I sought her here, I sought her there. I sought June Malo everywhere. And sometimes I found her, too.
Not that I was in a position to arrange my wartime efforts so that they would take me to the town where she was appearing. But the law of averages saw to it that we did arrive occasionally in the same place at the same time, and one of the places where our paths crossed was in Nottingham just before the Christmas of 1944. There I learned that she was due to play Dandini in Cinderella at the Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham, with rehearsals beginning the following week. As ill-fortune would have it she developed the most appalling tonsillitis during her Nottingham stay, but although I commiserated I could do little to help since I was due to play in Edinburgh the following week. However, between rehearsals in Birmingham she received hospital treatment and was in adequate singing order for the opening night.
Noelle Gordon, now well known for her appearances on ITV's Crossroads, played Prince Charming and Billie Baker was Cinderella, with George Doonan as Buttons. It was a good panto, which was just as well since I saw it every weekend for the sixteen weeks of its run. There were three houses on Saturdays, the first being at 10.30 in the morning (what a time to play pantomime!) so the principals were more than ready to unwind after the last house - in the office of the manager Bill Dobson. When Billie's boy-friend, Dennis Bowen, was not in a London show he used to come up to Birmingham for the weekend and, to give the girls a break, we all took off to the Swan Hotel at Lichfield. June and I walked quite a bit and together we spent a good deal of time gazing through the windows of the antique shops that abounded in those parts. Although they were always closed on a Sunday I found them fascinating.
Finally I said to Billie: 'What do you think would happen if I proposed to June?'
To which she sensibly replied, 'Why don't you ask her?'
So I did - well almost. What actually happened was that after one show I steered June clear of the rest of the cast and said:
'I've something to ask you, June...'
And she, interrupting brightly, said: 'I know. Billie told me.'
'Well,' I persevered, 'what do you say?'.
'I say that anyone who sits through the panto every Saturday deserves all he gets.'
Next day June telephoned her father, Mr William Warren Triggs (or Boncy as she always called him), the senior partner in Marks & Clerk, the patent agents and consulting engineers. When told who it was that she was about to marry, Boncy said: 'Good gracious, I'm one of his greatest fans. I'll come up to see him at once. I've loved that fellow for years.'
'That's all very well,' June replied to this enthusiastic outburst, 'but it's me who's marrying him, not you.'
So up Boncy came and we got on like a house on fire. While June was running through Cinderella yet again he and I went to the Queen's Hotel, Birmingham, where he was immediately greeted by the lounge waiter. 'Hello, Mr Triggs,' he said politely. 'It's been a long time since we last saw you.' Then, more usefully, he added: 'I'm afraid whisky is very scarce but I expect I can find you a drop.' Over a precious scotch Boncy told me of his enthusiasm for the game and that he used to have a table at his home when June and her brother Jack were young - which, I realised, accounted for June's not inconsiderable skill at the game. By the time Boncy returned to London we were firm friends - a friendship which only grew with the years. He died in retirement in Copenhagen, having received the CBE from the Queen in 1958 for services rendered to the government. We miss him very much.
Having secured Boncy's seal of approval, June and I arranged to get married at Birmingham Register Office on April 6th - thereby failing by a day or so to claim a married person's Income Tax rebate for the year. The eve of the wedding was a wonderful night. George Doonan, as Buttons, worked into his act that Dandini was marrying Joe Davis next day and this brought a round of applause. Afterwards we held a party on stage. All the Cinderella crew joined in, Vera Lynn and the veteran comedian Billy Danvers came from another theatre and many friends made the trip up from London. Food and drink was, of course, generally in short supply but pals from all over the country sent offerings and the bullet that we laid on was pretty magnificent by wartime standards.
After the wedding, attended by that well-known soldier Gunner Fred Davis RA, June and I fled for a weekend honeymoon to the Moor Hall Hotel in Sutton Coldfield. When we had deposited our luggage that evening I said to her that before we had a cocktail I should send my mother a telegram since she had no idea that I was getting married. I went downstairs to ask the hall porter to send off the message and was just going back to our bedroom when to my surprise I was accosted by an acquaintance of mine. He congratulated me on my marriage, which he had read about in the evening paper, and asked me to celebrate by having a drink with him.
As we did so, I said: 'Anyway, what are you doing here?'
'Oh,' he replied, 'I come here most evenings to have a game of snooker.'
'I didn't know they had a table here,' I said.
'Yes, a very nice one,' he said. 'Come and have a look.'
So off we went to the billiard-room and before I knew where I was I had a cue in my hand and was trying out a few trick shots. It was some time before I came to my senses and then, horrified at my misdemeanour, I dashed upstairs to my bride. 'Where on earth have you been?' the lady asked. 'You've been away long enough to have gone to tell your mother personally.'
'Sorry, darling,' I said feebly, 'I got tied up.'
A nice thing on our wedding night.
After one more week, with June in Birmingham and me in Manchester, the panto came to the end of its run and I drove June back home to my flat in Linden Gardens, Notting Hill Gate, where I was hoping that my Irish housekeeper, Maggie, would have a good lunch ready. She was there to receive us and I introduced June as my new wife. 'Oh,' said Maggie, 'I thought he would have married either the blonde or the redhead.' Very diplomatic. Soon afterwards Maggie won £375 on Littlewoods football pools and, under the illusion that this would last her a lifetime, gave up work. June and I spent a week at home - really a continuation of our honeymoon - and took in a few shows so that she would not feel too far from the stage. We ate out a good deal but inevitably the evening came when we stayed at the flat. I thought that a girl who had been on the stage for years would not have much clue about cooking so, to save June embarrassment, I said: 'Let me show you how I can do a smashing bacon, egg, sausage and tomato grill.' Into the kitchen I went, but no sooner had I started the operation than the telephone rang for me and I became bogged down in a detailed conversation. I returned not only to find the grill completed in the kitchen but the dining-room neatly laid out in readiness. Apart from boiling an egg I have not been in the kitchen since.
When we were about to be married I had made one condition.
Knowing the strains exerted on marriages when the partners lead their own lives, one in one town and the other hundreds of miles away, I asked her whether she would give up the stage. Somewhat to my surprise she readily agreed. Then she said: 'Actually, I have a proviso, too.'
'Oh' I said. "What is it?'
'That you don't traipse me round any more blooming antique shops,' she said.
And we have lived happily ever after.
The brief honeymoon over, it was back to work. Having raised something like £125,000 for wartime charities I began to think again of my own finances. Like every other business after the war billiards and snooker had to pick up the pieces and gradually put them together again. With Horace Lindrum and my brother Fred both released from active service I staged exhibitions in various big cities to great effect. In Glasgow, Horace and I played before 1,500 people in the circus ring at the Kelvin Hall, while in Manchester's Houldsworth Hall we were treated to a running commentary broadcast by none other than Willie Smith. Also in Manchester, Fred and I made another small bit of snooker history when we both scored breaks of over 100 in the same session. A year later in Birmingham we did even better: Fred made a break of 133 in the fourth frame, broke the pack for the fifth frame and I stepped in to clear the table with a run of 134. In billiards I made the first four-figure break since beating Tom Newman for the 1940 tide, reaching 1,029 against Kingsley Kennerley, now turned professional, at the Burroughes Hall. And the UK Billiards Championship itself I retained in 1946, gaining a walk-over against newcomer John Barrie, a 6 foot 3 inch twenty-one-year-old from Wisbech.
This then left the snooker championship of 1946, an eagerly contested match in which the entrants included Kingsley Kennerley, John Barrie, Alec Brown, Sydney Lee, Willie Leigh, Canadian Conrad Stanbury, Walter Donaldson and new boy John Pulman. In the final, a marathon match of 145 games, I met Horace Lindrum having beaten Stanley Newman in the semi-final and Horace having narrowly beaten Fred. The event itself was staged by red-bearded Bob Jelks, managing director of table makers W. Jelks, on behalf of the BA&CC in the Royal Horticultural Hall in Vincent Square, London. It was broadcast on the radio and heard in Australia; the commentators were Willie Smith and Joyce Gardner, who also acted as compare. Microphones were set up over the table to amplify the click of the balls. The expenses were enormous, the rent was high and it cost £400 just to black out the glass roof. In addition Horace and I were insured for £3,000 to cover the risk of non-appearance. Luckily, though, the crippling entertainment tax of 48 per cent was cut to 33.3 on May 5th, the day before our match began.
The atmosphere was certainly different from that of the hallowed precincts of Thurston's. But that did not worry Horace and me. We were delighted to see our audience of 1,200 at each session, even if they did applaud frequently in inappropriate places, and even if they did walk around and bang their seats while we were playing. Because there was so much space round us players, all we were aware of was the balls and the table; in the close confines of Thurston's the movement of a hand used to be as distracting as someone waving a huge flag in front of your face. Old-timers mourned the cockpit atmosphere of Thurston's but Horace and I were more concerned with the fact that we were packing 'em in at seat prices ranging from 5s to £3 a session. All told, we took £12,000 at the box-office and sold some 8,000 programmes at 5s each so that Horace and I came out with around £1,500 each for the two-week match (thanks largely to the reduced entertainments tax). The final was a huge success. It was the only one of my fifteen snooker championships that made me any real money and was no less satisfying because I won by 78 frames to 67. Furthermore, on the first Thursday I created a new championship record break of 133 - which was also my 200th snooker century - and topped that with another championship record of 136 on the Saturday.
In recognition of my double century, June's father - always a generous and kindly man - gave me a cheque for £200 and when I made 300 centuries he gave me £300. I forbade him to recognise my 400th century in like fashion and instead, when I reached 500, I gave him an inscribed set of cuff links, which on his death came back to me and which I treasure.
It was after the 1946 final that I announced my retirement from championship matches. I was still at the height of my abilities as unbeaten champion, but I felt it was not good for the game, indeed for any game, to be dominated by one man. This first post-war snooker championship had shown that there was no shortage of new talent eager to get a foot on the ladder - but I knew that unlike, say, football there was room for only one or two men right at the top. And after an unbroken run of twenty years in that position I felt it was time for me to step down.