Pook's Love Nest

ONE

I don’t know if you have ever had financial problems, like only being able to leave the house at night or sitting in your public library to get warm wearing dark glasses, or having to entertain your friends in the station waiting-room sporting a high scarf and a hat with a cowboy brim, or taking a short cut through the park via the bushes to see if the birds have left any bread.

I was in this position through buying Mr Booster’s Prosperity Bonds, which led me to join a small queue outside the crypt of Cudford Cathedral for prayers and hot soup. Never had the Church devised a better method of encouraging prayer among mankind, for as I dipped the bread in the soup I prayed with that fervour of the biblical prophets for the return of my funds and the bankruptcy of Mr Booster.

You may recall how people were doubling their money in one year simply by investing their savings in Boogies, as the bonds were affectionately known in financial circles. Eager to double my own capital and carried away by a euphoric advertising campaign, I jumped in with all I possessed following the disastrous Derby of 1960 when I had backed a horse which was apparently in foal. I received my Boogie Bonds by return of post, but when Mr Booster sent me the half-yearly report it contained a graph resembling Mount Everest, racing up to the summit, then plunging down again to the foothills. However, it did not halt at the foothills but went potholing into the bowels of the earth.

By consulting the date line I discovered I had purchased my bonds at about 29,000 feet, just where Hilary and Tensing had run out of mountain and planted the Union-Jack.

In the accompanying blurb Mr Booster ignored my own crisis in order to explain the world crisis. How lucky we were, he said, that we had invested our money in Boogies instead of the National Average. Look at the National Average dotted line superimposed on the Boogie graph and count our blessings. Thank heaven our own folio of investment was widely spread under the experienced hand of Mr Booster. I consulted the dotted line as advised and thanked God I had not invested in the National Average—it plunged sickeningly like a lift-shaft.

Mr Booster went on to compliment me on my financial sagacity, and as a reward he was about to whisper a secret known only to City brokers. Take advantage of the market and buy now. Prices were the lowest since the South Sea Bubble disaster of 1720; they could only fall lower if the Western World collapsed under a Soviet invasion. Only a fool would neglect to rush in and buy Boogies now they were practically worthless, and so low that their sole possible movement must be up.

What with the brilliant propaganda, easy-to-complete forms and prepaid envelope, I would have bought all I could if I was not a pauper. I cursed myself for letting this golden opportunity slip because Mr Booster was already working day and night to readjust our folio in readiness for the coming boom, shedding our holdings in firms who manufactured gas-mantles, magic-lanterns and barrel-organs in order to take up options on more widely-spread stock in Japanese kimonos, African blowpipes and Maori war-canoes. Furthermore, he anticipated that despite the world crisis of the past hundred years the world would have to eat—a pronouncement I heartily agreed with right now—so he was investing in rice, ground-nuts, crabs and soya-beans, plus a scheme to obtain food from the desert sand, and another experiment to skim plankton from the ocean. An odd feeling gripped me that these schemes were in some way connected with keeping the holders of Boogie Bonds alive until the market recovered.

I wrote to Mr Booster in the City, explaining how I had given him my life savings at the summit of his Everest, and requesting him to lend me some money to tide me over as advertised in his Plan 9: ‘As much cash as you want, when you want it, for as long as you want it, no matter what you want it for. Just ask Mr Booster and get your cheque within seven days under the Boostie Golden Plan Nine.’ But it seemed the coloured picture of a beaming Mr Booster handing over a bag of gold to a laughing debtor who was standing on the deck of a new yacht was not meant for me, for Mr Booster only lent you money for more luxuries, not for everyday items like food. Nor did he take kindly to my suggestion that he accept my Boostie Bonds as security.

It is a terrible blow to a man’s pride when he is forced to accept money from his girlfriend, so I was fortunate not to suffer in this respect, no matter how much Olga gave me. The deed always made Olga happy, so on the whole we were a pretty happy couple. I had long made a vow she would get it all back in the end, thus salving my conscience, but preferably when we were married and had a joint bank account. Olga was an extremely generous girl who loved helping mankind, and me in particular, to the extent that to refuse would sadden her, with the result that sometimes I felt I was going out with Oxfam.

Whenever she gave me money I let her know I only accepted it to make her happy, and that if our positions were reversed and she was in desperate need she could rely on me not to desert her as we stood together in the soup queue outside the crypt of Cudford Cathedral. Olga worked at Cudford Gas Board, which gave me a pleasing sense of security to think how such an industrial giant was supporting me so solidly.

Good thing you don’t have to rely on your writing for a living, Olga observed, opening her handbag to buy the drinks in the Bold Forester. I dreaded that handbag because the big brass acorns which formed the clip went off bang every time they operated, informing the bar like a starting-pistol that I was a kept man.

"Not my fault that Desert Romance folded, Olga dear."

"Family Help folded; Modern Love folded; Weekly Passion folded. How is it everything you write for goes bust?"

"I’m still writing for Sex International, Olga dear." I always called her dear and simpered lovingly during hard times in case she thought I was ungrateful and decided to support Central Africa instead of me. To this end I had given her a Victorian wall-plaque last Christmas engraved ‘Charity Begins At Home’.

Then why does the editor keep returning your stories with little notes hinting that the Battle of Waterloo was fought on land, not in bed? And why does he keep explaining that the celebrated courtesans of history were all women, not men—and could he have a hero for a change who supports himself, if not his wife and family?

But he’s always harping on about finding stories with a novel twist, Olga dear.

Then for good luck’s sake write one where the hero works just hard enough so he doesn’t have to be the pimp of the year, Peter. Some of your heroes sound as if they’re either making love or lying in an iron-lung.

The trouble with great talent, Olga dearest, is that the world is never ready for it. Most folks are only just beginning to say how good Chaucer is, and why has he packed in writing that travel series about Kent. What I need right now is something really big I can lose myself in.

"Like Sherwood Forest? You’d make a fine outlaw, Peter. How Maid Marian Supported Robin Hood, the Nottingham Gigolo, as told by his descendant, Peter Pook."

No, dear, I want to get into the big money so you can enjoy the kind of life you deserve.

I have no desire to become a London call-girl, Peter.

I laughed engagingly to let her see she was joking. Property, darling. Let rooms like Mrs Bosworth does. She’s kindly offered to advise me.

Mrs Bosworth was a master landlady, having let almost from birth. She had run hotels, boarding-houses, guest-houses, lodging-houses and en pensions. Moreover, she had managed a country club, which turned her husband into a billiards professional, as well as three pubs, which had turned her husband slightly alcoholic—which he had proved to be a fatal handicap to a billiards professional, a breed of men who are not expected to cue imaginary balls, rip green baize, nor employ the long rest as a javelin when losing.

In the bad old days of the Great War Mrs Bosworth had turned her gifts to running what very few landladies have experienced, in the shape of an internment camp for aliens; a task which certainly equipped her for the hard times of the twenties, when in the communal kitchen of her new boarding-houses she was forced to cut a secret nick in her carrots and potatoes before placing the stewpot on the stove alongside those of her lodgers. It was also necessary to take other precautions, like sleeping with one’s tea-caddy under the bed, and carrying one’s Sunday joint to church at the morning service. In fact, where today a fridge would stand in Mrs Bosworth’s kitchen there stood an ancient Chubb’s safe, requiring two keys to be inserted before the family could enjoy such treasures as marge or bacon. Yet even this bore the marks of an unsuccessful night raid upon its steel back-plate.

Mrs Bosworth had iron rules about letting, such as no fraternizing or gossiping by the lodgers—Everybody must keep themselves to themselves—no washlines out except Mondays; no late visitors; rent always in advance; everybody to use the Hoover and bath on their allotted day only. The sole rule she was never able to abide by was that a landlady should not reside on the premises herself. This was an impossibility unless she was prepared to sleep in the garden. Some lodgers who had been given notice to quit used to hint that Mrs Bosworth must think she was still running that wartime internment camp, yet everyone had to admit that she was a mistress of her craft and conducted the best boarding-house in Cudford.

In order to let you first need a house—and nobody can steal anything that big, Olga declared in her facts-of-life tone. Although she possessed an extra motherhood gene which I appealed to as much as possible by psycho-suggesting I was her enormous chick and bending almost double to lay my head on her bosom when we kissed good-night at my door, Olga had gone off me lately— thus confounding my maxim with women that nothing succeeds like failure. All the lads were after her, including Mr Smooth—Ronald Pearson, the Echo reporter—a creep capable of winning the Dunmow Flitch even as a bachelor. Olga referred to him as the Perfect Man because he did not smoke, drink nor molest girls; just like being courted by a chaperon. But his bait was free tickets to everything, then back to his flat for lemonade and cake while he wrote it up for his paper. This mad whirl of scout concerts and Iolanthe by the Co-op did not really suit Olga, who always came back to me for what she called some old-fashioned vice. I invariably told her quite frankly that I was a failure who could not hope to compete with the Mr Smooths of this world, and all I could offer her was personality, charm, dog-like infidelity, bad habits and unsuspected happiness. Finally, to prove I was not jealous, I offered to accompany her and Ronald to Wembley if he could obtain three Cup Final tickets; or, to prove my trust in her, I would go alone.

I have a suitable house in view, Olga darling. I shall call it Pook’s Nook, and it will become our very own little love-nest.

If our very own little love-nest costs more than £30 I can’t afford to buy it for you.

Money is no object, dear. I have obtained financial backing from Honners.

Nobody can pay that much interest, Peter. If he tells you the time he expects payment for depreciation on his watch. I wonder he doesn’t fix a taxi-meter in that car of his. They say he can light a cigarette inside his pocket if he’s with another smoker. At least you’re mean because you’re broke.

It wasn’t like this when we first met, Olga dear, I sighed.

I know—you still had money left over from Hilda Longbothem, and I wouldn’t believe what other people said.

I looked extremely hurt, to the point of industrial injury. Do I detect the flame of passion is temporarily flickering, sweetheart?

Soggy with safety-foam. Douse it with petrol and it wouldn’t so much as hiss.

One thing you could not call our potential love-nest was any kind of nook, having been built in 1893 when the Late Victorians realized they were late, so they were erecting the biggest terrace houses the world had ever witnessed. Four stone bays towering one above the other, topped by a floor of maids’ bedrooms, then roofed over by attic rooms with diagonal walls apparently designed for midgets. The impressive entrance was reached by twelve stone stairs which rode over the basement area like a drawbridge, so that not an inch of space was wasted.

The facade of the house was blackened with grime, the woodwork was flaking dark brown paint, yet I had seen a picture of the place in its heyday—white cement walls, wrought-iron flower-boxes full of geraniums right round each bay, and striped sun-awnings swung out from every window. In the picture the house reminded me of a young bride on her wedding day, but now she had turned into an aged witch.

You may have seen very old books which contained a frontispiece in the shape of a photograph or sketch. I should have liked to show you a frontispiece of the house—even a line drawing—but what with publishers asking authors to cut down on commas because of the world paper shortage, and to avoid words containing large letters such as W because of the world ink prices, and to end stories before the climax because of world printing charges, I had as much chance of getting a frontispiece as finding a cigarette card in a packet of twenty. Luxuries like frontispieces and cigarette cards went out with the arrival of the affluent society.

In a burst of mad enthusiasm and youthful bravado which Olga condemned as male cowardice, I had not revealed to her how far the arrangements for the house had progressed. In fact I had not mentioned it till now because she forbade me enter any more speculative enterprises, ordering me to take up some steady occupation wherein I could not possibly lose money even if bad luck intervened and I got run over by a tank. To this end she had enumerated all the advantages of employing my talents as a corporation dustman, showing me in the street the safety screen now fitted across the collection vehicle’s rubbish-crusher.

Difficult to believe today that just a few years ago the giant vertical village in Raymond Crescent was on the market for £2,750 or near offer, yet stood unsold because of its size. I visited the site to view the row of estate agents’ flags flying along the front railings