My night with a murderer

My father met a murderer once; a carrot-topped former chorine called Ann Woodward, who gave her veddy veddy posh husband both barrels after discovering he intended to divorce her for someone more upper-class. She got off after her mother-in-law, Elsie, who preferred a killer in the family to a scandal, bought off the American cops. That was back in 1955, and Ann is now one of the subjects of the new Ryan Murphy FX series, Feud: Capote v the Swans.

These days, murderers generally get what they deserve, which is a relief to me, as not so long ago I had one in my bedroom. My homicidal maniac, though I was ignorant of his proclivities at the time, was a neighbour called Sandip (Sam) Patel. Short, wiry and with cobalt eyes, he was a dead ringer for Sajid Javid, albeit with a complexion that seemed drenched in unguents. I had always found his relationship with self-control a tenuous one; Patel’s, that is.

Nonetheless, I had agreed to put on the nose bag with him and his girlfriend. At the restaurant, a French eaterie in St John’s Wood, whose customers possess unerring snobbisme, they rowed like the blazes. He then exited after ordering a £90 bottle of wine and creating such a scene over its price that the owner turned puce. I was even more aghast when his girlfriend mincingly begged to repair chez Wyatt and offended my pathetically bourgeois sensibilities by trying to call her dealer. I had always wondered why her face had such a moronic look. She was a moron, or damn near.

After allowing her to borrow a pair of my pyjamas, which she never returned, I ejected her from the house before slumping into bed, relieved that the nightmarish evening was over.