispered Leap.

As Archie began to quietly sob, Sandy was roused from his miserable reverie. New fumes were reaching him and he realised that his jacket had spontaneously combusted in the sun. The entire stock of his ‘small business’ was now aflame – the handcart a funeral pyre for the books he loved and for his Barcelona affair.

Barcelona Calling

Arch & Leap have a strange routine. They drink and listen to music when they get home from work after a long commute and consequently tend to eat late, very late. Leap controls the menu – she is a vegan, or as Maude’s father once introduced her, ‘a very severe vegetarian’. Archie relishes Leap’s cuisine at home, but lapses occasionally when out and about. Maude witnessed him eating a pork pie on a passing bus last week. The large pie obscured his face momentarily, but as he lowered the meat feast to draw breath, his cover was blown.

‘I love what Leap cooks,’ insists Arch – ‘it’s really healthy’.

We visited Arch & Leap’s cottage last night. Maude has tired of being offered nothing more in the way of hospitality than some Bombay mix, so she called in advance and told them that she would bring some food. When we arrived she handed a large pan of curry to an unusually excited Archie. His knees almost buckled under the weight, but he giggled and managed to rush through to the kitchen without spilling it. His progress wasn’t helped by various obstacles. Arch & Leap have an unorthodox approach to storage. They ‘organise’ their possessions by creating a miniature Manhattan skyline of piles of books and compact disks on the floor of their lounge, so that they are constantly reminded of what they own. One wrong move and a pile is demolished – sometimes creating a domino effect which knocks down neighbouring piles of stuff. When this occurs Arch shows remarkable agility for man of his girth and rushes to minimise the damage.

‘They’re all in order, you know!’ He exclaims. ‘That took me ages to alphabeticalise.’

In a clearing in the forest of piles there is enough space for the sofa, and the hearth. Archie lies on one side of the hearth and Leap assumes a lotus position on the other. For the festive season Leap creates a nut-cracking workshop space on her side – consisting of a tree stump and a toffee hammer.

‘Have you thought any more about shelving?’ Maude asked after we had finished our curry.

‘We’re fine,’ insisted Leap, as she smiled and whacked a walnut.

‘This way we know where everything is when we need it,' added Arch, as he glanced at his watch.

I could see that Maude was eager to point out that they were unlikely to need most of the things littering the floor in the very near future, but she resisted the urge.

‘Anyway,’ continued Leap, ’it provides a smashing little playground….’ Leap smiled in Archie’s direction at this point.

‘Isn’t Archie a little long in the tooth for a ‘playground’?’

Leap shook with laughter. She mis-hit a walnut which flew across the room and bounced off Archie’s forehead.

‘Not for Arch, Silly! For Fingerbob.’

‘Fingerbob?’

‘Yes, I keep catching Fingerbob in my mouse-catcher and releasing him out in the fields, but he keeps finding his way back to us!’

Maude looked unimpressed. ‘You have a mouse?’

‘Yes, but he is no trouble really. He is really quite entertaining. Last week he took some cinnamon sticks all the way from the kitchen cupboard to the corner of the living room.’

Maude’s eye followed Leap’s finger as it indicated a corner of the room completely obscured by the piles.

‘Quite the little adventurer.’

This created a natural pause in the conversation and Arch took the opportunity to wind his way through the area of the room devoted to his ‘alphabeticalised’ cd collection to reach the bathroom. The phone rang. Maude was comfortable on the sofa. Leap was stoking the fire and gestured to me to answer the call. I eventually traced the phone behind a teetering pile of fading Sunday supplements. As I was about to lift the receiver, Archie came back into the room at speed. He had left the bathroom early after hearing the phone. His excited manner and his watch-checking all made sense now – he had been expecting a call. Archie was wearing a cardigan which was far too long for him and had the look of a frock-coat. As he bounded across the room his woollen train caught the top of one of his piles of party compilation cassettes.

As he excitedly shouted ‘That’ll be Sandy!’ and kept motoring towards to me, I watched the edifice of cassettes collapse and destabilise a neighbouring pile of Betamax videos, which in turn unsettled an orangebox of Leap’s recipe scrapbooks. Archie was undeterred by the chaos developing around him and continued on his expedition to reach the phone. His face was remarkably gleeful. He looked lustful and carefree – like a man half his age and twice his height running along a beach towards the outstretched arms of the love of his life.

(Sandy has been in Barcelona for over a year and Archie sorely misses playing a bit part in the imaginary film that Sandy casts around him.)

I could see Archie’s small hand forming to grasp the handset as his arm began to outstretch, but this movement took his attention away from holding up his trousers (as I mentioned, he left the bathroom early). Small change and a heavy tobacco tin soon had Archie’s trousers plummeting to knee level. The poor man then lost his footing and became a human torpedo – crashing through the carefully arranged music section of the pilescape and causing severe ‘de-alphabeticalisation’.

As I lifted the phone to suggest that Sandy called later, Leap unfolded her legs and went to Archie’s aid. As she abandoned her post, Fingerbob saw his chance to make off with the last walnut of the evening. Maude was already buttoning her coat.