Chapter 7: Men’s sana in corpore sano

0645 hours Thursday 4^th April 2019. Thurston Hall.

DAY 4

I fielded a brief smile from Michelle before Molly and Debbie swooped on her, and the trio, chattering like magpies, moved towards the female dressing room.

“See you at breakfast,” I called after them. Molly raised her hand in acknowledgement but didn’t turn around.

Once into my shorts and tee-shirt, I wandered out into the gym. It was a large hall with all the usual machines: rowing, cycling, and jogging, besides more elaborate contraptions for lifting weights. I spotted a punch bag, speed bag and skipping ropes. The wall bars and a vaulting horse brought back memories of Barking Comprehensive School and the sadistic PT teacher Mr Maggs. We called him Mr Muscles, and he used to bounce around the gym as if he had springs on the soles of his trainers. PT in his case stood for physical torture.

“Hello, I’ve not seen you in here before,” someone said from behind me.

I turned and stared at a reincarnation of Mr Muscles, although it couldn’t be the same person because Mr Maggs had gone to that great gymnasium in the sky not long after I joined the Metropolitan Police. Mr Maggs was married to a much younger Mrs Maggs, a personal trainer and a kick boxer exponent, and his heart had given out after a particularly energetic bout of groin to groin combat with her.

“Err, no. I’ve just transferred from the Met to the East Anglian Constabulary and this is my first visit to the gym. It’s several months since I’ve had a workout –” I could have added ‘or a shag’ “– and I thought to start with an hour of circuit training to get back into the swing of things.”

The man cast an experienced eye over my physique; I could see he was unimpressed. “I suggest you start with just thirty minutes and build up gradually before moving on to the machines.” He pointed to a locker by the side of the wall bars. “There’s a circuit training program sheet on the door of that locker. It’s nothing too severe; press-ups, star jumps, sit-ups, pull-ups, punch bag work and skipping, the usual stuff.” He held out his hand, “My name is Carl, Carl Nixon.”

“Ajay Dolihaye,” I replied and tried not to wince as he crushed my hand. Another PTI sadist! They say ‘all coppers are bastards’ but I reckon PTIs should be added to that saw.

Sadist or not Carl was right; half an hour was enough to start with. In fact fifteen minutes would have been better. I staggered towards the showers, letching en route at the four well-shaped females in leotards bending their lissom and supple bodies into all sorts of interesting and some rather erotically stimulating positions. It was a shock when I realised the quartet of temptresses were Molly, Debbie, Janice, and Michelle. I hurried into the male changing room before my shabby, sweat-stained, shorts betrayed my lust.

The shower revived me and by the time I was dressed in suit and tie I was ready for breakfast. The thought of a Full Monty had me salivating but I decided to keep such a cholesterol loaded treat to one a week. Cereal and toast this morning, I virtuously decided.

From the table alongside the servery I picked up a bowl of what looked like bird feed but was labelled ‘muesli’. The canteen was quiet as it was before the breakfast rush, and I sat alone at a table near the servery. I spooned up a dollop of muesli, put into my mouth and swallowed it, ugh.

“You seem to be really enjoying that, AJ.” Michelle Deveraux stood before me, a smile lighting up her face and my day.

“Muesli is like what my granny says about medicine; ‘if it doesn’t taste horrible then it is not doing you any good’,” I said and stood up.

Michelle looked surprised. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Err, no – but it is polite to stand when a lady...”

“That sort of behaviour went out of fashion when Women’s Lib came in. All genders are equal, although the male gender is more equal than others.” She sat down and so did I.

“Where are the other three?” I said, looking around for Janice, Debbie and Molly.

“I left them after thirty minutes of yoga. They are now at their Tae Kwan Do class.”

“Tae Kwando?”

“Yes, so don’t mess with the Miller girls or Janice Rawlins. All three wear red belts!”

She put down the bowl of cereal she was carrying. “I also went with the muesli. One does get used to it in time,” she said, and started eating with gusto.

It doesn’t take long to eat muesli, if you are lucky, and soon both our bowls were empty, although mine wasn’t as empty as hers.

“I’ll take these back to the servery and make us some toast. Would you prefer marmalade or honey with your toast?” Michelle asked.

“Whatever you’re having will be fine with me.”

“Get two cups of tea from the urn,” she indicated a trolley at the side of the server, “and find a table for two,” she looked around the room and then pointed, “in that secluded corner. We need to talk.”

With that cryptic remark hanging in the air she made her way to the servery.

I poured two cups of tea from the urn and carried them to the table she had indicated. ‘We need to talk’?

The last time a girl said that to me was when Annie Groves was late with her period. Fortunately, it was a false alarm. Annie Groves was a friendly girl, a very friendly girl, and most of the boys and some of the girls, in Year Ten at Barking Comprehensive School had been between Annie’s ample thighs. However, if she had been pregnant, and if the child had been mine, I would have named the kid Houdini for managing to escape from a johnny. I always wore a condom when dipping my wick in Annie; my dad had impressed on me the use, not just to stop unwanted children – Annie was on the pill, as were all Year Ten girls at Barking Comp – but to avoid STDs. My former fiancée didn’t allow unprotected sex with her until I had been passed FFI at a private pox clinic. (FFI: Free From Infection or Fit For Insertion)

“No, I’m not pregnant!” Micky’s voice, and what she said, so startled me I spilt some tea onto the table top.

“How did you... ?”

She grinned. “Men are so easy to read, but I admit I could have used a less alarming phrase.”

She sat down and placed a plate of toast on the table. I had wiped up the spilt tea with the towel from my training kit.

“I’ve got honey and marmalade,” she said, placing the sachets on the table.

“And I’ve got white or brown sugar,” I replied, and did the same.

“I’ll see your Demerara and raise you a thick cut Seville,” she said and we both chuckled. We were back to the easy feeling of yesterday’s breakfast. She sipped her tea, gazing at me over the rim of her cup. “Debbie told me what happened between you and Molly yesterday...”

“Nothing happened between me and Molly yesterday. It was a misunder...”

“It is really none of your business, but for reason I cannot fathom I want you to know the truth of what happened at Caius before I was awarded my doctorate.” She gave me a penetrating look as if trying to delve into my mind, before continuing. “There were rumours aplenty but only one other person apart from me knows the full details, and I really can’t explain why I should want you to know, but I do.” She took a deep breath. “I’m dyslexic. Although dyslexia is considered a language-based learning disorder – a reading disability – it also affects one’s ability to write. I can tell you something quite logically, but should I have to write it down on paper it would be incomprehensible. My essays at school were one huge paragraph with long, run-on sentences. There would be wildly incorrect punctuation, including not capitalising the first word in a sentence or not using end punctuation, no spacing, or incorrect spacing, between words. It is a nightmare to write and even worse to read.”

“How did you manage to gain a BSc, never mind a Masters?”

“There are speech to text programs that allowed me to dictate my course work. Some programs, however, are better than others. One of the first I used translated ‘hedonistic’ as ‘head on a stick’, I kid you not. I obtained a better speech to text program when it came to having my course work reviewed. Exams were not too difficult as a lot consist mainly of multiple-choice questions. During an exam that required written answers, I was placed in a soundproofed booth so I could dictate my answers without being overheard by the other examinees. I had no real difficulty with my BSc or MSc.”

She drained her cup and indicated she would like a refill. I rushed over to the urn and carried back two more filled cups. She thanked me and then, after taking a sip from her fresh cup of tea, continued with her tale. “Being awarded a PhD is completely different from taking a three-year degree course or an extra year to become a Master and then sitting examinations at the end. To gain a PhD you need to persuade/prove to a committee, a panel, of Academics in your field of expertise, that your thesis contributes to the body of knowledge in the discipline and convince them your research adds something completely new and undiscovered to the theoretical body of knowledge in your field. All the research experiments conducted must be indexed and results tabulated, along with the references to the many papers already part of the theoretical body of knowledge one has consulted. Once your thesis is accepted it becomes a brick in the foundation of the subject, thus the text must be accurate, logical and readable. Future postgraduates will refer to the thesis to further their research, as I had referenced publications that had been the theses of past doctorates. The plethora of arcane technical and scientific words scattered through a thesis is too much for even the latest speech to text programs to recognise and translate correctly.” She took a sip of tea, no doubt her throat was getting parched with all the talking.

I was fascinated, enthralled, entranced, but not by the information concerning a doctorate but by the melodic and attractive voice emanating from those soft red lips of that adorable mouth. I imagined how she would sound and look when in the throes of passion. The image sent a jolt of lust to my groin. I pushed the thought from my mind and I concentrated on what she was saying.

“I could record my thesis and have it professionally produced, but the cost would be too much for me. Post-graduate students doing a doctorate are cheap labour for the dons and tutors at college and are employed as researchers, working a five day week eight to five like any wage slave in industry or commerce, and are paid a pittance. I worked evenings and weekends in a bar to pay for luxuries like a visit to a hairdresser, new jeans, and other girly things. The hours were limited, the tips abysmal and the pay even worse. Eventually, I opted for the sort of employment that funds many a female undergraduate and postgraduate studies.”

I swear my heart stopped beating for a second. “You went on the game?”

“No, I joined an Escort Agency. It was explained to me that to make a deal of money one was expected to be ‘extra nice’ to clients. To have my thesis professionally produced I was willing to be extra nice – I would just lay back and think of my PhD! However, my tutor, Professor Galbraith, a lovely man who is also deputy dean of the college, made me another offer...”

“To be extra nice to him?” Anger turned my question to a sneer.

Micky shook her head. “Not exactly, but to do something that would make him and his grandson very happy.”

“A threesome, with an old man and a young boy?” By now my fury was causing me to go red in the face and my neck to swell. At any moment I expected steam to come from my ears.

“You, Detective Sergeant Dolihaye, have a very mucky mind.” I couldn’t decide if she was amused or disgusted by my remark but she had defused the moment. She waited for my rage to subside and then continued. “Galbraith’s grandson Robin was a boy of eighteen who had an incurable illness, some degenerative disease that was wasting him away. His mind was sharp and he looked OK on the surface but had been given less than six weeks to live. Robin was a virgin and he wanted to experience sex with a woman before he died. Professor Galbraith offered to pay for my thesis to be professionally edited and printed if I spent a night with his grandson. We are talking two or three thousand pounds to have a professionally published thesis with extra copies as required for the vetting process. I was already prepared to allow some lecherous out-of-towner slobber all over, and in, me for a couple of hundred pounds a throw. To accrue enough money to get my thesis published would mean me having to take about a dozen dicks inside me. Galbraith’s offer would take only one. It was a no brainer.”

She finished her tea and placed the empty cup on the table with studied deliberation. “I did go away with Professor Galbraith for a dirty weekend. We spent the weekend at Eastbourne, not Brighton as the rumour mill had it, at the house where Robin lived. His parents were not there as Galbraith had sent them off to Dinard for a weekend of rest and recuperation after looking after their son for so long. That night I made love to Robin, a sweet boy and a lovely person. He had no idea of what to do and I took him through all the stages. He never actually orgasmed – neither did I – but he had such a smile of happiness on his face when I rose from his bed the following morning it made me cry. Robin died about two weeks later. I was concerned I might have contributed to his death – I can be quite vigorous at times and Robin was as weak as a kitten. However, Professor Galbraith said not. Hours before Robin passed away he told his grandfather that the night spent with me was the happiest and most wonderful time of his life.”

She dabbed at her eyes with her hanky. “It still makes me well up when I think of Robin, and I’m proud I gave him a memory to cherish before death took him.” Micky blew her nose and composed herself. “So, there you have it. Technically I did prostitute myself because I was paid for sex. The money paid for my thesis to be professionally edited and published. My thesis was accepted by the committee, on which sat Professor Galbraith, and I was awarded a PhD.”

She didn’t say it but I could hear it in her mind. ‘Does that make me a whore?’

At times during her tale her hands had been bunched into fists, but now, with the story told both her hands were flat on the table palms down. I reached over and took hold her left hand, turning the palm uppermost. She didn’t resist but stared at me in anticipation of what I intended to do.

I raised her hand, lowered my head, and then kissed the inside of her wrist, feeling the vein pulsing against my lips. Seconds later I laid her hand back on the table. She looked down at her hand then lifted her eyes to my face.

“You are full of surprises, Detective Sergeant Dolihaye.” There were tears in her eyes but the look on her face filled me with unbounded joy. We sat in quiet communion for several moments before she spoke.

“I have decided to call you Adge.”

“Adge! What on earth is an adge?”

“It’s not a thing but a person. Adge Cutler and The Wurzels.”

“I have never heard of him. Are you sure you are not making this up?”

“I grew up to the sounds of Adge Cutler and The Wurzels, they are famous in Somerset. My father has all their recordings. When he was a teenager he went to all their gigs, most of them were in pubs and he was underage, not that it matters in Somerset – if youm old enough to shag then youm old enough to drink scrumpy, me luvver!”

“I haven’t the faintest idea of what you are talking about, Micky.”

“Well then, m’dear, pin back yer lug ‘oles an’ I’ll tell ‘ee.” Her accent was full-blooded, mangle-wurzling West Country, and there follows a précis of what she told me.

Alan John ‘Adge’ Cutler was the frontman of the folk band The Wurzels. Adge wrote most of the songs the band played, their genre being Scrumpy and Western! Cutler had a dry, West Country, sense of humour and was styled “The Bard of Avonmouth. He was born in Portishead, Somerset and got the nickname ‘Adge’ from his initials, A.J. He generally sung his songs in the Somerset accent though some are in an exaggerated Bristolian dialect. He wrote songs about the county, about the cider industry, the names of villages, and the occupations of the inhabitants, always with a humorous slant and double entendres. Most of the recordings of him and the band are live; pubs and clubs were his venues. Probably the best- known of his songs is Drink Up Thy Zyder“ – It is regarded as the National Anthem of North Somerset and Bristol if not all of Somerset. Adge died in a car crash returning from a gig in Hereford in 1974. However, the Wurzels continued to play his songs and wrote some of their own. Probably their most popular song is The Combine Harvester.

“Okay, Adge I will be, as my initials are the same as his. But don’t expect me to drink scrumpy or shove ferrets down the legs of my corduroy trousers.”

“Thata be girt lush, me luvver,” she said. I heard but did not comprehend, not only the dialect words she threw at me but also the broad Somerset accent used. “So what about your name for me?” She said in impeccable Home Counties accented English.

“Have you a middle name?”

“I have. It begins with A, but I’m not going to tell you what it is.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a silly name. You will laugh when you hear it.”

“No, I won’t. Cross my heart and hope to die.” I made the cross sign over where I thought my heart to be.

“Can I trust you, Adge?”

“Stand on me; I’m an Iron!”

“Is that an affirmative, Adge?” I nodded, and she continued. “My middle name is Anastasia. I told you it was a silly name.”

“It’s a beautiful name. Russian isn’t it?”

“Yes, my mother is a
Crossley, a well- known Somerset family who, for reasons best known to themselves, give their children Russian names. My mother’s name is Natasha, which is quite nice. Her brother is named Yuri, a cross he has had to bear all his life.”

“So your initials are M, A, D. Mad...”

“Mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” she said with a chuckle.

“I’m from Barking and you are Mad. Barking mad! A match made in heaven,” I paused. “Maddy, you shall be Maddy.”

She beamed her killer smile. “That’s wonderful, Adge. Adge and Maddy; I like the sound pattern the names make together – and they go together like biscuits and cheese...”

“Or hell and high water.”

“Or stand and deliver.”

“I think we’d best stop before getting into another round of silly schoolboy and girl names like yesterday,” I said.

“I suppose we should act like adults occasionally,” she glanced at her watch. “Damn, I’ve got a meeting.” She stood up, I followed and she grinned. “Proper little gennelman that Adge do be,” she said in a Somerset accent before reverting to Home Counties. “Same place, same time, tomorrow, Adge?”