Harold has been a bit of a drain on my inner strength recently, so my doctor advised me to go somewhere quiet for a complete rest cure. Paris seemed the obvious place. Dusting off my best La Perla lingerie, I packed a small case and climbed aboard the Eurostar.
After an afternoon spent soaking up the peace and quiet of Galeries Lafayette, I met up with some old friends from my Folies Bergère days. Dolores Entwhistle is very well-preserved for her age, it’s amazing what a little detachment from reality can do for the complexion. It appears that she takes the expression “international relations” rather literally, as she has had a succession of escorts in recent years who hail from the developing world. Strangely enough, she is constantly disappointed to discover that her latest Denzil Washington lookalike is not the UN Secretary-General or an Ambassador or even a French footballer, but a postman if she’s lucky, or even worse a student with an entire village to support which he is rather hoping Dolores will help him with. I’m all for giving to charity, but I do prefer to do it once a year and with a discreet cheque that won’t restrict my retail activity. Eye-candy is all very well, but diamonds are a gel’s best arm-candy, and failing that, a good stash in the bank.
Chartier (9 rue du Faubourg Montmartre) seemed like a good place for dinner, as everyone knew where it was – or thought they did. It turned out the metro station Rue Montmartre has been re-named Grands Boulevards, and there was a queue a mile long which Vi Hornblower and I had no option but to get in.
Thank God for mobile phones – Dolores texted from her taxi to say that she was on her way with Hattie Mildew-Spliff and “Orinoco” Flo McCluskey, two old hoofers we used to work with. Once at the restaurant, we reminisced about the good old days treading the boards, and in my case, splintering them. Flo pulled out a faded photograph of one of our grand finales, oh how we laughed about how many more feathers we would need these days! (Of course Harold knows nothing about that short period in my life, and I’ll thank my readers to keep it that way) Chartier, by the way, is still nowhere nearer its first Michelin star, but at 20 euros a head including about a litre of wine each, and you can keep the menu, who cares?
We went for an after-dinner snifter at a nearby nightclub where the pulsating African rhythms emanating from the doorway had caught Dolores’ attention, and that was where the evening started to take on a surreal turn. As soon as we walked in I knew we were in trouble. I tried to steer us out again before Denzil IV (more like the one in Only Fools and Horses than the delicious Hollywood filmstar) hit Dolores’ line of vision, but alas it was too late. Her eyes locked on to him like a heat-seeking missile, and she followed a trajectory which led her to trample several other drinkers in her path before entwining herself around him like ivy. We tried to tempt her back with promises of Sex on the Beach, but she had found her magnetic north, and all we could do was try to keep her in our sights as she was swallowed up by the pulsating throng on the dancefloor. We gripped our handbags and looked at each other.
“There’s nothing else for it, girls,” said Flo. Hattie nodded grimly.
“Daphne, you remember the routine?”
I nodded firmly.
“Let’s go to work, ladies. Count us in, Hat.”
We linked arms and high-kicked our way onto the dancefloor like an eight-legged bowling ball, scattering dancers every which way. Flo and Hattie were using their handbags as daisycutters, and in formation we had the destructive power of a Sidewinder missile. The nightclub started to look like a Beryl Cook painting filmed by Quentin Tarantino. Patrons dived for cover under the tables, screaming about white mischief and third party insurance. We kept kicking until we located Dolores, whereupon we circled her and her partner in the old Tiller Girls hatband formation and started to rotate with increasing velocity. When we had reached the speed at which we looked like a blur, the resulting vortex lifted Dolores right out of the arms of her would-be next failed romance and deposited her in the back seat of a taxi which happened to be passing in the direction of her home. All that was left on the dance floor were a pair of white stilettos and a gibbering Congolese breakdancer. Betty Boothroyd would have been proud of us.
We left the nightclub in a dignified fashion, although not before Orinoco Flo had handed out cards offering to lift curses for an undisclosed sum of money. The Hellcat Matrix (as we are now known) are available for weddings, barmitzvahs and wars (just ones, of course), but we have vowed never to use our handbags in anger. Or in Africa for that matter.
May the Force be with you.
After an afternoon spent soaking up the peace and quiet of Galeries Lafayette, I met up with some old friends from my Folies Bergère days. Dolores Entwhistle is very well-preserved for her age, it’s amazing what a little detachment from reality can do for the complexion. It appears that she takes the expression “international relations” rather literally, as she has had a succession of escorts in recent years who hail from the developing world. Strangely enough, she is constantly disappointed to discover that her latest Denzil Washington lookalike is not the UN Secretary-General or an Ambassador or even a French footballer, but a postman if she’s lucky, or even worse a student with an entire village to support which he is rather hoping Dolores will help him with. I’m all for giving to charity, but I do prefer to do it once a year and with a discreet cheque that won’t restrict my retail activity. Eye-candy is all very well, but diamonds are a gel’s best arm-candy, and failing that, a good stash in the bank.
Chartier (9 rue du Faubourg Montmartre) seemed like a good place for dinner, as everyone knew where it was – or thought they did. It turned out the metro station Rue Montmartre has been re-named Grands Boulevards, and there was a queue a mile long which Vi Hornblower and I had no option but to get in.
Thank God for mobile phones – Dolores texted from her taxi to say that she was on her way with Hattie Mildew-Spliff and “Orinoco” Flo McCluskey, two old hoofers we used to work with. Once at the restaurant, we reminisced about the good old days treading the boards, and in my case, splintering them. Flo pulled out a faded photograph of one of our grand finales, oh how we laughed about how many more feathers we would need these days! (Of course Harold knows nothing about that short period in my life, and I’ll thank my readers to keep it that way) Chartier, by the way, is still nowhere nearer its first Michelin star, but at 20 euros a head including about a litre of wine each, and you can keep the menu, who cares?We went for an after-dinner snifter at a nearby nightclub where the pulsating African rhythms emanating from the doorway had caught Dolores’ attention, and that was where the evening started to take on a surreal turn. As soon as we walked in I knew we were in trouble. I tried to steer us out again before Denzil IV (more like the one in Only Fools and Horses than the delicious Hollywood filmstar) hit Dolores’ line of vision, but alas it was too late. Her eyes locked on to him like a heat-seeking missile, and she followed a trajectory which led her to trample several other drinkers in her path before entwining herself around him like ivy. We tried to tempt her back with promises of Sex on the Beach, but she had found her magnetic north, and all we could do was try to keep her in our sights as she was swallowed up by the pulsating throng on the dancefloor. We gripped our handbags and looked at each other.
“There’s nothing else for it, girls,” said Flo. Hattie nodded grimly.
“Daphne, you remember the routine?”
I nodded firmly.
“Let’s go to work, ladies. Count us in, Hat.”
We linked arms and high-kicked our way onto the dancefloor like an eight-legged bowling ball, scattering dancers every which way. Flo and Hattie were using their handbags as daisycutters, and in formation we had the destructive power of a Sidewinder missile. The nightclub started to look like a Beryl Cook painting filmed by Quentin Tarantino. Patrons dived for cover under the tables, screaming about white mischief and third party insurance. We kept kicking until we located Dolores, whereupon we circled her and her partner in the old Tiller Girls hatband formation and started to rotate with increasing velocity. When we had reached the speed at which we looked like a blur, the resulting vortex lifted Dolores right out of the arms of her would-be next failed romance and deposited her in the back seat of a taxi which happened to be passing in the direction of her home. All that was left on the dance floor were a pair of white stilettos and a gibbering Congolese breakdancer. Betty Boothroyd would have been proud of us.
We left the nightclub in a dignified fashion, although not before Orinoco Flo had handed out cards offering to lift curses for an undisclosed sum of money. The Hellcat Matrix (as we are now known) are available for weddings, barmitzvahs and wars (just ones, of course), but we have vowed never to use our handbags in anger. Or in Africa for that matter.
May the Force be with you.
