Golden Boy Read Online Free Page B

and common nous, won three times, my father taking her success with such bad grace that, at the third win, he sulked and retired to his cabin claiming an upset stomach. We did not set eyes on him again until the following day when he complained my mother had not visited him in his sick bed.
    â€˜No, Ken,’ she replied, ‘I did not. A sick tummy I can fix with chlorodyne but a sick mind’s beyond my reach.’
    This did not improve matters and my father continued to brood for another day, his mood only being broken by an invitation from the captain to drinks that evening with a number of other male passengers in or connected with the Royal Navy. Women were excluded. He returned from this party with his plumage puffed up and his head held high.
    A fancy-dress tea party was thrown for the children. I was dressed by my mother as a pirate in a crepe paper cummerbund, one of her head scarves and an eye-patch borrowed from the ship’s doctor and painted black with a mixture of indian ink and mascara. A cardboard sword was tucked in the cummerbund and I carried an empty whisky bottle. I took home no prizes. First place was awarded to a tubby boy of twelve whose parents had seized their opportunity in Simon Artz. He wore a pair of round sunglasses, a real cummerbund, baggy pantaloons, Egyptian felt
slippers and a fez. A long ivory cigarette holder completed his ensemble. He was King Farouk.
    The ocean provided its own diversions. Dolphins cavorted ahead of the bow wave and we were permitted, under the supervision of a parent and a deck officer, to go for’ard to the f’c’sle (as my father would have it) and look down on them. They were sleek and grey, the colour of torpedoes. On occasion, they swam on their sides, the better to look up at us with an almost human eye. Flying fish scudded over the waves, their fins outspread like grotesque, ribbed wings. Occasionally the wind took them and they glided up on to the deck to be spirited away by the Lascars, low-caste Indians who cleaned, painted and polished the ship, who ate them. Off the Horn of Africa, a vast pod of at least fifty whales was sighted, blowing and diving, the huge flukes of their tails rising into the air only to slide under the surface once more.
    Every evening, I lay in my bunk watching the sea speed by and reading or pondering what lay ahead of me. At least I knew the pigtail was unlikely, for my mother had insisted I had a haircut from the ship’s barber soon after departing Algiers. But for the rest, I could only let my imagination wander. My father refused point blank to discuss anything about his job, claiming it was top secret. I considered the chances of him being a spy and asked my mother one night as I got ready for bed if this was his role in the Navy.
    â€˜A spy!’ she retorted. ‘In the Navy? What gave you that idea?’
    â€˜Daddy said his job was secret.’
    â€˜Your father could no more be a spy than I could be a spanner,’ she replied, always keen to find an alliterative metaphor. ‘He’s a Deputy Naval Stores Officer. A naval grocer! It’s his job to see ships get fresh supplies of lettuces and eggs. Secret!’ She laughed. ‘I’m sure the Commies’re not interested in how many tins of sardines HMS Ark Royal is carrying.’

    At seven o’clock – or nineteen hundred hours, as my father preferred – my mother, having seen me into my bunk, would join my father on deck for cocktails and dinner. Although, once in the tropics, the formal evening dress code for the dining room was waived unless there was a dinner dance or the like being held, my father insisted on wearing a lounge suit when all that was demanded was a tie. This greatly embarrassed my mother and, one afternoon between Aden and Bombay, it created an argument conducted sotto voce in my cabin. I only heard a part of it, eavesdropping at the door.
    â€˜ … but it’s unnecessary,