Queen Camilla (7 page)

Violet turned the radio down and said, ‘’Ave you took some painkillers?’

The Queen nodded.

‘Only I’ve got some good ’uns that the doctor gave me for my back. I had to cut down on ’em, they turned me into a zombie.’

‘At the moment,’ said the Queen, ‘I find the thought
of being a zombie rather attractive, but I need my wits about me today.’

Violet reached for the telephone and pressed the speed-dial button for her granddaughter, Chantelle, who was at work at the Frank Bruno House nursing home. ‘Chan? It’s Grandma. You know that woman what takes teeth out…? You do know somebody what takes teeth out. She’s married to… works at Walkers Crisps. The one with the funny leg… you do know him. His sister always sings the
Titanic
song on karaoke night at the One-Stop Centre. Yes, Sheila. Right, you know Sheila’s daughter, don’t you?… Can you ring her and ask her for her aunty’s number, the one what takes the teeth out?… Good girl. I’m here with the Queen.’

On the radio, a woman with a high-pitched voice was saying that she intended to vote Conservative for the first time in her life, because she wanted to see the Queen back on the throne. The Queen sighed, and clapped her hand over her jaw. Her tongue seemed to have a life of its own. Despite the pain, it kept finding and prodding the wobbly tooth. She wished it would stop.

After Chantelle had rung back, Violet went upstairs to get ready. The Queen fed Micky a few sauce-smeared crusts that Violet had left on her plate. Micky was in a benign mood and allowed the Queen to stroke his coarse ginger hair. The Queen said, ‘Have you ever had toothache, Micky? Have you, boy? It’s frightful.’

Micky growled, ‘I’ve had toothache for the past three years. Why do you think I keep losing my temper?’

The Queen looked into the dog’s eyes and saw that Micky was entirely sympathetic to her plight. Harris and Susan started barking in the street, and Micky ran through the house and hurled himself at the front door. From upstairs, Violet screamed at him to be quiet, and Barry Toby’s heavy tread was heard on the stairs. Barry’s solicitor habitually described him to the courts as a ‘gentle giant’ with a ‘heart of gold’. Neither of these statements was true. He was tall, and he did have a ladylike demeanour, but his heart was a violent, suspicious organ that had lost him wives, children and jobs.

‘Shut the fuck up!’ roared Barry, to the furiously barking Micky. Barry then nodded to the Queen and said, ‘All right?’

Barry was not much of a conversationalist. The Queen was glad when Violet tottered down the stairs in high heels, with her hair brushed and her face painted. After ordering Barry to behave himself, the Queen and Violet left the house.

Dwayne stood at the entrance to Hell Close. It was the first day he’d been allowed out on patrol without a senior officer. He’d been ordered to carry out spot checks to ensure that the residents were carrying their identity cards. It was impossible to check everyone, so he worked out a system: this morning he’d stop men with beards, anybody with black hair, and old ladies.

After working the last three days in the operations centre, he knew that every move he made was being captured on a screen, so he couldn’t let anybody off if
they didn’t have their ID card with them. When he saw the Queen and Violet Toby approaching, followed by Harris, Susan and Micky, his legs went weak; he was in awe of the Queen.

‘Good morning,’ he said. ‘Could I trouble you ladies for a perusal of your ID cards?’

Why was he talking like an old fart? he thought. How could the wearing of a uniform affect the way he spoke?

Violet said, ‘This is the third bleedin’ time I’ve been stopped this week. Why am I being victimized?’ She took her card out of her coat pocket and flashed it in front of Dwayne.

The Queen was searching frantically in the compartments of her bag. ‘I don’t seem to have it with me,’ she said with panic in her voice.

Dwayne said, ‘I’m sorry, madam, but I have to see it.’

He glanced around at the CCTV cameras perched on top of tall metal poles and wondered if his colleagues at the station were watching and mocking him. Seeing that the Queen was uncharacteristically nervous, Violet had taken charge of looking for the card and was now methodically searching through the Queen’s coat, cardigan and trouser pockets.

The Queen said, ‘Oh, Harris, where did I put the wretched card?’

Harris growled. ‘
I haven’t had it
, don’t look at me.’

Susan yapped at the Queen, ‘I know where it is, it’s down the back of the sofa.’

Harris began pulling on the bottom of the Queen’s trousers; maddened by toothache and anxiety, she smacked him away.

Dwayne said, ‘I’ll give you twenty-four hours to produce it at the station.’ He took out his electronic notebook and, sticking to procedure, he said, ‘Name?’

‘You know ’oo she is,’ said Violet witheringly. ‘And I know ’oo you are an’ all. You’re Dwayne Lockhart. I remember you when you were a rag-arsed kid. Is your mam and dad still alive, or have they finally killed each other?’

Dwayne said, ‘Me dad’s dead, but Mam’s still going strong.’ Then, because he was an honest man, he added, ‘Well, as strong as a woman with heart disease, cirrhosis of the liver and bipolar disorder can be.

‘So, what name do you go by nowadays?’ said Dwayne to the Queen. He knew from the history books that the Royal Family changed their names and religion to suit their circumstances.

‘My name is Elizabeth Windsor,’ said the Queen. ‘My registration number is 195311, my tag number is 19531187.’ She lifted her trouser leg to the knee and exposed the metal tag.

Dwayne sent them on their way by saying, ‘You may resume your perambulations, ladies.’

This caused hilarity back at the station. Inspector Lancer said, ‘I shall have to remember that, “You may resume your perambulations, ladies.”’

Constable Peter Penny said, ‘I’d of just told ’em to fuck off.’

Inspector Lancer said, ‘It’s all them bleedin’ books he reads. He knows too many words.’

As they got nearer Hawthorn Street, where the pliers woman lived, the Queen grew more anxious. Harris
and Susan fell silent and pricked up their ears, trying to work out the exact location of Magic, the Dobermann pinscher whose territory they were entering.

Standing in the unkempt front garden of the pliers woman’s house was a bitch of such rackety beauty that Harris, an infamous philanderer and connoisseur of bitch loveliness, stopped to gape. She was Britney; she had inherited her father’s long legs and blonde coat and her mother’s exquisite face and dark long-lashed eyes.

Susan ran up to Britney and sniffed her bum. When she ran back to Harris, Susan reported, ‘She’s a slag, Harris. Keep away from her.’

But Harris was mesmerized. ‘How do you do?’ he growled. ‘I’m Harris, the Queen’s dog.’

Britney lay down, displaying her elegant limbs to their best advantage. ‘Am I bovvered?’ she said, tossing her blonde head. ‘Do I look like I’m bovvered?’ she yawned.

Susan yapped, ‘Harris! She’s had more dogs inside her than the show ring at Crufts!’

But it was too late. Harris lay down beside Britney and began his seduction routine.

A mildly obese teenage girl showed the Queen and Violet into a front room, where to their surprise they joined other people who were sitting around the edges of the room on white plastic garden chairs. Piles of ancient celebrity magazines were stacked on a coffee table. The television in the corner was showing the wedding of the Prime Minister’s daughter. The cameras swept around the flower-filled interior of Westminister Abbey, picking out famous faces in the seated congregation.
‘Jimmy Savile,’ said Violet. ‘I thought he was dead.’

‘If he’s not, he deserves to be,’ said the Queen irritably. She had not expected that she would have to wait. After all, it was not as if the pliers woman had a qualification in dentistry. When screams were heard from the next room, the teenage girl came in and turned the volume up on the television. The deep vibrato of the Westminster Abbey organ rattled the pliers woman’s sash windows.

Violet Toby said, ‘Look, Liz, the Prime Minister’s scraping his foot on the steps. He looks like ’e’s stepped in dog muck.’

After an hour of agonized waiting for the Queen, the teenage girl came to collect her, saying, ‘Mam’ll see you now.’

The Queen was shown into the steamy kitchen where a pan was boiling on the stove, watched by a plump woman dressed in Lycra leggings and a white tee shirt, on which was printed the slogan ‘NO PAIN, NO GAIN’ across the front.

‘Won’t be a minute,’ said the pliers woman. ‘Only I ’ave to sterilize between patients, I’m dead careful like that.’

A cigarette burned in an ashtray on the draining board. Every now and then the pliers woman picked up the cigarette and sucked on it as though she was drawing nourishment from it. ‘Sit down and take the weight off your legs,’ she said, dropping cigarette ash into the pan. The Queen hesitated. It was not too late to apologize for wasting the pliers woman’s time, and
leave before her consultation began, but she simply could not face another sleepless night. So she sat at the kitchen table and looked at the row of small metal implements laid out on a clean white towel. She recognized some of them: a crochet hook, eyebrow tweezers and a darning needle. A bottle of vodka stood on a tray with a glass next to it.

‘I know your daughter-in-law, Camilla,’ said the pliers woman, who believed in putting her patients at ease with small talk.

‘Oh, really,’ said the Queen, who was possibly the world’s leading expert on inconsequential chat.

‘Yeah. She goes down the One-Stop Centre on Thursdays, karaoke night. She’s a mate of that big gob, Beverley Threadgold. Camilla’s all right, though.’

‘Does Camilla sing?’ asked the Queen, who knew very little about nightlife on the estate.

‘Yeah, she does. Gloria Gayner, “I Will Survive”. She ain’t bad, but it don’t sound the same in a posh voice. Right, let’s get started.’

She put on a pair of Marigold gloves and, using barbecue tongs, grabbed the pliers out of the boiling water. While they cooled she examined the Queen’s mouth.

‘Yeah, you got a nasty back molar there. I’ll soon ’ave that out, it’s as wobbly as Pavarotti’s arse.’

After asking the Queen ‘to keep dead still’, she yanked on the tooth with the pliers. The Queen felt a violent pain, which subsided almost immediately.

The pliers woman dropped the tooth into a paper tissue and said, ‘That bleeder’s better out than in.’

After swilling her mouth out with vodka and spitting into the sink, the Queen said, ‘How much do I owe you?’

The pliers woman said, ‘Just give us a couple of quid towards the vodka.’

Before she left the kitchen the Queen said, ‘I’m terribly grateful.’

The pliers woman said, ‘Perhaps you’ll remember me when you’re back in the palace.’

The Queen could not imagine the extraordinary circumstances that would compel her to call on the services of the pliers woman again, but she said, ‘I most certainly will.’ Thinking to herself, if the honours system is restored I will recommend the pliers woman gets an OBE, for services to the community.

It should have been the wedding of the year. The guest list was an impressive mix of British society. There was Sir David Frost, Jordan, Cliff Richard, Nancy del’Olio, Frank Bruno, Simon Cowell, Elton John, Peter Mandelson, Sharon and Ozzy Osbourne, Chris Evans, Charlotte Church, Kate Moss, Steve Redgrave, Ben Elton, Carol Thatcher and numerous foreign dignitaries and heads of state. Jeremy Paxman had declined, claiming he had an important fishing match to attend.

Sonia was marrying a public relations executive. There were gratifyingly large crowds outside the Abbey when Jack arrived with her in the open-topped golden coach that Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, had used many years before. There were some in the crowd of onlookers who thought that this was rather
excessive for a proclaimed Republican, and a few brave souls protested. There were shouts of ‘You’ve sold out, Barker’ and a madwoman shouted ‘Golden coaches for cockroaches!’ But the police moved in and dragged the dissidents away, citing the new Disrespect to Those in Public Office Law.

The day was suffused with autumnal sunshine and Sonia looked spectacularly beautiful in her white, strapless, satin dress with the long shimmering train. When Jack stepped out of the carriage, he trod straight into a mound of dog muck that had just been deposited by a sniffer dog with an upset stomach. The dog was Mercury from the Metropolitan Police Bomb Squad. His handler was Sergeant Andrew Crane. (An investigation by the
News of the World
later found that Sergeant Crane had been transferred to the Falkland Islands. Despite an intensive search, Mercury was never traced. Now and again, on a ‘slow news day’ one of the tabloids will raise the question: What happened to Mercury?)

Jack managed to push Sonia away from the mess on the otherwise immaculately clean red carpet, but his own right shoe was covered in the stinking muck. There was a gasp from the crowd, then a ripple of laughter.

From inside the Abbey came the sound of the organ playing the ‘Arrival of the Queen of Sheba’. Jack had no other option but to walk on, up the steps. He hoped there would be an opportunity to clean his shoes before he escorted Sonia down the aisle. But no such opportunity arose.

The smell intensified under the television lights, as Jack and Sonia processed down the aisle. When they
passed Cliff Richard, Jack saw the singer wrinkle his nose in disgust. He glanced behind and saw that he had trailed dog muck up the red carpet and that the bridesmaids holding Sonia’s train were inadvertently spreading more of the nightmare substance on their white-ribboned ballet shoes.

When they reached the altar, the groom and the best man covered their noses. Jack watched the Archbishop of Canterbury as he struggled with ecclesiastical duty versus human revulsion. Nothing showed on the cleric’s face, but when Jack looked down he saw that the Archbishop was wearing open-toed sandals and that he was curling his toes back in an effort to protect them from the pollution. He heard his first wife crying behind him.