‘So,’ said Fangio to Mama Cass, ‘ Woodstock, eh? I’ve heard tell of this. An outdoor Hippy Life-Affirming Cosmic Celebration. Or as we right-minded Republicans would say, a bunch of them no-good peace-queers and drug fiends smoking reefers and supporting the cockney work ethic.’
‘What?’ said the guy. And I for one joined him in this.
‘Are you for real?’ asked Mama Cass of Fangio.
The fat-boy felt at his person.
‘That is disgusting,’ said Mama Cass.
‘It’s my person,’ said Fangio, ‘and I’ll feel at it if I wish.’ Adding, ‘And as it’s also my bar, I can propound right-wing bigotry also, if I so wish. It’s the prerogative of the barlord. That and fiddling the change.’
‘And skimping on the toilet rolls in the gentlemens’ John,’ I added.
‘That goes without saying,’ said Fangio.
‘So, where is the phone?’ asked Mama Cass.
‘Now that,’ said Fangio, ‘is a question.’
‘But you do have a phone?’
‘It depends on what you mean by “have”,’ said Fange. ‘I had measles once, but I’m damned if I know whatever became of them.’
‘I had a lost weekend once,’ I said to Fange. ‘But I’m damned if I know whatever happened to that.’
‘I was with you on that weekend,’ said Fangio. ‘And I do know, but I’m not telling. Being enigmatic is also the prerogative of the barlord.’
‘So, no telephone,’ said Mama Cass.
Fangio the barman shook his head. ‘Don’t you just long for the invention of the mobile phone?’ he asked. ‘Or cell phone as we’ll call it over here. Because people will use them in prisons, I suppose.’
There was a small but perfect silence.
‘My mum predicted that,’ said the guy. ‘And do you know what? I miss my mum.’ And he got a rather sad face on.
‘You’re going off on a tangent again, kid,’ I told him. ‘Never take your eye off the ball. Except if you’re in a gay pub quiz.’
‘But where is this leading?’ he pleaded.
‘Just stick around and you’ll see.’
‘Oh dear,’ said Mama Cass. ‘Well, if you don’t have a phone here, I suppose I’ll have to go elsewhere and look for one. I must get in touch with Mr Ishmael.’
‘Mr Ishmael? ’ went the guy. But I silenced him with a raised fist and single look so intense that it could have swallowed a pigeon, beak and trotters and all.
‘Mr Ishmael?’ I asked Mama Cass. ‘Who is this Mr Ishmael of whom you speak?’
‘You have a lovely way with words,’ said the talented, if slightly overweight, chanteuse. ‘Would you care for some free love in the back of the limo?’
‘Lady,’ I told her, ‘in my line of work, I don’t have time for love. I have time for danger and time for trouble. And time to talk the toot. But to Lazlo Woodbine, love is a stranger who wears a tweed jacket with ink on its right lapel. And leather patches on its elbows. Which can say so much, whilst still remaining mute, if you know what I mean and I’m sure that you do.’
‘Don’t get me going on tweed jacket elbow patches,’ said Fangio.
‘I won’t, my friend,’ I told him.
‘But this is free love,’ said Mama Cass. ‘It’s not like real love. In fact, it doesn’t really have anything to do with love at all, really. It’s more about meaningless sex. It just sounds nicer to call it free love. It’s one of those new buzz words, like Flower Power, that the Big Apple Corporation create.’
‘The Big Apple Corporation?’ I questioned.
‘The BAC, that’s right.’
‘Pray tell me, madam,’ I asked of her, ‘what do you know of this uptown organisation?’
‘Not very much,’ said Mama Cass. And she took the cherry brandy from my client’s hand and quaffed it away at a gulp. ‘They’re behind the Woodstock Festival. Although they’re very secretive about it and not many people know. I just happened to overhear a conversation that Mr Ishmael was having.’
‘That name again,’ said I. ‘Who is this Mr Ishmael?’
‘The backer of Woodstock. The chairman of the Big Apple Corporation.’
‘This is news to me,’ said the guy.
‘Be still,’ I said. And I meant it. And I showed him that I did.
‘Mr Ishmael is the driving force behind the BAC,’ continued the ample diva. ‘And it was the BAC that came up with not only Free Love and Flower Power, but Peace and Love, Man also. And a good thing, too, because if the BAC hadn’t got the Flower Power thing going, me and my band could never have found a record label to take our stuff.’
‘You’re on Dunhill, aren’t you?’ I said.
‘It’s Mr Ishmael’s label really. But I must be going. I need to find a phone.’
‘It’s very cold out,’ I said to the girl with the golden voice. ‘What say you and I sit here and sink a few Buds, chew the fat and talk about the good old days.’
‘You mean memories? Misty watercolour memories?’
‘The very same. Can I buy you a beer? My client there is paying.’
‘The young guy lying on the floor next to the McMurdo?’
‘The very same.’ And I hailed Fangio. ‘We need some service over here,’ I hailed. ‘And none of your service- with-a-smile-without-the-smile. ’
‘I missed his earlier smile,’ said Mama Cass, ‘because it was before I came in. But I just bet it brought joy to the world, for it certainly did to me.’
‘Sister,’ I said to her, ‘you know how to talk the toot. Let’s crack a bottle of bubbly.’
I ordered that bottle and by three of the clock that ticks out the afternoon it was delivered to us, along with a bar tab that I signed on my client’s behalf and a kitten that I petted gently and returned to Fange. Who placed it in a cardboard box to be mailed to our boys in ’ Nam.
I filled glasses and toasts were exchanged.
‘I have a black eye,’ said my client, rising unsteadily from the floor and viewing this in the mirror behind the bar.
‘I’ll drink to that,’ I said.
Fangio excused himself from a crowd of Jimbos who had recently entered the bar and returned himself to my company.
‘What very big women,’ he said. ‘And such deep voices. And they smell a bit iffy, too.’
I noticed my client glance over his shoulder.
‘Are you okay, buddy?’ I asked him.
‘Jimbos,’ said my client. ‘I told you about them. At The Green Carnation Club. I think they might be undead.’
‘But you can’t tell for sure because you’re not on the drug, right?’
‘Right,’ said the guy. ‘And that wasn’t funny, what you said earlier. You weren’t in the green room at The Stones in the Park gig. I would have seen you.’
‘But you did,’ I told him. ‘I was in disguise.’
‘As what?’
‘As whom. As Marianne Faithfull.’
‘I think I’m drunk,’ said the guy. ‘I don’t believe you actually said that.’
‘I didn’t,’ I said. ‘Just keep telling yourself I didn’t.’
‘And add I must pay Fangio’s bar tab,’ said Fangio. ‘And, a little while later, when we’re all very drunk, you can sing us a song, also.’
‘I don’t want to,’ he said. ‘I’ve been sitting around here for hours now, drinking and lying on the floor unconscious also, although I don’t remember how that happened. And I’m beginning to believe that Mr Woodbine here is just treading water, as it were, because he is being paid by the hour.’
