Keith Waterhouse - Office Life

'Have you ever set eyes on the Purchasing Director, Mr Bellows?' (Grant-Peignton was quite the prosecuting counsel when he got going, thought Gryce admiringly. A pity he had selected, or been dragooned into, one of the female roles. An Edwardian morning coat would have been more fitting altogether.)

'No. I've never had occasion to seek him out.'

'Have you any reason for supposing that he even exists?'

'He must do, Mr Grant-Peignton, because in due course our typewriter ribbons arrive on the doorstep!'

('Where are the bleeders, den?')

'Exactly, Mr Bellows. The typewriter ribbons arrive on our doorstep. As everything "arrives on our doorstep"! And that, is it not, is the end of the transaction? Do you ever receive an invoice? You do not. Does our esteemed "Purchasing Director" receive an invoice? Come come, Mr Bellows. Can we really picture for example General Parkes-Exley sitting at the boardroom table and signing fiddling cheques for typewriter ribbons?'

Grant-Peignton, in between bouts of applause for this sustained piece of rhetoric, went on to ask the wretched Fred Astaire, or Bellows, whether he thought the typewriter ribbons were donated as an act of charity by Messrs Ryman's or W. H. Smith, whether alternatively they fell out of the sky, or whether there was any explanation other than that they were provided by the true employer of all British Albion personnel, which if it was not an eccentric billionaire could only be HM Government. Having brought the house down — even Vaart conceding that he was a bugger with the words — Grant-Peignton plucked at the folds of his dress, blew down his false cleavage to cool himself off, and was once more the impassive chairman.

'Any more matters arising from the minutes ?'

'Mr Chair!'

Gryce recognized Seeds' voice. Turning round, he saw that Seeds was advancing, some would have said strutting, to a commanding position in the centre of the aisle.

'Yes, Mr Seeds?'

'On a point of information, Mr Chair. The number of fifteen subsidiary companies mentioned in the minutes as having been shown to have ceased trading should be amended to sixteen. This morning, Mrs Fawce and I travelled to Rugby, where British Albion is supposed to own a factory manufacturing we know not what but trading under the name of Binns Brothers.'

Gryce, in the pause for effect left by Seeds, who was certainly having his big moment, felt a twinge of jealousy. So that was where the two of them had got to. And no doubt they had enjoyed a pleasant lunch with a bottle of wine, either courtesy of British Rail or in some Midlands trattoria.

'Binns Brothers, Mr Chair, does not exist. There was a firm of that name, engaged so we're reliably informed in the reconditioning of diesel engines, but it ceased trading several years ago and the factory premises were demolished shortly afterwards, as part of a road-widening scheme.'

This, Gryce grudgingly had to admit, caused quite a stir. He thought, though, that Seeds needn't sound quite so full of his own importance as he went on to demand: 'Is it the committee's wish that we continue our survey of the remaining subsidiary companies?'

There were cries of 'By all means!' and 'Carry on with the good work!' Gryce was thankful when the focus of attention switched to Beazley, by dint of his rising and asking Grant-Peignton whether a brief comment would be in order. Until now Beazley had been sitting patiently enough with his gaitered legs crossed and his arms folded, like a rural dean at a public school prizegiving. But he had obviously been itching to speak: as president of a boys' club with considerable experience of this sort of thing it must have rankled with him that Grant-Peignton and not he was in charge of the meeting.

'Chairman,' began Beazley in his gruff way. 'I'm sure a vote of thanks is in order to Mr Seeds and Mrs Fawce for their efforts. Whether there's anything to be gained in pursuing these enquiries, when they might be exploring other avenues, is another matter. I think we have the general picture.'

'Would you agree with that, Mr Seeds?'

But it was Pam who answered. Quite right, too: Seeds had already had his fourpennyworth. 'If Mr Beazley is saying we're unlikely to find any subsidiary company that is operating, I'd go along with him. The pattern seems to be that they bought up firms that were either dead or dying, for two reasons. Originally, when they were still in the transitional stage from the old Albion Printeries to British Albion, they absorbed mainly printing companies…'

'S'right,' volunteered Vaart, bobbing up to address anyone who would listen. 'An then they do no more, they go an close em dahn.'

'The object there seems to have been to build up the nucleus of a staff for British Albion without causing too much comment on the labour market. If anyone noticed they were closing down these plants as soon as they took them over, they could claim to be "rationalizing" — it was all the rage at that time.

'Then,' went on Pam, well in command of her audience: her bossy streak coming out, thought Gryce, 'as they started to expand — I mean expand in terms of recruitment — they began buying up these other shell companies. The only explanation we can think of is that it was a cosmetic operation: they wanted it to be thought that they were diversifying, because the more a large organization diversifies, the less anyone knows about what it is actually up to. I'm sure Mr Beazley is right and you can take it as read that all the firms listed in your guidelines booklet are merely names and addresses. They don't exist any more.'

The older version of Petula Clark, in the front row, got hesitantly to her feet. She looked nervous to Gryce: probably not used to public speaking but felt encouraged to have a crack by the example set by a member of her own sex.

'Excuse me, I don't know whether this has anything to do with it, but my brother-in-law, I should say my sister's brother-in-law, he lives in Aldershot.'

She paused as if this statement in itself was of significance.

'Yes?' said Grant-Peignton with an encouraging, others than Gryce might have said patronizing, smile.

'Only he goes into some of the army camps on account of his business, he's a dry cleaner. According to him, they've got a whole mock coal-mine down there, all hidden away. You go into a gymnasium, apparently, and some steps lead down from a trap-door, and when you get through this tunnel you're in a coal-mine.'

'Yes?' said Grant-Peignton again, as baffled as everyone else.

'Well you see, they're training them in case of an all-out miners' strike. Only what I'm wondering, all these firms that Mrs Fawce has been talking about, could they be doing the same thing? I mean they could be training for anything in these factories and that, couldn't they?'

'Madam,' replied Grant-Peignton, hitching up his skirts and bending in her direction to lend emphasis to his words, 'these factories no longer exist. They're simply holes in the ground. Our own parent company, the Albion Printeries, is a hole in the ground. What possible training use could be made of holes in the ground?'

As the older version of Petula Clark sat down, thoroughly rebuffed, Flight-Sergeant Neddyman from Gryce's RAF days was already on his feet.

'If they're all holes in the ground, why are some of them still on the phone?' Same face, different voice: the original Flight-Sergeant Neddyman had had a distinct Cornish burr.

'Are some of them still on the telephone?' asked Grant-Peignton.

'Cobbs and Co. of Harrow is,' replied Flight-Sergeant Neddyman, triumphantly brandishing what looked like a page torn from the telephone directory. 'Yet according to what we were told last week, they closed down over four years ago. Now I rang this number two days ago, Mr Chairman, and I was put through to a bloke who said he was the sales manager. That's of a firm which from what Mr Seeds tells us, doesn't exist.'