Weather yesterday was hot and humid. Rain forecast for today.

I had a glorious walk in the woods with Aussie Sheila Friend, Gill. Before we set out,we headed to a great pub, The Deer Hut, near Liphook. Sat in the garden and ate better than usual salads. We reminisced about the ‘good old days’ and training to be lawyers in the 80s.

That got me thinking back to my days with Justin Codrai at Barlow, Lyde and Gilbert. My second trip to the United States later in 1990, was a grand tour: New York, Charleston (South Carolina), San Diego (California) and finally back to Chicago (Illinois). By now I’d been working for Justin for a while and had become accustomed to his unorthodox, brilliant way of practising the law. He was completely secure, so he readily gave his team plenty of exposure to clients. And he treated us like equals, albeit with different roles. He didn’t hide us in back rooms.

One of the clients involved in the two pieces of litigation we were working on was the Claims Manager for Sturge (the lead syndicate which had taken the biggest slice of the insurance risk), Charles, a handsome man a bit older than me.  He went to the same school as Geoff in Kent, Tonbridge. As Charles was besotted with his wife, Susie, still is, it was possible to be mates. I also became firm friends with Greg, the brilliant assistant for the American law firm in Chicago, Peterson & Ross, running the litigation there. I had met his delightful wife Mary Beth, on the first trip and we hit it off immediately. For my thirtieth birthday we met up in Rome!

Justin and I stayed at the Four Seasons in New York. I had never stayed in a 5 star hotel. I felt like Cinderella at the ball. We managed to have a cup of coffee at the Plaza, walk through Central Park and make it to the top of the Empire State Building where we had our photo taken with King Kong. In Charleston we were treated to Southern charm. We had drinks at the local partner’s colonial house down on the waterfront ‘Battery’, where the artillery assembled their guns in the Civil War. He was something out of Gone with the Wind, a veritable Rhett Butler. He told us about Hurricane Hugo the year before, hitting town with winds above 100mph. Despite opening all the windows to the house to prevent the them from imploding, the hurricane still managed to beat the hell out of the house.

Tom and Greg from Peterson & Ross joined us and together we flew to San Diego to interview the main client, the retired Sturge Underwriter, Ralph Rokeby Johnson (pronounced Rayf not Ralf). He had debunked from Britain to alleviate his arthritis. Charles flew in from London. Ralph was a formidable man. He was known for being sexist and ignoring female insurance brokers. For some reason he took a shine to me and called me Roo – as in Kangaroo. I was the centre of attention when we were not working.

Ralph’s house was extraordinary. It was Spanish on the outside to comply with local regulations, but he had flown over English craftsman to transform the interior into the equivalent of Buckingham Palace: gilding, plasterwork, oil paintings of ancestors, chandeliers, wood panelling and marble floors. We had a tour on the first day when we broke for lunch. When we finally made it to the rose garden, he motioned for me to sit in the middle and the other men flanked me, apart from Justin who took the photo for posterity. At a large dinner he hosted, including us lawyers, I turned over my solid silver cutlery to find small mice on the underside.  His nickname was mouse. Extraordinary!

Justin had located a very powerful speed boat and took Charles and me out in heavy, large swell when we were off duty. He reasoned that the only way to ride the waves was to go as fast as possible and skim over the top of the waves at full speed. Charles was calm. I was terrified! Charles told me to stand and to take hold of the top of the seats on either side and take the impact of the waves in my legs. I could barely walk the next day. 

When the torture was over, we made our way to refuel and there was a gin palace adjacent to us, draped with Baywatch babes in skimpy bikinis. I tried to brush my hair but it was matted. My legs and ankles were sunburnt and swollen. Charles couldn’t help but ask, “Are your ankles always that fat?” I don’t have the slimmest ankles, but they were twice the size of normal. Agony. I had not put on any sunscreen. I had turned back into Cinderella. The spell was broken.

No need for sunscreen today as it is much cooler after the heat spell. Tonight we have dinner with the tennis contingent from Hurlingham at Lizzie’s house in Fulham.