Lost Lad (24 page)

The following Saturday evening these strongly felt views were briefly put aside, when that same anglophile, one eye on Lieutenant Uhura, ever fiddling with her numerous knobs and switches
'All hailing frequencies open, Captain'
- and the other eye, sizing up the possible chances of landing a cute little number called Sam.   

And so it came to pass that the young and inexperienced Gary (not Sam) started to look up to, and respect, the relatively sophisticated and relatively well travelled Simeon Hogg who came across as cultured and cosmopolitan. 

            Gary Mackenzie lived with Mom and Dad and the four ignorant boorish brothers he hated in 'dullsville', commonplace, suburban Allen Park.  Quite naturally, there would have been no hate at all had Gary been limited to their conventional 'All American', clean livin', root-beer and hamburger, baseball, cars, cars, cars, girls, girls, girls - lifestyle.  But Gary Mackenzie had discovered wider horizons.  By sheer chance, five weeks before, in Hudson's Department Store, on the mezzanine ...

well, in certain quarters, Hudson's mezzanine had quite a reputation.  On this occasion Gary met two older men who changed his life forever.

            The two introduced him to another two - and so on.  A whole new wonderful world opened up.  Professionals who went to the opera, to the ballet, to classical concerts spoke to him with respect and treated him as an equal.  He was entertained, wined and dined, by well paid executives who lived in beautiful and expensive apartments furnished in antiques.  It was all a very long way from 7681 Roosevelt Avenue, Allen Park, Michigan. 

            During the Mackenzie family dinner, the day before Joe's party, one of the uncouth boys was in baiting mood.  Sensitive to Gary's new found values and high aspirations, Chuck Mackenzie engineered an argument about music and said -

           
"Beethoven's a load a crap!"

The effect, as expected, was verbally explosive.  Vicious insults were exchanged over the cheap K-Mart kitchen table.  Among a barrage of several other un-manly barbs, Chuck called Gary a
'stuck up ponce'
and Gary hit back with his entire stock of words which described rough young hoods with low taste.  A few of these critical terms, those known to Chuck, hit their mark.  Unfortunately, Gary's most powerful verbal missile
'parochial lout'
- missed, because Chuck was not sure of the meaning of the word 'parochial'.  Finally, when the two combatants rose to their feet, it started to look as if the angry words would turn to blows.  This is when Mom Mackenzie also stood up and stopped play.

            Such regular 'sport' was only possible due to the volatile nature of Gary Mackenzie's frenetic personality.  He was so easy to wind up when you knew which buttons to push - and his brothers knew all the right buttons.  After one of his urbane friends had taken him to see a Shakespearean play in Detroit, Gary developed a morbid hatred of the television set, particularly the popular soaps and endless day-time quiz shows which were littered with frequent banal commercials.  So it was now possible to irritate Gary by telling him how he looked just like 'Lurch', a tall gangling creepy butler to the 'Adams Family' - and so on.         

Meeting Simeon Hogg was yet another stage in Gary's new education.  He listened with admiration when told of educational documentaries, the excellent 'Panorama' programme, serious improving plays and rejoiced when Simeon told him that the English had never even heard of 'Lurch'.                 

As the years passed by, this original boundary between the respectful younger pupil and the older complacent master became blurred.  The deference gradually dissolved and gave way to a slowly creeping equality as the friendship gained a firmer and more sound footing. 

            Gary Mackenzie had an ever increasing appetite to meet and mingle with the avant-garde, to rub shoulders (or whatever) with the international chic, to soak up more and more high culture.  He and Simeon spent time together in New York and London, but Gary extended his travelling to Paris, Rome and Vienna.  During one long vacation he stayed in France and learned the language.  Gary became a francophile whilst Simeon the tenacious anglophile was, and remained, a francophobe and in general terms - a confirmed xenophobe.  This entrenched prejudice aggravated the manic and short fused Gary Mackenzie.  He was annoyed with his friend for refusing to holiday in France.  Simeon's reasons made Gary furious -

           
"No!  Why should I spend my hard earned money only to have outrageously expensive muddy coffee thrown at me by an insolent anglophobe.  Anyway, I want tea.  I need tea, but they won't serve tea.  They take delight in not serving tea.  And why, pray, why should I be mugged each time I hail a taxi in Paris?  Now Allen's taxis in Belper ..."

           
"Oh, for God's sake!  Give me strength!  Who the hell wants a taxi in Belper?  I could scream!" 
He often did.
  "You are so narrow minded.  Your biased, bigoted world is so pathetically small.  When I think of the hours I've wasted waiting for you: you, stooped over a bottomless tea pot, taking endless sips in boring tea shops.  And then some stupid old peasant comes shuffling up -

           
'Shall ya 'ave a drop more 'ot water, dook?'

Then I have to suffer another 20 minutes watching that cup kissin' that irritating, insular, smug, dozy, dopey face ... "
      

Such tantrums seemed to accompany a sort of frenzied dance of storming to and fro with flaying long arms.  Yet, amazingly, the friendship endured throughout the many years surviving these regular dramas which were precipitated by the vast gulf of temperament between the calm and stolid Hogg and the impatient gesticulating Mackenzie.  Gary was all go.  He was all energy and highly sexed.  Simeon could sleep for eight hours and more.  Gary, ever busy hunting, clocking up the tricks, had little time for sleep and accused Simeon of wasting his time in the safe bath houses in which there were -

           
"... too many creepy old men, and so God awful depressing.  Why the hell can't you go to the bars like any normal guy - or live a little.  Get ya ass to Palmer Park ..."

           
"Oh yes, where Marie was arrested last year!"

           
"Marie's a slut, she'd been there five hours ... So what!  Police
raid, once in a while, an occupational hazard."

           
"You seem to forget that my occupation is that of a teacher, not a taxi driver."

           
"This is Detroit!  This is not Derbyshire.  Get your head into Detroit.  Three murders a day.  The newspapers have more important things to report.  Palmer Park.  Go there tonight.  It's the vice squad's night off - trust me.  In bed at 10.30!  That's ridiculous.  That's pathetic.  That is sad!  Swing on that bar under the Henry Ford statue - great stuff: or go to the 'meat rack'.  Live some.  Life is passing you by, Simeon.  In three years time you'll be 30.  Who'll want to touch you then?  Are you listening?  Is anybody there?  Oh, what's the use!"
  

Behind these lively exchanges, there was a subtle reason why acrimony never actually boiled over into real resentment.  It was so subtle that neither party was really conscious of it.  It was this: Simeon was entertained by the tantrums.  Simeon enjoyed winding up Gary and watching him whirl around the room with fire coming out of his mouth and steam coming out of his ears.  On the other hand, Simeon was a rock of stability in Gary's fast and precarious life.  Simeon Hogg was always there for him. 

One day the secretary of a proctologist phoned up Mrs Mackenzie complaining about her son's unpaid medical bills.  It did not take long for Mom to find out what a 'proctologist' did, and a can of worms was opened at 7681 Roosevelt Ave, a 'Christian house', which resulted in the swift ejection of one 'degenerate son'.  Simeon was there to receive the suddenly homeless Gary, but Gary knew that he would not be welcome for very long, especially, after the 'Tom Cruise look-a-like' incident.  This was a typical Mackenzie one-night-stand, a gorgeous Canadian hunk who made himself very agreeable and displayed oodles of charm at the dinner table.  Unfortunately he took it into his head to leave Gary's bed and Simeon's home in the dead of night, but, alas, did not leave Simeon's wallet.  Under extreme duress, Gary quickly found himself a small cheap apartment in north Highland Park which was very handy for frequent visits into Palmer Park.

           
" ... So quit ya broodin'."
  ranted Gary in his new home. 
"I'll
never hear the end of this one.  Thank God he didn't take ya precious Cadillac.  That thing's an affront to common-sense and the ecology ... an you rushin' to ya Billy Fury records.  What a joke.  Who the hell's ever heard of Billy Fury anyway, as if that guy would want one!"
     

Gary always remained a taxi driver.  If he never went to college, it was not for want of intelligence, it was for the want of concentration and staying power.  His nocturnal activities always came first.  Gary was self educated.  He tried to educate Simeon Hogg into an appreciation of fine art.  These attempts usually ended in failure and biting recriminations -

           
" ... and I was horribly embarrassed in front of Hank and Randy when you thought that Nureyev was a Russian car!  You were bored out of your skull last Tuesday sittin' through that Fellini movie."

           
"You didn't understand it either!"
snapped Simeon.
  "Oh no, don't deny it.  That was amply demonstrated at the start when there was no sound.  Of course the folks around us thought there was a technical fault and were ever likely to start to grumble.  But you didn't have to attack them and call them 'a bunch of ignorant peasants' insisting that it was
supposed
to be silent.  And what happened next?"
 

           
"Well, we can all make mistakes ..."

           
"It flashed on the screen - 'We apologise for the temporary loss of sound' - my turn to be embarrassed.  I thought those teenage girls would never stop giggling.  And another thing, I'm through with your high-brow obscure composers.  Who was that appalling guy I had to suffer for two hours?"

           
"Bartok,"
said Gary,
"Bela Bartok."

           
"Oh well, if I must be afflicted by another wretched concert with Hank and Randy, let it be at least a composer I've heard of - Bach or Handel, I can just about cope with Baroque."

           
"'Pearls cast before swine'!  That's you isn't it?  Don't think Hank didn't notice you fidgeting, yawning and sighing.  So God-awful rude.  Baroque!  You can't be serious?  Martha and the Vandellas is more your speed."
  

Chapter 21

Butch Numbers and Bitchy Queens

Two old friends sat facing each other: the younger sad, the older elated.  Gary Mackenzie was sorry to be losing the companion who had been around for most of his adult life.  Over dinner, the talk was about the immediate future in which Simeon Hogg became nostalgic about his English past, boyhood friends and a lost world of green hills, wooded valleys and lush dales.  Throughout the years, Gary had occasionally heard about the intriguing mysterious disappearance of Brian Forrester and now, once again, his ever home-sick British friend agonised over the various possibilities.  Impulsive as ever, Gary blurted out a suggestion which was aimed at keeping him in the company of his friend for some time longer.

           
"Why don't we go over there together and look for Brian?"

This proposition was startling in its simplicity, but designed to conform with Simeon's present mood to leave the USA as soon as possible.  During the last three decades at the same Detroit taxi company, Gary had proved reliable and built up a strong tenure with his employer who had come to accept the demands for long summer vacations at short notice.  Each spring it was understood that Gary would 'quit', but each fall he was always re-hired.  Gary was valuable.  Regarding the vast expanse of Metropolitan Detroit, he certainly had 'the knowledge' - in more ways than one.  He was a good and experienced driver (if somewhat aggressive at times) who could be relied upon to safely convey his passengers near and far: even as far as any major hotel in Chicago or New York.  Driving through Manhattan filled Simeon Hogg with horror; it filled Gary with joy.

Gary argued that his imagination, bravery and radical thinking could be useful at this critical moment in his more cautious friend's life.  Furthermore, both men were Agatha Christie fans.  Here was an opportunity for adventure.