Emma wouldn’t come. Why should she? She’d seen the damn act a million times before. She hated it. He knew that. He wasn’t blind. The last thing she’d need after jet lag was a couple of hours with a hostile crowd at the Wellington Arms watching his lame act go badly and having to spend the rest of the night going through the whys and wherefores.

How would she get to the Wellington Arms anyway? Benny wasn’t going to hang around while she had a bath, was he? At least he hoped he wasn’t. An unwelcome image popped into his head. He shook it away. Get a grip. He looked through the hole again.

No wife. No Benny.

810

“That sounds like a nasty bit of feedback there. Might have to watch that.”

809

John’s confidence drained away.

His act was that of a nervous performer making a farcical mess of his performance. He’d bound on, all smiles and savoir faire, clock the crowd, freeze, gulp, tug at his too-tight collar, smile nervously, try to speak, croak “Good evening,” cough to clear it, sweat. His voice would break, he’d drop the microphone, get caught up in the wire, pick it up, electrocute himself, pretend his brain had short-circuited, deliver a stream of rubbish jokes with forgotten punch lines or no punch lines at all.

It had been hit and miss in the past and it needed a showbiz buildup to give a good contrast.

Miles was supplying no such contrast. His intro lacked showbiz.

“You don’t want to go on first, do you, Shelley?” asked John.

“No.”

John heard the sound of smashing glass.

“Now that reminds me,” said Miles. “I have got something I want to say about glasses, as it happens, and I don’t want to get heavy or anything, we’re here to have a good time after all, but those glasses need to be returned to the bar . . .”

There was another smash.

“. . . Okay, there goes another one, and as yet it’s not serious, but I will say, and I think I’m being fair, that if there are any more breakages, I’ll have to operate a sort of deposit scheme whereby—”

He was drowned out by the sound of smashing glass.

808

Michael Davies hit eighty-five and hummed Sinatra to unwind.

807

Did he give the doorman Benny’s name? John couldn’t remember. Benny would get pretty pissed off if he had to pay.

806

Michael overtook a family car with a MIND MY CHILD sticker in the back window. The kid inside gave him the finger. Michael stuck his finger up back and the dad saw him. The dad mouthed “Fuck you” at him. Michael mouthed “Fuck you” back. He saw the kid ask the dad what was being said.

Michael accelerated to ninety to get away from it all and sang Sinatra loudly. Not very tunefully though.

805