You Have Not a Leg to Stand On (13 page)

It was now coming towards the end of November and Europe was definitely beginning to shroud itself with its winter blanket. We, on the other hand, had nothing of the sort. Even the poor car didn't have any heating. It was only by chance when filling with petrol, the pump attendant casually asked, ‘Shall I top-up the antifreeze?'

I'm talking as though we were driving directly into Europe as it is now, but then, of course, we still had the immensity of Yugoslavia through which to wend our way. One day, after a very pleasant night stop, we drove down a little track off the main road, and into what once could have been an orchard, the ancient, gnarled trees were mesmerizingly beautiful. I turned off the engine. It was perfectly quiet and still. All the trees must have stood there for hundreds of years. They had a presence silently standing there in perfect stillness. We didn't say anything. We slowly got out of the car and wandered about, gently touching the trunks with the palm of our hands, as though they were magnificent animals.

Just recently we were taken, by Gwynne (who so memorably had carried me out to the reef), into a game park in Tanzania. He stopped the Land Rover to let a herd of elephants cross the road in front of us. The herd must have been over a hundred strong. They slowly began to surround the car. I could feel my heart thumping in my chest. We shouldn't be here. One elephant stopped right next to my window. He slowly turned his head and looked at me. I caught his eye. We stared at one another. Through his huge, dense, black eye, perfectly surrounded with long beautiful eyelashes any woman would die for, it seemed as though I was looking through a window deep into his soul. Surely he must have heard my heart crashing against my ribs. Only seconds later he quietly turned away. The whole herd disregarding us, went about their business, pulling up great bunches of newly grown, long, lush green grass that springs to life after hard, heavy savannah rains.

Being there, in that orchard, with no one else around, among all those knowing old trees, was very similar, without the thumping heart, to being in the middle of that great herd of majestic elephants. An incredible sensation.

Later the following morning we stopped to fill the car with fuel and have a coffee. A man with the similar mission as ourselves, parked himself at our table and immediately launched into conversation as though he knew us. We were used to this sort of thing happening quite often because of the unerring magnet of my two girls. After a torrent of questions, in almost perfect English, he said, ‘Well, if you want my advice,' for which we weren't aware we'd asked, ‘you should take time to drive through Yugoslavia. Fairly soon, certainly in your lifetime, there will be a deadly eruption in that country that will change it forever. You might never have the chance to go there again.' We didn't know what to say, we just looked at him. It was the second time we'd been given almost exactly the same sort of information by the man I told you about earlier in Damascus. Only that had been about Israel and its war with its Arab neighbours.

He was absolutely correct in all respects. Yugoslavia no longer exists, it was a deadly, terrible eruption that tore the whole country apart, back into its original states before Tito artificially created Yugoslavia.

We took his advice to a certain degree, zigzagging away from our main route, taking a few extra days pitching our tent in farmers' fields, briefly visiting the beautiful cities everyone's heard about. Although we never felt unsafe, because of the warm welcome from practically everyone we met, and to which we'd grown accustomed wherever we travelled, we did have an awareness of an undercurrent of unrest here, that made us feel uncomfortable. From area to area, even though we didn't understand anything spoken, there was a palpable difference in attitude. We should have known more, of course, but now we know the ignorance of youth is always astonishing.

We crossed the border into Austria at a point that lead us to the most direct route over the Alps, into Germany and straight on to the autobahn pointing north to Hamburg. This may sound straightforward, but crossing the Alps at that time of the year, through one of the smallest, highest passes on the map, perhaps wasn't the best of decisions. We could clearly see all the heavy snow shrouding the mountains ahead, but we thought that as the pass was open, it was obviously passable. It was passable, but only for 4x4's with studded tyres or chains and proper heating inside, whereas our poor little African car had nothing suitable for the vagaries ahead. Quite soon, on leaving the border, the road started to ascend. The snow quickly piled thicker and thicker on the side of the road. The road itself became white with un-melted snow. I stopped the car, ‘Perhaps we should stay on the main roads and take the tunnel under the mountains rather than climbing over the mountains.' Surprisingly, both girls said, ‘No, no we've just driven through the whole of the Middle East and Turkey, we can't let a little snow defeat us.' I said, ‘If this is a little snow, what's a lot of snow?' They both said, ‘It'll be exciting.' The majority vote won. Very surprisingly, without much skidding about, we did make incredibly good headway. We were so proud of our sturdy little African car. Quite suddenly the road started to descend. We looked at each other and laughed at our achievement. Too soon! I touched the brakes. No response. I touched them again. Still no response. A shaft of ice ran itself through the middle of my body. What can I do? I changed gear down to second, then again to first, the response was minimal. A stationary car was fast coming up ahead. What could I do? I couldn't steer around it, into oncoming traffic, I couldn't see beyond it. The only alternative was to crash the car into my side of the icy bank. The ice was so hard it wouldn't let me in. The car ahead was looming closer and closer. I steered into the bank again. The noise of the bumper tearing against the ice was awful. I'd started to slow down. But not enough. I crashed into the car in front, bumper-to-bumper. I can still hear that noise now. The driver flung his door open, he descended on us, his face swollen purple with rage. I couldn't get out, my door was jammed closed by the wall of ice on the left. My girls, meanwhile, were struck dumb with the horror of what was befalling us, so soon after laughing with pleasure, when reaching the top of the pass. It turned out there wasn't much damage done, apart from dented bumpers, and the driver himself had had to do the same thing to stop his own car.

As luck would have it, a hundred yards ahead, on the right-hand side, was an inn. An Austrian Chalet Inn, with three feet of snow on the roof. We slid, like a crab, down the hill, as the queue of cars ahead cleared, and tentatively crept into the car park. How could there be a room in which to lay our weary heads? Not only was there a room, it had three separate beds with an enormous, puffed-up duvet on each. And better still, the night under these inviting duvets included a delicious supper with a carafe of wine. Also, our sturdy little African car was not forgotten. It was allowed into the barn, with the cows to keep it warm. It couldn't feel more at home.

In the morning, the proprietors wouldn't let us leave, to slide sideways down the rest of the pass. They ordered a huge 4x4 lorry, specially built for this particular purpose, to come and escort us down the remainder of the pass. With a great deal of kissing and shaking of hands, we bade our farewells. The driver of the lorry was a cheery chap who knew exactly what he was doing. He attached a tow rope to our rear axle, and the other end was attached to the front of his gigantic lorry with enormous studded balloon tires, to fix the lorry to any surface. With the power and size of that vehicle, I think he could have climbed a mountain face.

I was instructed to drive slowly ahead of him until I started to slip, then to put the gearbox into neutral and turn off the engine. He would then determine the speed of the descent, and I would steer as tightly as I could on the right of the road. On no account was I ever, ever to touch the brake pedal. If I did, and he knew how tempting that would be to do so, I would lose control of the steering and I would dangle about in front of him like a worm held by its tail. His treat would be my girls with him in his spacious, warm cab. All was going well until about halfway down. The road was becoming steeper and steeper, and instead of slowing, he was driving faster and faster. It felt as though he'd lost control, that question hadn't arisen in his instructions. My brake peddle leg had a will of its own. Ever since I'd learnt to drive all those years ago, if I needed to slow-down in any situation I would use the brakes. Now I needed to slow down, not go faster, but not use my brakes. I desperately looked in the mirror. He wasn't even looking at me. He and my girls all had their heads thrown back in open-mouthed laughter. A momentary rage brought my right leg back into my control. At the bottom of the pass when the road had flattened, he stopped his vehicle and quickly climbed out of his cab. Before I could say anything, he said, ‘I'm very sorry I didn't tell you I would be going faster on the steeper parts of the road, to keep you in my control, I don't know how you kept your foot off the brakes.' I didn't say, ‘I thought you were enjoying yourself a bit too much.'

We all happily shook hands and we sped off north to Hamburg. We only had one more night together. We'd done and seen so much. We'd lived so intimately. Honey had undertaken her task of chaperone admirably.

We couldn't afford anywhere splendid, we were down to our last few shekels as it was. The autobahn motel served very well, but the poor little car couldn't cope with the cold, and froze solid overnight. The poor thing had to be warmed-up, with hot air fans, in the nearby garage, before it showed any sign of life. Late that afternoon Honey directed us through miles of modern, tidy, orderly neighbourhoods, back into her life, she'd left behind a lifetime ago. We were down-in-the-mouth and monosyllabic.

In the morning C and I made our 24-hour non-stop drive back to our lives in England.

Back to London

I'd never been in a good enough financial position to be married, but that rather vital factor didn't seem to worry me in the least. When I asked C's father if I could marry his daughter he asked me how I thought I'd support her. I said, ‘If I'm lucky I might make as much as £1000 a year.' He was hard of hearing, so he asked me to repeat what I'd just said. He'd heard me the first time, but he couldn't believe what he'd heard. He, very hesitantly said, ‘I think you'll need a little more than that. Please could you wait a while.' But his ‘while' and my ‘while' were a long way apart. I simplistically thought if two people loved each other they should live together and make a life together. Marriage was a formality. What could be plainer than that?

The acting profession is really in a category of its own. You're either in work or you're not. If not, you still remain an actor but you're not acting. In 1966, I don't remember it ever being difficult to find some sort of job at a moment's notice.

On returning to London after our honeymoon in Kenya, and a few days in Paris, we had nowhere to come back to. Even that fact didn't worry me in the least. We'd been given the use of a flat in central London by C's baffled, elderly uncle, for a few weeks. So it was from there we set forth to find a home. It took longer than I'd hoped, but we did find a small two bedroom flat on the Edgware Road just up from Marble Arch with which we were very pleased.

But I've jumped ahead of myself. I'll go back to the beginning of the time we'd arrived back in London after our mammoth non-stop drive from Hamburg.

It was almost exactly a year since I was introduced to C's family, and then getting married. C's mother had had a nervous breakdown from the effect of us driving back to England together, albeit with a chaperone. So I was somewhat apprehensive about my initial introduction. She couldn't have been more civil. She came straight up to me, shook me by the hand and said, ‘so, at last we meet.' I was very lucky.

Before leaving Nairobi, C had a job as a programme presenter with The Voice of Kenya radio. She took to it like a duck to water and loved doing it in the same way I loved to be in a theatre. So she applied to the BBC for the job of ‘studio manager'. She was with them for about 18 months. It was because she worked at the BBC, she wanted to be married at All Souls Langham Place, the BBC church. For the banns to be read, I had to be living in that parish. It would be deemed as living at an address if I had a suitcase with a few clothes in it for the three weeks they were read. I rang a number in the Evening Standard newspaper that advertised rooms and put forward my plight. Without a second thought the landlord agreed, technically that suitcase is still there.

During the year leading up to the wedding, C was working at the BBC and I was doing all sorts of jobs, some acting and some definitely not. I was, of course, aware that I had no money other than what I earned for day-to-day living. Even I began to think perhaps I wasn't suitable material for marriage. No prospects, nothing.

One of the auditions I attended was at a public swimming pool at the top of Shaftesbury Avenue in London. There must have been at least fifty of us out-of-work actors huddled about the pool wearing swimming trunks. We were being auditioned for four non-speaking parts, in a little film called Submarine X1, introducing an up-and-coming, possible Hollywood Star, called James Caen. We were all told to jump in to prove we could swim. Quite extraordinary how many of them had no idea what to do when in water. A couple of them even had to be ‘saved' by the pool guard. The rest of us were then sorted into groups of similar height. Three at a time we then jumped in again and were told to hold our breath, on the bottom of the pool, for as long as possible. I was in my element. I couldn't help showing off by holding my breath on the bottom for so long they had to send a guard in to see if I was in trouble. After another couple of hours of being told to do the most absurd antics you can possibly think of, they'd whittled us down to about ten people. By now we were quite cold, hugging our own bodies to try to keep warm.

I found myself suddenly transported back to my childhood, to the years I attended my prep school in Kenya near Eldoret. Every morning queues of pathetic shivering, skinny white bodies, hugging themselves endeavouring to keep warm, while waiting for the basins of brown cold water. Making an attempt to wash, before hurriedly dressing, only to stand in another queue for our skimpy breakfast of solid porridge and a hard-boiled egg. All the memories must be so sharp because others around the same time are so joyful. The joy of running to the stables to say good morning to my beloved Thistle, already saddled up, whinnying when he saw me, then gliding through the countryside with his long smooth strides.

Back to the swimming pool in central London, so different yet linked to a beautiful crisp, clear picture. One must be grateful for small mercies. We were summarily dismissed and told in an offhand manner, our agents may or may not be in touch. I wonder why it's so prevalent when people who are given temporary authority over others, are so rude. I skulked back to my lonely one room abode, stinking of chlorine, and ran myself a hot bath to wash it all away. After a few days the memory of the pool, C working long hours at the BBC and me going hither and thither from job to job and audition to audition, began to recede. As an actor, you feel as though you can't ever be far from a telephone. The next ring is bound to be your agent lining up an excellent offer for the lead in a play for which you're about to audition. However, he did ring, but it wasn't for the lead in a play, the Submarine X1 producer wanted to see me at their offices in Elstree. My mind went haywire, my heart beat so hard I thought it would jump out of my chest. On arrival at their offices, I was given the script. This was getting better and better. The producer was a very small-framed man, an American, with a round pallid face and black slicked down hair, sitting behind an enormous desk. He asked me to read a few lines. Then he said. ‘Your part hasn't got any lines and he's killed at the beginning of the film, we just want to make sure you can act as a fallback. Thanks for coming, we'll be in touch.' Can you imagine the let-down? I think you can. But I stood up, beamed my gratitude for seeing me, shook him warmly by the hand and left the office. A few days later my agent was given the offer; £70 a day for seven days, on location in Scotland on Loch Ness.

The reason why I'm taking such a long time telling you, in such detail, about this minuscule episode that happened about fifty years ago, is because with the presentation of that cheque from the producers of Submarine X1, I said to C and her father, ‘Surely you can't have any doubts now I can support a wife.' Pathetic when I think back.

The wedding was planned for the first of December 1967, my father-in-law's birthday. Why we thought I would be a good birthday present, I'm not entirely sure. It was quite a grand affair for then. There were about two hundred people at the church and the hymns were very carefully chosen by C with her love of music, and the choir sang a beautiful anthem ‘Love one another'. The vicar taking our service was quite a well-known clergyman called John Stott. He died very recently. He was a stickler for time and he told C she must not be more than five minutes late. He'd be there waiting on the steps. Five minutes came and went, ten minutes came and went, fifteen, twenty. A taxi suddenly rushed into view and screeched to a halt at the bottom of the church steps. A baffled vicar stood at the top not knowing what to do. The taxi door opened and inside, filling the whole cab, was a mass of snow-white wedding dress, veil and train, billowing to be let out. Also with C, somewhere hidden by the white snow, was her father and their assistant who, once on the pavement, straightened C's dress and laid out the train. She was ushered to the top of the steps to an agitated but relieved vicar. Her two little unruly nephews were the pages, and true to form they ran around the church shouting for their mothers. She held her father's arm and they walked slowly up the aisle in time to the wedding march, he reluctantly gave her to me and I could see her beauty shining through her veil.

It turned out, the reason why she was so late, was because the car due to bring her from their club to the church had not been ordered. She was all dressed standing in the courtyard of the club, with her father, when they suddenly realised. The doorman had to run out into Piccadilly and hail a taxi. The driver understood the emergency and legitimately had the fun of tearing about jumping all the lights.

It was a lovely service and we had it all recorded on tape. I was quite nervous so I spoke too fast. I'd been nervous going on stage, of course, but I had a character to hide behind, and everything was well rehearsed. This was just us, a one-off, the most important ceremony in which we'd ever take part.

In those days it wasn't expected that the whole congregation, after the ceremony itself, would be given a lavish three-course, sit-down meal, with as much wine and champagne to supply a cruise liner for a month. Not to mention an enormous marquee more suitable for the King of Saudi Arabia. Instead the congregation would quietly gather at
one's club
, in our case, the Naval and Military in Piccadilly, have a couple of glasses of champagne, a sandwich or two, then cake and speeches. A change of clothing for the bride and groom, and the wave-off. So much more dignified.

My mother-in-law had lent us her beautiful Daimler for me to drive to the airport. We picked up my wife's Cousin Peter at the other side of the underpass at Hyde Park Corner, for him to drive the car back to the club.

We flew to Paris and spent two lovely, serene days in a little homely hotel just off the Champs Elysees. We had nothing to do but wander about the city. Wonderful. It was strange we knew each other so well but had never spent a night together, or with anyone else. I wouldn't have thought that situation could ever exist today, or ever again.

***

I told you earlier I was assistant stage manager (ASM) /actor, with the Donovan Maule Theatre in Nairobi. I'd turned down their offer to remain with them, in the expectation of furthering my career by returning to London. Well, ten years later I'd achieved absolutely nothing.

I still maintain, if you're not making a living in your chosen profession after ten years, you should do something else. If you love doing it, whatever it is, you can still be part of it but you must make your living and earn enough money to support your way of life. So reluctantly, I realised I was in the same position as many other actors, in fact, the majority by far, of not earning enough money from acting to support my wife and myself.

One of the few jobs I had, and enjoyed the most, was being part of the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Aldwych Theatre in London for a year. Although in a very lowly position, it did include a tour around Europe. I was asked by an actor who'd remained with the Donovan Maule Theatre in Nairobi all his working life, what had I been doing for the last year. I said, rather grandly, I'd been with the R.S.C. He looked at me in utter astonishment and said ‘You've been in the Irish Sea. What on earth were you doing in the Irish Sea?'

Being part of that Company was a lovely experience. In repertory we played, Troilus & Cressida, Revengers Tragedy, and Bartholomew Fair. I suppose there may have been about forty of us altogether in that one company. Before they became household names were, Norman Rodway, Michael Williams, whose voice as Troilus, boomed out so musically every time he spoke, Ian Richardson, Alan Howard, Patrick Stewart and Helen Mirren. They were regarded as good actors, but no more so than anyone else. No hint of the stars they were to become. Fascinating watching them grow into the roles they now hold, thrust upon them by the viewing public.

It was obvious, to me at least, I had to change my way of earning a living. We'd recently been back to see my parents in Kenya, and a long-standing friend of mine since prep school, couldn't understand that if we wanted a new way of life, why look any further than where I used to live. My father would give me as much land as I would need for doing anything I wanted to do, we could build ourselves a house and start afresh.

Living in London with not enough money is no fun. The call of the wild grew to a crescendo. I don't know why, but we never discussed this change of direction definitively, as something my wife may or may not want to do. I can only excuse myself by saying, we were, and still are, so bound-up with one another, living in each other's pockets, I just assumed she knew what I was thinking. After all, she did go along with the whole plan. We were driven to the airport by my Uncle and Aunt, and as my little wife kissed my Aunt goodbye, tears rolled down her cheeks. It's a picture, a snapshot that has always stayed with me.

*
**

My wife had come into a small sum of money, on her twenty-first birthday, her father had made over to her as a child. It had then grown into a sum large enough to buy a small, run-down Georgian terraced house, in a square just off Clapham Common, in South London. Her mother was horrified. Once again her beautiful daughter had been led into doing something so far away from her expectations. Then, I discarded her sentiments as being out-of-date and worthless. Now, looking back, I'm embarrassed and ashamed at my brainless attitude and general lack of care and understanding for someone who merely loved her daughter and genuinely feared for her well-being.

The whole square was council tenanted and a developer bought it as a speculation for next to nothing. He then came to individual financial arrangements with each tenant to either leave completely or move to other houses within the square. As each house became vacant, he'd put it freehold on to a fast-rising house market. It was a very good ruse for him and it was a very good investment for us.

In 1971, after a last-minute gazump from his lawyers, and much to the embarrassment of ours, we acquired it for £11,500. It was a very neat little house, but it was very little. A half basement with two small rooms, one front and one back, the same upstairs and the same on the first floor, then there was the roof space. One cold water tap and no indoor loo. It's incredible that so recently as 1971, people, in our capital city of London, one of the most renowned cities in the world, had to live in conditions such as those. We spoke to the previous tenants while doing the renovations and they seemed completely accepting of their situation. Yes, it was very cold in the winter, yes, there was only one cold water tap, and yes, they had to venture outside to get to the loo all the year round, but that's all there was on offer. No hint of resentment, or wishing they could afford a house of their own. They were tenants, and that's all tenants were offered. It's difficult to comprehend, the sweeping change in mindset that would have to happen when, only a few years later, Mrs Thatcher would come into power.