DEAR BEN,
Just a note to say thanks for the recent trip. I'd sworn I'd never go golfing with you again after you gave me the flying lesson in Florida. I really didn't have the faith in my arms that you seemed to have in yours - rightly as it turned out, because, if you remember, you urged me to jump first, and I did. You were still up there with that nicer young girl, Denise Whatsit? when the police arrived. The hotel sanitary engineers, as they call the binmen over there, only found me three days later, somewhat the worse for wear.
I forgive you Ben. I know you, had your own troubles at the time, though I would have appreciated it if you'd managed to remember that I'd gone off the sill first. Naked. There was a reason why I was naked, though I can't remember what it was. Maybe the sherbet. Odd thing that, a man of your age trying sherbet. Still it wasn't bad. But it would have been nice if you'd, remembered that I was down there with two broken legs, a shattered wrist and a prolapsed colon.
The Colon
Ben, the colon still isn't working all that well. Sometimes when I'm out on the ninth hole - you know the big open one, not a hedge or a tree, but just this vast expanse of links - my colon feels the need to express itself forcibly in the only way it knows how. That is not a pleasant sensation, Ben, and even less pleasant being found by the club captain attending to one's colonic needs between the eighth and the 10th holes. Let me be frank, Ben (and let you be Ben, Frank). I blame you for that. Do you want to know what humiliation is? It is being found by the club captain in such circumstances, the plaid trews around the ankles, balancing oneself with the nine iron firmly in the hand.
It was hardly less humiliating being found naked in the backyard of the hotel where you'd been giving me my flying lessons. Americans like money Ben, I expect you'd noticed that. Hospitals don't treat you unless you've got money, Ben. The humiliation of it - and I had to phone the Sister, reverse charge, to bail me out. She didn't like that one bit. How is it you have a sister who is so totally unlike you? Doesn't play golf, doesn't sniff sherbet, doesn't give flying lessons. And Ben, when she looks at you it's like being eyed up by Stalin just as he thinks it time to have a purge and you're the first item on the agenda. Whatever you do, don't let her get the goods on you, or we're all sunk - but sure you're too wily for that, aren't you?
Anyway, the Sister footed the bill, and she made me promise to be a good boy and never go on a golf outing with you again, and in my hospital bed, with all sorts of tubes sticking out of that and the other, I said yes. But then I got home and I found that lovely big extension you'd built on my house. Kitchen, sauna, new west wing. OK, no planning permission, but nobody's perfect - and I could swing that myself through our friend Yoo know whoo.
Have you squared him by the way? I am aware his duties probably prevented him going on all the golf trips you would have liked - but I'm sure he has more time on his hands these days. Maybe you could arrange another little outing for the gang of us?
Which brings me round to thanking you for the last little trip. I was most relieved to discover that you are no longer conducting flying lessons from the balcony of your hotel room. Even though it was above the swimming pool, from my own experience in these matters, I tend to miss swimming pools in the course of flying lessons and you tend not take off. So I was pleased to discover that your Bleriot days are over.
The Iceman
It was nice meeting the Ice man. He's a cool character all right - I liked the way he got his hands on the business. A cute one and no mistake. Wasn't too keen on the aftershave, though. I'd seen him driving around the place in the old, pre black Merc days, in a top of the range Beamer. I tend to steer clear of fellows with that class of a car. Always drive as if they've got to take Warsaw by breakfast, is he in the right party? Seems to me he belongs to the other crowd. You know the sort - winks as he shakes your hand and remembers your mother's maiden name and her corns and how he got her a medical card. That class of caper. Midnight comes and he's singing Boys of the Old Brigade and Kevin Barry til four, out of bed at six making phone calls and running his constituency clinic from nine til noon. I hope you've seen him right. Not the fellow to cross on a wet road at midnight, if you take my drift.
Anyway, it was a pleasure to meet him and the rest of the crowd. An enjoyable time was had by all, as they say - and imagine my surprise when I got back and found you'd added a swimming pool, a basketball court, a golf driving range, a stableyard, a heliport and three all weather tennis courts to my house while I was away. So kind of you. A nice touch were the three Danish girls in the pool. That's you. Ever thoughtful.
The sister?
There's something I should mention to you. The Sister. I'm not surprised she makes men weep. The way she looks at you. Only the other day she came to see me about you. Ben. Time to clean up the stables, she said. Ben, she put the heart across me, glaring at me. Then she started stamping the floor and swinging her gold nuggets at me. It was terrifying. I didn't say a word, Ben, not a blooming word, until she started to rattle her jewels threateningly. It was then, Ben, that I told her she was wasting her time going after you, because you'd seen yourself right, you'd got the best protection money could buy - king here, and king maker there. And I dared her to do her best.
Ben. It was a moment of pure triumph. Her eyes glittered in disappointment. She stopped stamping up and down. Even the gold chandelier around her neck stopped swinging. And she said something odd, Ben. She laughed out loud, and then yelled, "Bingo! Got him." Get you? Ha! As if anybody could. An odd woman, your sister.
Yours sincerely,