Amazing Disgrace (21 page)

‘No. No one but the very deepest and dimmest ecologist thinks of weed as sentient. But I’m sure as a writer you’re aware of the philosopher Peter Singer who wrote
Animal Liberation
? He used to draw the line between animals that can and can’t feel pain by saying that shrimps could and oysters couldn’t. But I believe now he won’t even eat bivalves. Personally, the idea of mussels in agony strikes me as a load of balls, but there we are.’

‘But I remember Millie telling me that on long voyages she used to spin for fish with a line over the transom. Anything for fresh food, she said.’  

‘Of course. Any long-distance sailor does. Did you put that in your book?’  

I tried to remember. ‘I think so, yes. But now you mention it, I believe it was one of those bits she cut out. I’d have to check.’  

‘I shouldn’t bother. She’ll have removed it, bet you anything. This is all new, you realize.’ She indicated with her Bluto-like chin the food on the table and the assembled company,
somehow
even managing to imply the entire Neptune movement. Aha, I thought. Getting interesting. Of course: Millie’s original groupies were fellow-sailors, not environmentalists, and some of them must be feeling badly upstaged by all these sudden new alliances. ‘Only a year ago we were having these bloody great fish banquets down in the harbour or on our boats. Whatever was fresh. Mackerel, sole, gurnard, tope, lobster, crab, you name it. Smashing nosh. We had great parties with the world’s greatest sailor. But now … I wouldn’t dream of giving my dogs most of this stuff. Not that they’d touch it. Got more sense.’  

Our voices had sunk to a conspiratorial murmur, lost in the general hubbub and Australian bonhomie as our eyes vainly raked the table for serious nourishment. A dismal floe of black jelly went mournfully by, highlights glinting from its quivering flanks.  

‘Christ,’ said my new friend with the ancient mariner’s breath, ‘I miss those days, honest I do. And what’s more, I bet old Millie does. I can’t see this deadly purity lasting. Where’s the moral issue, anyway? Fish eat other fish; big enough fish often eat us. Can’t see why we shouldn’t return the
compliment
. We’re all animals and we all prey on each other. Right now I could prey on a decent steak-and-kidney pudding like the ones we used to get in the Navy after dives. Thick, rich gravy, suet and animal parts. That’s the stuff to chase the cold away and put hair on your chest.’

Having got so far with the admirably subversive Joan, I
couldn
’t resist asking whether she knew about Brilov and Tammeri’s translations of King Neptune’s oracular sayings from the seabed. She shot me a warning look with a sideways glance at my neighbour on the other side, but Debra was now chatting earnestly to the moth-eaten man on her right.  

‘It’s blithering bollocks, this food faddery,’ said Joan briefly, her square-tipped, nicotine-stained fingers closing
conspiratorially
about my wrist. ‘Not to mention the mystic stuff. It could be very damaging to Millie, you know, but I don’t think she sees it. She played us a CD of these underwater noises and naturally I recognized them at once.’

‘Transponders?’

‘Exactly. You’ve heard it too.’ She glanced at me sharply, obviously wondering how much I knew.

‘Did you tell Millie that’s what they were?’

‘I haven’t yet. It would have to be done at the right moment, and probably alone. You don’t know where the recording came from, I suppose?’

‘Not really,’ I said guardedly, and immediately regretted not having denied it outright. This lady who smelled of Sealyhams or spaniels was no fool. Nice as it was to believe one might have found an ally in this lair of lunatics, a breezy, over-
the-dinner
-table conspiracy might backfire fatally. I could easily be exposed as a traitor to my subject, who at the moment was being very queenly with Nanty over on the other side of the table. Her ‘aquariarm’, as I’d heard her call it, was resting in full view by her plate and seethed with animal activity as though she embodied the very life-force of the ocean. Bogus old bat. The guileless Nanty seemed fascinated, possibly by his
hostess’s appalling oaths that occasionally ricocheted around the table. Meanwhile my pungent neighbour, like one of her own terriers, was not letting go.  

‘You know something, don’t you?’ she said nearly inaudibly. ‘Is someone setting her up?’  

This was far too astute. I took a temporizing gulp of Foster’s before replying.  

‘Oh no, I’m sure not. Why would they want to do that?’  

‘Ha! Don’t be naïve. Politics, what else? This whole
movement
’s a fucking minefield, pardon my French. Christ, you’re her biographer. You must have discovered that by now.’  

‘Well, of course,’ I said, a bit thrown by how far ahead this redoubtable old dyke seemed to be. ‘But basically my role is that of a hack. I write what I’m paid to write. The lady’s an international sports personality, massively famous, much loved, blah-blah, and my job was to get her down on paper in a way that’s going to warm the hearts of people who get given the book at Christmas by nephews who gave them golf balls last year. They’re not an audience that appreciates complexity and they sure as hell don’t want politics. They want a simple, straightforward heroine.’  

‘Which she ain’t. She’s very much more.’  

‘Agreed. And now I’m supposed to write another book about her and this whole Neptune business, and it’s become dead obvious that it’s politics up to the eyeballs.’  

‘Too true. Me and the girls are none too happy about it.’  

‘Let me guess,’ I said. ‘You think she’d do better to rest on her laurels as an outstanding sporting celebrity rather than risk derision if this Neptune caper blows up in her face.’  

‘Something along those lines,’ my neighbour conceded. ‘As you must have noticed, dear Millie has an innocent streak in her. She can’t believe that anyone as popular as she is might have enemies. But people are mean. You know – the tall poppy syndrome. There are plenty out there who want to see her cut down to size, believe me. Give you an example. The other week one of the girls here overheard some lunchtime table talk
in a pub called Pegleg Dandy’s. It’s right across from where we’re lying now. She thinks they were scientists from BOIS – you know, the oceanography institute here. It’s a favourite place of theirs. One of them was speculating it would be possible to organize quite a neat smuggling racket using long-distance sailors like Millie. Diamonds, drugs, anything small and high value. All she’d need do is pick up a buoy dropped on her course and putting out a discreetly weak transponder signal. She could home in and pluck it out of the ocean while hardly reefing in. To be on the safe side she could hang it below the hull on a length of piano wire or nylon, just like the old Vietnamese boat people did back in the Seventies when they were trying to get their valuables past the Thai pirates. Then she sails right over the finishing line and ties up. You’ve got TV coverage, cheering crowds, helicopters, a
triumphal
escort of a zillion yachts, interviews, the works. Who’s going to bother with a customs inspection? Okay, some official might go aboard to satisfy the letter of the law, but he won’t be thinking of contraband, will he? At most he’ll be thinking of nicking a souvenir for his kids – Millie’s sou’wester or
something
. Then later, when it’s dark, a scuba diver comes and retrieves the bundle hanging underneath. Easy-peasy. She might not even have to pick the stuff up at sea: it could have been aboard from the start, even unbeknownst to her. All sorts of ways to work it, according to these scientists in the pub. Easy enough to put a rumour around, heh-heh. And it would be, too,’ said Joan. ‘No lack of folk wanting to believe it. I’m told Millie has acquired some dedicated enemies at BOIS, though I don’t know why. Frankly, if she’s put some of their delicate scientific noses out of joint, good on her, I say.’  

‘She’ll be all the easier to attack if she’s seen to make an ass of herself over Neptune.’  

‘Exactly.’  

All this was highly interesting but I could no longer deny that my body was now demanding immediate attention. Oh dear, oh dear. For over the past hour my passionless
protuberance
had lurked at maximum elevation like a field gun beneath camouflaged netting and was now undeniably aching. As I had reflected at Crendlesham Hall, Italian habits and elapsing years between them have done much to ease my embarrassment at minor social crises (and which historical character was it I’d recently read about who, rather than excuse himself from the king’s table, had sat there and allowed his bladder to burst, dying shortly afterwards?). I had no intention of suffering silently for etiquette’s sake. Still, priapism does rather flaunt its own banner, the
Excelsior
! touch that gets its bearer noticed, whether by pious monks or Deep Blue environmentalists. But there was
nothing
for it. With a muttered excuse I stood up and turned quickly from the table, thereafter sauntering for the exit, one hand casually in my pocket. I don’t believe I gave Debra a chance to focus those pop-eyes of hers before I was out of range. Dusky gentlemen in white jackets pointed me through various doors before I arrived at one I could bolt on the inside. From within I conducted an alarmed inspection. This, then, was my punishment for having meddled with nature in the interests of science. The orchic substances were taking their revenge. It is unnecessary to go into detail but I admit I was shocked by my howitzer’s appearance. The single
adjective
‘empurpled’ will convey everything of importance. Cold water appeared to help a little but I could hardly spend the rest of the evening leaning over a brimming hand basin aboard
Vvizz
. To think that my jocular experiment should have led to public humiliation and the dishevelling of my endocrine system! A ditty chants satirically in my mind:

I am referring here, of course, to my shame. I dried myself and left, and almost immediately met someone who might
have been an off-duty officer. A dapper young man except for shoulder-length hair, he peered at me.  

‘Yer looking a bit crook, mate, if yer don’t mind my saying. Can I help?’  

‘No, no,’ I said wanly. ‘I was having dinner and, well, I just thought I wouldn’t mind stretching my legs.’  

‘Up to you, but why not see the doc? Be on the safe side, you know?’  

‘There’s a ship’s doctor?’  

‘Sure is. You need one on a vessel this size. We’ve a crew of nearly thirty and there’s Lew himself. Come on, I’ll show you. Won’t take a second.’  

He led off down a companionway, along a broad corridor, and knocked on a door. He must have heard an invitation to enter because he opened it, stood aside, said ‘Guest feeling crook, Doc,’ and waved me in. I found myself in a brightly lit cabin. The door closed behind me.  

‘You’re the, er, doctor?’ I asked unnecessarily. She looked like a
Playboy
centrefold wearing a black leotard, sitting in front of a computer.  

‘G’day,’ she said and rose courteously to her feet. Or rather, to her foot, since her right foot was completely absent. I then noticed on the floor beside the desk an exotic pair of trainers, the right one being a racily designed orthopaedic job trailing Velcro straps. ‘I’m Steffi Toms. What’s the problem?’  

What indeed? ‘Well,’ I began cautiously, ‘I’m not really ill at all, you understand, doctor. I’m dining with Lew and Millie and … er, this
is
in confidence?’  

‘Absolutely. If it’s about your health, that is.’  

‘Um.’ All my worst premonitions about turning into a
medical
curiosity seemed to be coming true even though I was still clad in chocolate corduroy rather than a paper gown. ‘The fact of the matter is I seem to have acquired – only temporarily, I’m sure, and for no obvious external reason in the sense of the usual stimulation – a …’  

‘Yes?’ she offered encouragingly. ‘Mr …?’

‘Oh, sorry: Gerry … An intractable erection.’ There, that wasn’t so bad. Now, so long as she wasn’t going to be breezy.  

‘How long?’  

‘About, er … oh, you mean
time
? The last hour and a half. Give or take.’  

‘Any pain?’  

‘Far less than agony; rather more than discomfort.’  

‘A very British answer.’ She smiled. ‘Sorry. It’s just that I’m sure no one but an Englishman would have put it quite that way. We’d better have a look. These things need prompt
treatment
.’ Dr Toms put on a pair of latex gloves, snapping them with relish. The distant sound of a zip. I stared numbly at the row of books beside her desk.
Famous Medical Errors
was one of the titles I registered. ‘Ah yes. Characteristic softness of the glans but rigidity of the corpus cavernosum. Classic stuff.’  

‘Oh, that’s all right then. You know how patients worry that theirs won’t be a straightforward case. And I don’t see why that shouldn’t be “cavernosus”. Corpus being masculine, I mean. And nominative.’  

‘Don’t gibber, please, Gerry. This is serious. It needs
draining
immediately. But before we declare a full-out emergency you might try a simple remedy that sometimes proves
effective
. Find some stairs and climb them for five minutes. It might do the trick. Failing that we’ll call an ambulance and get the launch to take you over.’  

‘Up and down stairs?’ I said, gratefully zipping up Blaise Prévert.

‘Yes. I suggest the ones you would have taken down to the dining room. They’re nice and wide with good handrails. Get climbing, Gerry. By the way, “corpus” is neuter, so “
cavernosum
” is perfectly correct.’  

Which is how, when the first batch of dinner guests started to leave, they found me plodding wearily up the same flight of stairs, turning at the top and plodding down again, merely to repeat the process. To forestall questions I announced that this was an old naval punishment for leaving the table without the
Captain’s permission. There was some dutiful laughter but I didn’t care what they thought, and particularly not Debra Leather, who was giving the hang of my trousers the attention of her large blue eyes. I didn’t care because for whatever hydraulic reason, Dr Toms’s emergency measure was proving effective and I was fast regaining the lineaments of normality. The pain had left, too, and it seemed the immediate crisis was over. I trotted back down to thank Steffi Toms who was down on one knee attaching her prosthetic shoe. Then she stood up, limber and tall in her black leotards but a foot short.  

‘Damned glad it worked, Gerry,’ she said after a quick peep inside the chocolate corduroy. ‘You must go and see your
doctor
tomorrow without fail. It needs investigating. And if it happens again tonight, get yourself immediately to the nearest A & E, okay? If it goes on for more than a couple of hours it’ll cause permanent damage and you could well wind up
impotent
. How old are you? Forty. Really? Well, I expect you’d agree that’s a bit young to lose such a useful member.’  

I couldn’t help staring at her own orthopaedic trainer. ‘Coming from you, I shall take what you say seriously.’  

‘Do. And in case you’re wondering, I lost it to a shark in South Queensland.’  

‘That’s an odd coincidence. What with Millie Cleat losing her arm to a shark, I mean.’  

‘No coincidence at all. The common denominator’s Lew Buschfeuer. As a matter of fact the whole ship’s crew has
suffered
a disfiguring attack by one predatory animal or another. Sharks, crocodiles, snakes, and in the case of one of the
engineers
a koala. It’s a condition of employment on the
Vvizz
.’  

‘Are you joking?’  

‘Not at all.’  

‘Well, what about the young officer with the long hair who brought me to see you? He didn’t seem to be missing
anything
.’  

‘He lost one of his ears to a moray eel while scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef. Sliced clean off. He’s thinking of
having the other one removed surgically. Fearful symmetry, and so on.’  

‘And the Aboriginal gentlemen?’  

‘They’re missing their entire continent, aren’t they? We removed it from them without the benefit of anaesthetic many years ago.’  

I bade Dr Toms good night, found my way to the upper deck and went outside. By now Millie and Lew were there seeing the last of their guests down into the ship’s tender, all except for Nanty, who I gathered had already been picked up by
helicopter
from the helipad on the afterdeck. I was handed a note he’d left me which I pocketed while making my own farewells to my host and hostess at the top of the companionway. Far below on the dark waters of the Solent the launch waiting alongside burbled and rocked, probably not doing much good to the various digestive systems aboard it tackling their boluses of seaweed, toasted Burmese tree pith and deep-fried Sumatran pitcher plant. A steward was standing on the floodlit grating beside it holding the end of a painter half-hitched around a stanchion, obviously waiting for me.