false teeth, a plastic-spectacles-frame company and a dry-cleaning processor. The sewage came from a badly corroded twelve-inch pipe which leaked at the fifth-floor level.
I hated the place. The ventilation to my flat, one of a dozen ‘residences’ on the top floors, the occupants of all of them engaged like myself in some manufacturing process, was adequate but, in removing the noxious gases produced by my processes, it merely imported the others. Down the centre of the street outside ran the underground railway system, supported on concrete piers like the New York subway only far more up to date and, astonishingly, spotlessly clean.
The place was indescribably noisy, too: the trains passing at three-minute intervals, trucks, cars, machinery, human shouting, car horns, hammering and thumping and grinding and hissing. Every few minutes for most of the day, a jet aircraft roared momentarily.
I was there five weeks. I worked without ceasing. The job was quickly done for I wanted to get out. Delivery had to be made to Manila. After that, I took a long break in Fiji, lying in the shade like a retired pirate, living as a spendthrift on my loot.
In London, I rented a garage built into the archway of a railway viaduct south of the Thames. It was a grotty locality – grotty was an in word then – yet it served me well. I could work with the door open, by daylight. The other archways were used as lock-up storage units, an auto-body shop, a television repair works and a fire-extinguisher recharging plant. No one intruded upon the others’ businesses. We all drank in the nearby pub at lunchtime, eating Scotch eggs and pickled herring with tough-crusted buns and drinking Bass. There was a camaraderie in that row of archways with its muddy, puddled approach, its grimy brickwork and dusty mortar, its rusting chain-link fencing and the strangely comforting rumble of commuter trains overhead making for Charing Cross or Waterloo.
The others thought I custom-made bicycle frames. I bought a racing cycle to further the deception. When I left, it was a close call. The cops were only hours behind me with their megaphones and plain-clothes snipers. One of the auto-body mechanics was an informer. He tipped them off I was stealing lead: he could smell it when I melted and recast the metal. It was a ridiculous accusation. The man was judging me by his standards, a bad error.
I went back two years later. I found the muddy approach had become a pedestrian precinct with pretty posts made of iron and painted with the crest of the council. The archways had become a trendy restaurant, a photographic studio and a unisex hair salon. I also found the mechanic living in a quiet, tree-lined square off the Old Kent Road. According to the tabloids, he and his young common-law wife committed suicide. A lovers’ pact, the articles suggested. I fixed it to look that way.
It was the only time I ever returned. Marseilles, Hong Kong . . . I never went back. Athens, Tucson, Livingstone. Fort Lauderdale, Adelaide, New Jersey, Madrid . . . I never saw them again.
Of all the workshops I have had, however, the second bedroom in this, my Italian refuge, is by far the best. It is airy. Even with the shutters closed on a hot day in high summer, there is a continuous, transient breeze passing through. Enough daylight enters through the door or the shutter slats for me to dispense with the spotlamps unless I am doing the most detailed of work. Any pernicious redolence I might cause from time to time, as a part of this or that stage in one or another process, blows away to be replaced with fresh air. Outside, it is quickly diluted in the sky. The floors, being made of stone, are strong and absorb a good deal of the sound.
The room contains no furniture as such. In the centre is a large workbench. Beside it stands a bank of metal shelves upon which I keep tools. Against the wall, to the right of the window, is a small lathe of the sort jewellers use. It is mounted
I hated the place. The ventilation to my flat, one of a dozen ‘residences’ on the top floors, the occupants of all of them engaged like myself in some manufacturing process, was adequate but, in removing the noxious gases produced by my processes, it merely imported the others. Down the centre of the street outside ran the underground railway system, supported on concrete piers like the New York subway only far more up to date and, astonishingly, spotlessly clean.
The place was indescribably noisy, too: the trains passing at three-minute intervals, trucks, cars, machinery, human shouting, car horns, hammering and thumping and grinding and hissing. Every few minutes for most of the day, a jet aircraft roared momentarily.
I was there five weeks. I worked without ceasing. The job was quickly done for I wanted to get out. Delivery had to be made to Manila. After that, I took a long break in Fiji, lying in the shade like a retired pirate, living as a spendthrift on my loot.
In London, I rented a garage built into the archway of a railway viaduct south of the Thames. It was a grotty locality – grotty was an in word then – yet it served me well. I could work with the door open, by daylight. The other archways were used as lock-up storage units, an auto-body shop, a television repair works and a fire-extinguisher recharging plant. No one intruded upon the others’ businesses. We all drank in the nearby pub at lunchtime, eating Scotch eggs and pickled herring with tough-crusted buns and drinking Bass. There was a camaraderie in that row of archways with its muddy, puddled approach, its grimy brickwork and dusty mortar, its rusting chain-link fencing and the strangely comforting rumble of commuter trains overhead making for Charing Cross or Waterloo.
The others thought I custom-made bicycle frames. I bought a racing cycle to further the deception. When I left, it was a close call. The cops were only hours behind me with their megaphones and plain-clothes snipers. One of the auto-body mechanics was an informer. He tipped them off I was stealing lead: he could smell it when I melted and recast the metal. It was a ridiculous accusation. The man was judging me by his standards, a bad error.
I went back two years later. I found the muddy approach had become a pedestrian precinct with pretty posts made of iron and painted with the crest of the council. The archways had become a trendy restaurant, a photographic studio and a unisex hair salon. I also found the mechanic living in a quiet, tree-lined square off the Old Kent Road. According to the tabloids, he and his young common-law wife committed suicide. A lovers’ pact, the articles suggested. I fixed it to look that way.
It was the only time I ever returned. Marseilles, Hong Kong . . . I never went back. Athens, Tucson, Livingstone. Fort Lauderdale, Adelaide, New Jersey, Madrid . . . I never saw them again.
Of all the workshops I have had, however, the second bedroom in this, my Italian refuge, is by far the best. It is airy. Even with the shutters closed on a hot day in high summer, there is a continuous, transient breeze passing through. Enough daylight enters through the door or the shutter slats for me to dispense with the spotlamps unless I am doing the most detailed of work. Any pernicious redolence I might cause from time to time, as a part of this or that stage in one or another process, blows away to be replaced with fresh air. Outside, it is quickly diluted in the sky. The floors, being made of stone, are strong and absorb a good deal of the sound.
The room contains no furniture as such. In the centre is a large workbench. Beside it stands a bank of metal shelves upon which I keep tools. Against the wall, to the right of the window, is a small lathe of the sort jewellers use. It is mounted
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