Telling Lies to Alice Read Online Free Page A

because the whole restaurant was looking at us.
    “I’m a cretin, sir!” yelled Lenny. “Anyway,” he continued—more quietly, thank God—“we’d had enough of it, so Jack—I didn’t know him then—Jack decided he was going to do something about it.”
    “What this RSM used to do,” said Jack, “was he always went to the local town on Friday nights. He’d have a few drinks at the British Legion Club and then he’d come back and set off the fire alarm. So one night I was on guard duty, and a few of us climbed up on the roof of the guardroom with a plank of wood and stuck it through the siren, because it used to rotate, you see, to make the sound, and we jammed this great big plank in there and lashed it with rope so it couldn’t move . . .”
    “And then the RSM comes back,” said Lenny, “and he sets off the alarm and nothing happens. So next morning he goes up on the roof. . . . When he saw what was causing it he went mad. So Jack owned up—well, he had to, or we’d all have been in the shit, so he got put on jankers—”
    “Jankers?” I asked.
    “Punishment,” said Lenny. “After that, of course, it was fire drill every other minute. He kept on at us about how it didn’t matter what we were doing, we’d only got three minutes to get down there.”
    “We knew damn well,” said Jack, “he’d always do it midday Saturday because it was a free afternoon, so everyone wanted to get their skates on and down to the town as fast as they could. So Lenny said, ‘Right. We’ll take our clothes off—like we’re in the showers—but keep your boots on, and when the siren goes we’ll all rush down there stark bollock naked and line up.’ So we got there in two minutes flat, and the RSM came out on the steps to inspect us.”
    “He didn’t say anything,” said Lenny, “but you could see his eyes light up, and he made us form up and marched us down the road to the parade ground—still in the buff—and, of course, the NAAFI girls’ quarters were on the other side of the road and they were all cheering and whooping—and then the fucker only went and drilled us for an hour. . . . Oh, dear . . .” Lenny wiped his eyes. “Then he called it quits . . .”
    “Lenny and I were standing next to each other in the lineup, and he turned round and gave me a wink, and I thought, nice one, because I’d been told it was his idea, so we shook hands, and I said I’d buy him a drink . . .”
    “And that was it, really. . . . But it still makes me laugh, us standing there with our tackle blowing in the breeze and this bloke never batted an eyelid . . . he was all right, though, wasn’t he? Remember when he retired, we had a whip round for a cigarette case, and he made a speech . . .”
    “Yeah,” said Jack. “He took it pretty well, when you think about it . . .” He raised his glass, and Lenny raised his, too, and they said, “The sum of our parts!” I thought I’d better join in, so I raised mine—“The sum of your parts!”—then I asked, “Why do you say that?”
    “It’s silly, really,” said Lenny. “But it’s what Don Findlater says. He’s our agent. He’s always telling people that the act works because we’re greater than the sum of our parts.”
    Jack gave a schoolboy smirk. “Don’s in love with Lenny. Besotted with him.”
    “Pack it in, Jack.” Lenny looked uncomfortable. “She doesn’t want to know about that.”
    “Don’t worry,” Jack said to me. “Don knows Lenny’s normal so he contents himself with longing from afar. . . . That’s how he likes it. He’s the sort of queer who can only get a hard-on if he’s paying for it. Thinks it doesn’t count, poor sod.” Jack rolled his eyes. “He only comes to the club with us because he’s got his eye on one of the busboys . . .”
    It was a combined effort at seduction, really, although they didn’t ask me anything about myself, which is what men often do when they’re trying to get you into bed. . . .