‘Life, eh?’ said Fangio who, having served others, had now returned unto me. ‘You can’t live with it, but you can’t live without it. Or is that women I’m thinking about?’
‘Probably women,’ I said. ‘I think a lot about women. But I never seem to have sex with any of them.’
‘Perhaps you’re gay,’ said Fangio.
‘How dare you,’ I said.
‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ said Fangio.
‘Quite so.’
‘I should have said perhaps you’re gay. Ah-harr-harr-harr.’
‘I should think so too.’ And I sipped at my Bosun’s Whistle.
‘Getting anywhere near a solution regarding its ingredients? Ah-harr? Ah-harr-harr?’ asked Fangio.
‘Sadly not,’ I said. ‘If I can’t come up with something soon, I will just have to accept defeat and take the hundred dollars for failing.’
‘And that will serve you right.’ And Fangio chuckled again. ‘Harr-harr-harr-ah-harr, ’ he went.
And then he said, ‘Ah-harr slice-me-membrane and walk-me-plank (also cocktails), there was a guy in here earlier, asking for you.’
‘Asking for me?’ I said.
‘That’s right. Aar-harr-harr-’ and then Fangio coughed. ‘I don’t know how pirates keep it up,’ he said. ‘It makes my throat sore. But yes, asking for you. Well, asking for Lazlo Woodbine, Private Eye.’
‘A client?’ I said. ‘Well, if you see him again, you send him over to my office.’
‘No,’ said Fangio, shaking his head. ‘I can’t do that. Oh no.’
‘And why not?’ I asked, and I downed the last of my Bosun’s Whistle and then picked a pair of lady’s underpants out of my teeth. ‘Why can’t you send them to my office?’
Fangio beckoned me close and whispered into my ear. ‘Between you and me only,’ he whispered, ‘that was the real Lazlo’s format. The four locations. You’ll have to come up with your own special format. I’m not going to help you to copy his.’
And I thanked Fangio for his whispered words. And I concluded, in my rather drunken state, that he did have a good point there. I mustn’t copy the way Laz had conducted his business, even if I was going to work under his name. And I was. I would have to come up with my own special way of doing things. Perhaps, learning by Laz’s fatal mistake, not such a hands-on, in-your-face, get-up-and-go, jumping-directly-into-danger kind of way of doing things. I would definitely have to come up with my own. Some way to get the job done with no direct danger to myself. Some technique, in fact, that mostly involved sitting down, preferably in the office, or in this bar, and thinking things out. A technique of my own. A technique for Tyler.
The Tyler Technique, that’s what.
And I would have ended this chapter right there. At that momentous moment, when I made my momentous decision. But for the fact that Fangio suddenly tapped me briskly upon the left trench-coat sleeve and said, ‘Hey, Laz – that’s the guy. The one that wants to speak to you. About a case. I think.’
And he pointed and I turned to look. And there he was in the doorway. And I raised up my fedora to the guy.
Because he was Elvis Presley.
46
Well, it certainly looked like Elvis Presley.
But then, how was I to be sure?
Because I remembered Dr Darren McMahon, the Scouse one at the Ministry of Serendipity. So was this the real Elvis Presley, or just another Elvis Presley? Whatever that might mean. But think about this. If this really was Elvis Presley. And he had a case he wanted Lazlo Woodbine to solve. And I was, for all the world, Lazlo Woodbine now. It would mean that I would be solving a case for Elvis. How cool would that be? How cool? I tried to hold on to myself and my composure. I would have to act professionally here. Keep calm, I told myself. And so I kept calm. Very calm. Very very very calm, I kept. Though really rather drunk.
The chap that might be Elvis Presley caught sight of me and he grinned, with that most-distinctively-Elvis-lip-curl grin, and swaggered in my direction.
And I use the word ‘swaggered’ without fear of correction. Elvis was a swaggerer. He sidled also, did Elvis. In fact he combined swaggering and sidling into a walk that was quite his own. Unique, one might say. So perhaps I shouldn’t say that he swaggered. No, he swaggered and sidled simultaneously.
He swiddled.
‘Mr Lazlo Woodbine, sir?’ he said to me, swiddling up and sticking out his hand. He smelled very strongly of ‘product’, this fellow did, and I found myself almost immediately engulfed by an overall cloud of it. I know folk like to write that in his last years Elvis rarely washed, taking the occasional ‘whore’s bath’ – a wipe under the armpits and around the willy and bum/fanny regions – but I can vouch for his cleanliness. It was scrupulous. And so he smelled of ‘product’. Of products.
A musky aftershave. A cedarwood-based body lotion over vanilla soap. An olive essence hairspray that kept those roguish darkly dyed strands [23] in place and a lily-of-the-valley-flavoured foot powder, which ensured for ever freshness of the feet. I did not know at the time, and in fact never did find out, that these personal products had all been promoted through a Fifth Avenue advertising agency in which my old chum Rob of The Sumerian Kynges now owned a controlling interest. I’m glad I never knew, really, because I’m sure it would probably have upset me.
‘You are Mr Woodbine, ain’t you, sir?’ asked the sweetly smelling swiddler.
I nodded in the manner that suggested that yes, I might be, but who was it who was asking.
‘The name’s Presley, sir,’ said the fellow. ‘Elvis Presley – you might have heard of me.’
‘I might,’ I said. Enjoying the moment. A drunken moment, it was.
‘Help me, Mr Woodbine. You are my only hope.’
I bade the fellow seat himself beside me. And I glanced around at the clientele, who had now all ceased to speak, but not to whisper, and were staring slack-jawed at my would-be client. ‘Back about your business,’ I cried at them. Firmly, with authority.
‘A drink?’ I asked Elvis. Because it appeared to be him. The accent was certainly right. And the manner. And the swiddling.
‘Well, thank you, sir.’
I called out to Fangio. But not too far, as he was leaning right across the bar counter behind me.
‘It is him,’ whispered Fangio, his big face once more close against my ear. ‘It is him, isn’t it? Say it is him.’
‘It is him,’ I whispered in reply.
And Fangio whistled. Tunelessly. ‘Richard Nixon,’ he said. ‘Right here in my bar. Just wait until I tell the guys at the tennis club.’
‘Tennis club?’ I said. ‘You?’
‘I’ll have you know that I do own a tennis club,’ said Fangio.
‘Own a tennis club?’
‘Certainly. It’s a thing about yay-long.’ Fangio mimed the yayness. ‘Made of wood, with criss-crossed strings at the fat end.’
‘That’s a tennis racquet,’ I said.
‘Not the way I use it,’ said Fangio.
‘Two Bosun’s Whistles,’ I said to Fange. ‘And don’t feel that you need to skimp on the speed when serving them up. As fast as possible will do just fine.’
Fangio made the sound that a sparrow will make when pushed through the strings of a tennis club. And went to mix our drinks.
‘An honour to meet you, sir,’ said Elvis. ‘Might I say that you’re younger than I figured you’d be.’
‘I keep myself fit,’ I told him, ‘because in my business, keeping yourself fit can mean the difference between serving up a winning storm at Wimbledon and serving time in Sing Sing with a swarm of bees up your jumper.’