I’ve been called a rascal a few times in my life, but I remember two in particular. My mother called me that when I was young and she meant it in that endearing way the word is now generally used. It sits alongside scamp and mischievous and it’s a term of affection for someone you like who is perhaps a little bit naughty. Many years later I was called a rascal by a man who intended the word to carry its older meaning, a member of a ‘rabble’, a villain. So, there seems to be some agreement that I’m a rascal; but are they born or are they made? What I’ve written here is the tale of a rascal. I’ve tried to tell it honestly and I’ve avoided the temptation to leave out the unflattering and unsavoury bits. It’s a warts-and-all recounting of growing up in England during the aftermath of the Second World War, going to sea at a young age, jumping ship and stowing away to reach my personal Mecca at the other end of the world. I thrived there, married and had a family. I succeeded in a range of businesses both legitimate and illegal and lived a life that was well beyond the imagination of my family and peers back in England. I took enormous risks and participated in some dangerous and criminal activities. In the end I survived.
I live in England once again and have the luxury of looking back at the last seven decades, most of them spent in New Zealand, Australia and Asia. I remember with great affection all the characters that life threw across my path, the humour and the heartache, the thrills and the despair. And I’ve written them out as best I can in the hope I can honour the memory of the ones who’ve passed on and I record the great kindnesses that were shown to me, perhaps provide a cautionary note for any person thinking of making a career in the underworld and if I’m lucky, make a couple of retired policemen gnash their teeth in rage at chances missed. My editor says I remind him of the “Sixty-year-old smiling public man” in W.B. Yeats’ poem. I apparently remind him of the character who after a life of rage and lust and passionate existence is bemused to find himself an elderly, respected figure in his community. He may be right. Life is certainly a quieter affair these days, but I am thrilled to have survived and to be surrounded by my family, particularly my grandchildren and to be living in the little Home Counties town of Rickmansworth, where my father’s family settled in 1890 after living, working and dying as “Bargees” on the Grand Union Canal since around 1826.
Perhaps I should settle for retired rascal then. But my question remains: are they born or made? I’d like you come with me though this little tale and see what you decide. And as Yeats said, sometimes it’s hard to tell the dancer from the dance.