heard.
‘Well, yes. You know—just to get rid of a few aches and pains.’
‘You wantee normal or special massage?’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘A tenner,’ she replied in perfect English.
‘How much is a normal massage?’
‘A tenner.’
‘And what would I get for a normal massage?’
‘The same as a special massage only quicker.’
‘American Express?’
‘Balls!’
‘Okay then.’
‘I take it honourable gentleman would likee special?’
Sid expected Edward G. Robinson to walk in at any moment and the whole thing to develop into a Tong war.
‘I will leave you to get undressed,’ she went on. ‘If you would let me have the twenty qui … pounds, I will not embarrass you by remaining. Of course, if honourable gentleman pays twenty-five pounds, my beautiful younger, virgin sister helps me to makee you relax more in longer time.’
‘Twenty-five?’
‘Only if you wishee complete relaxation, but if master only desire … er … quickee … er … I alone am willing to accommodate.’
Sid said to himself, That fella going downstairs wasn’t drunk or exhausted. At twenty-five quid he was probably broke. However, after the win he had the cash to spare and the urge to spend it. ‘What’s your sister’s name?’ he asked.
‘Why.’
‘Well, I think for twenty-five quid I’d just like to …’
‘Her name is Why.’
‘Why?’
‘Yes, Why.’
‘Not Why Aye Sho Yu?’
‘All is arranged.’ She crossed herself. Sid looked slightly surprised at a Chinese Roman Catholic, but in Soho …?
‘Were you recommended?’ she asked demurely.
‘No, no, no. I would put myself down as a one-off.’
Miss Yu waddled over to a small gong on a pair of wedges. If she had any wish to commit suicide, she could have jumped off them. She hit the gong with an object that a book like Family Planning or Getting Married would have called a phallic symbol. What Miss Yu called it she kept to herself.
‘Please undress and lie on table,’ she said. She started to walk away from him, then turned round to add, ‘Face upwards.’ She smiled.
‘I thought Chinese people didn’t laugh.’
‘It all depends on who they are with, oh great one!’
She threw Sid what Carrie would have called a face flannel, with which to save himself any embarrassment. She then left the room, walking through a river in the willow pattern. Sid began to undress. Through a loud speaker, which was painted so as to blend in with the willow pattern, and rested on a Chinaman’s head, came a noise that made Sid almost jump out of his pants. It was very loud and sounded like what a Cockney would call in rhyming slang ‘a jam tart’. Then, as it settled down and the sound was lowered, it became some sort of Oriental music, although quite modern, it was to Sid’s mind Japanese. A Japanese group was singing songs like ‘The girl from Okayama’ and ‘Oh Yokahama, where the wind comes sweeping down the plain’.
Sid was now in his Y-fronts. The small towel Miss Yu had given him was laughable. He hoped there was a shower for later and also a bigger towel with which to dry himself. He kept on his Y-fronts and also his socks, as, although the white carpet looked clean, he was more than a tiny bit afraid of verrucas. He sat on the edge of the white, towelled mattress and swung his legs. It might make a good sketch, he mused. Lies, all lies, Sidney, and you know it. That’s true, he murmured back to himself. How about Carrie, you rotten sod? Have you no conscience? He smiled. Ah, he answered, conscience doesn’t stop you from doing it. It just stops you from enjoying it. He started to swing his legs from side to side. Does that mean to say if you don’t do it you’ll enjoy it? he asked himself. He was now on his back, cycling his legs in the air. That doesn’t make sense, he replied. He leaned forward to touch his toes. You see, he continued. He pulled his feet towards him like a footballer with cramp. What? He grimaced for the trainer to be sent on. Exactly.
A gong sounded and through the river of the willow pattern entered Why. She carried a tray on which were oils and perfumes. The thing that puzzled Sid was that earlier on she had left him via Bruce Lee and had now come back via the river. Did that mean that rooms 68, 70 and 71 had connecting doors? Had she gone through room 70 to get to 69? His mind went back to reading the advert outside. Next to him, he remembered, had stood the biggest negro he had ever seen in his life, big enough to make Mandingo look like a black Ronnie Corbett. He remembered also seeing another ad: ‘Madame La Rochelle, MBE. French taught the easy way. Guaranteed satisfaction. Room 70—third floor.’
Sid looked at Why. She did not look overworked. He noticed as she put down the tray that she had changed her dress. She was now wearing very little everywhere. She did not speak and, as she walked away from him, he looked at her lovely little firm, round bum and thought, I’ll never eat another hot cross bun again.
The gong sounded. Sid looked towards the river but nothing happened because Aye came through another door which was painted as a rice planter. As the door opened Sid thought he saw a pained expression on the face of the painted rice planter as the whole of his arse was moved from the rest of his body.
Aye was carrying a folder. Her outfit—well, with Why you could see through what she was wearing, and with Aye you could not see what she was wearing. To Sid twenty-five pounds was a lot of bunce, but at least they were working for it. Judith Chalmers would have difficulty in describing Aye’s costume—two pieces of elastoplast and a cork.
‘Why you no undressed?’ Aye asked Why.
‘Well, you see …’ Sid started to answer.
‘I was asking my sister, Why. Why you no undressed?’
‘Oh.’
Any moment Sid expected Aye to say, ‘Did white man arrive in big iron bird?’
‘Why? Please.’
Why went to the leg end of the high mattress, while Aye went to the other end, placed her hands on Sid’s shoulders and easily and professionally forced him down. Why grabbed his underpants and, with one deft movement, whipped them off, and his socks too, with such speed and dexterity that would have made a hospital nightnurse applaud and many a magician go home and practise. Sid’s first reaction was to reach for the towel, but that was by now in the same place as his underpants and socks, wherever they were. So, as he first thought, he felt like a chip.
Aye handed him the contents of the folder. ‘Please to take plenty good look at Chinese art,’ she said.
God,
