Silver-tipped cane, brown leather shoes, corduroy trousers, linen jacket, fine woollen v-neck, flannel shirt, Old School tie – all of it slightly worn, though worn with grace: Jono walks onto the stage.
The stage was the Petit Socco square in Tangier, and Jono was walking right down into it with the easy air of the bon viveur.
I watched him over the next few days from the Tingis Café, and not long after, found him sitting in the sun at a table next to me at the Cinéma Rif, just up the road in the Grand Socco square.
” I’m Jono, delighted to meet you. I do love this place, don’t you ? “
I liked the affable intimacy of his ‘don’t you? ‘ question, and his English public school vowels, warm voice. He was about 60, blue-eyed, with fine graying hair combed back off his good-natured face. He was tall and fit-looking ( effortlessly so, not in a personal-trainer-at-the-gym way ), and as he talked, he used his hands with leisurely, elegant gestures. His nails were well manicured, and he wore a signet ring on his left pinkie, which he twisted every so often during conversation.
He felt to me like a contented, amenable creature, who wore ‘the world as a loose garment’ (to quote St Francis), and meeting him was exactly the kind of experience I had come to Tangier for.
Out There & In Here 