From our Arts correspondent:

To the other corner of The Wash last Saturday, King's Lynn for a concert by the Philharmonia Orchestra and violin soloist, Min-Jin Kym.

The venue, their much restored Corn Exchange (1854), stands in a nice Georgian square with its back to the docks on the River Ouse. Opposite is the Crown Hotel, an invitingly lovely building whose user comments on Tripadvisor would put off all but the hardiest from staying there. English hospitality and service at its most typical, apparently.

The programme had been selected with a traditional audience in mind and didn't disappoint. First up was Rossini's Overture, Barber of Seville. Conductor Joji Hattori's satisfyingly flowing black locks shook impressively in the appropriate manner as he took the orchestra through it at a cracking pace. Then Min-Jin floated onstage, gold slippers peeping from under a diaphanous pink silk gown, to perform Beethoven's Concerto.

There's always something so vulnerable seeming about violin soloists, who have nothing to sit behind like cellists or pianists do, while they wait for their turn to play. She must have felt the weight of the thousand pairs of eyes focused on her while she stood, sometimes picking imaginary specks of dust from her Strad, or making tiny adjustments to her bow, or just scratching her shoulder. Then when it was her time, she lit the stage up with her presence, her control over volume and intensity, her total command of Beethoven's score and her ability to make individual notes flow together like liquid ripples. She pushed it to the limit and, towards the end, she had something of the matador about her, showing just that touch of exaggerated pride at her mastery of the piece and making us wonder if she could dare to reach for new heights as the inevitable climax approached.

She'd dominated the Philharmonia throughout, fully deserving her ovation. Whether through design or inability to keep up, they'd played rather a restrained role. I'd have preferred a more evenly balanced partnership, and a little more interest shown by some members - notably the first cellos who looked bored witless throughout. But after the interval, it came into its own with Tchaikovsky's Sixth.

Opinions differ as to whether this symphony is really the composer's 'last will and testament'. But it's hard not to see it as such and that thought might well have been in Hattori's mind, judging by the way he conducted it. The first movement - alternatively lushly romantic and moodily pensive is said to symbolise Tchaikovsky's forbidden homosexual love-affairs. The 5/4 time of the second makes it sound like an impossibly awkward waltz to be danced to by someone who can't fit convention. The third, with its martial theme; sometimes imperious, sometimes almost comic-opera, ends in a towering crescendo dominated by the brass and almost always draws applause from sections of the audience who think the work has finished. It's as if he's saying, "yes, see - see what I can do to you when I want to. You loved me, didn't you? Now listen to this..." And so to the final movement, almost unbearably deep and miserable, with parts harking back to the romance in the first, eventually simply ebbs away from us into nothingness.

Nine days after the premiere, Tchaikovsky's life had ended too.

On that sombre note, we left for home. Our lives changed, just by a small amount, by a Korean violinist, a Japanese conductor, Italian, German and Russian composers and a historic town in the flatlands of rural Norfolk. If only all multiculturalism could be as satisfying as this.

Tarkwith Vonackle

Le Fromage du Mort

Dinard Airport was built to serve an age when air travel was a more personal pastime. You find this out as soon as you find yourself squashed into its baggage hall even more tightly than you were in the Ryanair Boeing that you landed in. Still, its advantage is that it's only steps into the outside world once you're through the perfunctory immigration check.

Our base for the 4 night break was an hour's drive away at the Manoir des .. oh damn, I've forgotten the rest. Anyway, it's just outside Sables d'Or des Pins and good because it doesn't have a restaurant and they leave you alone to come and go as you wish.

The attraction of this part of Brittany, of course, is that it's a coast like you wish England had - and would have if it wasn't for the way our coastline has been spoiled by pandering to the worst elements of mass tourism. Dramatic cliffs, hidden coves, long sandy beaches, fishing towns with actual fishing boats in their harbours, pleasant courteous waiters who bring delicious local produce to your table cooked to perfection at prices that make you swear never to be ripped off in an English restaurant ever again. We spent most of the time at nearby Erquy, where the west-facing beach curves in a perfect crescent and you can eat coquilles St. Jaques and drink a glass of cider on a cafe terrace, looking across the harbour where the day's catch is brought to.

Well we inspected the sights, as you do on holiday. Remnants of abbeys, ancient stones, things that you don't give a second glance to back home that suddenly become must-sees when abroad.

We'd rented a Ford Fusion. I've driven automatics for years and this thing showed me why. To change gear you had to ram the clutch so far into the corner of the footwell that it could only be done using the very tip of your big toe. Agonising. And with a gear lever that felt like stirring Artex with a feather. After 100 years of motoring, how a major manufacturer can come up with such crap is beyond me. Not that it would matter if the public's irrational hatred of automatics could be overcome and we could all drive sensibly. Why they can't be arsed even to lock the car door without a remote control and yet insist on faffing about with a manual gear-box is a mystery.

Back at the airport, there was a sign saying what was forbidden to take on board. Among them, amusingly I thought, was 'smelly items'. We smiled condescendingly, thinking it was a quaint mistranslation from the French. Not so! Les Douaniers Francais could hardly be more rigorous on this matter! In a search of Mme.'s hand-luggage, an eagle-eyed gendarme detected a suspicious tub of Boursin fromage and confiscated it forthwith. Comforting to know the War on Terror is being taken so seriously on both sides of the Channel.

Reminders of Summer 2006

Other times. Different places.

On the Tuesday, we left at about 10.30 to go to Evora where, according to the information, it was Market Day. The day had dawned dull and cold and there had been rain in the night. I was achy and cranky when we parked the car just outside the walls. No sign of a market, just a few stalls selling pots. We went in through the Parc (1866, it said, set in the black and white paving tiles that are everywhere). The Mercado Municipal, too, was closed for restoration. Evora is a superb, intact, old city – enclosed by walls in an area about a mile across. A great 12th century gothic cathedral sits on top of the hill in the middle and there is a 16th century university as well as many more fine ancient churches and buildings among the steep warren of cobbled streets. There’s even a Roman Temple of Diana, so far back does the continuous inhabitation of this town go.

At one end of the main square, there's a marble fountain in front of a big church and at the other, a grandiose bank. In between are four-story, white painted buildings, mostly small shops, with filigree ironwork balconies and painted mouldings. The north side is arcaded with heavy stone arches to shade the shop-windows and whenever we've been here before, we’ve always gone into the Café Arcada.

Inside the doorway, on the left, it had a tabacaria and news-vendor. Facing that was a counter selling cakes and sweets to the noisy families, the students, the lovers and the daydreamers who would take their time over a coffee at the tables which stretched half-way down the deep interior. Further inside, steaming urns of soup stood on a long zinc bar which ran down the left-hand wall over glass-cabinets holding soft drinks, beer, fruit and sandwiches. In this part of the café, in the gloom, old men would pass their afternoons with a glass of wine while they talked and argued together or idly turned to watch television. The only decorations were enlarged black and white photographs of forties-style tuxedoed musicians playing behind music stands with the script ‘Orchestre Arcadia’ written on them – memories of bygone glories, perhaps. In the evenings, we ate simple meals there, brought by a waiter in an open-necked white shirt, black waistcoat, scruffy shoes and a tea-towel tucked into the waistband of his sagging trousers. It was one of our favourite places in Portugal. Now, it has changed. Now, it has become a symbol of all I loathe, despise and detest about modern life. Now, it sells lifestyle.

Gone is the tabacaria, replaced by a stone wall of mock-neolithic art. The cake counter is still there but now no-one lingers over their coffee – sharp-eyed waitresses make sure business stays brisk. Inside, after you pass a sign saying ‘Please wait to be seated’, you don’t find the zinc bar or the shambling waiter any more. The photographs are still there, surrounded now by smart tables where American tourists can eat - safe in the knowledge that the food will be as wholesome and familiar as it is in Kansas City. Gone, too, to who-knows-where, are the old men.

Why DO tourists stand out so? They wander bewilderedly. They carry maps, their wives walk two paces behind, wear silly holiday clothes and carry all their money, credit cards and passports in pouches strung over their bellies. They can't help that, by their very presence, they must change the nature of a place. But why must they turn them into what they left behind at home?

We drank a quick espresso there, paid the euro for it and left in a hurry. We had lunch in a café in a nearby street. The waiter was friendly, the rest of the customers (all men) were noisy Alentejans and the food was good, simple and cheap (grilled fish, salad, boiled potatoes, red wine, bottled water – about 17€). Didn’t drink any wine but felt picked up by then.

Back at the casa, we hadn’t been there long before there was a knock at the door and the owners had arrived to visit. Clare was first through the door, small, dark hair, green waterproofs, brown riding boots. Her husband, Anthony, tall, grey, red sweater, followed carrying gifts for us of two jars, one of home-made jam, the other of home-grown honey. They are both frightfully, terribly, posh and Clare told us her family owned this farm. They say they spend about a third of the year here and, when in England, are from Wiltshire. Judging by their accents, they are probably from most of it. They will be back on Thursday bringing a chap who wants a long-term let on this place – once he’s checked for ‘light pollution’ – he’s an astronomer. After they’d left, Salvatore, Maria and Chico’s son, brought us in a basket of logs – no doubt on La Pincent’s orders. Mme. soon lit a bright fire and we spent the evening reading and eating the rest of the cheese.

Wednesday, walked the dogs down over the dam again, lost them as usual as they chased rabbits through the garden of the other cottage that stands over there – the one we’d like to buy. After lunch, (omelette, fried potatoes, salad, white wine), drove through Igreginha (Little Church) around to Vimiero and back over heathland with hawks, buzzards and shrikes through Vale de Periero. Houses for sale in each but neither are what we’re looking for. Be nice to find out what they are worth, though.

The sun is setting spectacularly as I write this on the terrace with a glass of Licor Beira next to me. Overhead, ragged clouds are tinged with rose and violet against a dulling blue sky. Then, a swathe of heavy purple and below to the west, ribbons of orange and gold lighting the far distance. The bent old shepherd and his black dog collected the sheep about half an hour ago. Now, all there is to be heard of them is just an occasional call of a ewe or a lamb and the gentle ringing of a collar bell. The first cricket has begun whirring and one or other of the dogs barks from time to time. Evora’s lights have begun to sparkle on the horizon and there is the faint smell of wood smoke. Supper of salami, olives, bread and red wine and then an early night.

Faking it

I killed a man
Called One-eyed Chan
In a bar-room in Manila
I went ashore
With my forty-four
And blew his brains out on the floor
His girl cried out, “You shot my love,
You dirty low-down killer.”

It isn’t true
I’m telling lies
I’ve never looked into the eyes
Of anybody with a gun

Then once when on
The Amazon
I met a man named Sailor John
We used to eat
Dead monkey meat
Rotting in the jungle heat
It made him sick
He died one night
I buried him. He’s gone.

I made that up
Another lie
I’ve never seen a person die
Or dug a dead man’s grave.

In '92
I took the view
That mining was the thing to do
And then the price of silver soared
I sold off all my bullion hoard
And bought a seat upon the board
Of companies investing in
Oil and gas and coal and tin
More and more the money poured
Into my banks in Liechtenstein
Where interest gathered
Mine, all mine

I lied again
Another fraud
Dear Lord
I don’t know what is real

I think I kissed
A girl called Kate
Who had an Argentinian mate
Whose tattooed ears and braided hair
Made him welcome everywhere.
Kate was charming and I’m sure
She would have let me kiss her more
If only I’d been rich

I’m not a liar
Or a fake
Just don’t take…
It seriously


Do you remember when we met?
I hope you do ‘cause I forget
I’ve been so many people that
I can’t remember where I’m at
I try to do what’s right, all right
It’s harder in the depths of night.
As everyone who knows me knows
I’m true as true as true can be
So long as people all agree
That I know them and they know me

copyright akc 2006

Valencia

Valencia was beautiful. The streets are lined with grand buildings covered in elaborate carvings and encrusted with balconies edged with fancy wrought-ironwork. Shops selling high-quality goods are everywhere and, especially in the evening, people swarm among them filling the pavements, bars, cafes and restaurants with noise. I spent a day in Placa de la Reina, the open square in front of the cathedral, while Mme. went shopping. As I arrived, I was straightaway accosted by one of the gipsy women who beg there. She was small, slightly built, was wearing the typical long skirt, shawl and headscarf and carrying a photograph of her bambinos, which she kept thrusting at me as she pleaded, in the faint sobbing voice they use, for money to buy bread and milk for them. A few steps later, another began entreating me with the same patter. They are persistent and it’s hard to know whether to sympathise with them in such an affluent country as this.

I sat on a low stone wall and watched the world go by. Two young lovers sat on a bench facing each other, cross-legged, knees touching. The occasional knot of Japanese tourists walked past, looking as bewildered by everything as they always do. I suppose the culture is so different from their own that they can’t appreciate subtleties. Yesterday, for instance, during a service in the cathedral, a Japanese girl was posing in mock prayer to have her photo taken by her boyfriend, oblivious to the offence she gave to the worshippers. Still, to be fair, there’s a relic in a glass box behind the altar, of San Vicente the Martyr. It’s the skeletal remains of his left arm, neatly sawn off just below the elbow. And I’ve seen the displays of piety it inspires among the throngs of Catholics who look wistfully at it but I can’t see the point, either.

Three buskers; clarinet, alto-sax and accordian, played a free-form jazz version of Jingle Bells. At about two o’clock, the square’s occupants began to switch sides. The sun had moved from warming the pavements outside the cafe’s on the west side so it was the east side’s turn to get the customers. In the summer months, the opposite would be true as the eaters, drinkers and loafers fled the afternoon heat of the east to the cool solace of the west’s shadows. I sat at a shiny steel table and ordered a beer and a seafood paella.


Another beggar arrived, an old man. This one lifted the bottom of his jeans to display his leg, with a hideously yellowing wound on it. But he had a dog with him that I felt sorry for so I gave him a euro. A couple more beers and nothing much happening. Cock pigeons cooed, strutted and posed around their hens and were disdainfully ignored. Petunias belied the time of year by blooming in the flower-beds. Orange trees were laden with fruit glowing as if they were Christmas decorations. Church bells lazily tolled the quarter hours. Taxi-drivers dozed in their cabs waiting for fares. Groups of families and friends pulled tables together – the women all gathering together at one end so as to exclude the men from their chatter. I tried to scribble more notes but gave up when I couldn’t come up with anything less cliched than ‘honey-coloured’ for the stonework of the cathedral so went back to the hotel for a nap.

That evening we went to the circus. In England, circuses have all but died out thanks to animal acts being deemed Politically Incorrect. I’d wondered if the same would be true here but, if I’d thought about it, the fact that the bullring was the venue should have reassured me.

This one was a magnificent affair – with a proper Ringmaster and attendants and programme vendors dressed in gold-braided uniforms as if they were the Prussian Cavalry and at least a couple of thousand of us were packed into the Big Top, set up on the blood-soaked sand in the centre of the arena, to see it. First up was, of all things, a contortionist. She writhed, wriggled and twisted so that her limbs seemed ready to burst from their sockets. I’m glad I never married one now. Thoughts that used to make my mouth water now make my eyes water instead. It’s not that the urge lessens with age.... just that I’m not as bendy as I used to be. We laughed at the clowns’ antics, marvelled at the dare-devil tumblers and acrobats, gasped in awe-struck amazement at the death-defying feats of the high-wire act. We loved the massive, docile elephants, cheered oddball Professor Blick and his assorted performing dogs, thrilled at the Cossacks jumping on and off their galloping horses and, best of all, admired the pride of lions and Bengal tigers and their fearless, glamorous, whip-cracking, high-heeled, long-legged, scarlet-sequinned and top-hatted trainer. You just have to have animals in a circus. Without them it’s like sex with your socks on.

Afterwards, we walked back through still-crowded streets towards the hotel – a white-painted wedding-cake of a building, formerly a ducal palace. We called in at a nearby bar for a brandy. Now then... Spanish brandy is a favourite of mine. People who think themselves connoisseurs sneer at it, considering it to be an inferior version of the French stuff. What they fail to realise is... it isn’t supposed to be French.... it is a sweet, fragrant, caramel-flavoured liquor in it’s own right and should only be appreciated as such. Even better, here they dispense it in huge balloon glasses and you get at least three times the amount compared with bars in France. Anyway.... this bar was an exclusive sort of a place. With its own doorman, even. Inside, it was all low lights, marble floor, dark wood, leather and brass in a room full of well-scrubbed men in cashmere and women flaunting their tightly-trousered behinds in expensively tailored suits. They were listening, or dancing, to a duo on electric guitar and bass playing well-worn rock standards. If you can picture in your mind a bar in downtown Atlanta with a couple of good old boys trying to do Flamenco in phonetic Spanish... you’ll get an idea of how out of sync these two sounded. Un-authentic. I bought a Havana, trying to fit in, and smoked it as nonchalantly as I could manage. Some places you feel at home in, some you don’t.

Going, going...

These beautiful creatures, full of life and menace, are high on a church near Boston, Lincs. They were carved in about 1390 by a craftsman whose name we'll never know.

There are hundreds like them on thousands of medieval parish churches in every county of England. Monsters and monarchs, saints and sinners, everyday people in an array of satirical, threatening, humorous and occasionally obscene poses. They date back centuries. They have been a free outdoor art gallery for generations. But they are disappearing fast. At least half have already fallen victim to wind, rain and air pollution and the rest are at serious risk of decay and disintegration.


This one is above a doorway on a neighbouring church. What is it? What might it signify? Who commissioned sinister beings like these, and why? Are they reminders of the beasts from Hell? Or a harkback to paganism? Who knows. Their meanings have been lost over time and now stand only as tributes to their artists' creativity, talent and imagination.


A face looking out eastwards from high on the roof of Burgh Le Marsh Church; across the Fens, over the Wash and onwards for ever. It has features similar to those of the Green Men that are found almost everywhere in Medieval carvings both here and abroad.


There is no effort being made to preserve exterior carvings like these. The structure and fabric of church buildings do receive a share of scarce funds for maintenance. Religious architecture is appreciated and preserved. But works of art such as these three above are neglected and will soon be gone forever.

It's the OIL, Stupid.

Suppose that in your garden, you had built 5 huge bonfires; all the waste that you'd stored up for a year. And you were ready to set fire to one a day for the next five days. Then suppose a busybody from the Council came along and told you that you couldn't; because all that smoke and soot going into the atmosphere would be hazardous. And after you'd thought about it, you agreed with him.

Then, suppose he told you it would be OK if you made 6 piles instead and took 6 days over it. Because, by doing so, you would cut the pollution down by 20%. It's bollocks, isn't it? You'd still be burning the same overall amount, wouldn't you?

But that's the reasoning behind reducing carbon emissions to prevent 'Global Warming'. They say that, if we reduce usage of carbon-rich fuel (basically coal and oil), we'll prevent the planet from overheating and stop sea-level rises that will flood many areas that are currently inhabitable.

Now then, there are some who dispute: (a) that world temperatures are rising at all and (b) that, if they are, whether it's attributable to increased levels of greenhouse gases and (c) that the amount of polar ice that could be affected would be sufficient to significantly raise sea-levels even if it did melt.

But the point is, even if the Global Warming theorists are correct; how will reducing emissions back to 1980s levels (which is all that's being proposed) help matters in the long run? Britain, for instance, is trying to get emissions down by 20% (by 2010). Right. So it will now take us 120 years to emit the same amount we would otherwise have done in 100. Hardly allows enough time for the poor old Earth to get its breath back, does it?

Humans have only been using carbon fuels intensively since the Industrial Revolution of 1850. And in that short space of time, have already used approximately (some say) half of the earth's oil reserves. Even if more deposits are found and become viable, how much longer can they be burned - at the increasing rate with which countries' outputs are expanding? 100 years? 200? 500? I doubt it. So one way or another, all the carbon presently locked up under the earth is going to be released into the atmosphere - where it once was, anyway.

And then, 'Global Warming' will have happened and nobody will be in much of a position to care one way or the other unless they're all cycling around with windmills on their heads.

So what's the fuss about? Why are politicians telling us we've all got to be taxed to stop us taking an Easyjet to Prague or else we're all going to drown under the tide?

Same reason we invaded Iraq? Because the bloody stuff's running out? Surely not.

Flamenco!

There are two types of flamenco. One, if you’re lucky enough to catch it, is the real thing and happens in hot little back-street bars where a man sings unintelligibly but spine-chillingly and, if you’re luckier still, people will be so moved as to get up and dance spontaneously. It’s great. It’s thrilling. But if non-aficionados are honest – not as enjoyable for us Gringos as the tourist type. The best of the tourist type, that is. And the very best of it is at El Cardenal, in Cordoba. It starts at 10.30 p.m. So there’s time for a couple of drinks first, as you wander down through the tight warren of the Juderia’s cobbled streets to the venue - the courtyard of the Bishop’s Palace, across the street from, for me, the most sensuous building in Europe; the Mesquita.

They show you your table, then lights dim. A youth walks onstage with a guitar and plays some classical stuff. Then a singer, then another guitarist, then another singer. I’d already started wondering whether this was really my scene. But then the dancers came on with high heels and tight and swirly Spanish frocks. Wow. Four of them did their individual spots – as soloists or in pairs - to a bewilderingly complex rhythm of hand-claps and the strumming of the guitars and the voices of the singers. Electric. Every gesture, every pose, each heel-click…. All the eye movements, the facial expressions… arms and hands twisting perfectly right down to the fingertips…. Dazzling. One word sums up the appeal of Spain for me and it was here in bucketfuls – Passion. It’s in the landscape, and the language as well as the people.

The principal dancers closed the show. First up was the girl. I used to think that it must be every man’s dream to marry a contortionist. Now, in my next incarnation, I want to spend all my nights with a Flamenco dancer. She was a beauty in a crimson dress that somehow revealed everything yet maddeningly contrived to show nothing. She moved around the stage fixing every man in the audience with her eyes and, at the same time, challenging every woman with them. It was a no-contest. The male half of the audience had suddenly discovered what sex really truly meant and the women knew they were defeated and would be in for an undisturbed night’s sleep unless they could somewhere find a shop that stayed open late selling castanets and red underwear. At the end of her dance, she stood at our end of he stage and transfixed me with a stare. Me. Nobody else. Just me. She lifted the frills of her skirt to her ankles and began her finale. Her back arched, her arms writhed, he torso shook, her feet moved faster and faster, her head never moved. With a last haughty look and a stamp, she strode offstage without a backwards glance. As a torrent of clapping broke out she might well have been backstage using Mae West’s line, "Honey, that wasn’t applause. That was fly buttons hitting the ceiling." Fortunately, lest Mme. sneaked a glance down there, I’d already discreetly covered my crotch with the programme.

Now it was the guy dancer’s turn. He had long curly hair – a mite too greasy, I’d say – with Che Guevera’s eyes, Jerry Lee’s scowl and Elvis’s sneer. He stood in a Matador pose for a while; tensing his legs so that muscles trembled through his tight black pants and loose black shirt. Well, I suppose you could say that he was OK in a magnificent beast sort of a way if you like that sort of thing. Mme. certainly thought so, I can’t recall seeing her so thrilled with anticipation since the day we ordered the first automatic dishwasher. He could dance, though, I’ll give him that. He leaped, he kicked, he stamped to the rhythm, his feet becoming blurs of high-heeled black and silver. He barely looked at the audience, knowing that he had them exactly where he wanted them, safe in the knowledge that there was hardly a dry seat in the female half of the house. As far as the men were concerned, a contemptuous curl of the lip told that, if we had any complaints, he’d be happy to dispose of them later. Outside. With flick-knives. It wouldn’t last long and I felt confrontation was probably unwise unless I was happy going home with my cojones in a freezer bag.

Go some time. You’ll love it.


See it here at : www.tablaocardenal.com or follow my link

Somewhere Warm

"Here he is! This must be him. Look, coming over the dyke."

Ghislaine crossed quickly to the window and, peering through the slanting rain, could make out a dark-blue car bumping along the muddy, rutted track that arrowed through the cabbage fields towards the house. "Oh dear. Looks as if he’s driving a Jag." She patted some straying strands of her hair into place. "Hope I can handle him."


She was waiting for him as he slithered to a stop, hiding her nervousness behind a gentle smile. "Hello, I’m Ghislaine Colley. Thank you so much for coming all this way. Is this your first visit to the Fens?"
"Hi. Moss Bennett." He reached behind him to haul a briefcase from the back-seat. "Yes it is. Is the weather always like this?"
"Mostly." She beamed brightly at him as she shook his hand. "Come inside."
He followed her through a passage into a dimly-lit sitting-room, where the scent of burning incense made him dab at the corners of his eyes.
"I’ve made some tea, I’m sure you are ready for a cup. Do you like camomile?"
"I’ll try anything once. Aah ha, so this is it then?" On the table, resting in the plush gold lining of an open guitar case, was a gleaming crimson Fender Stratocaster. "OK if I take a look?"
"Have you brought the money? Is it the amount we arranged?"
"Yes, it’s all here," patting the case, "I wouldn’t normally. But seeing as it’s you and everything. I thought I might as well."
Ghislaine touched his arm reassuringly, "drink your tea first and we’ll look at the Strat soon."

He sat on a low armchair covered in an old flower-patterned sheet, the briefcase resting on his knee, balancing his tea-cup awkwardly. Ghislaine knelt beside the fire, feeling its comforting warmth on her back.
"How strange that you should sit just there," she said, "it was Bud’s favourite place, you must have been drawn to it."
"Yeah, bet that was it, eh? I was right gutted when you told me he’s...," he shifted, looking for the words, "you know, no longer with us, like."
"It’s all right. You can say it. Dead. I’m used to it now."
"Thanks. But I guess he’ll always be with us in his music, right?"
"Oh yes, he’ll never go away. Not really. Not from me, anyway."
"Well, OK. Sorry and all that. How long since he went would it be now? Didn’t hear much about it at the time."
"Just two years. He didn’t want there to be any fuss. So I buried him quietly. In fact, that’s why I chose you to sell his guitar to. I didn’t want the publicity with a local dealer."
"But he was never all that big over here anyway, was he though? Just America and Japan, wasn’t it?"
"And Europe. But no. For some reason, he couldn’t break through in this country. After the band split up, he could have got little gigs, small venues. But his heart wasn’t in it so..," she let her voice trail off in a sigh.
Moss sipped his tea slowly, as if trying to think of something more encouraging, "Guitar Hero, though, wasn’t he, eh? Legendary wasn’t he? Some said Clapton was better. But my dad used to say you can’t play the blues with a name like Eric. Hahaha.. he was only kidding though. Why couldn’t he have gone back to the States, your old man?"
"Money", she shrugged, "that’s all. Needed money to get a tour together.. just never quite happened. There were a few false starts.. promises that might have come off if he’d been willing to believe them. But he’d been ripped off too many times before. He’d lost his trust."
"So it never happened, then?
"No, and that’s how we finished up here. He always promised me he’d buy somewhere in a warm climate. But this," she felt herself shivering and moved closer to the hearth, "was all he could afford."

She stood, stepping lightly over to the table and taking the Fender out of its case. "I play it sometimes, would you like to hear?" She plugged it into a little mustard-coloured amp and perched on a stool facing him, her long legs crossed. "I can’t do the solos Bud used to play.. well, I can.. but…," she tuned the strings, "…anyway, this is something he used to like." She began to play, looking into his eyes, her hair falling over her face.
"That’s ‘Little Wing’, isn’t it? I recognise it from records my dad used to have. But you play it a hell of a lot more gently than Hendrix did. Did you ever meet Jimi?"
"Thank you. Yes, when I’d just met Bud and the boys. But I knew him before, too." she smiled inwardly at the thought. "Here," taking out the jack and handing it over, "hold it. Let it speak to you."
He took it gingerly, studying the nicks and dents on the front, the wear on the frets. He turned it over, where the paint had worn away down at the corner – the bare wood polished smooth by contact with Bud. "It must mean a hell of a lot to you, I’m surprised you want to part with it."
"Well, yes. It is a sad day. But I think it’s what he would have wanted for me."
"And there’s a letter with it, you said?"
"Oh.. yes. When I very first looked in the case it was there. His very last words to me, I suppose. You’ll need that, won’t you."
"Yep. So as to be sure that this is the one and only, you know, genuine article and all that. Provenance, we call it."
"Wait, I’ll fetch it. I’ve left it upstairs."

As soon as she’d left him alone, Moss stood up and held the Strat like Bud did in the photos on the album sleeves; legs wide apart, left foot forward, leaning over its neck, close enough to kiss it. Wishing there was a full-length mirror on the wall

In the attic, with its familiar smell of acetone paint and wood shavings, was Ghislaine’s workbench. Scattered on it were screws, cover plates, volume-knobs, a metal Fender ID plate she’d made and stamped herself, bits of tremolos and pickups that she’d begged borrowed and bought from online auctions and shops and collectors all over the world. There was a lathe and chisels, planes, sandpaper and saws, as well as the pieces of rosewood and alder she’d had sent over from the USA. A couple of guitars she’d worked on already were on stands – waiting for a little more work on the frets and more ageing to the backs to make them exact, beautifully faked, replicas of Bud’s.

And there also, sitting in an old sofa, happily watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon on TV, was Bud himself.
"Did he buy it?", he asked, grinning.

"Ssshh, turn that down," she told him in a mock-stern whisper, "you’re supposed to be dead you know. He’s still downstairs. You forgot the letter."
Bud shook his head, "oh man, no, did I? He hasn’t sussed us, has he?"
She took a sheet of paper - an old handbill for the Marquee Club - from a drawer, picked up a pen and gave them to him.
"No. But here, dear. Do it quickly now." She rested her forearms on his shoulders, stroking his once-red hair as he wrote, ‘My dearest darling Jizzie, by the time you read this, I will have gone to wait for you in a better land. My old guitar is all I can leave you, and my hope is that it gives you as much love as it gave me. Peace, Bud xxx’.
"Will that do?"
"Oh, Bud, I do love you. This should do the trick. You always said you’d buy me a house in a warm country. Only the two more of these to go and you’ll be able to. You are wonderful."
"It was all your idea, lovergirl."
"And put this out until he’s gone," she took a half-smoked joint from his ashtray and pinched the lighted end between her fingers.

Moss had put down the guitar and was waiting for her. She handed the letter over and he glanced at it briefly, "look, I know we said fifty on the phone. But, really, I’m taking a bit of a punt with this. How about if I offered you forty-thousand?"
"Forty? I really don’t know about that, Mr. Bennett. We had a firm agreement. I’d have to think."
"Well, forty-thousand pounds is still a lot of money, you know."
"I’m not sure. I don’t know what to say without asking Bud."
"Bud? What do you mean ‘asking Bud’?"
"Oh, I never do anything without him. I told you." She thought quickly, feeling a tiny thrill of hate for this silly little man and what she was doing to get his stupid money. "For me he never goes away. Wait. I know. Let’s go outside, I’ll show you."
She led him out of a side door, past tumbledown outbuildings, to a sheltered place under a high bank where a circle of seashells surrounded a cairn of white flints.
"This is where he talks to me."
Moss looked from Ghislaine to the stones and back again and shrugged. The rain had turned to freezing drizzle and the ground was soaked. She took a silk scarf from her pocket and spread it on the grass, took his hand and twined her fingers tightly through his. As she knelt, she pulled him down beside her, their shoulders touching so that he could feel her warmth.
"When I’m here, I can feel his vibe. I’m sure you feel it too."
A damp chill was seeping through the knees of Moss’s freshly pressed chinos but he nodded anyway.
"You do, don’t you?"
He nodded again, more convincingly this time.
She closed her eyes and tugged at a cheap silver necklace, hung with little glass stars. "He’s saying he thinks fifty thousand is very fair. He says Jimi Hendrix’s are fetching over a hundred."
"Well tell him, with all due respect and everything, he wasn’t no Jimi Hendrix." A cold trickle ran down his neck. "And can we get back inside now?"
Ghislaine composed herself and closed her eyes again. A seagull made a swooping pass overhead. A curtain twitched at an upstairs window. Minutes went by.

"Alright," she said, finally, "he said to tell you it’s got to be forty-five grand or it’s no deal."
Moss looked agonised. But she knew he wouldn’t have come all the way out from Birmingham if he hadn’t known that the price being asked was far less than he could get at a good auction or from an American collector.
"Forty-five? Look…I..."
Ghislaine made as if to turn back to the cairn.
"Oh OK then," he muttered, wiping rain from his eyebrows, "tell him he’s got a deal. Let’s get back into the house."

The cash was stacked on the table, in bundles of fifties. Beside it was the Fender, back in its case.
"Well, I’d better be going. Nice to do business with you."
"And you too. You won’t forget our agreement though, will you? You must keep the guitar for a year before you let it go."
"No, Mrs. Colley, I won’t. Besides, you know how to drive a hard bargain. I’m going to have to keep it a while, anyway, before there’s any profit in it for me."

She watched him climb back into his Jag and gave him a wave as he drove off. She felt an arm being slid around her waist. "Bud! Careful. Wait until he’s out of sight."
He laughed, "Oh, he’s well gone, he won’t see me. Well done, girl. Specially with the stones moody, I had to chuckle at that. Now, let me see the money."
"I didn’t enjoy that, Bud." She shook her shoulders, ridding herself of the memory, "I think I deserve a treat now. Why don’t I nip to town and get us some champagne?"

In the Land Rover, she felt better and was humming to herself as it bounced through the mud. Until, ahead of her, she saw a car, stopped at the bridge. She recognised the number plate, MOS 5. She pulled up behind it and climbed out. Moss wound his window down. "Mr Bennett," she said brightly, "not having problems, I hope."
Moss had the letter in his hand. Bud’s letter.
"Is anything wrong? Can I help?"
"You might just say so. Yes. Something was niggling at the back of my mind. It made me get this letter out and look at it. Just to confirm it. To confirm whether the Fender is the genuine article. Or not."
"And?"
"I’ll give you bloody ‘and’, Mrs Colley."
"Whatever do you mean? What is the matter with you?" She felt a chill of apprehension. Bennett looked ready to explode.
"You’re going to have to turn round. We need to go back to the house, that’s what’s the matter."
"But why?"
"This bloody letter, that’s why."
"What’s wrong with it? It’s got Bud’s signature on it, hasn’t it?"
"Oh yes, it’s Bud’s handwriting all right. I checked that. I’m not that stupid."
"Well what’s wrong then? Tell me."
Moss ground his teeth. He spat the words out.

"It’s dated today!"

"Oh Bud," she groaned.

copyright akc 2006