High society by Ben Elton Read Free Book Online Page B

Christmas, that is. Commander Barry fucking Eeman deserves what he gets.’
    ‘Yes, and he needs to get it soon.’
    ‘Exactly. Did you see that article he posted on the internet? ‘The only coppers who are making progress in the drugs war are the bent ones.’’
    That’s going to fill the public with confidence, I must say.’
    ‘Problem is, he can prove it. He’s been digging very deep. He knows what goes on. It’s like Countryman all over again. And he’s feeding everything to that MP mate of his. Our fucking business is getting discussed in Parliament!’
    ‘Paget? He’s a nonentity, a backbencher. Who’ll listen to him?’
    ‘Well, it was always going to be a nobody, wasn’t it? No one with a snowball’s chance of getting into power is ever going to say what Peter Paget’s been saying, but anyway, Paget ain’t the issue. Nobody is going to get drugs legalized in a million years. Our pensions are assured in that area, no sweat. Leman is the issue, because he’s putting the spotlight on us. He needs to be told in no uncertain terms to mind his own fucking business.’

ST HILDA’S CHURCH HALL, SOHO
    I can’t remember the last time I were knocked back when I tried to pull a bird, but Lulu was ever so nice about it. She said she was very flattered and all that but she’d just had her hair done, besides which she reckoned that once she got them leather trousers off she’d never get ‘em on again. So we had a laugh about it and I told her she was a top bird and she told me I was a right naughty young man so everyone was ‘appy.
    ‘Still, it was a knockback and I must say I did feel a bit of a twat when she turned round and buggered off as fast as she could back behind Elton’s picket fence. I suppose it should have been a wake up call, but when you’ve had a shedful of booze, about twenty noses full of charlie and a whole tab of E and all you’ve eaten is three Hard Rock chips nicked off a passing plate, you ain’t very receptive to reality checks.
    ‘So there I am, staggering around the backstage hospitality area trying to chill and looking for someone to pull, when suddenly the paps are all over me because they’ve realized that I’m looking pissed-up and lairy, and Emily, my betrothed, is nowhere to be seen. The press is supposed to be controlled backstage at the Brits, you know, stick to the music and no snapping the bird stars in their knickers (although most of them bird stars only wear knickers these days). There’s supposed to be rules and journalistic integrity and all that. However, if the UK’s number-one recording artist who is supposed to be happily engaged to a lord’s daughter tries to pull Lulu in full public view, word gets around sharpish, so I was fookin’ inundated. ‘What’s happened to Emily, Tommy?’ they were all shouting. So I says, ‘I dropped her, the engagement’s off!’ Well, that was it. Bang! They went crazy. Guaranteed Brits front page and I hadn’t even been trying. Whatever poor sod won best newcomer that year was not going to make it into the papers, because once more I was the story of the Brits. ‘Why’d you do it, Tommy?’ they shouted. ‘Because I didn’t like her voice,’ I said. ‘It were grating on me nerves, and anyway I’ve gone off tattooed birds.’
    ‘Eventually my people managed to drag me back to me dressing room, but I still hadn’t pulled and, like I say, coke and E just give me the horn like I don’t know what. It doesn’t strike everyone that way, but at the end of the day that’s how it is for me. It’s all about metabolism or whatever. I was gagging for it, I can tell you, shouting, ‘I need a bird! Get me a bird!’ but we were trapped in my dressing room with hacks six deep outside.
    ‘Well, you won’t believe this, but it’s true, I swear it’s fookin’ true. One of the A and R blokes has his girlfriend with him and he says that I can shag her if I like! I’m not lying!
    ‘He sort of grinned knowingly and