Where have all the bullets gone_ - Spike Milligan [39]
I’m lying in bed that morning ‘resting’, but for the love of me I don’t feel good. I feel myself all over but none of me feels good. I seek out Rosetta! Is she free tonight, or is she charging? Sorry, she’s got a date at Caserta Palace. So! She’s being unfaithful to me. Is it another man? No, it’s another Regiment.
“Darling, will you be my first wife?”
Never mind, there’s other distractions like housey-housey in the canteen, run by Sergeant ‘Dolly’ Grey, the Robert Maxwell of Maddaloni. “And another little dip,” he cackled. “Number nine, doctor’s orders.” As the afternoon wore on and his winnings mounted, I saw him visibly changing into a bent, hand-rubbing, cackling Scrooge. By five o’clock it was ‘Castor oil’ — we’d been cleaned out. I walked out with ten lire which had the purchasing power of a bootlace. Lewis! The Yew! He’d have shekels. Yes, he’ll lend me two thousand lire — after all, we were friends. I would just sign this paper consigning my entire worldly goods to him in the event of non repayment. So, as a bonded warehouse owned by Lewis, I went with him to the AFHQ Victory ball. Wow! Walking up those steps!
Casorta — Palazzo Reale — Scalone (prospetto)
The sound of a dance band wafts through the corridors. A girl is singing ‘I was taken for a sleigh ride in July’. It sounds good. What a surprise! It’s an all-American all-girl orchestra led by (it was a well-known name but I can’t remember!) -some of you may remember, their signature tune was ‘In the Blue of the Evening’ or, if you’re colour blind, the Brown of the Evening. They are all dressed in ice-white gowns looking like all-American women. Vestal virgins, hygienically wrapped, untouched by human hand, about to be debased in a TV series called Dysentery.
Such a cosmopolitan crowd! Greek sailors, Polish colonels, Yugoslavian partisans, Italian generals, Hindu captains, or as my father would say, a bunch of Wogs. Oh! the fun a xenophobe could have had with a shot gun! “Who’s paying for all this?” said Steve, as we raped the buffet table of food and wine.
I manage to get an American WAC. “Do you like waltzes?”
I asked, avoiding ‘Harry Lauder appeared in Glasgow’ routine. “Nhart Rilly,” she said. (Not Really, she said.)
“Where are you from?”
“The Yewknighted Staits.”
I guessed that, I said. Then why did I ask? She works as a ‘Clurk to Generil Muark Clurk’. I estimated her typing speeds would be anything up to several words a day. A Pakistani orderly cuts in. Just wait till she sees his, I thought.
“We’re supposed to be having a good time,” said Steve, guzzling Asti Spumante.
“Yes, I suppose this is a good time,” I said, guzzling Asti Spumante.
“Are you suggesting it could be better,” he said, guzzling Asti Spumante.
“Well it would be nice if we could find a couple of birds,” I said, guzzling Asti Spumante. “What I need is Romanceeeee.” And what do I get? — a Yewish Sergeant and Asti Spumante!
We bustle our way out to the rear gardens. There is a sea of tables with candles. We choose one and Asti Spumante. It’s a warm May night, the sound of the fountains is interwoven with the dance music. Lewis dumps a large jug of wine on the table. “Reinforcements,” he says. I have run out of money again. Would Steve give me a mortgage on my parents? We take a stroll on the great lawns. “It’s all mad, isn’t it?” says Steve. “I mean we don’t belong here. This,” he makes a sweeping gesture, “this is where the Bourbons and their satin ladies should be cavorting.”
He was right. “We are out of time with this place,” I said. “We belong at the WVS with Egg and Chips.”
There we are, wiping the eggs from the plate with bread in the canteen with the Italian Manageress with the huge bum. It ought to be in The Guinness Book of Records, but right now it’s in Caserta. “Two teas, signorina,” says Steve. I light up a cigarette, sip tea. We both sit staring, that end-of-the-day stare. You see it in pubs, tubes, restaurants, intervals at the theatre; always looking away from the company you’re in; something out there that will make the present more exciting? Curiosity