With a few other kids they knew, they made themselves into a band: Patrick on trumpet, Jimmy on drums, Val with an ageing alto saxophone that had belonged to his dad. After the first couple of rehearsals it became clear Val was the only one who could really play. I mean really play: the kind of sound that gives you goose bumps on the arms and makes the muscles of your stomach tighten hard.
It wasn’t long before Patrick had seen the writing on the wall and turned in his trumpet in favour of becoming agent and manager rolled into one; about the first thing he did was sack Jimmy from the band, Val’s was the career to foster and Jimmy was just holding him back.
A couple of years later, Val had moved on from sitting in with Jackie Sharpe and Tubby Hayes at the Manor House, and depping with Oscar Rabin’s band at the Lyceum, to fronting a quartet that slipped into the lower reaches of the Melody Maker small group poll. Val was burning the proverbial candle, going on from his regular gig to some club where he’d play till the early hours, and taking more Bennies than was prudent to keep himself awake. The result was, more than once, he showed up late for an engagement; occasionally, he didn’t show up at all. Patrick gave him warning after warning. Val, in return, made promises he couldn’t keep; in the end, Patrick delivered an ultimatum, and finally walked away.
Within months the quartet broke up and, needing ready cash, Val took a job with Lou Preager’s orchestra at the Lyceum: a musical diet that didn’t stretch far beyond playing for dancers, the occasional novelty number and the hits of the day. At least when he’d been with Rabin there’d been a few other jazzers in the band – and Oscar had allowed them one number a night to stretch out and do their thing. But this – the boredom, the routine were killing him, and Val, I realised later, had moved swiftly on from chewing the insides of Benzedrine inhalers and smoking cannabis to injecting heroin. When the police raided a club in Old Compton Street in the small hours, there was Val in a back room with a needle in his arm.
Somehow, Patrick knew one of the detectives at West End Central well enough to call in a grudging favour. Grudging, but a favour all the same.
When Val stumbled out on to the pavement, twenty-four hours later and still wearing the clothes he’d puked up on, Patrick pushed him into a cab and took him to the place where I was living in Kilburn.
I made tea, poured Patrick the last of a half bottle of whisky, and ran a bath for Val, who was sitting on the side of my bed in his vest and underpants, shivering.
‘You’re a stupid bastard. You know that, don’t you?’ Patrick told him.
Val said nothing.
‘He’s a musician, I told the copper,’ Patrick said. ‘A good one. And you know what he said to me? All he is, is another black junkie out of his fucking head on smack. Send him back where he fucking came from.’
A shadow of pain passed across Val’s face and I looked away, ashamed, not knowing what to say. Val’s father was West Indian, his mother Irish, his skin the colour of palest chocolate.
‘Can you imagine?’ Patrick said, turning to me. ‘All those years and I never noticed.’ Reaching out, he took hold of Val’s jaw and twisted his face upwards towards the light. ‘Look at that. Black as the ace of fucking spades. Not one of us at all.’
‘Stop it,’ I said. ‘Stop it, for God’s sake. What’s the matter with you?’
Patrick loosed his hold and stepped away. ‘Trying to shake some sense into him. Make him realise, way he’s going, what’ll happen if he carries on.’
He moved closer to Val and spoke softly. ‘They’ve got your number now, you know that, don’t you? Next time they catch you as much as smelling of reefer they’re going to have you inside so fast your feet won’t touch the ground. And you won’t like it inside, believe me.’
Val closed his eyes.
‘What you need is to put a little space between you and them, give them time to forget.’ Patrick stepped back. ‘Give me a couple of days, I’ll sort something. Even if it’s the Isle of Man.’
In the event, it was Paris. A two-week engagement at Le Chat Qui Pêche with an option to extend it by three more.
‘You better go with him, Anna. Hold his hand, keep him out of trouble.’ And slipping an envelope fat with French francs and two sets of tickets into my hand, he kissed me on the cheek. ‘Just his hand, mind.’
The club was on the rue de la Huchette, close to the Seine, a black metal cat perched above a silver-grey fish on the sign outside; downstairs a small, smoky cellar bar with a stage barely big enough for piano, bass and drums, and, for seating, perhaps the most uncomfortable stools I’ve ever known. Instruments of torture, someone called them and, by the end of the first week, I knew exactly what he meant.
Not surprisingly, the French trio with whom Val was due to work were suspicious of him at first. His reputation in England may have been on the rise, but across the Channel he was scarcely known. And when you’re used to visitors of the calibre of Miles Davis, Bud Powell, Charlie Parker, what gave Val Collins the idea he’d be welcome? Didn’t the French have saxophone players of their own?
Both the bassist and the drummer wore white shirts that first evening, I remember, ties loosened, top buttons undone, very cool; the pianist’s dark jacket was rucked up at the back, its collar arched awkwardly against his neck, a cigarette smouldering, half-forgotten, at the piano’s edge.
Val and I accepted a glass of wine from the proprietor and sat listening, the club not yet half full, Val’s foot moving to the rhythm and his fingers flexing over imaginary keys. At the intermission, we were introduced to the band, who shook hands politely, looked at Val with cursory interest and excused themselves to stretch their legs outside, breathe in a little night air.
‘Nice guys,’ Val said with a slight edge as they left.
‘You’ll be fine,’ I said and squeezed his arm.
When the trio returned, Val was already on stage, re-angling the mike, adjusting his reed. ‘Blues in F,’ he said quietly, counting in the tempo, medium-fast. After a single chorus from the piano, he announced himself with a squawk and then a skittering run and they were away. Ten minutes later, when Val stepped back from the microphone, layered in sweat, the drummer gave a little triumphant roll on his snare, the pianist turned and held out his hand and the bass player loosened another button on his shirt and grinned.
‘Et maintenant,’ Val announced, testing his tender vocabulary to the full, ‘nous jouons une ballade par Ira Gershwin et Vernon Duke, ‘I Can’t Get Started’. Merci.’
And the crowd, accepting him, applauded.
What could go wrong?
At first, nothing it seemed. We both slept late most days at the hotel on the rue Maître-Albert where we stayed; adjacent rooms that held a bed, a small wardrobe and little else, but with views across towards Notre Dame. After coffee and croissants – we were in Paris, after all – we would wander around the city, the streets of Saint-Germain-des-Prés at first, but then, gradually, we found our way around Montparnasse and up through Montmartre to Sacré Coeur. Sometimes we would take in a late afternoon movie, and Val would have a nap at the hotel before a leisurely dinner and on to the club for that evening’s session, which would continue until the early hours.
Six nights a week and on the seventh, rest?
There were other clubs to visit, other musicians to hear. The Caveau de la Huchette was just across the street, the Club Saint-Germain-des-Prés and the Trois Mailletz both a short walk away. Others, like the Tabou and the Blue Note, were a little further afield. I couldn’t keep up.