Jeffery Brakelight Breezes Through Life, Part 4

“New year, new me,” I said, staring myself straight in the eye in the bathroom mirror. The proclamation was issued with a hint of irony because at that moment I was in the grip of a robust hangover. I was as queasy as Dracula rushing to his coffin when the sun was coming up. It was New Year’s Day, you see, and I had arrived home at about three in the morning, having seen in the new year at the Feathers

I guzzled down a brace of fizzy tablets dissolved in water, which I hoped would counteract the effects of the alcohol I had guzzled down the previous night. During that revelry, my old friend, and occasional drinking partner, Silas ‘Sporty’ Porter introduced me to a new drink, the rum snatch. I tried one and told him I wasn’t keen, but he assured me I’d soon get a taste for it. After that introduction, almost every time I turned around there was a freshly poured one in front of me. I think the word that best describes my condition on the walk home (for who can get a taxi in the early hours of New Year's Day?) is sozzled. And, as you may be aware, a rum hangover is hard to beat.

Yet, despite my poorly condition, I had to brace up, because Sporty was coming over as we were going to embark upon our annual New Year’s Day pub crawl, during which all of the local bars would be packed, the clientele hung over to a man, and all present putting a brave face on things.

After expelling the obligatory burp that follows the consumption of effervescent indigestion tablets, I put a lining on my stomach via four slices of buttered toast with marmalade, washed down with a large mug of Earl Grey tea. As I chewed, the door entry intercom went, and, expecting the arrival of Sporty, I buzzed the visitor in.

Imagine my shock and displeasure when a moment later that wretched specimen Mutant Mason strolled into my apartment. I was aghast, agog, and a great deal agitated. You may recall that Mutant is the punk singer who thinks it’s fun to chuck a pig’s head about on stage, and who pipped our team in a tie-break at the Bluebell pub quiz just before Christmas. Seeing him in my apartment was bad enough, but what made things worse was that this belligerent lout was my first foot.

“Can I help you?” I said, in a tone that was far from welcoming. He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket.

“Message for you. From the Bluebell. You’re to ring this number.”

He handed me the paper, and on reading the scrawl thereon I have to say my heart stopped, slid down my trouser leg, and did two laps of the coffee table with its arms aloft, before climbing back up and returning to pumping duties. For, written on the paper was the word, Sonia, with a phone number underneath.

I could have kissed the messenger, but instead, I gave him a large whisky for his trouble, a regular blended one, of course, not the precious single malt I’d received from Uncle Dickie as a Christmas present. I asked my unwelcome guest what circumstances had led to him delivering the note.

“Someone rang the Bluebell yesterday asking for me. It was a woman, and she almost begged me to give you this phone number and ask you to call her. She told me your address, so here I am.”

The revelation caused such giddiness, I swayed in my slippers. Sonia, that young lady I am particularly sweet on, had been incommunicado since I was arrested for drink-driving just before Christmas. I’d assumed it was over between us, but here was her phone number, and, according to the bearer of the note, she was practically begging me to get in touch.

The Mutant downed his whisky and wished me a Happy New Year. I returned the greeting and thanked him for bringing the message to me. We shook hands, and he left.

I did a jig in time to a tune on the radio, and then I switched it off so I could gather my thoughts. "Sonia," I said, and the very mention of her name crushed my hangover like a boa constrictor might crush a mongoose (although there may have been assistance from the effervescent tablets).

I dialled the number, and a man, her brother John, answered. "It’s Jeff," I told him, and he handed the phone to Sonia.

“Jeff,” she said excitedly, “how have you been?”

“Fine,” I said, “but what happened to you?”

“Oh, it was awful. I was just about to leave for work on the morning the police stopped us, and my brother turned up. He told me that Mum had been taken ill and was in hospital, so we dashed down to Mansfield. I was in such a rush I left without your phone number. I’ve been wondering how to contact you, as I know you’re ex-directory. I rang directory enquiries and got the number for the Feathers, but no one answered. Then I remembered the Bluebell, so I rang them and asked for that horrid Mutant character. I assume he’s been to see you.”

“He has,” I said, “and I’m glad he called because I was worried about you. Is everyone all right?”

“Well, it was an unusual Christmas, and not a particularly merry one. But, Mum is on the mend, and she’ll be home next week. John is going to stay on to look after her, but I’m getting the train home tomorrow.”

“Is anyone picking you up from the station?”

“Yeah,” Sonia said, “I’m getting a lift home.”

“Oh, right,” I said, dispirited.

“In a white Astra,” she said, laughing, and, being the owner of that very vehicle, I beamed like a supermoon in a cloudless sky.

We made arrangements for the great reunion, and during a light-hearted ‘no, you hang up first’ exchange, the intercom buzzed, and this time it was Sporty. As he climbed the stairs, I told Sonia how much I was looking forward to seeing her, and, to my delight, she responded in kind. I’d hung up when Sporty entered, and my smile and general demeanour told him I was in a joyous frame of mind.

“Sonia, perchance?” he said.

“You know me well, mon ami,” I said, applying a splash of aftershave. I pulled on my coat, and we left the apartment together, me deliriously happy.

In fact, developments of that morning had lifted my spirits to such heights I was the first responder to an appeal by local vamp Pansy Trucklethorne for a volunteer to join her in a duet on the karaoke at the Horse and Cow. We did You’re the One That I Want, from the film Grease, and, while my sentiments were never aligned with those expressed in the chorus, despite the allure of my co-singer, I belted out my share of the lyric with considerable brio, while performing some of the moves from the film. At the end of the song, Pansy and I laughed and hugged. Bonhomie was the order of the day.

As our hangovers diminished, our merry band went around the bars, imbibing freely and playing assorted games. I was first to fall at killer pool in the George and Dragon, and at the Bluebell I made an early exit from a game of Shanghai on the dartboard after I missed the three. And yet, I cared not a jot for my mind was elsewhere.

It had just gone seven o’clock when I decided my day of revelry was over; a decision prompted in no small part by Sporty handing me one of those wretched rum concoctions. I guzzled the drink, bade all present a Happy New Year, and fought my way through the throng towards the exit, and into the car park where I awaited the taxi the barman had called for me.

Back at home, I put the central heating on, using the timer lest I dozed off, and I set about rustling up some much-needed belly timber. Minimal effort was called for, so I grabbed a loaf of bread and a pack of cheese slices.

After my repast, I dozed off and woke up shivering at 3.17, with a terrible crick in my neck. I quickly filled the trusty hot bag, brushed my teeth, and retired to a proper bed, where Morpheus clouted me with a mallet.

In the morning, I was up like a linnet, singing as I stirred the porridge, and rattling out a drum beat on the table with a knife and teaspoon in time to a tune on the radio. My early departure from the previous night’s revelry had saved my skin hangover-wise, and I was in fine spirits. My felicity was almost entirely down to the forthcoming reunion I was to attend. But in my heart, and for what reason I knew not, I was somewhat apprehensive.

I swung the old Astra into the same parking space I’d used a few weeks earlier when picking up Sporty’s wretched cousin, Holy Joe Hole. My anticipation was a lot keener this time around and I quickly left the car and headed for the platform, minus the flowers I had initially intended to buy but thought better of.

As I waited on the platform, I was suddenly overtaken by an urge that would force me to abandon my post momentarily. I don’t know if I was suffering from a bout of nerves at the prospect of seeing Sonia again, but, all of a sudden I desperately needed to pee. I hurried along the platform and into a toilet block, unbuttoning my coat.

Five minutes later, I emerged, just as Sonia’s train was pulling in. Carriage doors opened, and, as passengers alighted I scanned the assortment of heads that protruded from various forms of insulation. In so doing, I cast my eye upon something that stopped me dead in my tracks. I was so shocked by what I saw, I hid behind an iron pillar to observe. But then I was interrupted.

“Jeff!” Sonia said as she hastened through the crowd as best she could, carrying a bulging hold-all. I turned to see the face I’d sorely missed over the Christmas period.

“My favourite librarian,” I said. We embraced, and I swung her around. I asked how her journey had been and then, being a keen collector of brownie points, how her mother was. After issuing positive responses to each question, Sonia told me she was gasping for a coffee, and that we should retire to the Junction Cafe, right there on the platform.

As she made towards the cafe, I grabbed the strap of her hold-all and stopped her. She gave me a puzzled look, but what I had witnessed on the platform moments earlier prevented me from setting foot in that cafe.

I had seen Aunt Charlotte alight from a carriage forward of Sonia's, and she was minus Uncle Dickie. She went immediately to a man who had been waiting on the platform some ten yards along from me. The man gave a nod of recognition towards Charlotte, and then he held open the door of the cafe, and the pair went inside. Dickie and Charlotte live about twenty miles from the station, so it was all a bit curious. Yet, if someone even suggested my auntie was involved in extra-marital impropriety, well I’d chomp down the metaphorical titfer. I relayed my concerns to Sonia to explain my obvious distraction.

We decided to sneak out of the station to have coffee in town, but then Sonia had an idea. “Your aunt doesn’t know me,” she said, “I could go into the cafe to see if I can glean anything.”

“Good idea,” I said, wondering if all librarians use words like glean. I described Charlotte’s light grey hair and striking red coat with a black collar. Sonia went into the cafe, while I hauled her holdall back to the car, where I waited.

Ten minutes later, Sonia sat in the passenger seat. "What did you glean? I said.

"They had coffee and talked intimately. Your aunt slid an envelope across the table, I think it had photos inside, but I couldn't swear. I didn't hear what they were saying.

The photos added a new dimension to the mystery, one which threw up all kinds of ridiculous suppositions in my mind. Perhaps Aunt Charlotte was being blackmailed. Or it may be, I thought, that the mystery man was a private investigator, and the photos were covertly taken snaps of Uncle Dickie canoodling with a femme fatale colleague from the garden centre where he works. Those notions were unlikely, but par for the course for me; I grew up on a diet rich in Scooby Doo.

I have a rather excitable nature so when situations like the Aunt Charlotte mystery crop up, my inferences are naturally drawn towards the sensational. Of course, those inferences are rarely on the money; I’d be a shoo-in for a podium place if the wrong-conclusion jump ever became an Olympic sport. But, whichever way I looked at it, what had unfolded vis-a-vis my auntie was more than a bit fishy.

I tried to put Aunt Charlotte out of my mind and bask in the reunion with Sonia, but the nagging thought of her cheating on Uncle Dickie was hard to shake off.

"I could follow her again," Sonia said. Maybe find out more." I held her hand.

"Let me put my cards on the table," I said. "I'm quite sweet on you and I hope to see more of you. If that happens, we shall on occasion be in the company of Dickie and Charlotte. I wouldn't want Charlotte to think I was going out with her stalker."

"Bless you," Sonia said, laughing.

"But, I have an idea, so, to the Batmobile, Robin," I said, and we left the cafe.

Charlie Hobbs—known to all as Hobnail—is a fine goalkeeper and a most likeable chap. That said, he does have a rather irritating habit, but more on that later. I had an inkling that he might agree to tail Aunt Charlotte, who didn't know him from Ghandi.

The reason I chose to ask Hobnail if he'd be willing to tail Aunt Charlotte is that when we were kids, he was crazy about private eye shows. If a group of us were playing football on a Tuesday evening, Hobnail's mother or sister would approach the touchline and yell at him that The Rockford Files was about to start. No matter how important the game nor how close the scoreline Hobnail would leave the field immediately, handing his gloves to whoever volunteered to take over goalkeeping duty. It was a tenuous premise, but I had little else.

After the game, which Hobnail's side won 5-2, several players retired to the Horse and Cow for refreshments. Sonia and I sat with Sporty and I put my proposition to Hobnail.

"Would you be up for a bit of covert surveillance?" I said, "I need to have someone tailed." The goalkeeper smiled broadly.

"Oh, defy nit Eli," he said. This is the irritating habit I mentioned earlier. Hobnail often pronounces words as they are spelled, and that is his way of saying definitely.

Hobnail will tell you that he makes the best stroganoff in twenty counties using a ree-sype handed down from his gran.

He might also reveal that he was once butted by a go-at while visiting his uncle's farm as a child.

And, if you found his pronunciation peculiarity annoying to the extent you'd like to slosh him in the mouth, and you said as much to his face, he'd laugh and tell you to go to the back of the kwee-oo-wee.

The following evening, I drove Hobnail to the bottom of Uncle Dickie's street to show him where Charlotte lived. As we watched, the object of the surveillance emerged.

"That's her!" I said, "That's Charlotte." Hobnail immediately opened the door and pulled himself from the passenger seat. "Not now," I said, but he was out of the car.

"No time like the present, Daddio," he said, slamming the car door. I watched him follow Charlotte down the street.

He returned, out of breath, but looking particularly pleased with himself. "Miss eye on accomplished," he said, putting on his seatbelt.

"What happened?" I said, starting the engine. "And in English, please."

"Well, here's what I garnered," he said. With Sonia gleaning, and Hobnail garnering, I wondered if my own vocabulary was up to scratch, but that was for another time. "It was perfect timing. I tailed her to a phone box, and I overheard every word she said."

"Brilliant," I said.

"She rang a guy called Barry or Gary, and she's going to meet him tomorrow night at his house at seven o'clock."

"That's not a lot to go on," I said, "he could be anywhere." But Hobnail smiled.

"That was only half the job," he said, "he gave her the address, and she repeated it as she wrote it down. I have it up here." He tapped the side of his forehead with a finger.

"Come on then, out with it."

"Twenty-six Poplar Close, although I've no idea where that is." I pulled into a small residential car park and instructed Hobnail to get my A to Z from the glove box. We saw that Poplar Close lies on the other side of town.

When I dropped Hobnail off at his front door, we had recce'd the target's address, and everything was in place for a covert surveillance exercise the following night.

While I was pleased with Hobnail's work, what he garnered made the case even more curious. Why would Charlotte go to a call box to ring this man when she has a telephone in the house?

The next day, I met Sonia for lunch in town. I told her about Hobnail's mission, and what he had discovered. I said we were going that evening to see what we could ascertain, thus demonstrating that I can use a thesaurus just as well as the next bloke. On hearing this, Sonia became quite excited, and she asked if she could wait at my flat to get all the juicy details hot off the press. Of course, I agreed.

I drove to Hobnail's, and from there we took his car to Poplar Close, in case Charlotte recognised my Astra.

Hobnail may be a fine goalkeeper and an amiable chap, but his inability to follow basic directions lets him down badly. After making a wrong turn that took us onto a six-mile stretch of dual-carriageway, it was ten past seven when we rolled up at the target's house. The only visible light came from a tiny gap in the living room curtains, which we watched for about five minutes.

"We don't even know if she's inside," I said.

"At least the bedroom light's not on," Hobnail said. He started the car.

"Where are you going?" I said.

"Round the back."

"What for?"

"Look," Hobnail said, steering the car into a road that ran along the rear of the houses, "there may be a gap in the curtains, and if I spy your auntie parading in her skimpies, well, it's case closed. Covert liaisons are necessarily kept secret; we have to dig for our info."

"Go dig, then," I said, as Hobnail pulled in by a six-foot high wooden fence with a gate that bore the number 26. He left the car.

"Turn the car around, and keep the engine running in case I need to make a sharp exit," he said. I did as he asked, and he gave me the thumbs-up.

I watched as Hobnail grabbed the fence and peeped over the top. He turned a black iron ring, and the gate opened, triggering a second thumbs-up. He went inside, pushing the gate to behind him.

I wound down the window to listen in on the operation. All was quiet for a while, but then a man's voice broke the silence. It was an angry voice.

"A-ha!" the man said, "A burglar, eh? Caught in the act, you vile rat."

There followed the sound of a struggle, with both men shouting, and a dog began to snarl and bark. Someone crashed against the gate, and I saw a pair of hands grip the top of the fence. Hobnail's face appeared momentarily, but he was pulled back down, and the shouting and scuffling continued.

I know that Hobnail can handle himself in a bundle, but I don't think he was having things all his own way, for I heard someone yell, "You bastard, you made me bite my tong-yew." Then I heard a woman's voice. She pleaded for the men to stop fighting.

Seconds later, the gate opened, and Hobnail and a young dachshund ran out together. He got into the car, and I sped off, narrowly missing the dog.

"I think I knocked him out," Hobnail said excitedly, dabbing his tongue to check for blood. "I caught him square in the eye, and his legs buckled. He went down like a Fred Dibnah chimney."

"We need to get away sharpish before the police come," I said, leaving the estate, and heading for the dual-carriageway.

"But, she was there, Jeff," Hobnail said, "she came out to see what was happening. The grey hair, red coat, black collar. It was her all right."

"Oh, well," I said, dismayed, "that's that, I suppose".

Back at home, I told Sonia what had happened. While there was still a slim chance that Charlotte's visit to the man's house may have been innocuous, the evidence suggested it was not.

Over coffee, we discussed my next move, and we decided on a visit to Dickie and Charlotte's to see if we could sense any friction or unusual behaviour. There was even a valid reason for the visit; it was time I introduced Sonia to my relatives properly.

When I pulled the Astra in outside Dickie's house the following evening, the living room curtains were open. I was shocked to see Dickie, Charlotte, and the man from the platform, most likely Hobnail's sparring partner from the previous night, chatting. I wanted to flee, but Charlotte saw me and waved. The reason for Charlotte's tryst with this man would soon be revealed.

As soon as Sonia and I entered the living room, I knew my suspicions had once again been misplaced; the three occupants were getting along quite amicably.

"This is Harry," Charlotte said, indicating the stranger, who had a peach of a black eye.

"Evening," I said.

"Harry has a black eye because he disturbed a burglar at his home last night," Charlotte said, "imagine that!" I looked shocked.

"Come and see this," Dickie said after I turned down his offer of a whisky. He led me to an alcove, where hung two framed pictures of JR, Dickie's recently euthanised Jack Russell dog. "Harry does pet portraits," Dickie went on, "and aren't these lifelike?"

I nodded, and they were indeed lifelike. On one, JR looked straight out from the frame, and on the other, he looked to the right with a piece of knotted rope in his mouth.

"They are exceptional, Uncle," I said. Sonia agreed, although she had never met the little chap.

"I wanted to get them for Christmas," Charlotte said, "but Harry's skills are in demand so I had to wait. Still, they're here now."

"I'm delighted with them, darling," Dickie said. And all was well.

On the way home, we stopped at a shop to get toilet rolls. When we came outside, Sonia dashed back inside for something. I went to the car.

Back in the apartment, Sonia pulled from her coat pocket a net bag containing chocolate coins wrapped in gold foil. She took one of the largest ones, and handed it to me, saying, "Congratulations on winning the gold medal in the wrong-conclusion jump yet again. Well done, Sir." She kissed me on both cheeks.

She laughed. I smiled.