I phone Tony Morse that evening. H has gone back to bed, having toyed with the fish. Even a sprinkle of capers, his favourite garnish, didn’t do it for him. He pushed his plate aside and left the table without saying a word. Suddenly unsteady on his feet, he looked like an old man.
Tony tells me he’s watching Casablanca. He’s got to the misty bit at the airfield where Humphrey Bogart is telling Ingrid Bergman that she has to get in the waiting plane and leave him to face whatever follows.
‘I used to have a picture of that wonderful woman on my bedroom wall as a kid,’ he says. ‘Not many people know that.’
‘Ingrid Bergman?’
‘The same. The hat. The nose. Those lips. The hint of a tear. Just perfect.’
‘You never told your wife?’
‘Never. Not the first one, nor the second, nor the fragrant Helen. Confession was never my thing.’
‘Maybe you should have been more honest. It might have saved you a fortune.’
‘You’re right.’ The thought makes him laugh. ‘What are you after?’
I tell him about H. The bottom line, the way I phrase it, is brutal. He’s been in a bit of a state for a while. He’s not young any more and he’s at least a couple of stone overweight. Just now he’s developing all the symptoms of our Covid friend and Malo and I are debating what to do with him.
‘They call them hospitals,’ Tony murmurs. ‘Have done for a while. Lift the phone. Talk to someone.’
‘It’s not that simple.’ I explain about the video, about Fat Dave coughing his lungs out in the ICU. ‘There’s no way, Tony. If it comes to it, he’d prefer to die in that lovely flat of yours.’
‘You’re serious?’
‘Alas, yes.’
There’s a longish silence. In the background, I can hear the roar of aero engines and swelling music on the soundtrack as La Bergman makes her exit from Casablanca.
‘There might be something we can do.’ Tony is back. ‘But it’ll cost.’
‘How much?’
‘Lots, I’m afraid. Someone will need to take a good look at him. We’re probably talking consultant level. Then there’s round-the-clock nursing care. We’d have to go to an agency. These people are available but they’re not cheap. On top of that, there’s all the extras.’
‘Like?’
‘Oxygen, for starters. Assuming you’re right, we’ll need loads, and it could go on for weeks. Then there’s drugs, lots of them. To keep it neat and tidy, he’s effectively a private patient. It’s a seller’s market, my darling.’
‘Thousands?’
‘Probably more.’
‘Tens of thousands?’
‘At least.’
‘Hundreds of thousands?’
‘It’s possible. Solicitors always prepare for the worst. It’s part of the charm of the job. We need to be realistic here. I’m afraid it’s the old rule.’
‘Which is?’
‘No surprises.’
I find myself nodding. For some reason I hadn’t begun to wonder how much any of this might cost but, under the circumstances, I very much like ‘we’.
‘You might be up for this?’ I ask. ‘Lending a hand?’
‘I’ll certainly ask around.’
‘You know where to look? Who to talk to?’
‘In this town? Silly question.’ That laugh again, even softer. ‘You need to take care as well, my darling. Keep him in bed. Wear a mask. Splash the bleach around. Give the bugger a hard time.’
The bugger, I assume, is the virus. When I mention Fat Dave’s funeral, Tony says he plans to be there. He knows all about the fascists at the Crem, and he wouldn’t dream of crashing the party, but he’ll keep his distance and raise a solitary glass in the privacy of his car.
‘And you, my darling?’
It’s my turn to laugh. I’ve no intention of sharing Cynthia’s angst about Dave’s 6.57 Crew chums and I mutter something noncommittal about H not being up to it. Today is Wednesday. By Friday, anything may have happened.
‘Of course, my darling. Let’s talk tomorrow. In the meantime, I’ll make some calls.’ He breaks off again, then returns. ‘Remarkable. Truly remarkable. Pure class.’
‘What is?’
‘Ingrid Bergman. I’ve still got the photo, by the way. Black and white. Wonderful lighting. The planes of her face. Her cheekbones. Those lips, again, slightly parted. An old man’s fantasy, my darling. Sad, or what?’
Tony Morse, in the bleakest moments, has never failed to lift my spirits and now is no different. H is in bed. Malo is back in bad company on the PlayStation. I pour myself a hefty glass of Greco di Tufo from the fridge and settle at the table with yesterday’s copy of the Portsmouth News.
In a strange way, this city is beginning to grow on me. It’s rough at the edges, and far from pretty to look at, but the times I’ve ventured forth, visited a shop or two, eavesdropped on the odd conversation, tell me that the place has bred a very special kind of resilience. It’s an island community. It’s a bit cut-off, a bit claustrophobic. It seems to expect the worst, and I get the feeling it’s rarely disappointed, but for all its stoicism, it remains oddly upbeat.
It also has a long memory. The thirst for a fight evidently lies deep in the city’s DNA, and I get the feeling the Pompey tribes have been picking quarrels forever. Tim, my thespy friend, is very good on this. First, he says, Pompey’s finest went to sea and took on the Spanish, then the Dutch, and then the French. Trafalgar was a great moment, a really tasty ruck, then came two world wars and shoals of sneaky U-boats. The monument on the seafront, visible from this flat, tallies the thousands of lives lost, but even so the city has never abandoned its passion for lots of blood and lots of treasure.
Now, turning the page of yesterday’s News, I find myself reading about a fifty-three-year-old former UKIP candidate up in court. Back last year, Pompey were playing the hated Scummers in an FA Cup tie. Scummers is a word I’ve picked up from H. It means anyone born in Southampton. They arrived in some numbers at Fratton Park, and had the nerve to thrash Pompey 4-0. Afterwards, according to the News, there was a full-blown riot, two sets of supporters separated by hundreds of police, some of them on horseback. The Pompey fans couldn’t wait to get at the Scummers and give them a good kicking, but the police were in the way. Frustrated, our UKIP fan instead assaulted one of the horses. Not once, not twice, but three times. Now, months later, the judge has gravely warned him to prepare for a jail sentence.
I shake my head, and then recharge my glass. It’s a shame about the horse, but the story is richly comic. Did Mr UKIP look the beast in the eye? Did he challenge him? Ask him how hard he thought he was? And when he set about him, what did the poor horse make of it all? Pompey, I think. The gruff vigour of the place caught in a brief flurry of violence. I tear the piece out and put it to one side. If H and I are ever on speaking terms again, I suspect it might cheer him up.
Elsewhere in the paper there’s a whole page of lockdown recipes. Irn-Bru fruit loaf? Mega brownies to die for? Cadbury’s Creme Eggs shrouded in pavlova? This is a city that lives to eat exactly what it likes, and when it’s not battering the enemy, Pompey has a very sweet tooth. Hence, I assume, Malo’s amazement about all those seafront fatties.
I find him still locked in a battle of his own next door. With the last of the Greco di Tufo, I curl up in a corner of the sofa and watch a brothel sequence which is more graphic than I’d expected. Malo’s character goes for a black woman with improbable breasts, and he has the tact to back out of the action before it gets too raunchy.
‘Don’t mind me,’ I tell him. ‘She’ll probably eat you alive.’
Malo ignores the comment. He’s been speaking to Clemmie again and it appears that the news from the hospital is good. Mateo is breathing oxygen through a mask but so far the medics see no reason to put him on to a ventilator. His vital signs are beginning to perk up and Clemmie’s mum has been talking to him on Skype.
‘That matters,’ Malo says. ‘Once you’re on the ventilator, it’s fifty-fifty.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Half of them die.’
‘Christ.’
‘Exactly.’
I’m thinking about H, and I suspect Malo is, too. I tell him briefly about my conversation with Tony Morse, and to my slight surprise Malo immediately warms to the prospect of keeping his dad here in the flat.
‘Top idea,’ he says. ‘We’ll all muck in and Dad can boss us about. He’ll be better in no time. How many nurses, do you think?’
‘No idea. Two? Three? More?’
‘Brilliant. And do we get to choose?’
‘Choose? You mean some kind of audition?’
‘Of course. The Asians are the real lookers. There’ll be a couple of them, at least.’
I shake my head, and nod at the screen. Too much GTA has obviously rotted my son’s brain, and I’m about to launch into one of those mumsy lectures about the need to respect women when Malo lifts a finger.
‘Listen,’ he says. ‘Did you hear that?’
‘Hear what?’
He shakes his head, his finger still erect, and then – very faintly – I hear it, too. The muffled sound of a cough. From next door.