Service not included!

Dear George,

...The rain falls softly in a fine mist on the street outside, making no sound. But there is nevertheless sound aplenty; the cries of the whores and the fruit sellers in the market square beneath my window outside this filth ridden hotel, the scrabbling of rats within the walls and the crashing of opium junkies in the rooms around me. The sounds rise up, as if hell were bursting through the pavement below, but I listen in between these sounds. In this hot dark room I strain for one particular noise, I listen for his footfall. I Listen now for his familiar tread, knowing that at first hearing I will have scant seconds to flee.

I catch my reflection in cracked excuse for a mirror in the corner of the room. I barely recognise the sleep deprived mess I see staring back. My eyes are sunk and dark, like dry wells empty of life, empty of soul. The lank dark hair on my head, slick with sweat, is shoulder length now. With the brown trickle of water emanating from the rusted tap I try in vain to wash out the weeks of decaying food and dirt from my matted facial hair. I lie back on the faecal stained mattress and breath slow shallow breathes through my mouth so as not to make a sound. I fix my eyes on the light creeping under the double locked door and contemplate my life before all this. Why had things come to this and why had I chosen to stay in this Travelodge. It all happened like this.

When one dines out as frequently as I used to, in the heady days when I was the film editor for the Radio Times back home in England, there was one deeply irritating recurrence that one often encountered. It was called 'splitting the bill'.

What invariably happened was that I'd be dining out with a large group of people in some pricy restaurant and, being a man of modest stature, all I'd have to eat would be a glass of water and a small omelet while the other people in my group would all but inhale a whole roast swan each. At the end of the meal one of the gluttons would shout

'Hey, let's not bicker about who's eaten what, let's just split the bill equally between us!'

So i'd end up paying a hundred and forty pounds for a small mineral water and an egg.

Almost a year ago now, on that fateful evening, I was with a large party of acquaintances at a fashionable Italian eatery. My dainty appetite being the way it is I merely sipped a glass of wheatgrass juice and nibbled on an organic mixed leaf salad.

The rest of the group scoffed plate after plate of rich meats and sweet cakes and guzzled down gallon upon gallon of fine wines. When the bill came it was astronomical and, as usual, it was suggested that we split the bill equally.

Well I was buggered if I was going to pay a fortune for my petite portion, so I decided to do something which I had not done since my mis-spent youth, I decided to 'do a runner' i.e. to leg it out of the restaurant without paying the bill.

Unfortunately as I was racing towards the door I was spotted by a waiter called Marco, who chased after me crying,

'Hey, fatty, you no-a pay-a de bill!'

I got outside and flung myself onto a passing bus, Marco flagged down a taxi and ordered it to follow.

At Kings Cross station I leapt off the bus and fought my way through the throngs of commuters and managed to buy the last ticket to Paris on the Euro star. Marco, fumbling with his Oyster card, missed the train by seconds. Instead he made his way to Victoria station via the Piccadilly line where he caught the Gatwick express and made it on board a late flight to Le Bourget Airport. I know this to be true because as I stumbled bleary-eyed through the early morning hum of Parisian air, Marco pounced from behind a pillar while I sprinted across the Gare du Nord concourse. He was yelling,

'You no-a pay-a de bill, Mister!'

I side-stepped, smacked him across the face with a baguette and ran.

In a scabrous absinthe bar in the depths of Montparnasse I signed on as chief entertainment officer of a tar blackened tramp steamer laden with a cargo of Jeffery Archer novels and Hello Kitty ear muffs, bound for Tangiers. All went well until the third night the look-out spotted a high powered Yamaha FX jet ski racing through a cloud of spume towards us. Crouched over the roaring twin engines was Marco, muttering over and over to himself

'Service not included mister, service is not included!'

In a panic I abandoned my possessions and dived overboard and swam towards the coast of North Africa.

In Cairo he nearly had me and again in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe. Luckily, my years spent as a senior member of the East Dulwich Amateur dramatics society paid off and my wily disguises allowed me to travel incognito and kept me one step ahead Marco.

While in Marrakesh I spent 10 days riding the rail roads hidden inside a frozen lasagne. Bouncing along on the mid morning Marrakesh Express through the bright red desert, while goats fled the rattling approach of my carriage, I dared to believe that I was finally safe, that I could return home and piece together the fragments of a life I use to own. Sadly, I had misjudged Marco's tenacity. I peeled apart the layers of pasta to chance a glimpse at my surroundings, but no sooner had I wiped the bolognese from my eyes, I saw him. He'd been tailing the train all morning and was now driving along side in a Nissan Micra, his pristine white apron flapping in the breeze.

'Why you no-a pay-a de bill, mister?' he called out.

With the words echoing in my ears I scrambled forth from my hiding place, sending cutlery and condiments scattering across the laps of the surprised looking young couple who had ordered the lasagne.

Into Asia we chased. In a small mountain state high up in the oxygen starved Hindu Kush I managed to convince the populace that I was a god by skilful use of a prophecy made long ago in their religion which stated 'And lo there will come a man, who has the ability to obtain discount during sale time at a leading high street store'. One wave of my House of Frasier charge card and I was made king for life. At once I put out a contract on my determined pursuer. Unfortunately the contract I took out was a catering contract, so Marco, twice a week got a spread of sandwiches, mixed salad and a selection of French fancies. When he inevitably turned up I had him thrown into the deepest dungeon.

Weeks pass. As I set about teaching my subjects about modern civilization, like what a Sponge Bob was and why one should never put a letter from the Inland Revenue away in a drawer, Marco, the cunning swine, conspired with leaders of a Kurdish minority to stage a coup. I fled at once, just as the howling mob beat down the gates of my palace.

Now, I am in this filthy bug-ridden hotel in the sleaziest part of Caracas. I stagger around in my malnourished delirium listening for each footfall, each tread on the carpet, knowing that it will soon be him and again I will have to …