Liver: A Fictional Organ With a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes

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Val Carmichael credited Pete Stenning — who was always called ‘the Martian’ — with getting him off the gin and on to the vodka.

‘Clever cunt, the Martian,’ Val said to the assembled members, who were grouped at the bar of the Plantation Club in their allotted positions. Left to right: Val on a stool by the till, Scotty Henderson (‘the Dog’) on the one next to him, Dan Gillespie (‘the Poof ’) on the one after that — a tricky position, since, if the Poof tipped back, which he often did, he would be struck by the door if someone happened to come in.

In the second row were Bernie Jobs (‘the Cunt’) and Neil Bolton (‘the Extra’). While the other nicknames were mostly referential, as in, ‘Poof bin in?’, Bolton was called ‘the Extra’ to his rubbery-handsome face. He was a leading British character actor, and Val, who had known Bolton the longest, had issued one of his draconian decrees, to the effect that, having prostituted himself on the West End stage — and in a number of hugely successful Hollywood filmed musicals — the Extra was no longer entitled to any more familiar form of address. Bolton took this in good part.

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