opera set on a Sussex collective farm.
‘Come on, Davy old man. That’s just advertising speech, the way the Yanks do it. They’re always inventing new words. Just think of the challenge. For the actor. Playing a role like that.’
‘Playing is bloody right. Playing bloody Mickey Mouse with history. It’s a diabolical liberty.’
Stark had no idea what they were on about and wasn’t about to ask. He had noticed Lizzie who worked behind the bar evenings Thursday through Saturday come in, trailing a cold draught in her wake. She rubbed her hands together, hung her thin raincoat on a hook, and with a nod to Del, slipped through the hatch in the bar counter and began arranging glasses.
Stark ventured a brief smile but she wasn’t looking his way. He liked Lizzie Goldsmith. She was a pretty girl, with an air of vulnerability underneath the bluff exterior she put up as a defence against some of the more predatory customers. She had a trim figure, dark eyes and high cheekbones that in certain lights gave her face an exotic look, though in others could make it look frail and haunted. Once Stark had imagined he saw bruising there and wondered if someone was knocking her about, but even his most oblique attempts to hedge around the subject were greeted with a sarcastic comment that suggested he should mind his own business.
Since then their relationship had improved as a result. Having rearranged the ranks of upturned jug-handled pint glasses and filled the sink with water to rinse the used ones as they came back, Lizzie looked along the bar, and noddedto him. Del was too engrossed in the conversation of the pair at the end to pay attention to Stark’s empty glass and with a smile Lizzie took it off him and refilled it.
‘Cheers, love,’ said Stark. ‘A man could die of thirst around here.’
‘At least they won’t show it over here.’
‘It’ll end up on television though. Sooner or later.’
Hindsmith threw his eyes to ceiling. ‘More’s the pity.’ Stark was waiting for him to say they should never have taken down the jamming masts that back in the fifties had tried in vain to block the broadcasts from the powerful BBC transmitters in West London’s White City. He didn’t.
Lizzie mouthed at Stark, to ask, ‘What are they talking about?’
He shrugged. It took Del to join in, silently mouthing in his own right two words that had been on Harry Stark’s mind all day but which he had not heard pronounced out loud on more than half a dozen occasions in his lifetime: ‘Winston Churchill.’
Chapter 10
‘Say the name out loud, why don’t you?’ said Hindsmith. ‘You can now, you know. What with all this glasnost or whatever they call it this new bloke in the Kremlin wants to see. Revisionism, that’s what I call it. Spreading rumours about old Uncle Joe, blackening a good man’s name. Start down that road and see where it takes you.’
‘Where might that be, precisely?’ said Atkinson, the actor.
Hindsmith spluttered into his beer.
‘Here. Where we are now. Letting the bloody Americans rewrite history. Making a film. Called Bulldog Breed , about a dead rottweiler, singing the praises of one of the bloodiest old imperialists who ever sat in Downing Street. And that’s saying something.’
‘You can’t be sure they’re singing his praises. Nobody knows the plot yet. It doesn’t come out for another month.’
‘I’ll bet you two of your fancy so-called “British” pounds it’ll be a whitewash job. The Yanks reckon Moscow’s blinked first. Try and put a pair of tarnished wings on the old devil and they reckon they can stir the shit with impunity. Before you know it they’ll have their cowboy actor president grandstanding, calling for ‘that Wall’ to come down, so they can turn us all into capitalist wage slaves, consumer cannon fodder for the capitalist exploitation economy. Just you wait.’
Stark could hardly believe his ears. Del was looking distinctly unhappy. The other
‘Come on, Davy old man. That’s just advertising speech, the way the Yanks do it. They’re always inventing new words. Just think of the challenge. For the actor. Playing a role like that.’
‘Playing is bloody right. Playing bloody Mickey Mouse with history. It’s a diabolical liberty.’
Stark had no idea what they were on about and wasn’t about to ask. He had noticed Lizzie who worked behind the bar evenings Thursday through Saturday come in, trailing a cold draught in her wake. She rubbed her hands together, hung her thin raincoat on a hook, and with a nod to Del, slipped through the hatch in the bar counter and began arranging glasses.
Stark ventured a brief smile but she wasn’t looking his way. He liked Lizzie Goldsmith. She was a pretty girl, with an air of vulnerability underneath the bluff exterior she put up as a defence against some of the more predatory customers. She had a trim figure, dark eyes and high cheekbones that in certain lights gave her face an exotic look, though in others could make it look frail and haunted. Once Stark had imagined he saw bruising there and wondered if someone was knocking her about, but even his most oblique attempts to hedge around the subject were greeted with a sarcastic comment that suggested he should mind his own business.
Since then their relationship had improved as a result. Having rearranged the ranks of upturned jug-handled pint glasses and filled the sink with water to rinse the used ones as they came back, Lizzie looked along the bar, and noddedto him. Del was too engrossed in the conversation of the pair at the end to pay attention to Stark’s empty glass and with a smile Lizzie took it off him and refilled it.
‘Cheers, love,’ said Stark. ‘A man could die of thirst around here.’
‘At least they won’t show it over here.’
‘It’ll end up on television though. Sooner or later.’
Hindsmith threw his eyes to ceiling. ‘More’s the pity.’ Stark was waiting for him to say they should never have taken down the jamming masts that back in the fifties had tried in vain to block the broadcasts from the powerful BBC transmitters in West London’s White City. He didn’t.
Lizzie mouthed at Stark, to ask, ‘What are they talking about?’
He shrugged. It took Del to join in, silently mouthing in his own right two words that had been on Harry Stark’s mind all day but which he had not heard pronounced out loud on more than half a dozen occasions in his lifetime: ‘Winston Churchill.’
Chapter 10
‘Say the name out loud, why don’t you?’ said Hindsmith. ‘You can now, you know. What with all this glasnost or whatever they call it this new bloke in the Kremlin wants to see. Revisionism, that’s what I call it. Spreading rumours about old Uncle Joe, blackening a good man’s name. Start down that road and see where it takes you.’
‘Where might that be, precisely?’ said Atkinson, the actor.
Hindsmith spluttered into his beer.
‘Here. Where we are now. Letting the bloody Americans rewrite history. Making a film. Called Bulldog Breed , about a dead rottweiler, singing the praises of one of the bloodiest old imperialists who ever sat in Downing Street. And that’s saying something.’
‘You can’t be sure they’re singing his praises. Nobody knows the plot yet. It doesn’t come out for another month.’
‘I’ll bet you two of your fancy so-called “British” pounds it’ll be a whitewash job. The Yanks reckon Moscow’s blinked first. Try and put a pair of tarnished wings on the old devil and they reckon they can stir the shit with impunity. Before you know it they’ll have their cowboy actor president grandstanding, calling for ‘that Wall’ to come down, so they can turn us all into capitalist wage slaves, consumer cannon fodder for the capitalist exploitation economy. Just you wait.’
Stark could hardly believe his ears. Del was looking distinctly unhappy. The other
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