The New Collected Short Stories (84 page)

Later that afternoon a large brown box was delivered to the surgery.

‘What’s this?’ the doctor asked his assistant.

‘A gift from the chairman.’

‘Two surprises in one day,’ said the doctor, examining the label on the box. ‘A dozen bottles of a 1994 Côtes du Rhône. How very generous of him.’ He
didn’t add until his assistant had closed the door, ‘And how out of character.’

The chairman sat in the front seat of his car and chatted to his chauffeur as he was driven back to the bank. He hadn’t realized that, like him, Fred was an Arsenal supporter.

When the car drew up outside the bank, he leapt out. The doorman saluted and held the door open for him.

‘Good morning, Sam,’ said the chairman, then walked across reception to the lift which a young man was holding open for him.

‘Good morning, Chairman,’ said the young man. ‘Would it be possible to have a word with you?’

‘Yes, of course. By the way, what’s your name?’

‘Rod, sir,’ said the young man.

‘Well, Rod, what can I do for you?’

‘There’s a vacancy coming up on the Commodities floor, and I wondered if I might be considered for it.’

‘Of course, Rod. Why not?’

‘Well, sir, I don’t have any formal qualifications.’

‘Neither did I when I was your age,’ said the chairman. ‘So why don’t you go for it?’

‘I hope you know what you’re up to,’ said the senior clerk when Rod returned to his place behind the reception desk.

‘I sure do. I can tell you I don’t intend to spend the rest of my life on the ground floor like you.’

The chairman held open the lift doors to allow two women to join him. ‘Which floor?’ he asked as the doors closed.

‘The fifth please, sir,’ one of them said nervously.

He pressed the button, then asked, ‘Which department do you work in?’

‘We’re cleaners,’ said one of the girls.

‘Well, I’ve wanted to have a word with you for some time,’ said the chairman.

The girls looked anxiously at each other.

‘Yours must be a thankless task at times, but I can tell you, these are the cleanest offices in the City. You should be very proud of yourselves.’

The lift came to a halt at the fifth floor.

‘Thank you, Chairman,’ the girls both said as they stepped out. They could only wonder if their colleagues would believe them when they told them what had just happened.

When the lift reached the top floor, the chairman strolled into his secretary’s office. ‘Good morning, Sally,’ he said, and sat down in the seat next to her desk. She leapt up.
He waved her back down with a smile.

‘How did the medical go?’ she asked nervously.

‘Far better than I’d expected,’ said the chairman. ‘It seems the cancer is in remission, and I could be around for another ten years.’

‘That is good news,’ said Sally. ‘So there’s no longer any reason for you to resign?’

‘That’s what the doctor said, but perhaps the time has come for me to accept the fact that I’m not immortal. So there are going to be a few changes around here.’

‘What exactly did you have in mind?’ the secretary asked anxiously.

‘To start with, I’m going to accept the board’s generous retirement package and stay on as non-executive director, but not before I’ve taken a proper holiday.’

‘But will that be enough for you, Chairman?’ asked his secretary, not certain she was hearing him correctly.

‘More than enough, Sally. Perhaps the time has come for me to do some voluntary work. I could start by helping my local football club. They need some new changing rooms. You know, when I
was a youngster, that club was the only thing that kept me off the streets, and who knows, maybe they even need a new chairman?’

His secretary couldn’t think what to say.

‘And there’s something else I must do before I go, Sally.’

She picked up her notepad as the chairman removed a chequebook from an inside pocket.

‘How many years have you been working for me?’

‘It will be twenty-seven at the end of this month, Chairman.’

He wrote out a cheque for twenty-seven thousand pounds and passed it across to her. ‘Perhaps you should take a holiday as well. Heaven knows, I can’t have been the easiest of
bosses.’

Sally fainted.

‘Well, I’m off for lunch,’ said Rod, checking his watch.

‘Where have you got in mind?’ asked Sam. ‘The Savoy Grill?’

‘All in good time,’ said Rod. ‘But for now I’ll have to be satisfied with the Garter Arms because the time has come for me to get to know my future colleagues in
Commodities.’

‘Aren’t you getting a bit above yourself, lad?’

‘No, Sam, just keep your eyes open. It won’t be long before I’m their boss, because this is just the first step on my way to becoming chairman.’

‘Not in my lifetime,’ said Sam as he unwrapped his sandwiches.

‘Don’t be so sure about that, Sam,’ said Rod, taking off his long blue porter’s coat and replacing it with a smart sports jacket. He strolled across the foyer, pushed his
way through the swing doors and out on to the pavement. He glanced across the road at the Garter Arms, looking forward to taking his first step on the corporate ladder.

Rod checked to his right as a double-decker bus came to a halt and disgorged several passengers. He spotted a gap in the traffic and stepped out into the road just as a motorcycle courier
overtook the bus. The biker threw on his brakes the moment he saw Rod, swerved and tried to avoid him, but he was a fraction of a second too late. The bike hit Rod side-on, dragging him along the
road until it finally came to a halt on top of him.

Rod opened his eyes and stared at a package marked URGENT, which had landed in the road by his side:
The Chairman’s Medical Report.
He looked up to see a man dressed in a smartly
tailored dark suit, white silk shirt and thin black tie looking down at him.

‘If only you’d asked me how long the young man had to live, and not what his life expectancy was,’ were the last words Rod heard before departing from this world.

R
ICHARD
E
DMISTON
climbed off the bus feeling tired and hungry. It had been a long day, and he was looking forward to a meal and
a bath, although he wasn’t sure if he could afford both.

He was coming to the end of his holiday, which was a good thing because he was also coming to the end of his money. In fact, he had less than a hundred euros left in his wallet, along with a
return train ticket to London.

But he wasn’t complaining. He’d spent an idyllic month in Tuscany, even though Melanie had dropped out at the last minute without offering any explanation. He would have cancelled
the whole trip but he’d already bought his ticket and put a deposit down at several small
pensioni
dotted around the Italian countryside. In any case, he’d been looking forward
to exploring northern Italy for the past year, ever since he’d read an article in
Time
magazine by Robert Hughes which said that half the world’s treasures were to be found in
one country. He was finally persuaded to go after he and Melanie had attended a lecture given by John Julius Norwich at the Courtauld, at which the celebrated historian ended with the words,
‘If you were given two lives, you’d spend one of them in Italy.’

Richard may well be ending his holiday penniless, tired and hungry, but he’d quickly discovered just how accurate Hughes and Norwich were after he’d visited Florence, San Gimignano,
Cortona, Arezzo, Siena and Lucca, each of which contained masterpieces that in any other country would have been worthy of several pages in the national tourist guides, whereas in Italy were often
no more than a footnote.

Richard needed to leave for England the following day because he would start his first job on Monday, as an English teacher at a large comprehensive in the East End of London. His old headmaster
at Marlborough had offered him the chance to return and teach English to the lower fifth, but what could he hope to learn by going back to his old school and simply repeating his experiences as a
child, even if he did exchange his blazer for a graduates gown?

He adjusted his rucksack and began to trudge slowly up the winding path that led to the ancient village of Monterchi, perched on top of the hill. He’d saved Monterchi until last because it
possessed the Madonna del Parto, a fresco of the Virgin Mary breastfeeding the infant Jesus by Piero della Francesca. It was considered by scholars to be one of the artist’s finest works,
which was why many pilgrims and lovers of the Renaissance period came from all parts of the world to admire it.

Richard’s rucksack felt heavier with each step he took, while the view of the valley below became more spectacular, dominated by the River Arno winding its way through vineyards, olive
groves and green-sculpted hills. But even this paled into insignificance when he reached the top of the hill and saw Monterchi in all its glory for the first time.

The fourteenth-century village had been stranded in a backwater of history and clearly did not approve of anything modern. There were no traffic lights, no signposts, no double yellow lines and
not a McDonald’s in sight. As Richard strolled into the market square, the town hall clock struck nine times. Despite the hour, the evening was warm enough to allow the natives and an
occasional interloper to dine al fresco. Richard spotted a restaurant shaded by ancient olive trees and walked across to study the menu. He reluctantly accepted that it might have suited his
palate, but sadly not his purse, unless he was willing to sleep in a field that night before walking the ninety kilometres back to Florence.

He noticed a smaller establishment tucked away on the far side of the square, where the tables didn’t have spotless white cloths and the waiters weren’t wearing smart linen jackets.
He took a seat in the corner and thought about Melanie, who should have been sitting opposite him. He’d planned to spend a month with her so they could finally decide if they should move in
together once they’d both settled in London, she as a barrister, he as a teacher. Melanie clearly hadn’t felt she needed another month to make up her mind.

For the past couple of weeks, whenever Richard had studied a menu, he’d always checked the prices rather than the dishes before he came to a decision. He selected the one dish he could
afford before rummaging around in his rucksack and pulling out the book of short stories that had been recommended to him by his tutor. He’d advised Richard to ignore the sacred cows of
Indian literature and instead enjoy the genius of R. K. Narayan. Richard soon became so engrossed by the problems of a tax collector living in a small village on the other side of the world that he
didn’t notice when a waitress appeared with a pitcher of water in one hand, and a basket of freshly baked bread and a small bowl of olives in the other. She placed them on the table and asked
if he was ready to order.

‘
Spaghetti all’ Amatriciana
,’ he said, looking up, ‘
e un vetro di vino rosso
.’ He wondered how many kilos he’d put on since crossing the
Channel; not that it mattered, because once he began the new job he would return to his old routine of running five miles a day, which he’d managed even when he was taking his exams.

He’d only read a few more pages of
Malgudi Days
when the waitress reappeared and placed a large bowl of spaghetti and a glass of red wine in front of him.

‘
Grazie
,’ he said, looking up briefly from his book.

He became so involved in the story that he continued to read as he forked up his food until he suddenly realized his plate was empty. He put the book down and mopped up the remains of the thick
tomato sauce with his last piece of bread, before devouring what remained of the olives. The waitress returned and removed his empty plate before handing him the menu.

‘Would you like anything else?’ she asked in English.

‘I can’t afford anything else,’ he admitted without guile, not even opening the menu for fear it might tempt him. ‘
Il conto, per favore
,’ he added, giving
her a warm smile.

He was preparing to leave when the waitress reappeared carrying a large portion of tiramisu and an espresso. ‘But I didn’t order—’ he began, but she put a finger to her
lips and hurried away before he could thank her. Melanie had once told him it was his boyish charm which made women want to mother him – a charm which clearly no longer worked on Melanie.

The tiramisu was delicious, and Richard even put his book down so he could fully appreciate the delicate flavours. As he sipped his coffee, he began to think about where he would spend the
night. His thoughts were interrupted when the waitress returned with the bill. As he checked it, he realized she hadn’t charged him for the glass of house red. Should he draw her attention to
the omission? Her smile suggested he shouldn’t.

He handed her a ten-euro note and asked if she could recommend somewhere he might spend the night.

‘There are only two hotels in the village,’ she told him. ‘And La Contessina – ’ she hesitated – ‘might be . . .’

‘Out of my price range?’ suggested Richard.

‘But the other one is not expensive, if a little basic.’

‘Sounds like my kind of place,’ said Richard. ‘Is it far?’

‘Nothing is far in Monterchi,’ she said. ‘Walk to the end of the via dei Medici, turn right and you’ll find the Albergo Piero on your left.’

Richard stood up, leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. She blushed and hurried away, bringing to his mind Harry Chapin’s sad lyrics in the ballad, ‘A Better Place to Be’.
He threw his rucksack over his shoulder and began to walk down via dei Medici. At the end he turned right and, as the waitress had promised, the hotel was on his left.

He stood outside, uncertain if he could still afford a room now he was down to his last eighty-six euros. Through the glass door he could see a receptionist, head down, checking the register.
She looked up, handed a waiting couple a large key, and a porter picked up their bags and led them to the lift.

When he saw her for the first time, he didn’t dare take his eyes off her, for fear the mirage might disappear. She had flawless olive skin, long dark hair that curled up as it touched her
slim, graceful shoulders and large brown eyes that lit up when she smiled. Her dark tailored suit and white blouse had an elegance that Italian men take for granted and English women spend a
fortune trying to emulate. She must have been around thirty, perhaps thirty-five, but she was graced with the kind of ageless beauty that made Richard wish he hadn’t only just graduated.