Only Lovers Left Alive Read online

  “Going on about it must’ve set him off, then,” said Ernie Wilson. He was listened to with respect, his three weeks in a Remand Home giving him a certain cachet. “All that dozey lot of teachers may chuck themselves out of the windows one day. They must be mugs or they wouldn’t be doing the job in the first place.”

  “Look at the way he used to dress,” said the elegant Charlie Burroughs, glancing in the mirror behind the counter and patting his crimped helmet of a hair-set even lower over his forehead.

  Ernie Wilson favoured the leather-grained black plastic jacket act. Above the waist he dressed for the Arctic Circle and below it, with thin, tight jeans, nylon socks and pointed, pli­able shoes, for the Tropics. He was unwilling to have the con­versation seized by drips. He started punching his points home with the ancient cockney pecking gesture of fore­finger, in some way making it seem an invention of his own gen­eration. “But he was always a proper square, like the lot of them. Only this time you was all up there, going on about your Civics and that and suicide. And the thought of it, work­ing on him, see? made him do it. It’s psychological, see?” His gimmick was to sprawl astride his high stool as if it were the backless corner chair of a boxing ring and glower at all comers. Since his second arrest, at fourteen, he always faced the entrance and he was thus the first to see Mr. Tellen of the local paper peer through the steamy glass panel of the door. “There’s that bloke from the local rag. He’s a right one. He told my Dad he could keep my name out of the paper and the old feller was just going to slip him a quid when I had to tell him you was always kept anonymous in the Juvenile Court anyway.”

  Kathy Williams, now in spongebag check tights, Sloppy Joe sweater and stiletto heels swung one leg off her stool and waved to the black overcoat and Tyrolean hat floating in the fluorescent lighting of the street. An arm waved back and the door started to open. “He spelt my name wrong when I won the high jump in the sports,” said Kathy. “But he apologised ever so nicely later.”

  “Oh, natch,” said Charlie Burroughs.

  Mr. Tellen advanced smiling and took off his heavy, black-framed glasses to wipe the steam which had formed the moment he came in. He dressed in the neatest and most up-to-date fashion though the style was about ten years too young for him. When he put on his cleaned glasses and widened his smile all his face seemed to be composed of bits added to the original structure, moustache – dark and semi-military, glasses like those of an executive in an Air Line ad. and the brim of the green feathered hat snapped down concealing the fretful lines of a weak forehead.

  “Well, well,” he halted and swallowed over the right form of address, “this is sad news, kids.”

  “Couldn’t be sadder, kid, could it?” said Charlie Burroughs.

  Ernie Wilson tilted his stool back against the counter’s edge and glowered in imitation of a baddie in a Western and drawled, “Wadya want, kid?”

  Mr. Tellen drew his trade’s thick hide around him and pressed on. “I suppose you youngsters must know, must’ve known, Mr. Oliver? You’ve heard the news, of course? Inquest Wednesday so one of my sources tells me. Accident I suppose? Do you think those windows are too low? Ever had building inspectors round since you were in the school? Must be a great shock to you youngsters, eh? I’m sorry to be putting all these questions. There’s a reason, there’s something going on I don’t quite under­stand yet.”

  “Eff-off, youngster or I’ll do you,” said Ernie Wilson and they all looked at him coldly and calmly. A square, who was not even a teacher, trying to interfere in a school matter! They felt an odd loyalty to an institution they loathed and to a dead man they despised.

  “There’s something funny about all this,” said Mr. Tellen.

  “Yeah, your hat,” said Ernie Wilson and the others laughed.

  However, vanity, the excitement of the event and a desire to be in the know defeated the pose of worldliness, as Mr. Tellen knew it would, sooner or later.

  “What’s going on then?” asked a boy. “You got his name for the paper. You’ll be at the inquest, what do you want us to say?”

  Ernie Wilson changed his manner to that of a private eye. “What’s in it for us?” he asked.

  “Well, my dear young people. You’ve been seeing too many films. I don’t have a big expense account and the paper doesn’t pay for its information. I’ll buy the next round of coffee but that’s because I like young people not because . . .”

  “Pity it’s not mutual,” murmured Charlie Burroughs.

  “. . . not because,” continued Mr. Tellen, “I expect to make a fortune out of anything exclusive you young people may tell me. Now, eight coffees, is it?”

  “And a packet of fags to put on the counter,” said Ernie Wilson.

  “Oh, very well,” sighed Mr. Tellen.

  “Flip-top twenty Players,” said Charlie Burroughs.

  “Angelica, Angelica,” they all called to the West Indian wait­ress. “Same again and a packet of flips.” She commenced to serve the order.

  “Who paying?” asked Angelica.

  “This dear young person in the peasant-type titfer,” said Charlie.

  “Now, about Mr. Oliver,” said Mr. Tellen. Suddenly the group were quiet and, to protect themselves from pity or even, possibly, grief became tougher.

  “He chucked hi’self out the bleedin’ window. Pity you never thought of doin’ it,” said Ernie tilting his stool and look­ing round as if to acknowledge the applause of a crowd of ringside fans. “What is there to talk about? If he wanted to do himself in he was entitled, I reckon.”

  “What do any of you know about him,” persisted Mr. Tellen. He shook his head becoming all the dogged news hound on a tough assignment, and his large glasses wobbled slightly.

  “Did he ever coach any of the girls; privately? You know?”

  They all started to laugh and shout, “Old Olly and the girls. That’s a thought that is.”

  Mr. Tellen blinked behind the heavy glasses, but held his ground. It was no worse than standing in the rain reporting a local Saturday afternoon football match.

  “Boys, perhaps?” he hinted.

  “Listen to him! saying old Olly was a pouf, now. Why don’t you drop dead?”

  And so on, until Mr. Tellen said, “Listen, I shouldn’t let on about this, but there’s a reason why this business, this sad busi­ness I should say, is out of the ordinary.” They stopped laugh­ing one by one and looked at him. “The fact of the matter is, there’s something happened I don’t understand yet. There, I’m being frank with you, I trust young people, you see. Now, I know you’re waiting to hear what it is that’s puzzling me.”

  “Dig this guy,” said Ernie. “Sure, we’re hangin’ on your every word, newshawk.” But, in truth, so they were.

  Mr. Tellen, with slow, dramatic fumblings took out a folded copy of a popular paper. He turned to its most famous feature, How I See It Chums, by Alf Neighbour. Eight million people listened to him seeing it every day and viewed him chatting to them in Over the Neighbour’s Fence, on Sundays. For a moment the group thought it must be something to do with Alf Neighbour’s item for that day, “Who Gets the Pennies When The Stamp Machine Don’t Deliver, Chums? Biggest National Disgrace Since I Stopped The Chancellor’s Un­expired Dog Licence Racket”, but Mr. Tellen was only hold­ing it up as a solemn and identifying prelude to his announcement.

  “Mr. Neighbour himself is on the way down here,” he said. “His secretary ’phoned the paper. I’m to meet him at the tube in half an hour.” He brought this forth as if he had just been asked to make practical arrangements for the Second Advent. His manner hinted at the fact that he was an unworthy vessel and, for the first time, they warmed to him a little.

  They drifted off to the corner by the tube steps with him and, once out of the Tropic Night, spoke to him politely, “Do you know Alf Neighbour, yourself, Mr. Tellen?” asked Kathy Williams.

  “We’ve met once or twice in the course of business. I don’t suppose he remembers me,” replied Mr. Tel
len, recollecting that any bluff might be called as soon as the great man arrived.

  “What do you think he wants to know about it, Mr. Tellen?”

  “How do the big papers like that get to hear of things?”

  “Must be an interesting job, Mr. Tellen.”

  After this burst a silence fell. They might have been out for a walk with their parents or a teacher. They were now a hundred miles farther away than when baiting him in the café.

  A car drew up just short of the corner and out bounced Alf Neighbour, fastening a smoke-grey suede coat with a loose belt round his stocky figure. A tall, bespectacled photographer in a soiled gaberdine clambered out and stood beside him. Mr. Tellen scurried over with the children trailing behind. The boys swaggered more than usual. “Dig that suede overcoat,” said Charlie Burroughs.

  “Here we are, Mr. Neighbour, here we are,” said Mr. Tellen. “These are some young friends of mine, some of them know Mr. Oliver, er, knew him . . . I was able to get them together for you.” He lowered his voice, “Had to spend a bit on them you know. . . .”

  “Let me get me breath, chum, before I start getting out me bloomin’ wallet,” said Alf Neighbour.

  “Oh, I wasn’t hinting at a facilities fee, Mr. Neighbour. It’s just that as they knew this Oliver. . . .”

  “Who’s Oliver?” asked Alf Neighbour, “Oh, he’s the nut-case who’s just defenestrated.”

  Mr. Tellen blinked and set his glasses straight. “I thought you knew something about him. I mean when your secretary ’phoned I thought there must be some special dope on him of some sort, now it seems you don’t even know his name. What’s going on, I mean . . . ?”

  “Explain later, chum,” said Mr. Neighbour as the gang gathered round. He nodded and smiled to them and turned to the stooped photographer who had plainly seen it all before, many times. “Get the chick,” he commanded.

  “Get in the car, dear,” said the photographer.

  “Likely!” said Kathy. “What do you think I am?”

  “You dirty old man,” said Ernie.

  “You got it wrong, kids,” said Mr. Neighbour. “Just for the picture. Getting out of the car, as it might be hers.”

  “O.K.,” said Kathy. The photographer bent at the knees like a boxer ducking.

  “She’s a tall girl, watch it thigh-wise,” instructed Alf Neigh­bour. “This story’s sobs not sex.”

  “You do your job, Neighbour and I’ll do mine,” said the photographer.

  “Watch your talk, Harry. I’ve told you before,” said Alf Neigh­bour.

  “Now one foot out, dear and smile at me. No, not like that, sad but brave. ‘He was a good teacher, we’ll all miss him’ – that sort of smile, remembering like, how you’ll miss him.”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Charlie Burroughs. “How much was that coat Mr. Neighbour?”

  “My accountant sees to all that,” said Alf Neighbour. “Now cats get me with it. What do you know?”

  A few moments of their callow comment was enough for him. He turned to Tellen and drew him aside. “Here’s a proposition for you. This business tonight is not what I’m interested in in itself. I want you to keep on to every suicide in your paper’s area and get straight on to me with all the full gen. Everything about it, particularly the case facts, age of victim, method of doing themselves in and so on. Never mind the evidence about state of mind, and had he any worries, and all that. Leave that to my boys if we need it. Half a guinea for every case, whether we use your information or not, and five guineas every time you let us know first, by more than two hours. All right by you?”

  “Of course, Mr. Neighbour. There’s not all that many cases in the district.”

  “How many?” said Alf Neighbour.

  “Well, I don’t know exactly. Sometimes the inquest’s held over in another district, where the hospital is or something like that.”

  “And sometimes, there isn’t an inquest at all,” said Alf Neigh­bour mysteriously. “Come on Harry. Never mind posing that chick again. You’ll never make a Karsh of Ottawa of yourself, boyo. It’s still early. We might get time to take in that South Acton one.” They lowered themselves into the black Jaguar. Mr. Neighbour waved through the window, glanced round and swung the car away.

  “Dig that jag,” said Ernie.

  “Dig that driving,” said Charlie.

  “What’s going on, Mr. Tellen? Where’s he off to now?”

  “I wish I knew,” said Mr. Tellen.

  “Thought you newshawks knew everything,” said Ernie.

  “No, they only know how to choose hats,” said Charlie Burroughs.

  “When you going to get one of those suede coats, Mr. Tellen?”

  “When is he going to get one of those cars, you mean.”

  “How about another cup of coffee, Mr. Tellen?”

  “And another packet of fags.”

  “Goodnight, boys and girls,” said Mr. Tellen and scurried down the tube steps.

  “What shall we do?” said Ernie. The sense of occasion brought about by the recent events and the manner in which Alf Neighbour had swooped off to fresh excitement left them restlessly empty, as if they had taken knife and fork to a mouthful of froth.

  From the crossroads sodium-lighted thoroughfares, hung with a cold, late-night mist, stretched away to worlds where men in suede coats jumped in and out of jags and got paid for it.

  Some young worshippers of thirteen or so who fringed the group drifted off self-consciously. It was now ten o’clock and they were still susceptible to parental disapproval and the withdrawal of pocket money.

  Three of the boys were for going back to the coffee bar and some of the girls for walking on to the next. They discussed fantasies which livened and warmed the wintry street corner.

  “Let’s phone one of the other papers, not that Neighbour’s, and tell them about him being down here and make up some things about it so they’d give us some lolly,” said Charlie.

  “You get fifty guineas for exclusive news, my uncle told me,” said a tall youth in a white imitation leather coat with a tartan collar and lining.

  “We could make up some story about why he did it, keep it going. Tell them he might’ve been pushed.”

  “You’d have the rozzers round if you done that.”

  “Imagine if they gave you a hundred quid for saying you were his favourite pupil and how he once tried to make you and that.”

  “But that’s slander or something.”

  “So it’s slander, so what,” said Ernie in his film imitation Bronx-Jewish voice.

  “You could get a drag for a hundred quid,” said Ernie in his Laurence Harvey voice.

  “Or at least a good scooter,” said Kathy in her own voice.

  This seemed to kill the act because they all fell silent and started to drift not towards a telephone, Fleet Street and money but towards their home streets.

  They stopped in familiar darkened doorways and shadowed corners for some moments of uncomfortably cold fumblings and fondlings.

  “I have to go now,” said Kathy. “My mum’ll kill me if I’m late again.”

  She was with Ernie that night. The gang had a strict bar against steadies. If you started going steady you were not ex­pelled, you just left. Ernie commenced to work towards her breasts again. “No,” she said. “I told you, I must go.”

  “Wish my mum worried over me like that,” said Ernie.

  “You’re a boy, it’s different.”

  Ernie let her go. The gang had its code in such matters. She had let him have it twice. After that if a girl said no, it wasn’t the thing to force it.

  “Poor old Olly,” said Kathy as they walked to her door.

  “What if all the squares was to jump out of windows,” said Ernie. “Imagine.”

  2

  The school held a special assembly, with the younger children excluded, “Well done thou good and trusty servant” and “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” The staff all treated the business as an
accident. Emergency timetable changes were announced to cover Mr. Oliver’s lessons.

  After school Kathy Williams sat swinging her long legs from a table in the prefects’ room. A copy of Alf’s newspaper passed from hand to hand. “Not a word,” said Charlie Bur­roughs, “not a single word. Where’s the photo of you getting out of the car?”

  As if to convince themselves they turned again to Alf Neigh­bour’s own page – “Does Your Missus Still Darn Your Sox For You, Chums? My new investigation shows affluence now flowing to the feet as the darning needle follows the mangle to the junk yard.” They discussed this strange silence.

  “All the papers are the same, not a word,” said Kathy.

  “Let’s phone that Tellen and ask him.”

  “Ask him what?”

  “Ask him where he gets his hats.”

  “Oh, stop going on about his hat. This is serious. There’s something fishy going on.”

  “Call Interpol, then.”

  They fell into one of their regular clownings. “Let’s go and phone Tellen, then. Over.”

  “Agreed. With your fourpence, though!”

  “Calling all cars, calling all cars. Who has fourpence?”

  “Have fourpence, over.”

  “Roger. Rendezvous at phone box corner of Wellington Road. Over and Out.”

  Seven or eight clustered around the kiosk and three squeezed into it.

  Kathy did the talking. “Can we, I mean can I speak to Mr. Tellen, please?”

  “Who is it speaking?” asked a very tired man’s voice. She explained.

  “Oh, you are not a relative at all, nor a close personal friend?” Kathy giggled.

  “What’s happening? What’s he saying?” the others de­manded.

  “Shush,” said Kathy, and “No, not at all, it was just about our teacher, you know, poor Mr. Oliver. Mr. Tellen was asking us about it and we wondered, as there’s been nothing in the papers at all . . . He what! Oh, I see. No. Well thank you.” She hung up.