Peace Work by Spike Milligan Read Free Book Online Page A

Byzantine-Gothic shapes catching the light to give a hologram effect. Alas, the four colossal bronze horses that had once graced some Roman quadriga were missing – still in store from the war.
    Johnny Mulgrew joins us. “Hello,” he says in stark Glaswegian tones. “So you’re going to buy me a drink?” He tells us Hall is missing again. Are we going to stay on for the carnival? Yes. I order a couple of Cognacs. May as well start the festivities.
    “Here, wee Jock, drink this. It’s awfur gude,” I said in mock-Scottish tones. Silently, Mulgrew holds it up then downs it in one, licks his lips, looks at us and grins. It doesn’t take much to make a Scotsman happy.
∗
    The show over, we all make for the barge which has been stocked with drinks and food for the night. Our bargee has put little coloured bulbs in our awnings. There were ‘ooos and ahhhs’ as fireworks sprinkled the night sky. All the ferries and gondolas had coloured lanterns. In the Piazza San Marco, there was a municipal band and all the people in fancy dress, some quite fantastic with masks. Some waved handheld fizzers writing graffiti in the air. Gondoliers were outsinging each other, people waved and shouted from passing boats, rockets soar from the Isola di San Giorgio and it’s a starry night!
    We open the Asti Spumante and nibble fresh-cut sandwiches. It starts off quite civilized, but gradually the drunks start to manifest themselves. A gondola passes and tosses firecrackers into our boat. Screams and yells from us as they explode like miniature machine guns.
    “We should have brought some grenades,” says Bornheim.
    “You have anything like this in England?” says Toni to Bill Hall.
    “Oh yes, Blackpool,” he says.
    We had to stave off several British soldiers trying to board us from gondolas. “Hey, you want Jig-a-Jig?” seems to be their contribution to the gaiety.
    The trio plays for dancing. Swing, swing, swing, hot jazz, yeah Daddy! So I can dance with Toni, Bornheim relieves me on the accordion. I had never been relieved by an accordion before. Toni and I try to dance. It’s a crush, but what the hell. It’s nice just holding her. But now the drunks take over. Sergeant Chalky White thinks we need ‘livening up’: he is balancing a glass of beer on his forehead (Where had I seen this all before?) and doing a Russian dance. Why, oh, why, is it always the most untalented that think they are entertaining? “Eyeties can’t fucking sing,” he says and makes us all sing ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’. A barge full of people in Venice and it’s ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’. Then ‘My Old Man Said Follow the Van’. Splash. Riccy Trowler has fallen in the water. We haul him out, he’s giggling.
    “He needs a towel.”
    “No, I don’t. I need a brandy.”
    Toni and I sit it all out at the back of the barge. By 3.00 a.m., Life as we know it on this planet is over. The barge draws to the landing stage and they all stagger on to the Charabong. Chalky White is still manic with energy. “Knocked ‘em in the Old Kent Road,” he sings. Why God? At the Leone Bianco I say goodnight to Toni. Soon I’m in bed. Safe at last! No, with stifled laughter some low-life bastard is trying to fart through the keyhole. Yes, dear reader, FART THROUGH THE KEYHOLE.
    I have a hangover. Someone has put a Lipton’s tea chest in my head and the corners are expanding. I get up, someone is revolving the Lipton’s tea chest. I look in the mirror, I am suffering a severe attack of face. My red eyes resemble sunset in Arabia; my tongue is a Van Gogh yellow, I have to push it back in by hand.
    Bornheim enters. “Someone’s made a cock-up.”
    “Then dismantle it. Here comes the Mother Superior,” I say.
    The hotel in Trieste is full, so we are to move to Mestre just up the road. Someone is chopping up the Lipton’s tea chest.
    “What’s up?” says Bornheim.
    “My head.”
    “Yes, I know it’s your head.”
    “What time is the Charabong