‘What happened to your hair, Reg?’
‘I can’t afford to visit my barber.’ He was squatting on the path like a brooding toad while Hercules, his guinea-pig-sized Jack Russell, painstakingly emptied its tiny bowels. Reg looked fed up again: his big old face was wearing a seasick expression.
‘So a comb-over is the best option, is it?’
‘Yeah – otherwise it just hangs down on one side and I look like a Dutch maniac.’
‘You look like one of those anyway.’ I carried on trying to rouse him from his bad mood: ‘You look alright – not too bad. Makes you look cute and vulnerable. The seventies barnet restored still displays all the forgivable inadequacy and lack of virility it did back then.’
‘Indeed. I mean: what?’
‘Nothing . . . cheer up – it’s Christmas soon and – ‘
‘I’ve got one for you,’ he interrupted, standing up with a weary intake of breath, ‘what’s a hairdresser’s favourite Christmas carol?’
‘Go on, tell me.’
‘O Comb All Ye Faithful.’
‘Don’t ever tell that joke again, Reginald.’
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