Life Behind Bars (6 page)

His drinking followed a pattern
and it was fairly easy to work out what to do.  No way could he continue
as head chef and by now two of my other chefs had improved under his tutelage,
beyond all expectations.

So we had Robert on a week to
week basis.  Everyone was instructed to watch him like a hawk and this
actually worked for about six months.  Until one night he just disappeared
into the evening mist and I never saw him alive again. He and his wife had
indulged in one too many drinking sessions and Robert actually died in his
sleep.

He lay undiscovered for three
days, despite the fact that Mrs. Robert was in the same room.

More chefs . . .

As I’ve said, chefs are a motley
crew.  Just look at Gordon Ramsay, his behaviour is anything but normal
and I have to say, if he’d ever worked alongside any of my guys, he would have
a few more battle scars.

Maybe it’s the heat, or the extreme
pressure they work under but even the most normal have some foible or
other.  Most are heavy drinkers and at best, binge-drinkers.

I was so fed up with the buggers
not turning up for work on a Sunday morning that I stopped paying them until
end of shift on a Sunday, and if they wanted an advance on their wages for a
couple of beers on a Saturday, the maximum was £20.  None of them could
get drunk on £20.

Gamblers are the best workers
when they are losing, and they lose most of the time.  They completely
spend up on their day off and have no money for the rest of their free time, no
hangovers and usually want as much overtime as possible.  The downside of
this is that if they do have the occasional win, they are off and running and
you don’t see them for days.

The Hitman and . . .

For a while my head chef and
second chef were a double act from Glasgow who wreaked havoc across the county
for months.  The head chef, William, was an excellent cook and could work
under pressure like no other chef I’ve ever come across.  We were a
terrifically busy restaurant but he was a serious menace, of the worst
kind.  A street fighter who was always bragging about his ‘connections.’ 
He was the second cousin, twice removed, of someone involved in the ‘Glasgow
Ice-Cream Wars.’  Personally I think he bought a 99 cone from one of their
vans and that was his only claim to fame.

He had been an amateur boxer in
his youth and had been destined for great things.  But no one had told him
that drink, drugs and women do not Olympic gold medals make.  He, like
many before him, had missed the boat and he had become just a surly thug with
an enormous chip on his shoulder.

After work he would strut about
the bar like an ugly little bantam cock.  I forgot to mention how ugly he
was, and yet women swarmed round him.  He was a seriously bad drunk and
was always on the lookout for his next victim.  His sidekick James was a
reasonable enough chef; nothing special but they worked well together, in and
out of the kitchen.

They always played the ‘I’ve got
you over a barrel’ game with me, and would frequently make jokes about how if
they left, the kitchen would close and we couldn’t dispense with their
services.  And many other such enlightening quips.

The downfall for this pair was
that they never gave anyone else credit for being able to add two plus
two.  Actually, I wasn’t sure if they could master such advanced
maths.  It was time to divide and separate. 

William had decided he was having
an extra holiday between Christmas and New Year.  It probably would have
been fine, if only he had run it past me.  But such was his ego he was
convinced on his return he would spin ‘the stupid cow,’ (me) a line and all
would be well.  However, this stupid cow had been planting a few seeds and
had managed to get chef number two on my side.  He was furious that
William had taken off and had left him with the brunt of the work with not even
a by your leave.

That particular week is manic and
no one gets time off.  So to help ease the pressure, I pandered to James’
ego and gave him and the remaining chefs an extra bonus.  I also started
the rumour that William had been given the Christmas bonus to divide amongst
them and it looked like he had buggered off and spent it.  He hadn’t, but
who would they believe?  All this, to ensure that when he did show up he
would have no backup.  He was going, but not taking the whole brigade with
him.

On the 3
^rd
or 4
^th
of January, he strolled into the bar, having first made sure I had left for the
night, and proceeded to hold court; telling of his adventures.  His story
was that he had been abducted by a ‘Glasgow hit mob’ and driven, blindfold,
somewhere down south.  Apparently he owed them a favour and it had been
called in.  According to him you certainly didn’t argue with those guys.

As the story unfolded, we learned
that he had been given a gun and instructions (not sure if these were about the
firing mechanism,) but presumably about his victims.  It was three days
before they had returned and he was able to carry out his contract.

There actually
had
been a
terrible incident in London at the time and police really were appealing for
witnesses, and here we had the perpetrator sitting in the bar telling all and
sundry that he had done it, and how.  Now I don’t think I’ve come across
many hit men in my time, but even if I had, I wouldn’t expect them to advertise
their occupation.

There were at least a dozen
witnesses to his confession and we also had it taped on CCTV.  Given that
he was known to the police, it was hardly surprising that a few well-meaning citizens
who had suffered at this buffoon’s hands, reported to the boys in blue that the
culprit was in East Lothian.

The staff cottage was raided the
next morning and it was reported on the lunchtime news that a man was
‘assisting them with their enquiries.’   He obviously had nothing to
do with the crime, but he had two outstanding warrants for unpaid fines and an
overdue library book.  That was the last we saw of him.

James stayed with us for a few
weeks but without his protector took a quite few second prizes in encounters
with the locals, and he soon moved on to pastures new.

The Cider Man . . .

I always find it fascinating how
differently people appear to others.  Take the Cider Man for
example.  He was to us, an extremely well dressed, well groomed chap who
came into the bar most nights.  He always stood alone, never had any
inclination to join in bar room banter and steadfastly ignored any suggestion
he might want to enter into conversation, with either customer or barmaid.

He had two pints of super
strength cider and left.  This ritual continued for several years and it
was only when I took over another establishment that I saw another side to him.

Not once in all the years he had
visited the Tweedy, did I suspect that the cider he consumed with us was not
his only drink of the evening.  It turned out, that we were only one of
four or five hostelries he visited nightly, on his way home from work. 
His last port of call was our new home and he arrived at about 8pm each evening.

Previously we had regarded him as
well groomed; not by the time he’d finished his rounds.  Once thought of
as quiet and stand-offish, here we couldn’t shut him up.  After probably
eight pints of Dynamite he was certainly the life and soul of the party. 
I often wondered what his wife and family must have felt about his behaviour as
this was a nightly occurrence. 

He was a real high flyer in local
government, lived in a lovely house and had all the trappings of a decent
‘executive life,’ but eventually the wife left, taking their daughter.  He
lost his job and became more and more shabby.  The last I heard of him was
he was doing agency work and the house was on the market.  

But he still maintained the
façade that he only had two pints of cider.

The Three Marys . . .

Believe it or not, Big Mary and
Wee Mary were sisters.  Who said that parents had no imagination? 
Actually, they were stepsisters and were never apart.  When you saw one,
the other was only a mere footstep away.  I quickly figured out this
wasn’t because they adored one another, quite the opposite in fact; more to
make sure that the other sister didn’t get one iota, or crumb of anything more
than the other.

They had been thrown together
fairly young; the product of a second marriage, and from day one had competed
for everything.  The last biscuit, who had the bigger boiled egg, you’ve
had one drink more than me.  It was even rumoured that they had two 52” flat-screen TV’s in their sitting room so they could watch different channels at the same
time.  They say that truth is stranger than fiction and how strange is
this?  They were born on the same day; it was three years apart, but
still?

Big Mary was 5’2”, not exactly Amazonian
and Wee Mary was 5’ so if the big one was wearing trainers and the little one
was wearing heels, Big Mary was actually Little Mary and Little Mary became Big
Mary, confused?  You will be.  They didn’t dress exactly alike but as
near as damn it.  They usually managed to colour coordinate and were often
mistaken for twins.  They didn’t really look alike but the whole persona
gave that impression.  It was difficult to pinpoint their ages but they
looked to be in their late 30’s or early 40’s although that really is
guesswork.

The parents had long departed
this mortal coil and had left the house and all that went with it to ‘the
girls.’  Now, one wanted to sell up and move away but the other didn’t, so
there was a constant battle over ‘the hoose.’
 
At one time, I think
it was Wee Mary who rented her half out to four Polish workers in an effort to
force the situation.  But Big Mary was having none of it.  She was in
situ, so she, having increased the rent already agreed with Wee Mary, collected
it.  Wee Mary was out of pocket and out of the house, so that didn’t last
long.

I am sure they would have
continued this strange existence ad infinitum until George Clooney entered the
picture.  Actually it was a fifty year old, ex-priest called Michael, aka
‘My Boyfriend.’   It is difficult to imagine that this insignificant
weedy-looking chap could engender such passion in two such confirmed
spinsters.  But he did.

The competition was deadly
earnest now and it was
the
most absurd ménage a trois.  They seemed
to have worked out a kind of rota system which didn’t work because they were
both regulars in the same bar.  So when Michael was out with Big Mary,
Little Mary would just join them and pay for her own drinks, and when Little
Mary was the significant other, then Big Mary would do the same.   To
everyone but the threesome it was hysterical.

This situation went on for almost
a year with Michael getting thinner and thinner and paler and paler and looking
as if he was at death’s door.  I should imagine servicing that pair, in
all ways, would exhaust anyone and he wasn’t the most sturdy of chaps to begin
with.

Now, at this stage we’ve not met
‘Anybody’s Mary,’ or AM as she was affectionately known.  I am sure you
don’t need an explanation regarding her nickname.  AM was ‘Big Mary’ and
‘Little Mary’s’ cousin and she was some gal.  She had been married and
divorced at least three times, and had a string of paramours the length and
breadth of the country.

She had gone off to Turkey for a
week’s holiday with another of her benevolent pals the previous year, and as
was her wont, met someone and stayed.  It would seem this romance had run
its course and here she was back.   As big and as bold as ever.  

AM was as different to her two
cousins as chalk and cheese.  Within hours of being back she had charmed
everyone with her raucous tales and sexy banter and was already dancing on the
tables; a blatant exhibitionist.  The cousins were appalled and clinging
on to ‘My Boyfriend’ for dear life.  Michael, on the other hand, was mesmerised.  

‘Anybody’s Mary’ had arrived, bag
and baggage, and expected the cousins to accommodate her as they always
had.  It was the one thing about which they were united, their love and
envy of their feckless cousin.  But things were different now.  They
knew if they let her under their roof, “My Boyfriend” would be a thing of the
past but what could they do?

It took ten days, just ten
days.  They came home from work to find a note saying:  ‘Thanks,
we’ll call you when we get settled.’

We’ll?
 Who was the
other half of ‘
We’ll?’
   Of course it was the George Clooney
look-alike, aka ‘My Boyfriend.’ The pair had gone off to Benidorm to run a bar
owned by one of AM’S ex’s.   And by all accounts they are still
there, blissfully happy.

Big Mary and Wee Mary?  They
still hate each other but they hate her more!

The One Armed Bandit . . .

Every pub has at least one armed
bandit, aka the fruit machine or ‘the puggy’ but here in the Tweedy we had the
real thing.  We actually had a ‘one armed bandit’ called Sean.  Now
Sean was an idiot, the fact that he only had one arm is testament to
that.  He was born with both but managed to lose one somewhere along the
line.  There were so many tales as to how that happened; from a shark bite
to a paper cut that went septic, we’ll just agree he managed to lose one.

Prior to his loss, I believe he
was a fairly successful bank robber.  Successful in that he had avoided
capture and lived a fairly good life.  Things had changed.  Oh, he
still aspired to be a bank robber but when you have to ask your captors to open
the door for your getaway, it loses some of its threat.

Never one to be defeated, Sean
came up with more solutions to his problem than tongue can tell.  On
occasions when he was just short of money he would pull a pair of tights over
his face, walk into a building society or bank and demand money.