Open the Cage, Murphy! by Paul O'Grady

Author:Paul O'Grady [O'Grady, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9781448170050
Publisher: Transworld
Published: 2015-09-23T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 7

WE DIDN’T TAKE many holidays that weren’t working ones, mainly for financial reasons, but when we did it was usually close to home. Every January we either rented a house in the Outer Hebrides or took off for Brittany, regardless of the weather.

I wish I could summon up the same thrill of excitement that ran through me when I first caught sight of Mont Saint-Michel in the distance.

‘What the hell is that?’ I asked Murphy.

‘That, sunshine,’ he said, ‘is the Mont Saint-Michel and it’s where we’re staying tonight.’

Mont Saint-Michel is a small craggy island with a magnificent Benedictine abbey on the top. It’s a bit of a hike up a winding street full of cafés and shops selling a load of old tat, but when you get to the summit your thighs might be burning but you can see for miles and the abbey itself has a calming effect.

We stayed in the hotel and ate the famous omelettes served in La Mère Poulard restaurant and as it was the night of the full moon the tide rose to surround the island, temporarily cutting it off from the outside world. Magic.

Murphy and I went there many times and on one occasion Vera and Regina Fong joined us. Reg ended up getting his passport and wallet stolen from his room, the culprit hiding undiscovered behind the long bedroom curtains unbeknown to Reg, who had gone back to his room after dinner to ‘freshen up, daaarling’.

Realizing that he’d been robbed, he dashed into our room to rally the troops. On going to investigate we found the window open with a large set of muddy footprints on the carpet underneath and, bizarrely, a bar of chocolate placed neatly on his bed that certainly hadn’t been left by the chambermaid.

‘My God,’ Reg gasped dramatically, ‘he was in the room, daaarling, at the same time as me. I could’ve been attacked, murdered, raped.’

‘Attacked and murdered I’ll go with,’ Murphy said, crouching down to examine the footprints in the manner of Columbo. ‘But I don’t think you need to worry about rape, not while there are sheep in the fields.’

‘Cheeky bastard,’ Reg sniffed, fanning his face with a brochure. ‘And anyway, when you come to think of it, who’s to say the thief was a he, it might have been a she.’

‘Well, if it was then she had big feet,’ Murphy replied. ‘These prints are huge.’

‘So then, Miss Marple,’ Reg shouted, his voice no doubt echoing over the salt marshes, ‘we have a clue. We’re looking for a French woman with size sixteen feet running around fucking Normandy with my wallet and my passport. She’ll probably be on the boat to England as we speak.’

‘What are you going to do then, Regina?’ Vera asked, holding on to the headboard to steady himself after the amount of wine we’d consumed at dinner. ‘How are you going to get home without a passport?’

‘Oh my God,’ Regina screeched, ‘how am I indeed?’ Leaping off the bed, he stood motionless on the spot with one hand slapped on his forehead and the other on his hip.

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