‘Hey, that’s great,’ I told him. ‘Can I tell Prim?’
‘If you think she’ll keep it to herself, sure you can. Don’t mention it to Elanore, though. She’d burst her girdle.’
I studied him as he gazed out of the window. Somehow I knew that he was contemplating an evening shot, making use of the spectacular effect of the sinking sun as it washed the trees which bounded the mansion. ‘You really love your work, Miles, don’t you,’ I said.
‘Sure,’ he replied. ‘I can’t imagine it any other way. Don’t you?’
‘I would if I knew what my work was. I know I’m past my sell-by date in the job I started on, acting as a lawyer’s leg-man. Prim’s keeping that business going, but I’ve reached the stage when I don’t enjoy it any more. The truth is it was never any more than okay; it paid the bills and gave me a lifestyle, but there was never any fulfilment. The only time it gave me a buzz was when I found myself involved with real detective work, and that only ever happened by accident.
‘My GWA work is different, though. Bizarre as it may be, I’m doing something creative there. In my voice-overs too, and now here, even though it’s a one-off. But always I have the feeling that I’m just stumbling along.’
‘Then take control, Oz. You’re privileged; thanks to the lottery you can decide what it is you want to do and go for it, shit or bust. You say this movie is a one-off, but there’s no reason why it should be. You ain’t going to win an Oscar, but you’re competent in what you’re doing. I’d cast you again, and so will others.’
I had to laugh. ‘You saying I should become an actor?’
‘No,’ he shot back. ‘I’m saying you could. I’d recommend a little formal drama training, but it’s open to you as a career option.’
‘If I want a career.’
‘Of course you do. You’re a young guy and you’re full of energy. You can’t sit still.’
He was right; I tried that once, and it was a near-disaster.
‘I don’t know what I’d be doing now if I hadn’t found this business. I’d have played cricket for a while, I guess. I can’t bat worth a light, but I was a pretty quick bowler. I might have managed a few one-day games for Australia. But after that, I’d probably have wound up selling cars, or maybe insurance.
‘Every day I say a little prayer of thanks that twenty-odd years ago, I answered a newspaper ad looking for young guys to work as extras or minor players in a movie. I’ve been hooked on this business ever since. It’s the breath of life to me, and I’d die as a person without it.’
‘Do you have any ambitions left, then?’ I asked. This had turned into the deepest conversation I’d ever had with Miles. I’d known him for going on three years, but I hadn’t learned much about him that I couldn’t have found out in a newspaper.
‘Sure I have,’ he replied ‘and it’ll go on for as long as I do. I want to make my next movie better than my last, and so on. It’s nothing to do with money; that just happens, and it doesn’t have a hell of a lot to do with art. I’m not Bergman, or Bresson; I’m trying to be the movie equivalent of Robert Louis Stevenson; a great story-teller and entertainer.
‘My motivation is constant improvement; that and trying to reach as many people with my work as possible. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do if it was in the interests of one of my movies.’
‘Including his own stunts.’ Dawn’s voice came from the door of the study. We stood — gentlemen to a fault, both of us — as she came into the room; she was dressed in a simple blouse and skirt, and the ends of her hair were still wet from the shower. ‘I warn you now, Oz. If you ever work with us again, and there’s action involved, make damn sure there’s a clause in your contract that says he has to use a standin.’
‘Don’t worry,’ I assured her. ‘After last weekend, I don’t need to be told that.’
Chapter 26
For the next couple of weeks I settled into what most people would call chaos with just a dash of organisation; for me it was a normal life. Most of my time was booked, Sly Burr having worked a couple of London voice-overs into my movie schedule, but I managed to go into the office on a couple of occasions, just to make sure that Prim, Lulu and the new assistant were running Blackstone Phillips Investigations to my satisfaction.
I realised very quickly that they were doing a far more disciplined job than I ever had, and were providing just as good a service, but no way would I ever have admitted that to them.
Primavera came with me to Dublin with the GWA, and to Copenhagen the following weekend. She was popular with the wrestling team, most of whom remembered her first appearance among them, on a dramatic night in Barcelona — a night I will never forget either, but for a different reason.
By the end of the following week, my filming in the North was over; next on the schedule were two weeks in the studio in London for my off-camera narration, and for a few more scenes that Miles had mentioned, casually over dinner, on my first night in the Deeside mansion.
I’m pretty fit, but the action was catching up with me. I was knackered, and so I was pleased that the GWA had a weekend off, thanks to a big golf tournament which was dominating the satellite television channels. Prim and I decided that we would get out of Glasgow, and spend a couple of days in St Andrews with my sister, my nephews, and of course Wallace, my old flatmate.
They were all pleased to see us when we arrived at the freshly decorated bungalow, with its view across the links; none more so, it seemed, than Wallace. Green iguanas are reptiles, right, and generally reptiles have very small brains, capable of focusing only on catching and crunching insects, or in the case of crocodiles, any large mammals which are daft enough to drink from the wrong river. I doubt if they even think about sex; although. .
My point is that when I gave him to my nephews on a permanent basis I didn’t expect my old chum to have a memory which stretched back beyond his last bowl of Wonder Wienie Iguana Superfood, yet every time I walk into a room and he’s there, no matter how many other people are around, he ambles across to me, climbs up my leg and settles across my shoulders. He has five strong talons on each foot, so I have to be careful what I wear when I’m seeing him. The first time we visited Ellen and the boys in their new house, he did for a new silk shirt as well as leaving some choice scratches.
The performance was repeated when I went into the boys’ playroom, soon after we arrived at St Andrews that Friday evening; I’ll swear that as he secured himself on my old denim shirt he even rolled an appraising reptilian eye at Prim. After all, he played a significant role during the first night we ever spent under the same roof.
Ignoring his presence, and with Jonathan and Colin following, we wandered through to the kitchen where Ellie was preparing a meal. When I’d called her to ask if we could come, I’d told her we’d go out to eat, but she wouldn’t hear of it. Very few people are capable of throwing a chilling look down a telephone line, but my sister is.
‘You can take him with you, back to Glasgow, if you like, Oz,’ she said. ‘Didn’t you ever try to house train him?’
I felt my nephews’ eyes settle on me. They weren’t taking their mother’s threat seriously; they were used to the sparring between us and were waiting for my counter-punch. I raised an imperious eyebrow. ‘Of course. When he lived with me in the loft he used to climb up on the roof and crap in the guttering. Try leaving a window open.’
‘The insurance company would just love that. Ach, the truth is the old boy’s not that bad. Most of the time he goes outside to a corner of the garden, or he does it in his cage. I don’t give him the run of the house like you used to.’
I ruffled wee Colin’s hair. ‘What about these two?’ I asked. ‘You got them trained yet?’
‘In the bathroom department, yes. But in terms of general behaviour. .’ She pointed to Colin; it was enough to make his face redden. ‘That one there, he’s six now; you’d think he’d know better than to get himself locked in someone’s cellar.’