Read the book: «Confessions from a Nudist Colony»

CONTENTS

Publisher’s Note

Title Page

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Also Available in the Confessions Series

About the Author

Also by Timothy Lea

Copyright

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

‘Wonderful, isn’t it?’ says Sid. We have just come out of The Highwayman and he is gazing across the rolling expanse of couples trying to have it off in the middle of Clapham Common.

‘The first bit of sun always brings them out,’ I say.

‘What are you on about?’ says Sid, irritably. ‘I was referring to spring unfurling her mantle of green, not that bloke tucking his shirt down the front of that bird’s skirt. I don’t know how they have the gall to carry on like that in front of everyone. That geezer with the brown demob suit and a pork pie hat ought to get amongst them with his sharpened stick.’

‘The game warden?’ I say. ‘He’s too busy stopping people stoning the crocuses. Anyway, what’s got into you, Sid? They used to have to send a bloke round after you with a bucket of sand to fill in the dents. You’re the last person to start casting asparagus.’

But Sid is not listening to me. He is still under the spell of spring and four pints of mild and bitter. ‘Just grab a niff of that breeze,’ he drools. ‘You’d never think that had to blow over Clapham Junction to get here, would you?’

‘To say nothing of ducking round Battersea Power Station,’ I agree with him. ‘Yes, Sid, it’s a rare treat for the hooter, even after what you’ve just done.’

Sid takes a few brisk steps towards the pond where the middle-aged wankers crash their model boats into each other, and throws his arms wide. ‘Not just the hooter,’ he says. ‘All the senses rejoice. Look at the little buds on that chestnut tree. Each one glistening under its coating of sooty smog. That’s nature in blooming riot. Will our children ever see anything like this? That’s what I ask myself.’

‘I hope not,’ I say, ripping my eyes away from the bloke who is clearly connected by more than mental ties to his lady love. ‘They don’t care, some of them, do they?’

‘All over the grass,’ says Sid in disgust. ‘I don’t know how they can bring themselves to do it. You’d think they’d just want to lie back and clock nature weaving her magic spell, wouldn’t you?’

‘Surely that’s what gets them going,’ I say. ‘I mean, look at that pigeon up there. He’s not playing leapfrog with the other one. That’s nature saying “get at it!”’

‘Pigeons are always like that,’ says Sid distastefully. ‘You remember what they did to the seat of my bike? I only left it outside Reg Perkins’ loft for a couple of minutes, too.’

‘Yes, very embarrassing,’ I say. ‘Incidentally, the loose cover has just come back from the cleaners. I think Mum was hoping you might cough up a bit towards the bill.’

‘What about my trousers?’ says Sid. ‘It’s not my fault Reg Perkins can’t house-train his bleeding pigeons. She ought to get on to him about it!’

‘Just a thought, Sid,’ I say, deciding quickly that there is little chance of making headway in that direction. ‘Certainly is a lovely day.’

‘Definitely!’ Sid takes a deep breath and winces. ‘When it’s like this you couldn’t consider living anywhere else, could you?’

‘Er – yes,’ I say. Sid’s words sound a bit strange coming from a bloke who was quite happy bumming round the Mediterranean on SS Tern until an American admiral tried to run him down with his ship – he was unhappy because he had just seen Sid boarding another vessel with his wife and a couple of camels. (See Confessions from a Luxury Liner for surprising details.)

‘Finest country in the world,’ waxes Sid. ‘Don’t ever let anyone else tell you different. We may have our problems but when the sun is shining – shit! Can’t people control their animals? Bleeding notices everywhere and nobody takes a dicky bird. The only way they’d do any good is if you put them low enough to scrape your foot on. I’d like to see some geezer’s horrible hound doing his business on the public thoroughfare. I’d follow him home and drop one in his front garden.’

‘Highly sophisticated, Sid,’ I venture. ‘I hate to think what kind of aggro that could spark off. What do you fancy doing now? We could mosey down and collect our sausage.’ (Sausage roll: dole = National Assistance).

‘Nah,’ says Sid, finishing scraping his shoe and dropping the stick into the bin reserved for icecream wrappers. ‘It’s always a bit crowded after the boozers have shut. Let’s leave it to thin out. I hate to look as if I need the money.’

‘You just take it to save hurting anyone’s feelings, don’t you, Sid?’

‘And to keep it in the country,’ says Sid. ‘I reckon it’s the least I can do. All those Micks and Pakis would have it back to Bangladesh in no time – or any other part of Ireland you care to mention. That brings back memories, doesn’t it?’

‘You mean the couple having it off under the caravan?’ I say.

‘Nah,’ says Sid. ‘Don’t you ever think about anything else? I was referring to the fair. I remember coming up here as a kid. I never had money to spend on anything but I used to watch the roundabouts whipping round and listen to the records. I thought it was great. It was better than the telly in those days.’

‘There wasn’t any telly in those days, was there?’ I say. ‘I thought you had to listen to the radio with a pair of earphones.’

‘You’ve no sense of neuralgia, have you?’ says Sid. ‘I suppose you’re too young. It’s when you start slowing up a bit that you begin to remember.’

‘Blimey!’ I say. ‘If you can hang on a minute, I’ll nip into one of these caravans and see if anyone’s got a violin. What’s come over you? Nature, childhood. I’ve never known you like this.’

‘It’s a kind of menopause,’ says Sid ‘or I suppose you should say ‘manopause’. A time of life when you take stock of where you are and where you’re going. Have you noticed anything unusual about me lately?’

‘You fastened your cardigan to one of your fly buttons on Tuesday,’ I say, trying to remember. ‘Or was it Wednesday?’

‘I don’t mean that!’ snaps Sid. ‘I haven’t had an idea what we’re going to do next, have I? Normally, new career opportunities are bombarding my nut like flies round a steaming horse turd. But at the moment – nothing. I’m worried, I don’t mind admitting it.’

‘You mustn’t get yourself in a state,’ I comfort. ‘Maybe we should venture beyond those screens at the Labour more often. They might have something right up our street.’

‘I don’t want to work on my own doorstep,’ says Sid. ‘Swanning round the Med gave me a taste for the wide open spaces. That’s why I’m so contented up here. Look at the light on the sail of that yacht. The sun gives it an almost translucent quality – like when you’re sitting on your mum’s karsi.’

I take it that Sid is referring to the way the sun shines through the cracks in the door and focuses on the cut up bits of the TV Times in the bog paper holder but I don’t really like to ask. ‘I could certainly do with some bread,’ I say.

‘What for?’ says Sid. ‘What good’s bread?’

His words strike me round the face with the force of an ice-cold halibut freshly wrenched from the Arctic Ocean.

‘What good is bread?’ I repeat. ‘Everything we’ve ever done has been based on your desire to stash away a few bob.’

‘I was young then,’ says Sid. ‘No more than a gullible boy with distorted values. I used to think that if money couldn’t buy happiness at least you could live miserably in comfort, but I don’t believe that any more. Look at Paul Getty.’

‘That’s not him, is it?’ I say. ‘Behind the thermos with the blonde bird? She’s a bit young for him, isn’t–?’

‘No!’ says Sid, cuttingly. ‘I meant examine the situation of Paul Getty and ask yourself if he has found true happiness. I’ve realised that money isn’t the answer, Timmo. There’s much more to life than sipping your Bovril out of a gold-plated mug in front of Match of the Day in colour.’

‘And you don’t think Paul Getty has realised that?’

‘I do think he’s realised that,’ says Sid emphatically. ‘But he’s realised it too late. That’s why he’s always looking so blooming miserable. I don’t intend to make the same mistake.’

‘Thank gawd!’ I say. ‘You’d have been unbearable as the richest man in the world.’

Sid ignores what some might have considered to be a trace of sarcasm in my voice. ‘The only thing, is that having rejected riches, I don’t know where to turn. I’m in a state of limbo. Timbo – I mean, Timmo.’

‘Well,’ I say. ‘As it so happens, fate has directed us to the right spot. Look what it says on that caravan. “Madame Necroma reveals all: £1”. Your future laid bare for a couple of bars, Sid. Can’t be bad.’

I am not really serious but Sid’s mince pies light up. ‘Yeah!’ he says. ‘She should know, shouldn’t she? They have a gift, these people. Lend us a quid.’

‘Do me a favour!’ I say. ‘She can make do with the gifts she’s already got. I’ve already bought most of the booze you drunk in that rubber. Anyway, I’m very happy with you in a state of limbo. It doesn’t cost me money.’

‘There you go again,’ says Sid. ‘Money. It’s your BO and end all, isn’t it? You can’t think about anything else. You’re so inflexible. If it wasn’t for my ability to mellow and develop as a human being you’d be exactly where you were when I first met you.’

‘Don’t make it sound too tempting,’ I say.

‘What I always have difficulty in making you understand,’ says Sid, ‘is that you have a wonderful opportunity to learn from my experience in life. I go through things so that you don’t have to.’

‘Like my fiancée,’ I say.

‘You’re not still worrying about that,’ says Sid. ‘It was so long ago – and anyway, you were never properly engaged.’

‘Wouldn’t have made any difference if we’d been getting married,’ I say wearily. ‘You’d have been trying to feel her up while you handed me the ring.’

‘No need to be coarse,’ says Sid. ‘That’s all behind us now – all that sexual foolishness. Now I’m a more mature human being I can see what Mary Whitehouse and Lord Longford are up to.’

‘You’ve heard rumours, have you?’ I say, beginning to get interested. ‘Don’t tell me that nice Antonia Fraser’s daddy has done something untoward.’

‘Of course not!’ says Sid. ‘I didn’t mean “up to” in the slap and tickle sense. I was referring to their stand against the corrupting influence of books like the ones your Dad keeps in the hallstand.’

‘He doesn’t any more,’ I say. ‘They’re in the cistern.’

‘Blimey, I wondered why he was in there for so long. Dirty old sod! How did you find out?’

‘I pulled the chain one day and nothing happened–’

‘You have to pull it quickly and then give it one long pull,’ interrupts Sid.

‘Do you mind?’ I tell him. ‘It is my home. I ought to know how to use the karsi. Why don’t you belt up and let me finish?’ I pause for a censorial moment – good word that, isn’t it? – and then continue. ‘When I climbed up on the seat I found that a couple of mags had slipped underneath the ballcock.’

‘How very appropriate,’ says Sid. ‘They must have been a bit soggy.’

‘They were,’ I say. ‘But it didn’t spoil the effect. The photos on the reverse side of the page showed through so you had one bird on top of the other.’

‘You had that anyway,’ says Sid. ‘Oh dear. How sad it all is. Your Dad has grown old without achieving maturity. I’d feel sorry for him if he wasn’t such a miserable old git. Lend us a quid.’

I had hoped to talk Sid out of his insane impulse to help Madame Necroma towards a new set of frilly curtains for her caravan but once he gets an idea into his crust it can be very hard to budge. We are still arguing when one of the curtains is pulled aside and a bird with a beauty spot and a lot of makeup snatches a gander at us. She looks a bit ruffled, as does the geezer who appears when the caravan door opens. His knees are practically the first thing to hit the top step and he staggers down the rest of them like he has both feet through the slit of his Y-fronts.

‘Find it all right, did you?’ asks Sid.

The bloke looks not a little taken aback. ‘What do you mean?’ he says suspiciously.

‘You know,’ says Sid, jerking his head towards the window. ‘Does she know her stuff?’

The bloke gives a little shiver and pulls his mac around him. ‘Unbelievable,’ he says.

Sid turns to me. ‘There you are! Come on, don’t be a berk. Maybe she’ll take something off for the two of us.’

‘She won’t take anything off,’ says the bloke. ‘I asked her specially.’

‘Well, we’ll have a go anyway,’ says Sid. ‘Come on, Timmo! Don’t you want to know what the future holds in store?’

The bloke gives Sid another funny look and hurries away muttering. ‘Nice chap,’ says Sid. ‘He clearly found it a moving experience. Did you notice that glazed look in his eyes?’

‘I was concentrating on the way his knees bashed together,’ I say. ‘Do you really want to go through with this, Sid?’

‘Definitely,’ says my diabolical brother-in-law. And he bounds up the steps like a jack rabbit.

No sooner is his Oliver Twist poised in front of the Rory than it whips open and the bird in the window nearly clocks him one with one of her enormous earrings. They are so big that you could sit a parrot on them – provided you did not mind running the risk of it doing its business in your earhole. She is now wearing a head scarf tied tightly round her nut and her generous knockers heave beneath an embroidered shawl.

‘Madame Necroma?’ says Sid. ‘Good afternoon, madame. My friend and I would like to avail ourselves of your service.’

‘Both of you?’ says the bird.

‘Exactly,’ says Sid. ‘You have perceived my meaning to the T. We were wondering if there was a possibility of you making a reduction in our case?’

‘I’ll reduce anything you show me,’ says Madame Necroma. ‘Come in, boys. You don’t want to hang about. There’s narks everywhere. It’s getting impossible to turn over a couple of bob without finding a copper.’

She closes the door behind us and we take a gander round the inside of the caravan. ‘Blimey,’ says Sid. ‘I never seen one with a double bed in it before.’

‘It folds away to make a couple of work surfaces,’ says Madame. ‘Now, what can I do to accommodate you? Both together? Or, one at a time? Or one watching? – it’s amazing how popular watching has become lately. I suppose it’s the telly?’

‘What’s the cheapest?’ I ask quickly.

‘One at a time, flat rate,’ says Madame. ‘A quid each.’

‘You go ahead,’ I say to Sid. ‘I’ll give it a miss. I’m not all that keen.’

‘Charming!’ says Madame Necroma.

‘Don’t take it to heart,’ says Sid. ‘It’s a question of bees, not doubting your professional integrity. We’re both the same sign anyway. Scorpio: brooding, sensual, possessive–’

‘Skint!’ says Madame Necroma.

‘I’ll wait for you outside,’ I say to Sid.

‘Right,’ says Sid. ‘Don’t fret. Whatever I learn will be to our mutual advantage. This might be the turning point, Timmo. It could be the best quid you’ve ever spent.’

I am still trying to tell him that I only lent him the money when Madame Necroma pushes me down the steps. She certainly seems in a hurry to get on with it. I suppose Sid’s stars could be on the point of moving into a different quarter. I believe it is a very precise science.

When I get outside I have a quick shufti round the fair and then take a butcher’s at the couples on the common. I soon give this up because the other people who are clocking them are such a disgusting lot. It’s like pornography. There is nothing wrong with it except the kind of person it attracts. It makes you feel dirty to be associated with them.

About ten minutes have gone by and I reckon that Madame Necroma must have finished with Sid. She did not look the type to hang about. I wander back to the caravan and am slightly surprised that there is no sign of Clapham’s answer to Paul Newman. Nor is there any sound from the caravan. Madame must still be gazing intently into her crystal ball. Best to leave them at it rather than interrupt the seance, or whatever it is. Sid would be furious if I spoilt his big moment.

I have just started counting the china alsatians in the caravan windows when I turn and see a female copper surveying me with what would pass for interest in any other bird. I don’t know what it is but I immediately start feeling guilty. My palms get hot and sweaty and when I move it is as if I expected a jemmy to drop out of my trouser leg. I turn away but I am conscious that the bird is still watching me. Perhaps she thinks I am casing the caravans prior to a spot of B. and E.

‘Psssst!’ Do my senses deceive me or is it her making that noise? I turn and she waggles a finger at me and retires behind a trailer. What can she want? Perhaps it is a new way of arresting people. You nip round the corner after PC Niceparts and a blooming great bule bashes you over the nut with his truncheon. Still, what have I got to worry about? I haven’t done anything. I take a deep breath and trip round the side of the trailer – some twit has left an electric cable stretched across the grass. The Bluebird is waiting for me and, I must say, she could take me in charge any day of the week. Neat as a guardsman’s sewing kit and eyes like warm toffee. She has a delicate dust of freckles on her face and her eyelashes flop about like they have just been washed and she can’t do a thing with them. All in all, she looks as if she would find it difficult to straighten a seam in her stocking, let alone arrest anyone.

‘CID?’ she murmurs. She is nodding over my shoulder when she speaks and I am so busy clocking the plus features that for some reason I think she is referring to Sid – we often call him El Cid, anyway.

‘Er – yes,’ I say, not wanting to give too much away. You never know what Sid has been up to.

‘Balham,’ she breathes. ‘Sorry I’m late for our Romeo Victor. Has there been much action?’

I don’t answer at once because I am trying to work out who this Romeo Victor bloke is. Perhaps I misheard her and she said Romany Victor. That would make more sense in our present surroundings. ‘Look,’ I say. ‘I think there’s been a mistake.’

‘You were expecting a man.’ To my surprise her lip starts to tremble. It is a nice lip, as is its plump little friend underneath, and a wave of sympathy runs through my Y-fronts.

‘Only Sid,’ I say.

‘I don’t know Sid,’ she says. ‘I’ve only just joined the station.’

‘Balham,’ I say. ‘Oh yes, you said.’

‘I won’t let you down,’ says the bird. ‘I may only be a woman but inside me beats the heart of a man.’

‘Blimey!’ I say. ‘I bet that made the Police Gazette. It’s wonderful what surgeons can do these days, isn’t it?’

For a moment, I think the bird is going to burst into tears.

‘You’re making fun of me!’ she accuses. ‘I was referring to Elizabeth the First’s words at Tilbury.’

‘Oh, them,’ I say. ‘Yes, well, you should have made yourself clear. I missed that episode when it was on the telly. What precisely are you trying to say to me?’

‘I’m trying to say that you can rely on me,’ she says. ‘I won’t let you down. I don’t care what they’re doing in there. I won’t be shocked. Just say the word and I’ll be right with you – oh!’ While I am wondering what the hell she is talking about she suddenly whips a pair of handcuffs from under her skirt and slaps them on my wrists. God knows where she keeps her truncheon.

‘Don’t look surprised!’ she hisses. ‘Somebody’s watching us from the window. I’ll pretend to arrest you.’

I glance up at the window of Madame Necroma’s caravan and am not a little taken aback to see Sid blinking down at me. He looks strangely flushed and dishevelled. Maybe it is the surprise of seeing me being led off by one of the female fuzz. I raise my manacled mitts along with my eyebrows and his boat race is joined by Madame Necroma’s. She is looking a bit on the heated side and I can’t help wondering what they have been doing. Surely it is beyond the realms of possibility that kapok karate has been indulged in? Before I can indulge the horrible thought to excess, the female copper has led me round the corner and is feeling in the pocket of her tunic.

‘Sorry about that,’ she says, sounding like Barbara Cartland watching one of her pekes relieve itself against your ankle. ‘I thought they might think it was a bit fishy if they saw us hanging about outside the caravan – oh no!’

Her face goes all horror-struck like Harold Wilson looking at the latest trade figures and I am swift to realise that something is wrong. ‘Look,’ I say. ‘I don’t want to sound unsympathetic and I always used to enjoy Z Cars, but what is going on around here?’

‘I’ve lost the key to the handcuffs,’ she says. ‘Oh gosh. You’re going to think I’m an awful goose.’

‘At the very least,’ I say. ‘Look, you could get arrested for this. Everybody’s looking at me.’

‘Come over to the car,’ she says. ‘Perhaps the driver will have a spare one. I am most awfully sorry about this.’

‘So you should be!’ I hiss. Honestly, you feel like sticking your tongue out at Jack Warner, don’t you? No wonder the country is in a mess. I wonder this kid was able to cut out the application form without doing herself a serious injury. She must have needed guidance to follow the dotted lines round the advertisement. If she was not easy on the eye-balls I might be thinking about writing to my MP.

‘What’s he done, miss?’ says one of the kids who is clustering around us.

‘Child murder!’ I tell him. ‘Hop it, you horrible little basket!’

‘Looks a villain,’ says another God forbid. ‘Do you want any help, miss?’

‘No thanks,’ I say. ‘I’m going quietly. Which is more than you will be if you don’t scarper sharpish!’ I make a threatening lunge and they drop back half a dozen paces.

There is a police car parked under a tree and the bloke at the wheel puts down his copy of Six Hundred Ways To Thump Someone And Leave No Trace and leaps out hungrily. ‘Got the ponce, have you?’ he says looking me up and down hungrily. ‘Wait till we get you back to the station, matey.’

‘No!’ says little Miss Blue Serge, blushing. ‘He’s our contact. I locked him up by mistake.’

‘Oh, gawd, Millie!’ says the fuzz. ‘I thought you’d finished for the day when you arrested that store detective for shoplifting. Unlock him quick!’

‘I’ve lost my key,’ says the bird. Her lip has started trembling again and it is clear that she is on the verge of tears.

‘Oh no!’ The rozzer bashes his fist against the side of his nut so hard that his hat nearly falls off.

‘Haven’t you got one?’ says Millie.

‘Course I haven’t got one!’ The fuzz looks about him desperately. ‘Who’s keeping the caravan under surveillance?’

‘Nobody,’ says Millie. ‘I’d better go–’

‘No you don’t! You’ve done enough damage for one day,’ says the fuzz. ‘You stay here. I’ll go.’

‘What about me?’ I say.

‘You can’t go,’ says the copper. ‘Not with those handcuffs on. You get in the car with WPC Marjoribanks. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

‘Thanks a lot,’ I say, not without a trace of sarcasm.

‘Sorry about this,’ says the male fuzz, considerately opening the car door for me. ‘These combined ops are always a bit of a disaster, aren’t they? Get out of it! !’ His last remark is delivered to the pack of kids round the car as he turns and strides purposefully towards the caravans. The kids follow him.

WPC Marjoribanks slides along the back seat beside me. She has nice little knees and I can’t help clocking the curve of her thighs underneath the blue serge skirt. ‘Alone at last,’ I say.

She smiles nervously. ‘I don’t have to say it again, do I?’

‘Please don’t,’ I say. ‘It doesn’t help very much. Haven’t you got a hacksaw tucked away somewhere?’

She does not answer but starts running her hands over the front of her body. ‘I must have a hole,’ she says.

‘It’s not beyond the realms of possibility,’ I say suavely. ‘Perhaps you’d better have a look for it. I shouldn’t think anything would have much chance of dropping out of that lot.’

I am clocking the front of her tight tunic when I speak and it is true that she would be pushed to smuggle a thin stamp hinge in the space not taken up by knocker.

‘I suppose there’s always a chance,’ she says.

The same thought occurs to me as I watch her fingers delving in the breast pocket of her tunic and a wave of naughtiness sweeps over the maximum stress area of my jeans.

‘Any luck?’ I say.

‘Oh dear,’ she says. ‘There is a hole. The lining’s gone.’

Not surprising with that lot chafing against it, I think to myself. ‘Perhaps it’s slipped down inside,’ I say, jerking my manacled mitts to indicate that some kind of action needs to be taken.

WPC Marjoribanks nods and starts to undo her tunic. She is wearing a plum red half cut bra under her blue shirt and I suck in my breath appreciatively. ‘That’s not government issue, is it?’ I say.

‘What, the shirt?’ she says.

‘The bra,’ I say. ‘I can’t help noticing it when I look. It’s nice.’

‘Oh, no, it’s not – I mean, it’s not police issue. Frankly – if it doesn’t sound like heresy – I’m not all that keen on the uniform. In fact–’ her lip starts to tremble again ‘– I’m not all that keen on the Force.’

‘I don’t like force either,’ I say. ‘There’s too much of it. People talk about sex and violence like they are the same thing but I only see the–’

‘I mean the Police Force,’ she says. ‘Frankly I don’t think I’m cut out to be a copper. That probably sounds terrible to you. How long have you been a flat foot?’

‘Well, I’ve always had a bit of trouble with my arches,’ I say. ‘Mum made me wear my sister’s old sandals when I was a kid and–’

‘A policeman,’ she says. ‘How long have you been with the CID?’

This time I twig what she says: the CID, not the SID. She has obviously mistaken me for a plain clothes copper. I wonder if it would be wise to disillusion her? Especially in our present situation. ‘Not very long,’ I say. I give a light laugh and wait for her to ask me why.

‘What are you laughing at?’ she says.

‘I was just thinking,’ I say. ‘If I wanted to make a pass at you I’d have a problem, wouldn’t I?’ I hold out my wrists and give her the famous Lea slow burn. It is all good clean fun and she smiles gamely.

‘I sometimes wonder if that’s why I joined,’ she says sadly.

‘What do you mean?’ I say.

‘I used to be very free and easy,’ she says. ‘I remember how worried my mother was. I think I thought that if I joined the police force it would be the next best thing to becoming a nun. I’d be protected from myself. The sanctity of the uniform would keep me on the straight and narrow.’

You could nip on my straight and narrow any day of the week, I think to myself. I nod understandingly and take one of her hands in both of mine – I don’t have any alternative with the handcuffs on. ‘You don’t want to go against your true nature,’ I say. ‘Any luck with that key?’

She retrieves her hand and runs it along the hem of her skirt. ‘Nope. It must have dropped out.’

‘Couldn’t have slipped inside your shirt?’ I drop my tethered mitts on her Ned Kelly and have a little feel. It is even more sexy with the bracelets on. Percy certainly thinks so anyway. He bounces up like a rubber pigeon shit. ‘No. There’s nothing there – except you.’ The minute I lay hands on her she stiffens like something else I have just mentioned and it is clear that the pressure of my sensitive looks and fingers is not altogether repugnant.

‘This is awful,’ she says. ‘What would anyone say if they could see?’

‘There’s nobody around to see,’ I say. ‘They’ve all gone off with your mate. Let’s make sure you’re not concealing anything.’

I lower my nut in time with my voice and gently brush my mouth against hers. I wouldn’t exactly say that she abandons herself to my lips but she does not bust the back window jerking her head away.

‘Are you married?’ she says. ‘All the worst ones at the station are married.’

‘I’m not surprised you have problems,’ I say. ‘No, I’m not married.’

‘You shouldn’t be doing that,’ she says.

‘I’m just trying to keep the circulation running through my wrists,’ I say. ‘These handcuffs are blooming tight.’

‘Isn’t there anything else you can feel?’ she says.

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I’ll have to find out.’ Before she can say anything, I drop my mitts to her knee and twist my body round so that I can slide them underneath her skirt.

‘Ooh!’ she says.

‘The steel’s a bit cold, is it?’ I say – consideration for birds’ feelings has always been one of my strong points.

‘Not only that,’ she says. ‘Your cheek’s pretty cool too! I’ve never worked with any one like you.’

‘We could become famous in the anals of crime,’ I say.

‘I think you mean annals,’ she says. ‘Though when you do that with your hands I’m not sure.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘These seats slope down a bit steep.’ I give her another chance to taste the nectar of my lips and this time our cakeholes melt together and I feel her long lashes brushing against my cheek like imprisoned butterflies – poetry, isn’t it? Oh, all right, please yourself. Only trying to extend my range. And, talking about extensions – yes, Percy is rearing roofwards like he is bent on turning my lap into an imitation of a tent being erected. She has gorgeous lips, this bird. They are sort of soft and tacky so that they form themselves to the shape of your cakehole and then cling on like clams. What a bleeding shame that my mitts are manacled. I really feel the urge to mould this bird-sized bule to the stressed steel that is the Lea rib cage.