A Darker Shade of Blue (34 page)

There were times when we all wondered; wondered what it was going to be. Times when he seemed to be chasing death so hard, he had to catch up. Times when he didn't care.

Jimmy rang me this morning, not long after I'd got back from the shops. Bread, milk, eggs – the paper – gives me something to do, a little walk, reason to stretch my legs.

‘You all right?' he says.

‘Of course I'm all right.'

‘You know what day it is?'

I hold my breath; there's no point in shouting, losing my temper. ‘Yes, Jimmy, I know what day it is.'

There's a silence and I can sense him reaching for the words, the thing to say – You don't fancy meeting up later? A drink, maybe? Nice to have a chat. It's been a while.

‘Okay, then, Anna,' he says instead, and then he hangs up.

*

There was a time when we were inseparable, Jimmy, Val, Patrick and myself. Studio 51, the Downbeat Club, all-nighters at the Flamingo, coffee at the Bar Italia, spaghetti at the Amalfi. That place on Wardour Street where Patrick swore the cheese omelettes were the best he'd ever tasted and Val would always punch the same two buttons on the jukebox, B19 and 20, both sides of Ella Fitzgerald's single, ‘Manhattan' and ‘Every Time We Say Goodbye'.

Val loved that song, especially.

He knew about goodbyes, Val.

Later, anyway.

Back then it was just another sad song, something to still the laughter. Which is what I remember most from those years, the laughter. The four of us marching arm in arm through the middle of Soho, carefree, laughing.

What do they call them? The fifties? The years of austerity? That's not how I remember them, '56, '57, '58. Dancing, music and fun, that's what they were to me. But then, maybe I was too young, too unobservant, too – God! it seems impossible to believe or say – but, yes, too innocent to know what was already there, beneath the surface. Too stupid to read the signs.

Patrick, for instance, turning away from the rest of us to have quick, intense conversations in corners with strangers, men in sharp suits and sharp haircuts, Crombie overcoats. The time Patrick himself suddenly arrived one evening in a spanking new three-piece suit from Cecil Gee, white shirt with a rolled Mr B collar, soft Italian shoes, and when we asked him where the cash came from for all that, only winking and tapping the side of his nose with his index finger – mind yours.

Val, those moments when he'd go quiet and stare off into nowhere and you knew, without anyone saying, that you couldn't speak to him, couldn't touch him, just had to leave him be until he'd turn, almost shyly, and smile with his eyes.

And Jimmy, the way he'd look at me when he thought no one else was noticing; how he couldn't bring himself to say the right words to me, even then.

And if I had seen them, the signs of our future, would it have made any difference, I wonder? Or would it all have turned out the same? Sometimes you only see what you want to until something presses your face so fast up against it there's nothing else you can do.

But in the beginning it was the boys and myself and none of us with a care in the world. Patrick and Jimmy had known one another since they were little kids at primary school, altar boys together at St Pat's; Val had met up with them later, the second year of the grammar school – and me, I'd been lucky enough to live in the same street, catch the same bus in the morning, lucky enough that Jimmy's mother and mine should be friends. The boys were into jazz, jazz and football – though for Patrick it was the Arsenal and Jimmy, Spurs, and the rows they had about that down the years. Val now, in truth I don't think Val ever cared too much about the football, just went along, White Hart Lane or Highbury, he didn't mind.

When it came to jazz, though, it was Val who took the lead, and where the others would have been happy enough to listen to anything as long as it had rhythm, excitement, as long as it had swing, Val was the one who sat them down and made them listen to Gerry Mulligan with Chet Baker, Desmond with Brubeck, Charlie Parker, Lester Young.

With a few other kids they knew, they made themselves into a band: Patrick on trumpet, Jimmy on drums, Val with an ageing alto saxophone that had belonged to his dad. After the first couple of rehearsals it became clear Val was the only one who could really play. I mean
really
play: the kind of sound that gives you goose bumps on the arms and makes the muscles of your stomach tighten hard.

It wasn't long before Patrick had seen the writing on the wall and turned in his trumpet in favour of becoming agent and manager rolled into one; about the first thing he did was sack Jimmy from the band, Val's was the career to foster and Jimmy was just holding him back.

A couple of years later, Val had moved on from sitting in with Jackie Sharpe and Tubby Hayes at the Manor House and depping with Oscar Rabin's band at the Lyceum, to fronting a quartet that slipped into the lower reaches of the
Melody Maker
small group poll. All this time he was burning the proverbial candle, going on from his regular gig to some club where he'd play till the early hours and taking more Bennies than was prudent to keep himself awake. The result was, more than once, he showed up late for an engagement; occasionally, he didn't show up at all. Patrick gave him warning after warning, Val, in return, made promises he couldn't keep: in the end, Patrick delivered an ultimatum, finally walked away.

Within months the quartet broke up and, needing ready cash, Val took a job with Lou Preager's orchestra at the Lyceum: a musical diet that didn't stretch far beyond playing for dancers, the occasional novelty number and the hits of the day. At least when he'd been with Rabin there'd been a few other jazzers in the band – and Oscar had allowed them one number a night to stretch out and do their thing. But this … the boredom, the routine were killing him, and Val, I realised later, had moved swiftly on from chewing the insides of Benzedrine inhalers and smoking cannabis to injecting heroin. When the police raided a club in Old Compton Street in the small hours, there was Val in a back room with a needle in his arm.

Somehow, Patrick knew one of the detectives at West End Central well enough to call in a grudging favour. Grudging, but a favour all the same.

When Val stumbled out on to the pavement, twenty-four hours later and still wearing the clothes he'd puked up on, Patrick pushed him into a cab and took him to the place I was living in Kilburn.

I made tea, poured Patrick the last of a half-bottle of whisky, and ran a bath for Val, who was sitting on the side of my bed in his vest and underpants, shivering.

‘You're a stupid bastard. You know that, don't you?' Patrick told him.

Val said nothing.

‘He's a musician, I told the copper,' Patrick said. ‘A good one. And you know what he said to me? All he is, another black junkie out of his fucking head on smack. Send him back where he fucking came from.'

A shadow of pain passed across Val's face and I looked away, ashamed, not knowing what to say. Val's father was West Indian, his mother Irish, his skin the colour of palest chocolate.

‘Can you imagine?' Patrick said, turning to me. ‘All those years and I never noticed.' Reaching out, he took hold of Val's jaw and twisted his face upwards towards the light. ‘Look at that. Black as the ace of fucking spades. Not one of us at all.'

‘Stop it,' I said. ‘Stop it, for God's sake. What's the matter with you?'

Patrick loosed his hold and stepped away. ‘Trying to shake some sense into him. Make him realise, way he's going, what'll happen if he carries on.'

He moved closer to Val and spoke softly. ‘They've got your number now, you know that, don't you? Next time they catch you as much as smelling of reefer they're going to have you inside so fast your feet won't touch the ground. And you won't like it inside, believe me.'

Val closed his eyes.

‘What you need is to put a little space between you and them, give them time to forget.' Patrick stepped back. ‘Give me a couple of days, I'll sort something. Even if it's the Isle of Man.'

In the event, it was Paris. A two-week engagement at
Le Chat Qui Peche
with an option to extend it by three more.

‘You better go with him, Anna. Hold his hand, keep him out of trouble.' And slipping an envelope fat with French francs and two sets of tickets into my hand, he kissed me on the cheek. ‘Just his hand, mind.'

The club was on the rue de la Huchette, close to the Seine, a black metal cat perched above a silver-grey fish on the sign outside; downstairs a small, smoky cellar bar with a stage barely big enough for piano, bass and drums, and, for seating, perhaps the most uncomfortable stools I've ever known. Instruments of torture, someone called them and, by the end of the first week, I knew exactly what he meant.

Not surprisingly, the French trio with whom Val was due to work were suspicious of him at first. His reputation in England may have been on the rise, but across the Channel he was scarcely known. And when you're used to visitors of the calibre of Miles Davis and Bud Powell, Charlie Parker, what gave Val Collins the idea he'd be welcome? Didn't the French have saxophone players of their own?

Both the bassist and the drummer wore white shirts that first evening, I remember, ties loosened, top buttons undone, very cool; the pianist's dark jacket was rucked up at the back, its collar arched awkwardly against his neck, a cigarette smouldering, half-forgotten, at the piano's edge.

The proprietor, Madame Ricard, welcomed us with lavish kisses and led us to a table, where we sat listening, the club not yet half full, Val's foot moving instinctively to the rhythm and his fingers flexing over imaginary keys. At the intermission, she introduced us to the band, who shook hands politely, looked at Val with cursory interest and excused themselves to stretch their legs outside, breathe in a little night air.

‘Nice guys,' Val said with a slight edge as they left.

‘You'll be fine,' I said and squeezed his arm.

When the trio returned, Val was already on stage, re-angling the mike, adjusting his reed. ‘Blues in F,' he said quietly, counting in the tempo, medium-fast. After a single chorus from the piano, he announced himself with a squawk and then a skittering run and they were away. Ten minutes later, when Val stepped back from the microphone, layered in sweat, the drummer gave a little triumphant roll on his snare, the pianist turned and held out his hand and the bass player loosened another button on his shirt and grinned.

‘
Et maintenant,
' Val announced, testing his tender vocabulary to the full, ‘
nous jouons une ballade par Ira Gershwin et Vernon Duke,
“I Can't Get Started.”
Merci
.'

And the crowd, accepting him, applauded.

What could go wrong?

At first, nothing it seemed. We both slept late most days at the hotel on the rue Maitre-Albert where we stayed; adjacent rooms that held a bed, a small wardrobe and little else, but with views across towards Notre Dame. After coffee and croissants – we were in Paris, after all – we would wander around the city, the streets of Saint-Germain-des-Prés at first, but then, gradually, we found our way around Montparnasse and up through Montmartre to Sacre Coeur. Sometimes we would take in a late-afternoon movie, and Val would have a nap at the hotel before a leisurely dinner and on to the club for that evening's session, which would continue until the early hours.

Six nights a week and on the seventh, rest?

There were other clubs to visit, other musicians to hear. The Caveau de la Huchette was just across the street, the Club Saint-Germain-des-Prés and the Trois Mailletz both a short walk away. Others, like the Tabou and the Blue Note were a little further afield. I couldn't keep up.

‘Go back to the hotel,' Val said, reading the tiredness in my eyes. ‘Get a good night's sleep, a proper rest.' Then, with the beginnings of a smile, ‘You don't have to play nursemaid all the time, you know.'

‘Is that what I'm doing?'

Coming into the club late one evening, I saw him in the company of an American drummer we'd met a few nights before and a couple of broad-shouldered French types, wearing those belted trench coats which made them look like cops or gangsters or maybe both. As soon as he spotted me, Val made a quick show of shaking hands and turning away, but not before I saw a small package pass from hand to hand and into the inside pocket of his suit.

‘Don't look so disapproving,' he said, when I walked over. ‘Just a few pills to keep me awake.'

‘And that's all?'

‘Of course.' He had a lovely, disarming smile.

‘No smack?'

‘No smack.'

I could have asked him to show me his arms, but I chose to believe him instead. It would have made little difference if I had; by then I think he was injecting himself in the leg.

The next day Val was up before eleven, dressed and ready, stirring me from sleep.

‘What's happening?' I asked. ‘What's wrong?'

‘Nothing. Just a shame to waste a beautiful day.'

The winter sun reflected from the stonework of the bridge as we walked across to the Isle St Louis arm in arm. Val had taken to affecting a beret, which he wore slanting extravagantly to one side. On the cobbles close to where we sat, drinking coffee, sparrows splashed in the shallow puddles left by last night's rain.

‘Why did you do it?' Val asked me.

‘Do it?'

‘This. All of this. Throwing up your job …'

‘It wasn't a real job.'

‘It was work.'

‘It was temping in a lousy office for a lousy boss.'

‘And this is better?'

‘Of course this is better.'

‘I still don't understand why?'

‘Why come here with you?'

Val nodded.

‘Because he asked me.'

‘Patrick.'