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CRISPIAN ST PETERS ON A WHIRL OF FORTUNE
Everybody, we thought, loves to have their fortune told. So let's take somebody to four fortune tellers to see what they have to say, about his future, we thought. A nice treat for one of our current faves. So, one day we took CRISPIAN ST PETERS ON A WHIRL OF FORTUNE.
Crispian wasn't all that happy about having his fortune told. "I've never been to one of these before," he said. "What if she tells me something I don't want to know?"
"Tuff," I said, and watched just in case he turned and fled. But, brave as a soldier, Crispian marched up the rickety staircase to keep his first appointment with his Fate.
It was with Madame Ve-Ara, a white haired old lady in Wardour Street who is known by just about everybody in the show business world.
When he re-emerged, Crispian looked knocked out!
"She's fantastic," he said. "Very impressive. D'you know, the first thing she said was 'Who is this man, a chubby little fellow with glasses who is working very hard for you?'
"That's my manager, Brian Nicolson (sic). Now how did she know that?" We don't know because Crispian didn't let on who he was to any of the clairvoyants he went to see. Most of them guessed his "job" anyway.
"She had a lamp burning and said the flame was burning bright for me. She said, 'You are going to be very, very successful and kept repeating, 'I don't want you to get married yet. You are going to get a lot of girls but don't fall for them.'
"She kept calling me 'My dear' and asked me who this blonde girl with blue eyes who is laughing at me was.
"I said it must be my manager's sister. She also told me I am going to be a millionaire with a lot of property and that I would have a yacht. "She said I will do a lot of travelling but I would never have an accident."
Crispian felt much better about having his fortune told after that and was almost looking forward to his second go, a Spanish lady with a double barrel name, Edmee, Lady Owen-McCall, near Marble Arch. (We'd been told she reads the soles of your feet so Crispian was very disappointed when she just took out a deck of cards!)
After he'd been in there more than an hour I was getting worried in case she'd changed him into a frog or something but he finally appeared looking as happy-as-Larry.
"She told me I am going to America and that I'll meet a Colonel or Major who is going to help me in my career. (Col. Parker, perhaps?)
"She said I am going to be very rich as well and said I should invest my money. She also told me not to fall in love straight away.
"She said some rich girl in America is going to fall desperately in love with me, then I'm going to get bored with her and she is going to start throwing things.
"She said I had to be very careful how I drive and that I would be very close to death in five or six years time."
This fortune teller told Crispian as soon as he walked through the door that he was born in April - and she's right.
But before he had time to dwell on that last bit of terrifying foresight, I whisked him off to our third stop, a thought reader called Mrs. Knowles in Marylebone High Street who had been recommended to us by the Dave Clark Five.
"She said straight away that she could see America," said Crispian, half-an-hour later. "And she asked me if I had stayed in the north of England, in Lancashire and I said "Yes, I've just been there with The Puppets a few weeks ago!"
"She could see all sorts of wonderful things happening to me. I am going to be very rich and would appear on television! But she said it is going to be very big in America, the biggest thing that has ever happened to me. My disc, You Are On My Mind (sic) is 70 over there and it has a bullet on it so if it goes really high we will go over there."
At our last port of call Crispian had to place his hands on a crystal ball before clairvoyant Tom Corbett could get going.
"He said straight away, 'You are a musician'," said Crispian, "and he told me I was going to do a lot of TV and radio work and that I would go to Australia, South Africa and America. He said that I am going to meet a helpful older man very soon. He also told me not to get involved in a court case over contracts and said - about my driving - to watch out for a bottleneck coming off a motorway. He said I was living on my nerves. Well I do worry, but not all that much. Apparently '66 and '67 are going to be the important years for me and he said that the initial R would come to mean a lot to me. The second woman said I would meet a person with the initials T or O and that W would mean a lot."
The thing that disappointed Crispian most about our fortune telling bonanza was the mystics surroundings.
"They were just like ordinary people's sitting rooms," he said. "I expected something much more dark and mysterious."
But otherwise he wasn't disappointed at all. Especially not with the America bit.
"Looks like we'll definitely go over there, doesn't it? All of them said so."
At the last place Crispian handed over the fee and was waiting for his 15s change.
"Oh I haven't any change," the fortune teller told him.
"OK" said Crispian, "Give me ten bob and have a drink."
"No, let's toss for the £1."
Crispian agreed - but he insisted on spinning the coin himself, and made sure it landed on the floor unaided.
The clairvoyant shouted "Tails!"
It was heads.
That's probably the best omen of the whole afternoon!
Heather Kirby 'Fab 208' 23/7/66
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