Although the sample may seem unscientific, I have established a link between dry martinis and longevity. There was a wonderful old fellow called Roland Shaw, who lived to be nearer 90 than 80, and lived is the word. Even given the age of the vehicle, the mileage was prodigious. More than six-and-a-half feet tall, like a piece of Stonehenge with legs, Roland had lapidary features and a basso profundo voice. He would have made an excellent Commendatore, except that he would have won the sword fight. Roland was not only an oil man; he was the Nestor of the oil business, there when the first donkey nodded. He had a damn good war as a US Navy pilot — and he mixed a damn good martini.
‘Dry martinis are like women’s breasts,’ he would say. ‘One is too few. Three are too many. Two: just right.’ We would have a couple and go off to lunch at Buck’s, with no risk of eating on an empty stomach.
I rarely drink dry martinis, but if you ever feel that the blood alcohol level is dangerously low, there is no better remedy. They are easy to make. Choose a strong gin good enough to enjoy on its own, or with a little water. Pour it piping cold from the freezer. Then economise. Add a tiny, virginal meniscus of Martini. Josie, who runs the best bar in London at the Travellers’ Club, uses a perfume spray to ensure that the Martini never runs amok. If you run out of Martini, just whisper the name and pretend that it is there. Unless you have run out of Martini, do not think of using vodka. The tastes would clash — waste of good vodka. Leave all other ingredients to Hollywood.
There was a splendid old girl called Nancy Westminster, Duke Bendor’s last Duchess, who was famous for owning steeplechasers which she named after mountains on the Westminsters’ appanage in Sutherland. Although the peaks are not high by international standards, they tower over the landscape, helmeted in God-haunted mist. This is the Olympus or Mount Fuji of Scotland, the home of hairy, tweedy Gods enjoying a dram among their crags and fastnesses while appraising the mortals’ latest efforts at fishing or stalking. Arkle was Nancy’s most famous horse; Foinavon, the most notorious, though she had given it away before it won the pile-up Grand National. It was a brute which savaged stable boys and anything else within range. With a less sentimental owner — horses were Nancy’s sole outlet for sentiment — Foinavon would have been running in the dog-food stakes.
On the river or the hill, the hunting field or the racecourse, Nancy was a consummate sportswoman. Once, on her way to open a fete, she realised, first, that she was in danger of arriving early and, second, that the water level on the Laxford, which had been in spate, was falling. Fishing conditions were perfect. As ever, she had a rod on the car roof, but otherwise, no waders: only wellies. In a trice, she was into the wellies, into a cast and into a fish. The salmon was not going quietly. Nancy was becoming perilously horizontal. Fortunately, the AA man drove past and saw what needed to be done. He stopped, ran down to the river and held the Duchess’s skirt to give her further leeway. The skirt rode up, not that Nancy cared. But the AA man tried to assuage her non-existent embarrassment. ‘Dinna worry, yer Grace: I’m a married man.’
Nancy enjoyed a mean martini and she regarded strength as a fault on the right side. If the drink fought back like a vigorous fresh fish, she did not mind adding water. But anyone whose martini required reinforcement from the gin bottle would not be asked to mix again. She bred and owned great horses. She caught vast numbers of fish. She killed over a thousand stags. She lived to be over 90, and until the very end, she terrorised her younger relations. At the very least, martinis did her no harm.
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