He was a strange cove, though, was Percy. You never knew with him. He had that hoity-toity accent, talking as if he had a potato in his mouth. On a couple of occasions he went out for the evening in a top hat and tails. True, the hat was a bit dented, and the tailcoat had some iffy-looking stains on it, but the outfit was definitely the real thing. ‘There’s a world of difference between a gentleman and the other sort,’ Percy would say. ‘Putting on airs to which you are not entitled is the height of vulgarity. Remember that, my boy.’ This was one of what he called the ‘life lessons’ he ‘bestowed’ on Terry, in an effort to ‘inculcate wisdom’ in him and give him ‘a dash of style’.

Terry didn’t resent this kind of stuff. On the contrary, it amused him, and even made him feel a smidgen of fondness for the sad old poofter.

*

It was hard to know where Percy got his money from. He had his inheritance from his dead ma, thanks to Terry, but it had turned out to be nowhere near as much as Percy had given the impression it would be. He had no job, and certainly wasn’t in business for himself, though he claimed to act as a sort of agent for chaps who were. That was as much as he would divulge. It was hard to get Percy to be specific, about anything.

All the same, he put some sweet jobs Terry’s way, sweet jobs that paid sweet.

‘Got a little task for you, Terence my lad,’ he would say, rubbing his dry, bloodless hands together and doing his smoker’s cough and turning puce in the face. ‘Met a chap at the club who has a bit of a problem – dear me, how breathless I am.’

That was another thing he wouldn’t specify, which club or clubs he was a member of.

‘Oh, yes?’ Terry would say, offhand, without bothering to look up from the copy of Titbits he was reading. ‘What sort?’

And Percy would giggle and say, ‘You mean, what sort of problem, or what sort of job?’

‘Both.’

Terry had a look that could wipe the smirk off Percy’s face in an instant.

‘Small problem, fair-sized job.’

‘Sounds like an ad for laxatives.’

The giggle again, followed by another bout of juicy coughing.

‘Tee hee. You are a card, Terence.’

Percy loved this kind of jokey to and fro. He should have been a comic on the wireless, Terry thought, he would have been as good as the ones he listened to, with their catchphrases and cheeky banter – ‘Get yourself some stronger elastic, missus!’ – and their ancient jokes that audiences howled at but which for Terry went down like lead balloons.