Bond Street Story (7 page)

Mr. Rammell felt better when he had breakfasted. The coffee had been particularly good. And the toast was excellent. Of exactly the right thickness, and a clear chrysanthemum bronze in colour.

As he left the table with the
Sunday Times
neatly tucked under
his arm he felt that life was re-opening. Blandness enfolded him. And peace. He was, he realized, in exactly the right frame of mind for pondering on the future of his son. Not immediately, that is. But during the morning. In the meantime, he wanted to be alone. To finish reading the Sunday papers. To smoke a cigar. Even to doze possibly. He was still thinking about Tony and the way he would have a fresh shot at putting things to him, even more quietly, more reasonably than last time, when he reached the library.

That was why it was so unfortunate that he should have found Tony himself already installed there. And the boy certainly looked comfortable. His legs were dangling over the arm of Mr. Rammell's own chair, and a portable radio, like a pale cream cosmetics set, stood on the carpet beside him. Mr. Rammell knew that radio set well. And he hated it. Ever since it had come into the house, his son hadn't been alone with himself once. Wherever he went, he was followed by voices. Low, crooning voices. Husky, suggestive voices. Voices whispering in American accents of love and women's lips, and the moon.

To Mr. Rammell's relief, Tony turned off the set as soon as his father came into the room. But the relief was purely temporary. Compared with what Tony had to say, Mr. Rammell would have preferred the B.B.C.

“I say, Dad,” he began brightly. “I've just had a brainwave. I've thought what to do with this bloody awful room.”

Mr. Rammell started. The cigar, his first of the day, remained unlit between his fingers. This room, the library, with its quiet dark panelling and its deep red carpet and its heavy tapestry curtains had come to be his one retreat. His refuge. With the mahogany door closed behind him, he was safe alike from Mr. Preece and from Mrs. Rammell. Even his indigestion seemed to vanish as he entered.

But young Tony was still speaking.

“If we got rid of all that phoney woodwork,” he was saying, with the same kind of dreamy insistence that Mr. Rammell knew in his wife's voice when she was planning a concert, “we could scrap the curtains altogether and begin getting down to things.”

Mr. Rammell tried hard to feel amused.

“What sort of things?” he asked indulgently.

“I should junk the books for a start,” Tony continued. “It isn't as if you ever read them.”

“And then?”

“Why not offer the furniture to the V and A?” Tony asked
him. “Pity to disperse it. ‘Hotel Lounge. English style, c. 1900'—that kind of thing. They'd rather like it.”

“And if I did, what the hell should I sit on?”

“Plastic mostly,” Tony told him. “Plastic. And moulded ply.”

Mr. Rammell gave a little involuntary shudder.

“Any upholstery?” he asked.

Obviously there was nothing to be done but to humour the boy. And, up to the present, Mr. Rammell had been congratulating himself on the way he was keeping things going just as though it were a normal conversation between two sane, healthy people. But Tony's absorption in the project was already beginning to alarm him.

“Foam latex,” he replied. “Sprayed on. Choose your own colour.”

“That the lot?” he asked.

Tony paused.

“I've been wondering about the ceiling,” he said. “With the chandelier down, it would make a rather nice expanse. Could be plain silver. Then you could throw the light up at it.”

“And the walls? Don't forget you've stripped the panelling.”

“Why not pink?” Tony asked. “Pink for the two sides. And apple-green for the ends. Then it wouldn't look so much like a bloody undertaker's. You'd find yourself breathing again.”

Mr. Rammell took up a position on the carpet in front of the fireplace. He was still calm. That was the great thing. Hadn't lost his temper yet. But he knew from long experience of talks with Tony that it was liable to go at any moment. And he particularly wanted to avoid any kind of upset this morning.

“I think I'll just keep things as they are for the time being,” he said quietly. “If you want to go mucking about with the furniture why don't you start on your own room.”

He smiled a little as he said it. If only his wife could have heard him she would have realized how patient—God only knew how patient—he really was with the boy.

But already Tony was speaking.

“I have,” he said.

Mr. Rammell uttered a long, deep sigh.

“Does your mother know?” he asked.

Tony looked surprised.

“Oh, yes,” he said. “She likes it. It was her idea about this study. That's why I came down here.”

That was all that Mr. Rammell needed to hear. He could feel his temper, his carefully suppressed temper, suddenly boiling over inside him like a milk saucepan!

“Why the devil can't your mother leave things alone?” he demanded. “And you, too. It isn't like a reasonable home. It's just one long bloody madhouse. When it isn't music, it's ballet. And when it isn't ballet it's some goddamn-awful sculpture.” He paused for a moment. “Just you listen to me, young man,” he went on. “When I was your age I'd done nearly three years in the business. I knew enough to earn my own living. I could ...”

But Tony was no longer listening. He had got up from the chair and was bending down to pick up the portable radio. Then he walked slowly across the room without even looking at his father. When he reached the door, however, he turned.

“Oh, my God,” he said. “No wonder Mother gets sick of it.”

For Mr. Bloot it was being a very different kind of Sunday. A unique, exciting sort of day. Easily one of the most intriguing and stimulating Sundays he had ever known.

He had shaved once already. But being dissatisfied with a small scrubby patch that he had just discovered beneath his chin, he was now hard at it again. Hot water. Soap. Shaving brush. Everything. In matters of shaving, Mr. Bloot was strictly orthodox. Never used anything but a cut-throat. It was like the beginning of a sabre charge every time he really got down to it. And, by the time he was through he usually had one or two honourable gashes.

This morning, when he came to put his collar back on, he noticed that his cravat was unworthy of him. Not exactly messy. And certainly not stained. Nevertheless, it was still too creased and rubbed in places to be suitable. And this itself was significant. Because in the ordinary way he usually let up a bit on Sundays. For years now he hadn't worn anything better than his second-best when off-duty.

This morning, too, he spent nearly ten minutes in bringing his shoes up to real Guardsman standard. He stood there beneath the budgerigar cages sawing away with the Nugget brush. The toe-caps now glistened like gun-metal. And to avoid soiling them, he placed the shoes carefully side by side under the sink, with a sheet of newspaper on top in case of drips.

On a shelf above the sink stood a small white vase. And standing up in the vase was a tea-rose. It was saffron-yellow in colour. And ingeniously wired by the florist so that it would die of sheer old age before it could open up beyond the bud state. Mr. Bloot had chosen it carefully for his button-hole. And he made a special point of trying out the holder to see that it was still
water-tight. This was important. Because, although there was a patent rubber ring near the top of the holder to prevent spilling, it was not always reliable. Very much the reverse, in fact. Once when he had leant forward in the shop to pick up something the water had come squirting out as though it were some sort of carnival novelty that he was wearing.

Mr. Bloot glanced at his watch, and compared it with the kitchen clock. Eleven-fifteen. Everything ready. And no matter how slowly he walked, or how long he was kept waiting for a bus, it couldn't take him more than thirty minutes to get to Finsbury Park.

The Tufnell Park Road is one of the straightest highways in London. Probably the Romans made it. Or the brewers. Because, like most London thoroughfares, it runs quite simply from one pub to another. Slap down the Tufnell Park Road, in fact, is the very shortest cut there can be from the Boston Tavern at the Archway Road end to the Nag's Head at Holloway. But for most people its straightness is also one of its defects. About half-way along, it begins to pall on the pedestrian. He becomes aware of his feet. Mr. Bloot, however, scarcely noticed anything this morning. He was walking rather fast for him, with high springy steps like a Scoutmaster. Even though there was no likelihood of rain, he was carrying his umbrella. And not merely carrying it. With his hand held loosely round the handle, he was swinging the umbrella round and round in circles. His naturally florid complexion gleamed in the sunlight because of all that shaving. And, because he had been walking quickly for the last ten minutes, his nostrils were dilated. There was an air of conquest and adventure about him. He was like a superior kind of Viking on his way to sack a nunnery. If anyone from Rammell's had seen him they would have been amazed, incredulous. But that was only because no one had ever seen him really jubilant before.

This was Mr. Bloot in love. He was courting.

 

In a sense, it was all Mr. Bloot's fault. And, in a sense, it wasn't. He was perfectly entitled to live his own life. Especially his love-life. No one could deny him that. On the other hand, without him Mr. Privett was left lonely and unattached. And a couple of Sundays later Mr. Privett paid the penalty for his friend's unfaithfulness.

With no Mr. Bloot to keep him company, Mr. Privett simply stayed at home and moped. He hadn't the heart to do anything. He just sat in the kitchen in his shirt-sleeves, reading the
News of the World,
and getting in Mrs. Privett's way. The thought of going up to the Highgate Ponds crossed his mind more than once. He felt rather guilty about not going. He knew that the others up there would be expecting him. For years now a fair wind and fine sailing weather had found him there on Sunday mornings, taking his place on the bank along with the owners of the Sunbeams, Irises, Swallows and the rest of the fleet. If he didn't go this morning it would be the third Sunday in succession that he had missed. But somehow without Mr. Bloot to keep him company he hadn't the heart to set out.

Not that Mr. Bloot was anything of a model yachtsman. He didn't know a spinnaker from a jib. But he liked to take the fresh air. And he made an impressive figure simply standing there, waiting for the winner to come in.

This morning there wasn't even Irene for Mr. Privett to talk to. She had plunged out of the house just after nine-thirty as though on the way to an emergency. At one moment she was still in bed, obviously over-sleeping. At the next, she was downstairs, dressed all in her tennis things and gulping down a cup of tea that was too hot for her. Then, just as Mrs. Privett caught up with her and asked if she would like something proper—a rasher of bacon or a grilled sausage—Irene had gone again. The one-gun salute from the front door was all that was left of her.

Her departure saddened Mr. Privett more than it did his wife. Mrs. Privett merely winced a little as the door shut, and then began clearing away the breakfast things. But Mr. Privett was left staring into space. It was this morning that he had set aside for a special talk with Irene. He had promised himself that he would reason with her, gently and lovingly, about the Rammell's vacancy. Admittedly, the Staff Department hadn't actually written
to Irene yet. But Mr. Privett had a strong psychic presentiment that there would be a letter in the morning. Then it would be necessary to strike. And strike instantly. So long as Irene was merely being difficult within the family, it didn't really matter very much. But suppose she persisted in her attitude, and wrote back a snubbing off-hand kind of note to the Staff Supervisor? That was what really alarmed Mr. Privett.

For once, the
News of the World
was not much consolation to him. It told him that Tuesday was a poor day for engaging in financial transactions, and warned him vaguely of domestic troubles later in the week. Journeys also, he learned, were better avoided. The whole paragraph was vaguely alarming. Even with no financial transactions in prospect and no journeys that he could possibly want to make, the bit about domestic troubles was obviously addressed to him. He put down the paper and called through to Mrs. Privett who was washing-up in the scullery.

“You don't think we've done anything to upset Gus, do you?” he asked. “He didn't use to keep away like this.”

But Mrs. Privett was busy.

“Why don't you go and sail your boat?” was all she said.

As it turned out, Mrs. Privett could hardly forgive herself. It seemed that only by a last-minute whim of Providence had she been saved from being her own husband's murderess. Because when she spoke to him, Mr. Privett was so thoroughly dispirited that without a word he went upstairs to get ready.

Not that the matter of getting dressed for model-yachting was ever simple. There was so much to be remembered. First there was the pair of old grey trousers, the warm ones. Then the pair of long rubber Wellingtons into which they fitted. They were practically compulsory, the Wellingtons. Part of the uniform. And finally there was the blue, faintly nautical-looking jacket. The only thing that Mr. Privett drew a line at was the peaked cap.

Because Mrs. Privett was still washing up the breakfast things, Mr. Privett was left helpless and unaided in the difficult task of getting trailer and bicycle backwards out of the narrow hall. Today it proved even more difficult than usual. The pedal of the bicycle was in the upright position and kept catching on things. It was one of the legs of the hat-stand that it finally got hold of. And having got hold it would not let go. In trying to shake it off, Mr. Privett very nearly brought the hat-stand down on top of himself.