The Best Guitarist in the World & Other Tales of the Unexpected

By Peter Howard

Eight stories, eight themes, eight unexpected outcomes.

 

"... he strummed the battered old guitar, caring little that it was missing the D string – his talent was such that he could have made beautiful music if only one string remained." (The Best Guitarist in the World)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peter Howard
• Release date: Apr 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393295075

Peter Howard

Peter Howard is an alumnus of the Faber Academy "Writing a Novel" course. He lives in Hertfordshire and spends as much time as possible in his writing shed. Other books: The Miraculous Music of Clara Martinelli, a magical realism novel set in Nepal and England; The Certain Guilt of an Innocent Man, a political thriller set in West Africa and London. To find out more about Peter, to sign-up to his newsletter or order his books, please visit www.peterxhoward.com. You can connect with Peter on www.facebook.com/peterhowardauthor. He would be delighted if you sent him an email to [e-mail]

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Other Books by Peter Howard

The Miraculous Music of Clara Martinelli, a magical realism novel set in the Nepal and England; The Certain Guilt of an Innocent Man, a political thriller set in West Africa and London.

www.peterxhoward.com

www.facebook.com/peterhowardauthor

COVER DESIGN BY RALF DORRANCE-KING

The Best Guitarist in the World

Albert was depressed to discover that when he was ten years old his mother had paid other children to be his friend. He acquired this accidental knowledge while listening to the old women chatting in the warm, dry sunshine of a January day in the landlocked Argentine town of Santa Rosa, where even the dogs – mangy and jaundice-stained by the sand – stayed in deep shade for much of the day. On reflection, the discovery that he was an unpopular child did not surprise him. Who could blame his contemporaries for not wanting to associate with a glowering little runt whose digestive disorders fascinated medical researchers from Buenos Aires to London? Famed for his flatulence from an early age, the relief at the passing of this affliction was short-lived, for an alarmingly explosive form of suppurating acne followed it almost immediately. As he recalled these earlier conditions, he strummed the battered old guitar, caring little that it was missing the D string – his talent was such that he could have made beautiful music if only one string remained.

Now aged thirty, Albert’s pockmarked skin and sunken cheeks were evidence of his former complaints and hinted at his present illness. His black, greasy hair was badly cut and lay in clumps around his brow: this only added to the impression that his head was out of proportion to the rest of his body, and for all he knew it was. After all, he was always the shortest child in his class, and when he stopped growing at the age of fifteen he was only just over four feet tall. Although his mother insisted that appearances weren’t everything, Albert was convinced that being a dwarf was a serious disadvantage, and he resisted all entreaties to ‘smarten himself up’. Preferring to do the exact opposite, he presented himself as scruffy, filthy, and unshaven. His mother provided him with case studies of small, successful men, but he read their biographies with little enthusiasm. So what if Toulouse Lautrec was a distorted dwarf? It did not follow that all distorted dwarfs would turn into famous artists. The strength of his logic finally overwhelmed his mother, and she stopped pestering him. 

After enduring an encyclopaedia of diseases, it seemed grossly unfair that the thirty-year-old Albert should be visited by acute leukaemia, a terminal condition that required regular and intrusive treatment. The disease was diagnosed too late to expect the subject to live much more than a year. His long-suffering mother could no longer withstand the strain of her son’s illnesses, and on one hot and dusty Argentinean afternoon she let out the yell of a rabid dog and died on the spot, in the middle of the village square, surrounded by the chaos of a confirmation party for the mayor’s only daughter.

After four days the soul of the widow Albertina Cordoba was despatched to her God, and her fifty-five year old body was buried beneath a simple cross in the churchyard. During the days before the burial service the mayor’s wife, Anita Suarez, insisted on helping Albert to ‘smarten himself up’ as a mark of respect for his mother: the beautiful woman cut his hair, lanced and dressed his boils, shaved his rough chin, manicured his horny finger and toe nails, and scrubbed his hairy back with the stiffest brush she could find.

Albert had never been so clean, and when – on the eve of the funeral – Anita presented him with a fine, black linen suit, he burst into tears and begged her to leave her undeserving husband and run away with him. Distracted by the challenge of transforming the demeanour and appearance of her hapless subject, Anita had failed to notice that the proximity of her bare arms, and the transporting fragrance of musk that hung from her perfect neck like a rosary, had had a profound effect on the innocent Albert.

His previous sexual knowledge was confined to one event when he was in his early twenties: the unnerving sight of his parents making love on the kitchen table on the same afternoon that his English father left Argentina forever. Anita had the decency to refrain from laughing out loud at Albert’s proposal, and, with the pity she usually reserved for the children in the orphanage, she kissed Albert and promised that had she not made a solemn vow before God she would leave her handsome husband immediately. Satisfied with this admission of a shared passion tempered only by the strictures of scripture, Albert channelled his lust into a painstaking personal hygiene regime; from the day of his mother’s funeral it was difficult to find any man who was more fastidious about his appearance than Albert Cordoba. 

He sold his mother’s house and all its contents to Mayor Suarez, and used the proceeds to buy a second black linen suit – so he would always have a clean set of clothes – an elegant black trilby with a stylish crimson satin band, a new set of strings for his fine old guitar, and a one-way air ticket to London.

*

Albert arrived in Tuffnell Park on the first day of the winter term. He watched through the railings as his father welcomed the children, his voluminous black cloak swirling in the autumn breeze. When the last of the pupils had entered the Hall he strode across the yard with his arm extended, a genuine smile filling his broad face. He reached through the railings and took Albert’s hand.

‘Albert. Good to see you, son.’ The smile evaporated. ‘Why are you dressed in black?’

Albert watched the lines gradually gathering on his father’s forehead. It was five years since he had seen Henry, and the familiar sight of this slow frown put him at his ease. Albert told how his mother had died, and spoke of the kindness of the mayor and the sincerity of the simple church service. Albert’s composure surprised Henry, and he held on to his son’s hand, nodding as Albert told of selling the house and buying the air ticket.

Henry handed him the house keys. As Albert turned to walk away, his father called after him, ‘Son, things will be different this time – I promise.’ Albert stopped, half-turned, but did not look him in the eye.

Henry watched his smartly dressed son turn the corner. There was something different about Albert’s bearing, and he dared to hope that it was the blossoming of a new self-confidence. Although there was little that could be done about the pockmarked complexion, one’s overall impression was of a good-looking young man, and a great improvement on the scruffy 24-year-old Albert. Henry resolved to treat him with greater respect this time: he grimaced when he recalled how unsympathetic he had been when Albert was younger, and he blushed at earlier memories of his attempts to prove that Albert was not his son. 

Almost a quarter of a century had passed since Albertina informed him that he was the father of a sickly five-year old boy. She only contacted her estranged lover because the medical bills were beyond her means and she feared for the boy’s future. Driven more by curiosity than by an abiding sense of duty, Henry returned to Argentina to inspect the infant and pronounce that it was a certainty that he was not the father of such a pathetic specimen of the human race. Henry was tall, with a