Corporate Bodies (4 page)

The girl watched him go without emotion, then turned the beam of her blue eyes on to Charles. A half-smile haunted her lips, waiting for a response from him. If he grinned, she would be prepared to laugh at the departing Trevor; if he gave her no encouragement, she wouldn't.

Charles gave nothing. The half-smile faded from her lips.

‘Well, don't worry,' said Griff Merricks. ‘I'm sure we can get one of the other operators to do that for us, can't we, Alan?'

‘I'm sure we can,' the Warehouse Manager agreed sourly, ‘particularly since they've been stopped all morning from doing bugger-all else.'

Another forklift truck operator was enlisted and issued with a new set of gleaming blue overalls. Charles sat in his truck and ran through the lines in his head. He tested out the machine, switching on the ignition and pushing forward the gear lever, which was very loose and engaged easily. The truck edged forward. Charles gave a little kick of acceleration and swung the steering wheel with what he hoped Trevor would consider sufficient beef.

The truck jerked sideways and the load on its fork crashed into a shelved pallet of Delmoleen ‘Oat Nuggets'. Considering how relatively slowly he had been moving, the impact had caused quite a lot of damage, ripping the polythene covering and digging deep into the stacked cartons.

He looked around sheepishly, hoping no one had noticed, but was met by the unforgiving eye of Alan Hibbert. Charles tried a smile. ‘Quite a powerful machine, isn't it?'

‘Yes,' said the Warehouse Manager, tersely unamused. ‘You just be bloody careful with it.'

‘I will be.'

‘And make sure it's bloody switched off when you've finished farting around with it.'

‘Of course.'

Infinitely gentle, Charles reversed his truck away from the disaster and switched off the ignition. Trying to avoid Alan Hibbert's eye, he looked across to the ground-level office, inside which Griff Merricks was instructing Dayna on her first acting role. Behind them stood a dowdy woman of uncertain age. While Charles watched, she turned on her heel and went out of sight into another room. He wondered idly if the woman was Heather, the ‘Miss Bossyboots' who ran the Dispatch Office.

The lines were no problem, but a few takes were needed before Charles Paris could co-ordinate them perfectly with the movements of his forklift truck. Finally, on the fourth attempt, the timing worked.

As directed by Griff Merricks, the cameraman panned across the office end of the warehouse. On her cue, Dayna picked up an invoice from a desk and came out of the office, moving as if she hoped to be talent-spotted for a part in Emanuelle XII. The forklift truck operator who had replaced Trevor walked forward on his cue to meet her. They stopped and engaged in fascinated discussion about some detail of the invoice.

The camera panned across to the entrance of the aisle up which Charles Paris was gingerly coaxing his forklift truck. With aplomb, panache and – yes – beef, Charles swung the steering wheel round so that he was facing the camera, disengaged the gear lever, and launched into his speech. Will Parton's prose in this instance wasn't perhaps up to Pinter, but
The Birthday Party
voice still seemed to work fine.

‘This is where many of the Delmoleen range of products get loaded to be transported to the four corners of the world. My job's an important part of the distribution process, and I get a lot of satisfaction from being a link in a global chain.' As instructed by Griff Merricks, Charles grinned and gave a little toss of his head. ‘It's a good feeling to know that I'm a member of the Delmoleen family.'

Each time he said these words, Charles was again struck by the incongruity of a family which has to book in actors to play its members, but he didn't let this thought put him off the task for which he was being paid. Again following instructions, he engaged the gear lever, swung the steering wheel round (with plenty of beef), and drove the forklift truck sedately out of shot.

Charles was surprised to hear a single pair of hands clapping. As he looked round to the source of the noise, it was quickly joined by the clapping of other hands.

By the entrance to the warehouse was a little knot of people. Ken Colebourne stood on one side, with Robin Pritchard on the other, flanking a couple in the middle. The man, tall and fiftyish with a craggy face, wore a dark suit and plain red tie; the woman, of about the same age, was dressed in a pale blue suit, with co-ordinated dark blue hat, shoes and handbag.

The craggy-faced man had been the first to clap. The sycophantic speed with which the others had joined him, and the nervous sheen on Ken Colebourne's forehead, left Charles in no doubt that the newcomer was ‘B.T.' or, as the more relaxed Robin Pritchard would call him, ‘Brian'.

HIS NAME was Brian Tressider, and he was the Managing Director. The lady in pale blue was, predictably enough, his wife. She was called Brenda.

It was no surprise that their arrival caused a stir, but Charles felt the reaction was more than just one of awe. Brian Tressider was automatically impressive by virtue of his position, but he seemed also to command a great deal of affection amongst his work-force.

The warehouse staff gathered round him and he had a cheerful word and a Christian name for most of them. This wasn't just the researched ‘common touch' of a politician; there seemed to be a genuine feeling among the employees that their MD was ‘one of them'. Charles got the impression that Brian Tressider had worked his way up from the shop floor and was respected for it. The uneroded Midland twang in his voice supported that supposition.

His wife hadn't quite the same natural manner. Though she was punctiliously amiable and interested in everyone, Brenda Tressider's bonhomie showed signs of hard work – if not of calculation, then at least of application. Her vowels betrayed a more privileged upbringing than her husband's; she had the kind of upper-class voice which implies patronage and condescension even when they aren't there.

She must once have been beautiful and had since then been very well maintained. Her face now was lined beneath the skilful make-up and her hair had had an assisted passage towards blondeness, but the grey-blue eyes still packed a powerful punch. Charles also approved the suppleness of her well-exercised body. Quite classy.

He was introduced to both of them by an anxiously obsequious Ken Colebourne. The Marketing Director's cautious deference implied a less affable, steelier side to Brian Tressider, an insistence on high standards and a readiness to bawl out anyone who didn't match up to those standards.

Robin Pritchard was also watchful in his boss's presence. Though his manner was characteristically more laid-back than Ken's, the Product Manager was nonetheless on his best behaviour, ready to respond instantly to any switch in Brian's mood.

But that mood was currently sunny and looked set fair to remain so. Brian Tressider chatted easily to the people involved in the video, asking for technical explanations from Griff Merricks and his crew, joking with Will and Charles. If this was like a visit from royalty, it was a very relaxed one.

His wife's conversation, however, conformed to the more traditional royal style. ‘Charles Paris? Yes, now of course I know the name. Tell me, what would I have seen you in recently?'

As ever, when asked this question, Charles's mind went a complete blank. Given the progress of his career during the previous year, a complete blank was entirely appropriate.

‘Ah. Well, erm . . .'

‘Of course, if it's theatre, we may not know as much about it as we should. Brian and I don't get to the theatre as often as we'd like these days. Do tend to get involved in quite a lot of evening functions.'

‘Yes. Erm . . .' Suddenly, from the recesses of his memory, he dragged out a recollection of once having worked. ‘I was in a television series that was on a couple of years back. Detective thing . . .
Stanislas Braid
. . . don't know if you, er . . .'

‘Of course!' said Brenda Tressider. ‘Of course, I knew I recognised the face.' This was phrased in such a way that she didn't have to admit whether or not she'd seen any of the series. ‘Charles Paris –
Stanislas Braid
.'

She repeated the names, as if satisfied at having made a forgotten connection, but Charles reckoned it was also a way of entering the information into her mental filing system. He felt certain that, if they ever met again, she would greet him with ‘Charles Paris, yes, of course. You were in that
Stanislas Braid
series, weren't you?'

It was a good skill to have, though, that kind of social memory, an essential skill for a busy hostess. Charles just wished he couldn't see the wheels turning quite so obviously as the machinery clicked into action.

Brian Tressider's manner may have been as studied as his wife's, but it seemed more spontaneous. He found a friendly word for everyone. Heather from the Dispatch Office had emerged to greet the boss, and coloured winsomely at some remark he threw at her.

Then he clapped an arm round Alan Hibbert's shoulder. ‘Yes, don't tell me, Alan – this video's throwing all your scheduling to buggery.'

‘Well, I'm afraid it is, B.T.. We've got to get the regular Wednesday deliveries off and we can't wait around too long for –'

‘Don't worry about it. You'll make up the time.'

‘I can't see why we –'

‘No, really, Alan, the video's important. I wouldn't have agreed to our doing it if I didn't think so. And if you lose half a day here in the warehouse, or if we lose a day's production even, it's not the end of the world.'

‘Never thought I'd hear you talk like that, B.T..'

‘Priorities change. Of course I want to maximise production, but keeping everyone's nose to the grindstone every second of the day may not be the best way of achieving that. Making everyone feel they belong to the company could be more effective in the long run. A contented work-force is an efficient work-force, Alan.'

The Warehouse Manager looked at his boss with a blatant scepticism that suggested their relationship went back a long way. ‘Sounds like you've been reading another of those management books, Brian.'

The Managing Director let out a short laugh. ‘Maybe I have.' He laughed again and turned to Griff Merricks. ‘Tell me, how much more you've you got to do here?'

‘Couple more set-ups of Charles on the forklift. Just cutaways, really, for editing purposes.'

‘How long do you reckon?'

‘Half an hour top weight.'

‘And how long to clear up?'

‘Another half-hour?'

‘And then you'll be out of Alan's hair?'

‘No problem.'

‘That's it then.' Brian Tressider turned back to his Warehouse Manager. ‘Break all your staff now for early lunch – OK? Get them all back at two, and you'll be able to work through the afternoon with no interruptions.'

‘All right.' Alan Hibbert went off to communicate this decision to his operators. They needed no second bidding to leave the warehouse, and had all vanished within seconds.

‘Oh, and Griff . . .' the Managing Director went on, ‘if you want to bring your boys up to the Executive dining room for a drink and some lunch when you're through, please feel invited.'

This was the best suggestion Charles Paris had heard all morning. ‘That's very kind,' said the Director. ‘What, all of them?' This question did not encompass as many as it would have done on a proper television OB. Union regulations do not apply for the making of non-broadcast material, so Griff's technical support comprised only a lighting cameraman and sound recordist.

‘Well, all the ones who're wearing ties,' said Brian Tressider over his shoulder, as he took his wife's arm and led her towards the warehouse door.

Charles Paris caught the flicker of glee in Will Parton's eye. But he was distracted from melancholy thoughts of his tielessness by a little scene which was taking place the other side of the warehouse. The girl Dayna stood by the door as Brian and Brenda Tressider approached, with Ken Colebourne and Robin Pritchard close behind them. When they were almost level with her, Dayna leant against the doorframe in a frankly voluptuous pose, and winked.

What was surprising about the gesture was its lack of subtlety. Almost as if she was parodying a vamp. It was the performance of someone either highly sophisticated or deeply naive.

The Managing Director stopped in his stride for a moment, as if about to say something, but then thought better of it, and steered his wife out of the warehouse.

It had only lasted a second, and very few people had noticed the incident, but it did seem bizarre.

‘Right,' said Griff Merricks, ‘let's get these last few shots done quick as we can.'

‘Sure,' said Will Parton. ‘Then off to the Executive dining room for “a drink and some lunch”, eh?' He grinned at Charles. ‘That is – those of us who're wearing ties.'

Charles grimaced long-sufferingly back at him.

‘Don't worry,' said Will in a voice heavy with mock-solicitude. ‘I'm told the Rissoles and Spotted Dick in the staff canteen are out of this world.'

‘Thank you very much.'

The writer shook his head sadly. ‘Such a pity it's not licensed.'

It's remarkable how quickly television people can work when they've got a proper incentive. The last few shots of Charles on the forklift truck were in the can within ten minutes and almost before he'd got out of his seat, the cables were all unplugged and coiled up, ready to be packed away. Within another half-minute, Will Parton, Griff Merricks, his cameraman and sound recordist had all disappeared in search of the Executive dining room.

Blatant discrimination, thought Charles. Meant to be living in an egalitarian society, and yet there's still this massive undercurrent of prejudice against people who don't wear ties. Huh.