Confessions from a Nudist Colony

‘Nobody,’ says Millie. ‘I’d better go–’

‘No you don’t! You’ve done enough damage for one day,’ says the fuzz. ‘You stay here. I’ll go.’

‘What about me?’ I say.

‘You can’t go,’ says the copper. ‘Not with those handcuffs on. You get in the car with WPC Marjoribanks. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

‘Thanks a lot,’ I say, not without a trace of sarcasm.

‘Sorry about this,’ says the male fuzz, considerately opening the car door for me. ‘These combined ops are always a bit of a disaster, aren’t they? Get out of it! !’ His last remark is delivered to the pack of kids round the car as he turns and strides purposefully towards the caravans. The kids follow him.

WPC Marjoribanks slides along the back seat beside me. She has nice little knees and I can’t help clocking the curve of her thighs underneath the blue serge skirt. ‘Alone at last,’ I say.

She smiles nervously. ‘I don’t have to say it again, do I?’

‘Please don’t,’ I say. ‘It doesn’t help very much. Haven’t you got a hacksaw tucked away somewhere?’

She does not answer but starts running her hands over the front of her body. ‘I must have a hole,’ she says.

‘It’s not beyond the realms of possibility,’ I say suavely. ‘Perhaps you’d better have a look for it. I shouldn’t think anything would have much chance of dropping out of that lot.’

I am clocking the front of her tight tunic when I speak and it is true that she would be pushed to smuggle a thin stamp hinge in the space not taken up by knocker.

‘I suppose there’s always a chance,’ she says.

The same thought occurs to me as I watch her fingers delving in the breast pocket of her tunic and a wave of naughtiness sweeps over the maximum stress area of my jeans.

‘Any luck?’ I say.

‘Oh dear,’ she says. ‘There is a hole. The lining’s gone.’

Not surprising with that lot chafing against it, I think to myself. ‘Perhaps it’s slipped down inside,’ I say, jerking my manacled mitts to indicate that some kind of action needs to be taken.

WPC Marjoribanks nods and starts to undo her tunic. She is wearing a plum red half cut bra under her blue shirt and I suck in my breath appreciatively. ‘That’s not government issue, is it?’ I say.

‘What, the shirt?’ she says.

‘The bra,’ I say. ‘I can’t help noticing it when I look. It’s nice.’

‘Oh, no, it’s not – I mean, it’s not police issue. Frankly – if it doesn’t sound like heresy – I’m not all that keen on the uniform. In fact–’ her lip starts to tremble again ‘– I’m not all that keen on the Force.’

‘I don’t like force either,’ I say. ‘There’s too much of it. People talk about sex and violence like they are the same thing but I only see the–’

‘I mean the Police Force,’ she says. ‘Frankly I don’t think I’m cut out to be a copper. That probably sounds terrible to you. How long have you been a flat foot?’

‘Well, I’ve always had a bit of trouble with my arches,’ I say. ‘Mum made me wear my sister’s old sandals when I was a kid and–’

‘A policeman,’ she says. ‘How long have you been with the CID?’

This time I twig what she says: the CID, not the SID. She has obviously mistaken me for a plain clothes copper. I wonder if it would be wise to disillusion her? Especially in our present situation. ‘Not very long,’ I say. I give a light laugh and wait for her to ask me why.

‘What are you laughing at?’ she says.

‘I was just thinking,’ I say. ‘If I wanted to make a pass at you I’d have a problem, wouldn’t I?’ I hold out my wrists and give her the famous Lea slow burn. It is all good clean fun and she smiles gamely.

‘I sometimes wonder if that’s why I joined,’ she says sadly.

‘What do you mean?’ I say.

‘I used to be very free and easy,’ she says. ‘I remember how worried my mother was. I think I thought that if I joined the police force it would be the next best thing to becoming a nun. I’d be protected from myself. The sanctity of the uniform would keep me on the straight and narrow.’

You could nip on my straight and narrow any day of the week, I think to myself. I nod understandingly and take one of her hands in both of mine – I don’t have any alternative with the handcuffs on. ‘You don’t want to go against your true nature,’ I say. ‘Any luck with that key?’

She retrieves her hand and runs it along the hem of her skirt. ‘Nope. It must have dropped out.’

‘Couldn’t have slipped inside your shirt?’ I drop my tethered mitts on her Ned Kelly and have a little feel. It is even more sexy with the bracelets on. Percy certainly thinks so anyway. He bounces up like a rubber pigeon shit. ‘No. There’s nothing there – except you.’ The minute I lay hands on her she stiffens like something else I have just mentioned and it is clear that the pressure of my sensitive looks and fingers is not altogether repugnant.

‘This is awful,’ she says. ‘What would anyone say if they could see?’

‘There’s nobody around to see,’ I say. ‘They’ve all gone off with your mate. Let’s make sure you’re not concealing anything.’

I lower my nut in time with my voice and gently brush my mouth against hers. I wouldn’t exactly say that she abandons herself to my lips but she does not bust the back window jerking her head away.

‘Are you married?’ she says. ‘All the worst ones at the station are married.’

‘I’m not surprised you have problems,’ I say. ‘No, I’m not married.’

‘You shouldn’t be doing that,’ she says.

‘I’m just trying to keep the circulation running through my wrists,’ I say. ‘These handcuffs are blooming tight.’

‘Isn’t there anything else you can feel?’ she says.

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I’ll have to find out.’ Before she can say anything, I drop my mitts to her knee and twist my body round so that I can slide them underneath her skirt.

‘Ooh!’ she says.

‘The steel’s a bit cold, is it?’ I say – consideration for birds’ feelings has always been one of my strong points.

‘Not only that,’ she says. ‘Your cheek’s pretty cool too! I’ve never worked with any one like you.’

‘We could become famous in the anals of crime,’ I say.

‘I think you mean annals,’ she says. ‘Though when you do that with your hands I’m not sure.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘These seats slope down a bit steep.’ I give her another chance to taste the nectar of my lips and this time our cakeholes melt together and I feel her long lashes brushing against my cheek like imprisoned butterflies – poetry, isn’t it? Oh, all right, please yourself. Only trying to extend my range. And, talking about extensions – yes, Percy is rearing roofwards like he is bent on turning my lap into an imitation of a tent being erected. She has gorgeous lips, this bird. They are sort of soft and tacky so that they form themselves to the shape of your cakehole and then cling on like clams. What a bleeding shame that my mitts are manacled. I really feel the urge to mould this bird-sized bule to the stressed steel that is the Lea rib cage.

‘Stop! You must–’ she squawks.

‘Careful,’ I say. ‘Anything you say will be taken down and used to wipe the condensation off the inside of the windows.’ I have already managed to check that her grumble is no stranger to the velvet gong-belter and without further ado I give her knicks a sponsored trip to kneesville.

‘Stop!’ she squeaks. ‘This is terribly naughty. Supposing we have to make a sprint for it?’

‘Make a splint for it?’ I say. ‘There’s no danger of that I can assure you. Clock this.’

‘No!’ she squeals as I seize my opportunity to reveal Britain’s latest space probe financed entirely by pubic subscriptions. ‘I was referring to our raid on the vice ring. We may be called into action at any moment.’ She gazes into my lap and I see her mind grappling with the problem of what use I can be with my hands manacled and an enormous hard on. I suppose I could always try to batter down the door of a caravan if the worst came to the worst.

‘Get on my lap,’ I say. ‘Go on. You know you want to.’ If she doesn’t, I want it enough for both of us. By the cringe! You could paint my nob tartan and call it Throb Roy.

‘Oh, you’re terrible!’ To my relief she bends forward and helps her knicks over her ankles. ‘Are they all like you in the CID?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘You want to ask for a transfer.’ I raise my arms above my head and she takes a quick shufti out of the window and scrambles across my knees. They are steaming up fast – I mean, the windows not my knees – and it is probably just as well that a discreet veil should be drawn over the proceedings.

‘I could be discharged for this,’ she pants.

‘Likewise,’ I say working my khyber forward to the edge of the seat. ‘Mind how you – ah!’

She tucks my hampton away like your mum bunging a pair of freshly washed socks into a bottom drawer and it is clear that she is no stranger to parking inside the car.

‘I had a boyfriend with a midget,’ she says.

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘Still, they say that size isn’t everything.’

‘An MG Midget,’ she says. ‘It was very cramped.’

‘Of course,’ I say, getting her drift. ‘This is spacious, isn’t it?’ I slip my wrists over her head and shoulders and hug her to me so that the handcuffs press into the small of her back. Honestly, if you want to get into the police this is the only way. The experience could only be improved if she took her hat off but you don’t like to say anything, do you? Not at a moment like this. It might spoil the magic.

‘Ooooh!’ she gasps. ‘I never realised that pounding the beat could be such fun.’

‘It’s not bad, is it?’ I say. ‘Oooh!’ One of the problems of not being able to use my hands is that I have no control over any of my safety valves. Millie the Fuzz is strictly in the driving seat and with her dishing out the pelvic aggro the time to blast off can be measured in seconds. I try to think of Ted Heath’s organ to take my mind off what the copper bottom is doing to me but it is no good. Wisps of hair are hanging down in front of her boat race and she is biting her lip. I hate to see a woman doing a man’s work so I tilt my head forward and bite her lip for her. Not only bite it but suck it and send my tongue in to check that there has been no serious damage. This clearly goes down a treat and Millie joggles around so much that she hops off my hampton. ‘Damn!’ Boy! If all escaped prisoners were recaptured so quickly you would never hear that they had got out in the first place. WPC Marjoribanks gets my dick back on duty in a vulgar fraction of a second and I drive my feet down against the floor of the car. God knows what is happening outside. All the windows are totally steamed up.

‘Awwwwwweeeeee!’ Millie lets out a squeak and then cements herself to my cakehole. Her body has stopped juddering up and down but a long tremor ripples through it and her toes press against the carpet. I can feel myself teetering on the brink and I jerk my fife upwards until the chava lava runs wild through my quivering thighs and I feel like an electric blanket having it off with a cake mixer. It is a very affecting experience.

‘Right, let’s have you – blimey!’ The speaker is Millie’s mate who has just wrenched open the back door. He looks harassed and surprised, in that order. ‘Millie! You’re supposed to be on the job.’

‘Would you like to rephrase that statement?’ I say.

‘It was bad enough with that bloke in the charge room,’ says the male fuzz. ‘You were only supposed to be taking him a cup of tea.’

‘I was only trying to soften him up,’ protests Millie. ‘Why must you keep bringing up my past?’

‘Time to move on is it, chief?’ I say. ‘Don’t worry about leaving me. I’ll be all right.’ It has occurred to my shrewd brain that the sooner the two coppers slope off the better. What I had with Millie was very beautiful but it could not last. It was just a flash in the pants really. If I arrived home with a female fuzz Dad would have a heart attack – on second thoughts –

‘You’re a disgrace to the uniform,’ says the male copper. ‘Come, Marjoribanks. Button your tunic and shove your knickers down the back of the seat with the rest of them. There’s work to be done.’ He turns back to me. ‘You’d better wait here.’

‘Have no fear, squire,’ I tell him. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

I am blooming nearly right, too. Have you ever tried pulling up a pair of trousers with handcuffs on? – no! not on the trousers. Why would anyone want to handcuff a pair of trousers? Wake up! This isn’t exactly highbrow reading but you are supposed to have a certain amount of nous. Now, where was I? Oh yes. Standing beside this police car with my bum hanging out of my jeans. I can’t make any progress inside the vehicle and it is only when I straighten up that I begin to get somewhere – like nearly arrested again. I feel such a berk giving little jumps in the air and trying to pull my trousers up at the same moment. A couple of old ladies give me a very nasty look and though I can’t lip read I reckon they are looking around for a keeper. Ungrateful old bags! You’d think they would be glad of a bit of excitement at their age, wouldn’t you?

In the end I manage to tuck my fife away and I am ready to scarper. My shirt is hanging out at the back but I can’t do anything about that with the handcuffs on and nobody is going to draw any conclusions. I mean, it is often like that when you come out of the karsi, isn’t it?

I take a few steps along the road and then remember Sid. Is he still nattering to Madame Necroma or will he have come out and wondered where I am? I had better slip back and have a discreet dekko. Millie and her mate seemed interested in the lady so I had better step warily.

I approach the fair from a different angle and carefully pick my way through the caravans. The fair is now in full swing and the music is grinding out above the hum of the generators. I come round a corner and focus on Madame Necroma’s caravan just as the door opens and the good lady appears at the top of the steps. She is looking decidedly dishevelled and unhappy and pulling a coat round her shoulders. Behind her appears Millie looking embarrassed and I sink back into the shadows. The driver of the police car is the last to leave and he looks round behind him before closing the door. Where is Sid?

‘You’ve got nothing on me!’ says Madame Necroma. ‘Bleeding fuzz! I’ll have you for this.’ She turns on Millie. ‘You’ll have the curse for seven years!’

Before I can work out quite what she means by this statement, the trio disappear round a caravan. How very strange. I can only imagine that Sid has emerged and sloped off to his pad in trendy Vauxhall. He was never the patient type. But hist, what ist? The caravan seems to be trembling. Maybe I had better take a butcher’s. I keep a tight grip on the front of my round the houses and shuffle across the bruised grass littered with fag packets. Up the steps and I try the door. It opens. Inside, it looks just as it did when I last saw it. There is a bowl of Japanese fighting fish but they can’t be belting each other hard enough to set up the vibration that is running through the caravan. I look down at the crumpled bed and – wait a minute! There is only half a bed compared with what there used to be. I switch my gaze to the side of the caravan and see a piece of material I recognise. It is a fragment of Sid’s lumber jacket – we call it that because it is so diabolical that nobody knows how he could have lumbered himself with it. It is protruding from the door of a cupboard. The door of a cupboard that is shuddering as if someone is pressing against it from the inside. Could it be that –? No! It seems impossible – but yet – stranger things have happened to Sidney Noggett.

I grab hold of the handle in the wall and pull. Nothing happens so I pull with both hands and my trousers fall down. Hardly have they touched the floor than the missing half of Madame Necroma’s bed swings down to carpet level. On it sprawls the bright pink body of a naked man lying amongst a pile of discarded clothing and crumpled Tarot cards. His face looks like a chimpanzee’s bum after it has slid down a helter skelter without a mat.

‘Blimey!’ I say. ‘Are you all right, Sid?’

Sid does not answer me but looks round the caravan. ‘Don’t say she’s gone!’ he says. ‘We were just getting to the interesting part.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘I can’t believe that she was a nail,’ says Sid.

‘Stands to reason,’ I say. ‘That’s why the fuzz had the caravan under surveillance. I bet they’re pumping her down at the station at this very minute.’

Sid winces and then shakes his hand sadly. ‘I thought she had something,’ he says.

‘I wouldn’t be surprised,’ I say, ‘You’d better have a dunk with the Dettol. Use one of the egg cups if you can get your –’

‘I didn’t mean that!’ says Sid. ‘Where’s your romantic streak? I was referring to our instantaneous report.’

‘You mean rapport,’ I say. ‘A report is a bang – still, I suppose, when you come to think of it –’

‘Sometimes you meet someone and it’s as if you’ve known them all your life,’ muses Sid. ‘Making love seemed as natural as the couple of quid I gave her.’

‘I thought you didn’t have any money?’ I say.

‘I found I had another quid on me,’ says Sid. ‘I reckon it would have worked, too.’

‘What would have worked?’ I say.

‘She said that she would be able to get nearer to the reality that was me if we made love.’

‘And did she?’ I ask.

‘I don’t know,’ says Sid. ‘There was this bang on the door and “wump!” She presses a button and half the bed with me on it whips into the wall.’

‘So you got nothing out of her?’ I say.

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ says Sid. ‘She was completely at one with me about the environment. She had this feeling that our heritage was very precious and that we would squander it at our peril.’

‘That’s nice,’ I say.

‘And she resolved my uncertainty about the future,’ says Sid. ‘With her help I think I’ve found the answer.’ He leans back and taps his nail file against the end of his finger.

‘Go on,’ I say. I am referring to Sid’s effort to cut through the handcuffs with Mum’s nail file but he is making indifferent progress and is clearly more interested in his latest crack-pot scheme.

‘You might well cock your lug holes,’ he says. ‘This little number represents everything I feel like doing at the moment. A return to nature and a life free from stress and strain. I can almost hear the rooks crowing.’

‘Cocks crow,’ I say. ‘Rooks caw. What is it, Sid? Put me out of my misery.’

‘A camping site by the seaside,’ says Sid. ‘What could be simpler?’

‘You mean caravans?’ I ask.

‘Caravans, tents, anything. All you need is a bit of water and somewhere for them to have a Tom Tit and clean their Teds. A field will do. It’s a doddle to look after, and all the time you’ve got the sky as a ceiling above your head, You wake to the sound of birdsong. You’re in the middle of people who are enjoying themselves. And the moment was never riper. With this once great country of ours temporarily in diarrhoea straits, more and more families are taking holidays at home, discovering the joys of their own countryside.’

‘Where are you thinking of doing this?’ I ask.

Sid rubs his hands together. ‘Funny you should say that. When it came to a site I really fell on my feet.’

‘They look as if something fell on them,’ I say – somebody once described Sid as comatose and hammer toes.

‘Don’t take the piss,’ says Sid. ‘You’re going the right way to get a button down hooter when you go on like that. Just ask intelligent questions and you might learn something.’

‘Which one of Madame Necroma’s relations owns a field near the sea?’ I ask.

‘Her aunt,’ says Sid. ‘Wait a minute! How did you know she had a relation who owned a field?’

‘I’ve got mystic powers,’ I say. ‘I can foretell every time you are going to be conned. How much did you pay for this place?’

‘I haven’t paid anything yet,’ says Sid. ‘I’m not a fool! I’m not going to buy it without seeing it. It might be totally unsuitable. Really, Timmo, you do get up my bracket when you imply that I’m some kind of Charlie when it comes to sussing out job opportunities.’

He is still fuming when Dad comes in. I am a bit choked because I had not wished to be caught in a situation which might alarm my sensitive parent. ‘What have you two skiving ’arstards been doing?’ he says as I thrust my arms out of sight beneath the table.

‘Nothing,’ I say automatically.

‘I can believe that,’ says Dad. ‘Now, I’m going to say two words that should strike terror into your hearts: hard work.’

‘Why? Do you want us to translate them for you?’ says Sid.

Dad is clearly feeling righteous after putting in one of his irregular days at the lost property office and does not warm to Sid’s merry quip. ‘Bleeding disgrace!’ he snarls. ‘A working man does an honest day’s labour and he has to put up with two of his family behaving like bloody kids. Haven’t you got anything better to do than hop about in sacks?’

‘Ah – yes,’ says Sid. ‘Sacks. Well, we’re trying to get fit, aren’t we?’

In fact, what happened is a bit more complicated than that. The fuzz take most of Sid’s clothes with them when they leave the caravan and when Madame Necroma’s old man comes in and finds a naked Sid trying to pull up the trousers of a bloke wearing handcuffs he gets the wrong idea. You can’t blame him really. I mean, we live in disturbing times when what went for our grandfathers does not even make us think about coming. When he throws us down the steps of the caravan we are in a bit of a quandary and it is just as well that there is this pile of sacks lying behind the coconut shy. We slip two on sharpish and hop off home. Probably the most knackering experience I have ever undergone, especially coming after Millie – not that I did come after Millie. I am pretty certain that we came at the same time. Anyway, it helped to disguise Sid’s naughty parts and the fact that I was wearing handcuffs.

‘I’ll tell you how to get fit,’ says Dad. ‘Do some bleeding work! The country can’t afford to support grasshoppers any more.’

‘If it can support you, it can support anybody,’ says Sid. ‘Grasshoppers, arse hoppers, you name it!’

‘Hello, dear,’ says Mum, coming in with a tray of tannic poisoning – or tea as she calls it. ‘Did you get your certificate all right?’

‘Oh!’ says Sid. ‘Been down to Doctor Khan, have we? How long did he give you this time?’

‘He doesn’t know what he’s talking about!’ says Dad. ‘He’s useless if you don’t wear a turban.’

‘Don’t be like that,’ says Sid. ‘That curry powder did wonders with your warts.’

‘And you know who owns the supermarket where I had to buy it?’ complains Dad. ‘Only his blooming brother-in-law. I remember when you used to get your stuff at a chemist. He told Mrs Kedge to wear a lentil poultice and it was leaking out of her knickers all down the high street.’

‘Walter!’ Mum jerks up the spout of the tea pot in protest.

‘Well, it’s true. It’s no good trying to draw a veil over these things. It’s like this business of having to pay for your medical certificate. It’s profiteering off the sick and needy.’

‘So you’ve been down the library all day?’ accuses Sid. ‘Queueing up with the dossers to have a crack at the page three nude in the Sun.’

‘Some swine tore it out!’ says Dad. ‘That’s nice, isn’t it? Taxpayers’ money and all. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was one of Khan’s lot. They like white women.’

‘Well, that’s only fair,’ says Sid. ‘I mean, you like black women, don’t you? I remember how choked you were when you thought those African birds were going to have to cover up their knockers on the telly.’

‘Sidney!’ says Mum.

‘Nearly turned him against the monarchy, it did,’ says Sid. ‘He couldn’t make up his mind whether to write to Buckingham Palace or Bernard Delfont. In the end he chose Bernard Delfont because he was more influential.’

‘It was the artistic licence I was worried about,’ says Dad.