Part 37 (1/2)

'I think I should like to go home now . . .'

'. . . You shall go soon,' said Miss Havisham, aloud. 'Play the game out . . .'

Charles d.i.c.kens, Great Expectations I.

1.39.QUESTION 'Once there were four children named Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy ' So begins the most famous work of a scholar, novelist and Christian apologist But what is the name of the book7 ANSWER The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe The cliche about meeting famous people in the flesh, of course, is that they're often disappointingly a lot smaller than they appear on the screen. But in real life Bamber Gascoigne is actually a lot bigger than I'd imagined; very slim, and smiley, and surprisingly good-looking, like a benevolent character from C.S. Lewis who's about to take you on an amazing adventure, but with s.e.x appeal. The four of us are stood in a line in the TV studios, waiting nervously, and he's working his way down the line, a little like a Royal Variety Performance.

Alice is avoiding me, and is first in the line, so I can't hear what she's saying to him but presume that she's attempting to seduce him. Then Patrick, who's practically doubled over with humility, and is making a big show of having met him before, this time last year, and is acting as if they're big, big pals, like they've been on holiday together or whatever. Bamber's very charming, smiling a lot, and saying, 'Yes, yes of course I remember you!' when he's probably thinking 'who the h.e.l.l is this idiot?'

Then Lucy, who is incredibly quiet and nice as usual, and then it's my turn. The question is do I call him Bamber, or 333.

Mr Gascoigne? He approaches, shakes my hand, and 1 say: 'Pleased to meet you, Mr Gascoigne.'

'Oh, please, call me Bamber,' he says, grinning broadly, taking my hand in his two hands. 'And your name is?'

'Brian, Brian Jackson,' I mumble.

'. . . reading?'

'Eng. Lit.' I say.

'Beg your pardon?' he says, and leans in.

'Eng-lish Lit-erature,' I say loudly, over-enunciating this time, and I notice Bamber recoiling, almost imperceptibly, and guess that it's because he can smell the alcohol on my breath, and has realised that I'm pretty much p.i.s.sed out of my head.

Despite the best efforts of the licensing authorities, the fact remains that no matter how late it is, you can always get a drink if you need it badly enough.

After I run from Alice's room at Kenwood Manor, I walk the streets for a while, trying to calm down, trying to stop shaking, until I find myself outside The Taste of The Raj, a curry house that doubles as a sort of Indian speak-easy; you can drink pretty much all night, as long as you're always within ten feet of an onion bhaji.

Tonight, at just gone midnight, the place is empty. 'Table for one?' asks the solitary waiter.

'Yes, please,' and he shows me to a booth at the very back of the restaurant, near the kitchen. I open the menu, and notice that The Taste of The Raj is offering an extra-special, bitterly ironic Valentine's Day Menu for couples out on a romantic date, but decide that even though the menu represents good value for money, I doubt if I'd be able to swallow anything. Besides, I'm not here for the food. I order a pint of lager, two poppadoms, an onion bhaji, and a gin and tonic.

'No main course, sir?'

'Maybe later,' I say. And the waiter nods mournfully, as if 334.

lie unclei stands the sometimes brutal workings of the human heart, and goes to get my booze. I've finished both the pint of lager and the gin and tonic before I even hear the ping of the microwave from the kitchen behind me. The waiter slides the warmed-through onion bhaji in between my elbows on the table, and I offer up the empty gla.s.ses.

'Another pint of lager, and a gin please. No tonic this time,' and the sad-eyed waiter nods wisely, and sighs, and heads off to get my order.

'And, excuse me?' - I shout after him - 'could you make the gin a double?' Half-heartedly, I pick the crust off the onion bhaji and dip it into the sweet, watery mint yoghurt, and when the waiter returns with my drinks, I sip the top inch off the pint and pour in the gin, stir it with the handle of my fork, and think about all the things that I know.

I know the difference between a pterosaur, a pteranadon, a pterodactyl and a ramphorhynchus. I know the Latin name for most of the common domestic British birds. I know the capital cities of nearly every country in the world, and most of the flags too. I know that Magdalen College is p.r.o.nounced Maudlin College. I know the complete plays of Shakespeare except Timon of Athens, and the complete novels of Charles d.i.c.kens except Barnaby Rudge, and all the Narnia books, and the order in which they were all written, approximate in the case of Shakespeare. I know every lyric of every song Kate Bush has ever recorded, including B-sides, as well as the highest chart position of every single she's released. I know all the French irregular verbs, and where the phrase 'toe the line' comes from, and what the gall bladder's for, and how oxbow lakes are formed, and all the British monarchs in order, and the wives of Henry VIII and their fate, the difference between igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks, and the dates of the major battles of the War of the Roses, the meanings of the words 'albedo', 'peripatetic' and 'litotes', and the average number of hairs on a human head, and how to crochet, and 335.

the difference between nuclear fission and fusion and how to spell deoxyribonucleic and the constellations of the stars and the population of the earth and the ma.s.s of the moon and the workings of the human heart. And yet the important and most basic things, like friends.h.i.+p, or getting over Dad dying, or loving someone, or just simply being happy, just being good and decent and dignified and happy, seem to be utterly and completely beyond my comprehension. And it occurs to me that I'm not clever at all, that in fact I am without a doubt the most ignorant, the most profoundly and hopelessly stupid person in the whole world.

I start to feel a bit blue, so to cheer myself up I order another pint of lager and another double gin, pour the gin into the lager, stir it with my fork, dip a shard of poppadom into the mango chutney, and the next thing I remember is waking up in my clothes at 6.30 in the morning.

'Brian! Brian, wake up . . .'

'Leave me alone . . .' I say, and pull the duvet up over my head.

'Brian, come on, we're late . . .' Someone's shaking me by the shoulder. I push their hand away.

'It's still night-time - go away.'

'It's 6.30 in the morning, Brian, we're due at the studio at 9.30, and we're not going to make it. Come on, get up . . .' and Patrick yanks the duvet back. 'You've been sleeping in your clothes?'

'No . . . I' I say indignantly, but pretty unconvincingly, since I clearly am asleep, and wearing clothes. 'I got cold in the night, that's all . . .'

Patrick yanks the duvet off completely.

'You've still got your shoes on!'

'My feet got cold!'

'Brian - have you been drinking?'

'No ... I'

336.

'Brian, I thought we had an agreement - an early night and no drinking before the match . . .'

'I have not been drinking!' I slur, hauling myself upright, hearing the gin and lager and the onion bhaji settling in my stomach.

'Brian, I can smell it on your breath! What's your mattress doing on the floor, anyway?'

'He says it's a futon,' says Josh from the doorway, s.h.i.+vering in his underpants. Marcus peers, blinking over his shoulder.

'I had to wake your flatmates up to get in,' explains Patrick.

'Ooooops. Sorry Josh, sorry Marcush . . .'

'I don't believe it - you're still drunk!'

'I'm not drunk! Five minutes - just give me five more minutes!'

'You've got three minutes. I'll be waiting downstairs in the car,' snarls Patrick, and flounces out, followed by Josh and Marcus. I sigh, rub my face with my hands, sit on the edge of the futon.

I remember Alice.

I go to my wardrobe, and take out Dad's brown corduroy jacket.

The journey to Manchester is pretty grim. We're travelling in Alice's 2CV, and she gives me a patronising little no-hard feelings smile, which I pretend not to see as I clamber in the back, the crisp packets and shattered ca.s.sette cases crunching underfoot. I tug the door shut by means of the length of was.h.i.+ng-line that pa.s.ses for a door-handle, and the exertion causes me to belch a little, the air hissing through clenched teeth. Dr Lucy Chang detects this, makes her diagnosis, and gives me the hospital smile that they teach her to use as part of her training. I pull my coat up under my chin like a blanket as we set off, and try to ignore the lurching of the 2CV, which apparently seems to have no suspension at all, and feels like the Waltzers at a fun fair.

337.

Needless to say good old Patrick has prepared several hundred questions for the journey as a fun, fun warmup, all meticulously typed on 6 by 4 index cards, and he insists on bellowing them out very loudly over the noise of the 2CV's lawnmower engine as we judder along the motorway at a steady 55 miles per hour. I resolve not to answer any of them, just to teach them all a lesson. The trick about getting through today is to remain dignified. Pride and Dignity, that's the key. That, and not throwing up on myself.