Chapter 25: Sing, Sing, or Show Us Yer Ring!

1730 hrs. Friday 12th April 2019. 27 Castle Road

DAY 12

After my confession we spent time just chilling and smooching. I felt drained, not of man juice although Molly had made deep inroads into my supply, but rather emotionally drained. I hadn’t thought about my family for months, years even, and telling Molly the sordid details of my past had brought all the angst and bad feeling back. I knew I had not been a perfect son and was a great disappointment to my mother, and was now a pariah as far as her family was concerned. I had done what I did for revenge and spite rather than for lawful reasons and was more than happy that Lionel and his mother were now suffering the consequences of their criminal behaviour.

“I also have a confession to make,” Molly said, bringing me out of the brown study I had entered.

“You will have done nothing as heinous as I did, informing on your own family,” I said.

“No, but it is something only my parents know. I never even told Denny.”

That interested me. “OK, so what dastardly crimes have you committed? But I forgive you whatever you have done.”

“I haven’t committed a crime, only an omission. The given name on my birth certificate is not Molly but Morgaina.”

“Huh?”

“I told you my parents were into the Arthurian legend? Well, Morgaina was Arthur’s half-sister, also known as Morgan le Fay. No one other than my parents, the registrar, and now you know my real name.”

I said the name aloud. “Morgaina! It has a certain ring to it but you will always be Molly to me, unless you want me to call you by your...”

“No, there’s no need for that. I told you so you know my birth name; it will be a private name between us.”

Like the private names between Michelle Devereux and me, I thought.

Molly glanced at her watch, “Gosh, it is getting on for six o’clock; the time has just flown by. I will have to prepare something for supper, and after we can spend the rest of the evening making love on the settee or the carpet.” She gave a cheeky grin. “Or on the stairs, you pervert!”

“It is the Stairway to Heaven when you are underneath me, Morgaina”

“I’m wet just thinking about it,” she said, her tongue flicking across her lips.

Actually, I was shagged out with what Molly had put me through earlier and wondered if I would be able to do the business on the stairs, carpet, or settee when the time came. However, I came up with an alternative plan in case of being found wanting when making love with Molly.

“Let’s go out for a meal this evening,” I suggested. “It will save you cooking.”

“Out! Like out on a date?”

“Yes, although we have already been out on a date to the Mighty Eighth do.”

“That was in a group. This will be just me and you. That’s a whole different ball game. We will be making a statement.”

“OK, it’s a date and a statement. Will you do me the honour of accompanying me tonight, Missus Miller? What time shall I call for you, and will your Pa be waiting with his shotgun when I bring you home?”

She punched me lightly on the arm, and then kissed me fiercely on the mouth. “Yes, you sweet-talking Lothario, I will be delighted to come out with you tonight. Where shall we go?”

“There’s always the lay by on...”

She punched my arm again. “Seriously, Joshua, where shall we go?”

“You’re a native of this fair town, Molly. You choose.”

“There’s a Seventies Night at the Goat and Compass tonight. We could walk there and not bother about how much we drink.”

“OK, the Goat and Compass it will be. What time do the old people kick-off?”

“What do you mean?”

“You said it was Seventies Night at the Goat. I just wondered what time it will start; them seventy-year-old folk like to be tucked up at home with their cocoa by about nine o’clock.” I moved before she punched my arm again.

“Seventies music night, as if you didn’t know, smart arse!”

“Just so long as we don’t have to dress up in Seventies gear. What is it they say about the Seventies, ‘the decade that style forgot’? I remember seeing an old seventies film with a guy with Big Hair wearing a powder blue leisure suit and those stupid platform shoes. He looked ridiculous, a right plonker, and I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind wearing such crap.”

“I expect in the day it was considered as smart as any Hugo Boss suit and Jimmy Choo footwear.”

We went to the Goat dressed in smart casual modern gear and it appeared most of the other customers did the same, although I did notice a collection of young people wearing clothing probably borrowed from grandparents. Thankfully, no powder blue leisure suits were seen.

We were treated like royalty on arrival at the Goat and Compass, or to be more accurate, Molly was treated like royalty when we arrived at the Goat and Compass. The tall thin guy who had been on the door with a clipboard when I took part in the pub quiz rushed up to us.

“Missus Miller, what an honour!” He shook Molly’s hand as if pumping a well dry. She managed to disengage before her arm was permanently damaged.

“Hello, Phillip.” She turned to me, “Phillip is the pub landlord.”

He eyed me. “We’ve met before. You were with the Sweeny team at the last but one pub quiz.”

“That’s extraordinary you can remember me. We only met for a moment.”

“I never forget a face,” he said with pride in his voice.

“It’s the mark of a good pub landlord that every customer is in his mental database,” Molly said.

“The Sweeny team did well that night. Came second, didn’t you?” Phil said. “Pity you weren’t available for the following week as the Sweeny came last. I suppose you were too busy to attend last Wednesday?”

“Yes, I was rather tied up at the time.” In fact, Molly and I had been having mad monkey sex on the kitchen table, or it might have been on the dining room table, or the lounge carpet, or on the stairs. Whatever, I was tied up in a sweaty love knot for most if not all of Wednesday evening and night.

“Errol will be tickled pink to see you, and...” Before Phil finished speaking the door that I assumed led to the kitchen flew open and a gorilla of a man dressed in chef’s whites came into the bar. He looked as if he might moonlight as a cage fighter. He wore a ferocious scowl on his face and owned a pair of shoulders that had difficulty passing through the door. His sleeves were rolled up and his arms bore more ink than a printer’s devil. There were more tattoos on his bull neck and the parts of his gigantic chest not covered by his whites. He picked up Molly as if she were a feather.

“Molly, my love. It’s so good to see you.” His voice was surprisingly gentle and the scowl on his face changed to a beaming smile that showed a set of teeth a great white would have been proud of. He placed Molly back on terra firma and looked at me with questioning eyes.

Molly made the introduction. “Errol Flynn, meet Joshua Dolihaye.” I was rather hesitant when holding out my hand, expecting it to be crushed to a powder, however, Errol’s grip was nothing more than firm.

“Pleased to meet you, Joshua. Any friend of Molly’s is a friend of mine,” he said. “And I hope you are treating her right; Molly is a diamond.”

“The Koh-i-Noor,” I said.

He turned back to Molly. “This bloke seems to be OK.”

Molly slipped her arm in mine. “Joshua is much better than OK, Errol. He’s Kushti!“

Errol grinned. “I’m glad to hear it, whatever that is. But while you’re here would you mind taking a look at the beef stroganoff I’m working on?”

She and he walked towards the kitchen but before entering Molly looked over her shoulder at me.

“Will you get me a VAT please, Joshua. I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

I went to the bar where a dark-eyed blonde-haired female of about thirty- five years of age, with a pair of tits that rivalled Sharon Douglas’s, awaited me. A name tag strategically placed on her right breast proclaimed her to be ‘Isabelle’.

“So that’s the famous Molly Miller,” she said.

“Yes, I believe she worked here some time ago.”

“Yeah, it was about twelve years ago, long before I started. The way Phil and Errol talk about her I was expecting an amalgam of Mother Teresa, Delia Smith and Dolly Parton.” She saw my look of incomprehension. “As saintly as Mother Teresa, cooks as well as Delia, and sings like Dolly when they had Country and Western nights. Actually, she looks to be a really nice person. So what can I get you?”

“Err, a VAT, whatever that is, and a pint of Murphy’s.”

“A VAT is a Vodka and Tonic, love, it’s what all the girls drink. Where have you been, in a monastery?”

“My ex-fiancée’s tipple of choice was Bacardi and bitter lemon.”

“A posh piece was she?” Isabelle asked. I nodded. “Thought so,” she said, and pulled my pint. While it settled she concocted the VAT. I had just paid for the drinks when Molly returned.

“Let’s sit over there,” she said pointing to a corner table. “We can eat in here and afterwards go to the function room for the Seventies night.”

I sat at the table and noticed there were no menus.

“We need a menu,” I said and rose to get one from the bar.

“No need, Joshua. I’ve ordered the beef stroganoff. Errol wants my professional opinion. It’s something new on his menu and he wants to see how Joe Public will take to it.”

“And we are Joe Public?”

“Yes, I’m the professional and you are the amateur. An extremely gifted amateur in the bedroom department I might add.” She kissed me, and over her shoulder I saw Isabelle give a thumbs-up sign as she mouthed, ‘you’re on a promise tonight!’

The beef stroganoff was delicious. If I had had a slice of bread I would have wiped my plate even cleaner.

“I take it you enjoyed that, Joshua?” Molly said dabbing her mouth with a napkin, her plate equally as clean as mine.

“Bloody marvellous, the man’s a genius. He should be on the telly; it would certainly put Jamie Oliver’s and that foul-mouthed Jock’s, noses out of joint.”

“Yes, Errol is a first-rate chef and should be in a five-star restaurant but he is happy here and the owners are glad to have him.” Molly finished her drink. “I wouldn’t mind another one of these, Joshua, as I’m not driving tonight.”

I went to the bar and got another VAT, but when I came back to the table Molly had vanished. ‘Probably gone to the bogs’ I thought and sat and finished my pint. I was about to get a refill when Molly returned from the kitchen.

“I told Errol that both the professional and amateur gave the stroganoff full marks. He was well pleased.”

“I’d better pay for...”

“The meals are free, as we were asked to rate them.”

“Well, I would like to show my appreciation.” I pulled a twenty-pound note from my wallet walked back to the bar. “What’s Chef’s favourite drink?” I asked Isabelle.

“Parfait d’Amour,” she said.

“Perfect love! Is that some sort of cocktail?”

“It’s a liqueur. It is the base for many cocktails but Chef likes it neat.”

“Do you have a bottle?”

“There might be one under the counter. Why?”

“I’d like to buy Chef a bottle to show my appreciation of his gastronomic skills.”

“What do I need to do for you to show me your appreciation and buy me a bottle of something, or something?” She was coming on to me and really chancing her arm.

“We best not go there, Isabelle. I’m with a female who is a mixture of Mother Teresa, Delia Smith and Dolly Parton. Anyone of them would kick your arse if they thought you were trying to get off with me.”

She laughed. “You’ve got me there, boss, and a bottle of Parfait d’Amour is fifteen pounds ninety-nine pence.”

I handed her a twenty-pound note. “And have something for yourself with the change.”

“You are a sweety. No wonder Wonder Woman Molly Miller keeps tabs on you. She’s looking over here with a glint in her eye that could mean trouble for someone.”

“That would be for you, Isabelle,” I said, and then returned to our table.

“Was that tart trying to get off with you?” Molly asked, and I could see she was angry.

“She was just having a laugh.”

“Well, it had better not be anything else otherwise she will be looking for another job.” I wasn’t sure whether Molly was being serious; if she was it showed a side of her that Mother Teresa would not have recognised.

The function room was filling up when we entered and as we looked around for a free table I saw Jim Barlow sat alongside a very tasty dark-haired female. Jim saw me and waved me over. Molly also saw him.

“Oh, it’s Jim with his wife, Gina. She’s lovely.”

Jim introduced me to Gina, who obviously had Italian ancestry given her dark brown eyes and lustrous black hair but her accent was pure ‘Gor’ blimey’ London. As we were talking Bill Clark and Megan Bolton arrived.

“It must be Cockney Corner here,” he said. Jim, Gina, and I snorted in mock anger.

“We’re not Cockneys, are we?” Jim said looking at me.

“Not guilty. I’m from Barking,” I replied.

“And I’m from Plaistow,” said Gina, “but married to a bloody Spurs supporter from Tottenham.”

“You must be an Iron,” I said to her.

“Bloody right I am. And so must you be, being born in the same manor as the sainted Bobby Moore.”

“That’s all I need,” said Jim. “Two Hammers, one each side of me. But as we are in neutral territory let’s call a truce.”

“Suits me,” I said. “How long have you two been married?”

Gina smiled. “Eighteen years, and never a cross word other than when our two teams meet, and then there are some rather heated exchanges.”

While this conversation was taking place the others had been looking on in amazement.

“You Londoners, and your tribal loyalties to football clubs, it must cause more marriage break ups than adultery,” Bill said. “But to bring some serenity to the table, this beautiful lady accompanying me is Megan, who is a nurse at the West Suffolk hospital and can fix any broken bones that might ensue if these Cockneys come to blows.”

‘We’re not Cockneys,’ the trio of Londoners said but to no avail. Anyone from London is dubbed a Cockney; never mind if they are born within the sound of the bells of St Mary-le-Bow or not.

“My round, as I’m the new boy here,” I said. “What is everyone having?”

The girls all plumped for VATs and the boys for bottles of Abbot Ale, other than me and I had my usual can of Murphy’s. Easy, peasy, lemonysqueezy.

I carried the tray of drinks back to the table where Megan was concluding the tale of some hilarious happening at the hospital concerning a bedpan and an officious National Health Service mandarin. I got back in time to hear the punch line.

“ ... and covered in confusion and excrement!”

The rest of the table howled with laughter, and it was obvious all were enjoying each other’s company. I looked around the rapidly filling room and noticed Liza and Gloria sat at a table across the way from us. They were deep in conversation with two equally tasty females and I wondered if they were a ménage à quatre when Gloria looked up and saw me. She waved, tapped Liza on the arm and pointed towards me. Molly noticed where I was looking and smiled.