squires

I think I could do with a squire - not that I could afford one. I don't like the idea of having a servant but a squire might be a sort of apprentice, who could undertake helpful tasks while viewing me with respect.

The chef occasionally undertakes the sort of tasks I might entrust to a squire. For instance, she helps me zip up my jacket. (If I'm ever rich, I'm going to buy a fencing jacket with a zip at the side.) Sometimes she holds my sword bag while I get onto my bike. But I'm afraid that, as she admitted at the pub after fencing, she doesn't view me with the respect I'd get from a squire. For instance, she watches me get on my bike with fencing kit for the entertainment value.

While I lack a proper squire, there are plenty of people who help along the way. For instance, there's the cobbler. At the chef's suggestion, I took my sword bag, which had an awkward hole just the size of a foil-blade, to the local cobbler. I don't think he'd ever been asked to mend a sword bag before but he assessed the task, worked out what would be required, asked for £3.95 and gave me a receipt for the bag. When I returned two days later, he didn't demand the receipt - for some reason he remembered me. He'd fixed the bag with a neat leather patch which reinforces the whole bottom of the bag.

Another helper came to the rescue at fencing. This time it wasn't me who required help but the newish left-handed foilist (and occasional eppeeist). When I entered the women's changing rooms I found her searching for a lost earring - a special one that had been a 21st birthday present. Apparently she'd taken both off carefully before putting them carefully in a plastic bag - only to discover that the bag had a hole in the bottom. One earring was safe but the other had vanished. Together we searched everywhere - even a rubbish bin - and came to the conclusion that there was only one place left: inside the grille of the radiator behind the bench. The chef joined us as we headed to the reception to ask for help. A young man accompanied us back to the women's changing room. He assessed the problem and realised that the radiator would have to be dismantled - then told us to continue fencing while he looked. He came into the hall half an hour later with the missing earring in his hand. I noticed that he'd cut himself dismantling and reassembling the grille. He was blushing - I think with pride in his achievement but he may also have been embarrassed by the time spent in the women's changing room.

Either the cobbler of the dismantler of radiators would make an excellent squire. They have such useful skills. I think the chef would prefer to recruit her hairdresser who is called George and, in her view, "lovely." He certainly did an excellent job of cutting her hair, though she worried that it wasn't staying straight and in place under her fencing mask. Apparently George is also expensive so perhaps he wouldn't want to be a squire, even though the chef is planning her move to Paris which would provide him with opportunities for travel and a new clientele. And I fear I don't have the fencing skills that a good squire might wish me to impart.

Lately, I have not been fencing well. I like to blame tiredness, since I've been short of sleep. But I fear there are other causes: an insistent ache in my right shoulder and the continuing problem of policeman's foot. And then there's ageing. Perhaps I can't ever expect to get any better, which is a sad thought. Sometimes I wonder if I'll continue fencing after the summer. I'd like to continue, I think - but am I good enough to go on?

fencing foil - and starting sabre

"You're not going to wear those earrings," a fellow epeeist objected, "- not for fencing."

I had to admit they were unsuitable. "They've been admired," I explained. "I'll just wear them for the warm up."

"I like your earrings," said one of the coaches, and chuckled.

"But do they glow in the dark?" I asked my fellow epeeist.

She squinted helpfully, and concentrated on my left ear. "Not really," she said. "Perhaps if you left them under a strong light for hours ..."

But I'd kept them in my bag till evening. Only when night fell did I slip the pieces of wire into my ear-lobes. Two pale, articulated, plastic skeletons danced lightly as my head moved. The trick-or-treaters liked them ... at least, they said they did while I was doling out the loot. But I had to admit that long, dangling earring wouldn't go well with a fencing mask. After footwork, I slipped them back into my back and replaced them with grey, sparkly studs.

There were only three epeeists: two women and a man. We fenced each other in turns. The man's bladework was faster and more accurate than ever. He'd been off ill for a few weeks - I'm sure he spends periods of illness in bed, epee in hand, honing his accuracy. It's hard to score hits on an opponent with such deadly bladework. I managed one or two hits, and a handful of doubles.

Things were more even when I fenced the other woman. We could have gone on fencing one another for ages, but she suggested a break, then foil. We settled on steam foil and a coach agreed to ref - perhaps for a rest from our demands that he take us through the Academy gold medal syllabus. I'd quite like a gold medal, It would go well with my black winter coat. My foil level 4 fabric badge wouldn't work so well.

I was briefly ahead and even thought I was in with a chance. But after my opponent pulled ahead, my successful hits became less frequent. I think the final score was 15-8.

In the conversation afterwards, the coach reminded us about the club championship and repeated how few women would enter. I've got it in my diary but I'm not convinced it's a good idea - all that struggle and early waking at a weekend, just to come last. But I jokingly suggested we could both do sabre and insist on the title "woman master-at-arms." (I bet they'd make it mistress-at-arms").

Nobody had taught me sabre before, though I once picked up a weapon for a dare. We did the movernent quarte, quinte and tierce and then practised the hit to the head, followed by the hit to the cheekbone. I enjoyed it enough to remind myself "Epee is best." "Sabre-kir is expensive," and, most deadly of all, "Sabre - weapon of the Peterloo Massacre."

I'm still an epeeist, if rather short of opponents.


Incidentally, do you know any stories involving a fencer and a baker. There's a baker in Cyrano de Bergerac and a fencer pushed to suicide by contact with a baker in a Schnitzler short atory. How many are there - and is the baker ever the hero?

Three-hit epee

The one-hit epee contest has become something of a club tradition. Towards the end of every term, all the epeeists present – and any other fencer they can recruit – fence one another for a seasonal prize, donated by the club president. This time it was a bottle of cava, which he had selected as a suitable summer wine. The mention of summer brought groans although some of us, thinking back over the past few weeks, could recall a day when it hadn’t rained.

The rules of one-hit epee are simple. Every fencer fences every other fencer. The bout stops after the first hit so scoring simply registers V for victory or D for defeat. A double counts as a double defeat.

There were nine of us: seven who fence epee reasonably regularly, a 17-year-old sabreur who had done some epee, and a fencer who had joined the beginners in September and had never fenced epee before. A little was into the contest, we found we had the youngest ref in the business – a boy aged about 9 who took it all very seriously, watched us with care and filled in the score-sheet with great deliberation. He was a rather small and quiet ref but I feel he will soon acquire an air of authority.

One-hit epee makes me feel uneasy. Even in a bout to 5 there’s a chance to get a sense of your opponent and how he’s fencing. (I say ‘he’ because I was, yet again, the only woman competing at epee. The occasional epeeists among the women wanted to fence foil last night.) In a one-hit contest there’s no chance to pause and analyse – you just have to take your chance while watching your opponent.

I began badly. My concentration wasn’t good. Walking to the piste for my first bout, I was sure I’d forgotten something but I couldn’t work out what it was. I did a quick check: mask, hairband, protective plasters on the ears, breeches, plastron, jacket, bodywire. I was just connecting the wire when I realised what was missing – I’d left my epee at the other side of the hall. Not a good start, and my level of concentration didn’t improve much during the swift opening bout.

In my second bout I was beaten by the novice – the one person I’d thought I might beat. I began to worry that I’d score no hits – at least last time I did better than that. Then I was up against the young sabreur. It was some time since I’d fenced him and that was at foil. He’s fenced for longer than me. However, his sabreur’s stance laid him open to hits and he was evidently trying to remind himself of the target area. One hit to me – it wasn’t going to be a blank sheet.

A couple of other fencers dealt with me quickly. Meanwhile, the new fencer was scoring some wins while the sabreur left the piste assuming he’d lost again, only to discover that he’d won with a neat but unintended hit to the hand.

Then I found myself against someone who’d begun fencing when I did. He’s taken part in a couple of competitions at epee and also coaches fencing, so I didn’t have much hope. However, as a coach, he has said encouraging things to me in the past so I decided to take them seriously. He attacked first – and missed. Instinctively I’d responded by extending my arm and he walked onto my blade. A win to me – and an opponent cursing himself for the failed attack.

My final bout was against the ref’s dad – a far more experienced fencer. My previous opponent urged me on. “I beat him and you beat me – of course you can do it. He likes fancy fencing – go straight into the attack and hit him straight away.”

I took the advice. My first attack failed and left me to parry a counter-attack. I couldn’t mess around trying to fence well. I didn’t even aim for the arm but pushed forward as fiercely as I could. A chest-hit shouldn’t have won against a better fencer but it did.

I’d scored 3 hits out of a possible 8. This put me in joint 6^th place, beating two fencers. Meanwhile the novice had achieved an unexpected 3^rd place. One of the regular epeeists took him off for some coaching. A few minutes later I watched the novice hitting the wrist with apparent ease time after time. He's shorter most epeeists but I think the weapon has just got a new recruit.

I got to fence the novice again when he was tired – he’s not used to a heavy sword. And I ended by beating the sabreur again – 5-3, I think. He had a convenient tendency to pause after each parried attack, as though to establish right of way – and his sabreur’s stance continued to lay him open. Of course, if he were to switch to epee he’d soon learn to avoid such faults. But for the moment, there’s something very satisfying in beating a sabreur.

If I ever fight a duel, I want the choice of weapons.

P.S. The winner of the one-hit epee was the rather good young fencer who I beat so surprisingly a couple of weeks ago. It went to a final elimination bout in which he scored a neat wrist-hit on the club president, who'd donated the prize. Many of the usual contenders lost out through double defeats. And I'm beginning to think there's something to be said for one-hit epee.

earlobe protection

In the end, I decided on plasters.

I’ve never tried to fix plasters to my ears before. I had two boxes of plasters: the “family assortment” and the “extreme sports” variety.

My daughter thought “extreme sports” might be what I needed. The picture on the pack showed a man in shorts climbing a sheer rock face in mountain scenery. I think he may have had a plaster on his knee. Perhaps he was being pursued by bears as well. He wouldn’t want to leave a trail of blood in the wilderness.

Fencing didn’t seem quite as extreme as mountaineering and rock-climbing. I wasn’t sure that my ear-lobes were going to suffer extreme pressure. One of my fellow fencers suggested that the real danger lay in putting the mask on and off, though a hit to the mask could also cause problems.

That led me to the “family assortment”. It sounded like those tins of biscuits you get at Christmas. They are supposed to cater for everybody’s taste. There’s usually a general scrum for the ones with chocolate and jam. Then the custard creams and bourbons go. And finally, for a week or so, everyone contemplates the miserable shortcakes, coconut rings and Nice biscuits, hoping someone else will do the decent thing and put them out of their misery.

It will be like that with the plasters. Most are the shape and size you need for a small cut. They'll be used fast enough. The plasters for blisters will go rapidly. We'll move on to the slightly bigger plasters. In the end two big plasters, large enough to cover an entire knee, will remain. I’ll wonder whether to keep them for big emergencies or cut them down to size. I'll dither, buy another family assortment ... and another. Finally I'll have enough unwanted plasters to cover the bathroom walls, should I develop a strange taste in interior decor.

There were no plasters conveniently labelled: “earlobe protection: for fencers with newly pierced ears.”

By the time I’d twisted the plasters over my ears, I looked like an elf from Lord of the Rings whose ears had been put on upside down.

“Why did you do it?” a fellow epeeist asked. “I couldn’t be bothered with the time and trouble.”

Of course, when I explained my piratical ambitions, she fully understood. “But I thought pirates only wore one earring.” This seemed a distinct possibility but set up a further problem. Was the earring worn on the same side as the parrot?

Apart from fussing with earlobes, I did manage some fencing: against a taller man, a shorter woman, and a very skilful left-hander. While I didn’t shine and lacked the clear focus I’d had last week, I still managed a fair number of hits to accompany the very clumsy misses, though tiredness made me slower than usual.

My earrings and earlobes survived.

Help! I've been stabbed in the ears

My daughter won.

Last week she and her boyfriend (the sabreur) celebrated the end of exams and 6th form college by each getting one ear pierced. The piercings are quite high up - "through cartilege",my daughter said, proud of her ability to bear the pain - and they plan to wear matching ear-cuffs, or something of the kind.

When she returned, after the initial "ow! does it hurt? - my baby's got a hole in her ear" reaction, I remarked that perhaps I'd get my ears pierced too.

I think it was meant to be a frivolous, throw-away remark. For heaven's sake - I'm 52, which is a bit late to embark on a life of glamour and beauty treatments. But my daughter thinks I'm her mission in life (when she's not concerned with acting, her boyfriend, her friends, her busy social life, writing, computer gaming ...). She decided to take me in hand.

It was all slightly alarming. For a start, the professional young lady who pierced my ears - and did her best to check I hadn't been bullied into it - used a gun, not a sword. She gave me lots of warnings about what to do if my earlobes became infected or the stud got trapped inside the pierced lobe. (I was turning pale by then.) My daughter smiled in a way that was supposed to be encouraging.

I raised the crucial questions. What would happen when I put on a fencing mask? Would the ear/stud/piercing be at risk if I took a particularly hard hit to the mask? What should I do if a fencing injury caused problems with my newly-pierced ear-lobes? Strangely, the experienced piercers in the shop didn't seem familiar with this line of questioning.

My daughter suggested I ask my opponents not to hit me in the mask. I tried to explain why that wouldn't work but she seemed to think earrings more important than epee. Then she suggested plasters over the earrings - I think friends with newly-pierced ears used plaster in ballet displays and exams. The piercers thought plaster might work but said I must be careful for six weeks.

I decided to risk it.

My daughter stood by, grinning manically.

The first shot hurt but the second wasn't so bad. Suddenly I had holes in my ear-lobes and sparkly, dark blue studs.

The pierced ears will help in my piratical (post-retirement) career. I've found a place nearby where I can learn to sail too, when I have time, money and a boat. There's a colony of parrots in Richmond Park. Perhaps I could trap one to train on my next visit to London.

But I'm still uncertain about the fencing mask and how (if) to protect my ear-lobes and studs for the next few weeks. Any ideas? I don't want to lose this significant pirate accessory before my career begins.