She growled.

'And then, there was this session with Teddy Wilson? Now, Teddy Wilson didn't even like me. John Hammond made him do it and they fast-timed "What a Little Moonlight Can Do". What nobody knew is what I could do and that the session clarinet was a guy called Benny Goodman. He was a wild cat, in those days. They fast-timed and Benny and I just said to hell with it, let's cook. And we did. And I heard it slot together. I heard the angels turning the bolts. And I knew. I knew then I was the best, and I knew it was going to take time. That bitch Ella had a better voice and she left people happier. But I was going to be the greater singer. And I knew it would cost, I knew those bolts were just another jail. God was always going to want me for something.'

Billie took a deep breath. 'And now he's gone and done it again.' She smiled, drank in liquor and smoke and then announced, 'I know what you got to learn.'

Michael felt slightly forlorn. 'I wish I did.'

'You,' she said, bracelets clacking slightly against the glass, 'need to learn how to have a good time.' Her eyes brimmed with something like mockery, but it was not unaffectionate. 'Let's see. This is London, right? I bet you don't even know where the hot spots are.' When she said hot, she meant hot. This woman knew how to swing.

This is how it works,' she told him. 'You go to the swankiest place you can find where they play good jazz, because that is where jazz makes its money, honey. But you talk to the guys, and they get to know you, and pretty soon, you find yourself invited to where the action really is, where the guys go to jam afterwards. That's where you learn the music. That's where you learn the life.'

The only jazz place that Michael knew was Ronnie Scott's. He'd been there once in his twenties and his main impression had been that it cost a lot. There was a sudden blurring, and Billie's hair was suddenly conked and plastered close and she wore a clinging white satin dress, and round her shoulders a perfectly unfake fox fur.

'Where's the gardenia?' he asked.

'Gardenia?' Her face did a comic double take.

'For your hair. Um. They won't know you're Billie Holiday without it.'

'Gardenia, huh. OK.' And one appeared. 'Folks will just say she can't afford a hat.'

'It'll be your trademark.'

She adjusted everything, and turned, Lady-like, to be admired.

'They'll think you're a drag queen.'

Michael had to explain that drag meant something different these days. Lady was not exactly pleased to be told she could be mistaken for a man. 'So how come you got hair like Norma Shearer?'

'A lot of guys have hair like that now. In fact, it's kinda old-fashioned by now.'

Tuh. It's never-was fashion where I come from.'

Michael wore his only jacket, a kind of brown-green with a zigzag tweed, and Billie just laughed at it. 'I hope the whole town doesn't dress like you.' She touched his mane lightly, and then tried to jab it down into some kind of order. 'Actually, you know, that hair's kinda pretty. So one thing here is going to be OK. The boys are prettier.'

They swooped down on Ronnie Scott's in a taxi. The foyer was charmingly naff. It looked like something from a 1960s James Bond movie, hanging red plush curtains, black leather sofas and hundreds of photos of jazz stars on the walls.

Just inside the entrance there was an ordinary business desk and an old white guy wearing clothes like Michael's. Sitting on the arm of the sofa just behind him were a gang of people who had the air of working there, sharing jokes. They looked like James Bond too, in jackets, turtlenecks and medallions.

'Mmm,' said Billie, approvingly. For her this was swank.

A tall gangling man was leaning over the desk, signing in. 'I'm a guest actually.' For some reason he was carrying a single trolley wheel.

Billie nodded at the wheel. 'You play that thing?'

'It came off. I'm the bass player.' He shuffled with humility, skinny but with broad shoulders, big flat fingers, and Farah slacks.

Billie teased him. 'Bass player. You'd make more money playing a wheel. No bass player ever makes any money.'

The guys on the sofa laughed. An older black guy, speckles of white in his hair, stood up and chuckled. 'Specially the way you play, Jack.' All Jack could do was shrug and smile and escape. Billie was already one of the gang.

Except for the little old white guy behind the desk. 'Standing room only. Cloakroom's over there,' he announced. Billie slaughtered him with a glance.

'Isn't anybody going to take a lady's coat?' Billie demanded, giving them lessons in manners. She shrugged it off to reveal her finery. 'Alphonse?'

She had decided to call Michael Alphonse. It amused her to show up on the arm of a certifiable nerd. Michael felt like an Alphonse. He took her coat and he geeked his way towards the tiny cloakroom.

Billie looked egregiously resplendent. The old black guy strolled towards her. 'You don't have to try that hard here.'

'Try? You call this trying? You should see what happens when I try.'

She amused him. He ushered her up to the Please wait to be seated sign, consulted his book, and ushered them into the club.

There were ranks of narrow tables with little lights, and brass rails between levels and red tablecloths, and old fashioned straw lampshades that Michael wanted to call Tiffany. There were German tourists in long green gabardine coats and trimmed white goatees; skinny intense young men with black sweaters; a waiter with an Eraserhead haircut; women with hair as long and heavy as curtains with Dusty Springfield mascara.

Billie was fascinated. 'Everybody looks so sharp.' For her, this was all from the future.

They were sitting near the stage, and the lights spilled over onto her. Billie strode languidly to the table, milking the distance across the floor, making sure the satin caught the light.

They were going to have to share a table. Three rather large black men looked up, less than pleased.

Michael pulled a chair back for Billie, scraping it too loudly on the floor, for which Billie admonished him with her eyebrows, even though the sound made everyone turn towards her. She descended onto the chair as if it were a hereditary throne.

Alphonse was quite a fun character to play. Playing him gave Michael front. 'I'm Alphonse,' he announced to the guys. 'This is Billie. I'm just her foil for the evening. We don't sleep together or anything.'

The guys blinked as if swallowing something.

Billie opened her evening bag and flourished a cigarette. 'I don't suppose any of you gentlemen have a light?'

The gentlemen looked at each other uncertainly. 'Uh. I'm afraid the club has a no smoking policy.'

'A what?' Billie was outraged.

'At least down here in front,' said one of the guys in glasses, exchanging a glance with his bigger friend.

'It's bad for you.'

'What is this a sanatorium? If it ain't one kind of prohibition, it's another.'

They kept talking. Yes, they were musicians, yeah they knew some of the band this evening, uh, well, yes they're pretty good.

'So where do they play hot jazz in this town?'

A guy called Dave leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. 'Well, I don't think there is any. There's cool.'

'Cool, what's cool?'

'Uh, after be-bop? Charlie Parker?'

Billie was fearless. 'You'll have to educate me, I'm from 1938.'

Dave's smile was a little wayward: OK, he would play along. 'You haven't heard of Charlie Parker?'

She shook her head. 'Where's he from?'

' Kansas City.'

'Hmm. Good town. Basie's from Kansas City. I toured with him for a while. Basie swings. But then, he has my man Lester.'

Dave cocked a big, brown, doubtful eye at her. This Lady knew her stuff, but she must be kidding, or just out of her mind.