Lucius the Club | Page 6

fit, and I wasn't.
I was born, you see, with a condition known as talipes equinovarum - or a club foot, in common parlance. Same thing that Lord Byron had. And, as if that was not enough, there was probably an injury inflicted during birth, which resulted in damage to the muscles and nerves on the left side of my face. This meant that I tended to dribble a bit - especially when I got tired.
Mama never trusted doctors, and when I was a child she refused to let them operate on me. But later, when I was forty, I had some reconstructive work done on my foot, and a similar operation on my face, which stopped the worst of the dribbling. But when I was of school age both of these were a problem.
The club foot meant that I walked with a distinct limp. And it was Jack who insisted that I should use a stick, although it wasn't actually essential.
'A stick will mark you out, Lucius,' he said. 'Give you a bit of distinction. If you have to be a cripple, be a cripple with style.'
There was no political correctness in those days, you see. No talk of being 'handicapped' or 'disabled'. You were just crippled. So Jack got me a stick with a silver top. Quite a handy weapon actually, if push comes to shove. I've had a few different sticks, over the years, but they've all had silver tops.
Mama did her bit to overcome my disabilities too. When I was a boy she didn't hide me away, as if she was ashamed of me. Far from it. She took me everywhere - to theatres, film studios, parties, the lot. Wherever she went and whoever we met, she always introduced me.
'This is my son,' she would say. Proudly. 'My son Lucius. Lucius the Club we call him, because he has a club foot.'
That was very clever, you know. In retrospect. It meant that my condition was public knowledge - almost a mark of distinction. And so everyone knew me - including every doorman and head waiter in London.
Physically, I wasn't by any means an obvious shoo-in for any public school. On the other hand, I was really rather bright academically, which did quite a lot to recommend me.
By whatever means, possibly a little blackmail on Jack's part, I was allowed to enter Follington.
It wasn't until I got there that I found out where the name Lucius came from. I was named, it seems, after one of the mythical kings of Britain. I once asked Mama if she chose the name for that reason. 'Oh yes,' she said, 'of course. I made enquiries.'
Follington was quite a sporty school, and the standard game in that first Michaelmas term, five afternoons a week, was rugger. I couldn't do that, so they sent me to the gym instead. For remedial exercises with the PT instructor - a Sergeant Mansfield.
Mansfield was about five feet nothing; ex-Army man; short tempered. The boys were slightly frightened of him. He got me to walk up and down for him, with and without the stick, bending, turning, and so forth. Eventually he decided that there was nothing wrong with me above the waist, so he got me doing work with weights. Before long I was the strongest boy in my year, and within a couple of years I was the strongest boy in the school.
On three days a week, in the early evening, boys had the option of doing boxing or gymnastics in their spare time. Comparatively few volunteered for either, but Mansfield decided that I would box.
I thought this was a ridiculous idea at first, but his theory was that you didn't need to be able to move particularly fast in the ring. Not, at any rate, at schoolboy level. Well, he was partly right, and it was partly bullshit, but the long and the short of it was, he got me to box. And of the five or six boys in my year who also chose to box in their spare time, I was always the champion. Largely because I was strong.
Mansfield even got me representing the school. The first time I fought a boy from somewhere else, their coach turned a funny colour when he saw me. He came over and had a few pointed words. I couldn't hear all of it, but 'spastic bloody cripple' was one phrase which drifted my way. Anyway, the fight went on, and I won, which made me a hero.
I didn't always win against other schools, of course. In fact I lost more often than not. But as I took the train home from The Farm, after testing out Grandad's sawn-off shotgun, I thought about getting into the boxing ring as a schoolboy; and fighting boys who were