The Watchers on the Shore

by Stan Barstow

  'He's a bit of a ball of fire,'Conroy says. 'An engineer, not an accountant. Been all over the place and done all kinds of things. He's the nearest thing I've ever met to those tough engineers in American pictures. -You know - building a dam across a canyon one year and a road through a jungle the next.'

  'He sounds a bit scaring,'I say.

  'I'm exaggerating a bit,'Conroy says, 'He doesn't walk about with a six-gun strapped round him, but... well, he's a bloke who's obviously taken his talent wherever it was needed and he's just the opposite of the family retainer types we had at Whittaker's.'

  'Well, I can do with a change from them. The first horrible thought I had when Mr Van Huyten died was I might end up back there. Locked in again for life.'

  Conroy shoots me a sidelong look.'Yeh, I know just what you mean. It's so bloody dead easy to get yourself in a cage. You hardly know it's happening till it's too late. But it's funny how things happen. You didn't know what a favour you were doing me that day in the office at Whittaker's when you made that crack. What was it now?'

  'Summat about a pig, wasn't it?'

  'Yeh, that's right.'Conroy's grinning now and I've got a sudden sharp memory picture of him standing there in the drawing office at Whittaker's, his face red with fury in the second before he comes for me and we go down scrapping among the plan-presses.

  'If we hadn't had that little punch-up,'he says now, 'Althorpe wouldn't have talked to us the way he did and got my dander up enough to look for another job.'He touches the brake and does a quick change down as a middle-aged woman tries to end it all by stepping out in front of the car. We get a glimpse of her staring eyes and open mouth as she realizes how near she was to being clouted and Conroy says amiably, 'Blind bitch,'and picks up speed again.

  'Still,'he says in a minute,'I suppose something else would have happened to get me out eventually.'

  'What happened after you left?'I ask him. 'I never got the right tale about it all. I thought you'd gone to Australia.'

  'I nearly did. I'd practically got my bag packed. Then I saw this firm advertising and applied on a whim. There again, y'see, when I left Whittaker's the first job I tried was with a firm in Bradford. It was okay for a while, but they were nearly as bad as Whittaker's. Old retainers in nearly all the top jobs, too many other people in line before you for promotion. Accountants and clerks round your neck, knackering things up all the time, we do it this way because we've done it like this for the last fifty years. All the old stuff. You know. I'd got to a pitch where the only way out of it as far as I could see was to bugger off somewhere where everything was new. Though I didn't really want to leave England for ever.'He throws me a grin. 'I like the beer too much.'

  The old Conroy, I'm thinking: full of bad language, a liking for beer and skittles all mixed up with one for books and music, and all sorts of sensitive spots occasionally showing through. I say the old Conroy, but actually the first Conroy I knew was a loudmouthed, thick-headed, ignorant lout who shook me no end when he let me see his hidden depths. He doesn't seem to keep them as hidden now; but maybe that's because he's a few years older and in a happier position, and partly because I know him better and he doesn't have to put on an act with me. Though he still has his secrets. That marriage of his, for instance; mentioned just once when he was drunk and then tucked away again out of sight...

  We're up to a big traffic island with a sign showing roads off to Colchester, Chelmsford and Southend, and this seems to mark the end of the town proper. Beyond it, on the road Conroy takes, are semi-detached and detached houses, modern and posh-looking, behind well-established lawns and trees. Conroy swings the car left up a side road with open fields beyond it and in a couple of minutes we're going through a gate in a wire fence on to a stretch of flat ground, and there are the factory bays in front of us with the thump of a cropping machine coming from one of them and carrying to us on the cold air. Conroy parks in front of a long single-storey prefabricated office building next to a blue Zephyr estate car and we get out.

  'Here we are, then.' He walks towards a door with me following. 'There's nothing fancy about this set-up yet,'he says over his shoulder, 'so don't expect fitted carpets and uniformed commissionaires.'

  There's no commissionaire at all as far as I can see, and nothing on the floors except brown lino. There's perhaps half a dozen people to be seen and one or two heads lift on the other side of the glass as we go along the corridor. Sizing up the new man? No, more likely the vague interest anybody feels in a strange face. A funny thing, that, the way human beings swim about in the same tank, lots of them never seeing one another, others crossing tracks, and some bumping in real contact. For instance, if I go away from here today for good there's nobody who's seen me will remember me. If I come to a job, though, I'll become part of their lives; even altering some of them a little bit. All of which deep thinking flashes through my powerful mind as we go into the biggest office at the end of the building.

  Jimmy Slade grins at me from behind one of the four drafting machines and I wink and grin back as Conroy has a word with a smoky blonde piece in a dark green wool frock who's sitting at a desk by one of the doors leading out of the main office. She stops typing to answer Conroy.

  'Yes, he's by himself. I should look in. He's expecting you.'

  What is it about birds in wool? They seem to give off an extra body warmth that their perfume floats on.

  'Oh, by the way,'Conroy says, 'this is Vic Brown ... Cynthia Holness.'

  We say hello and her eyes come up to my face for a second's acknowledgement, then away again.

  'You have a natter with Jimmy for a minute, Vic,' Conroy says. He taps on the door behind Cynthia and goes through, closing it behind him.

  Jimmy grins again and swivels half round on his stool as I walk over to him. We shake hands.

  'Nice to have something decorative about the place,'I say.

  'Who, Cynthia? Yes. But her sights are set high, old cock, and draughtsmen - married or single - don't come into the picture.'

  'What did I say?'

  He laughs. 'Anyway, how's the old married man?'

  'Fair to middling.'

  'And Ingrid?'

  'The same. I hear you're doing a spot of courting these days.'

  Jimmy shrugs. 'It comes to most of us sooner or later.'

  'What's the set-up here, then?'I look at what's on his board as I talk to him.

  'The money's good and the work's interesting.'

  'Any snags?'

  'Well, I don't think there's anything to be scared of in the work itself. The only thing with a firm like this is you never know how they stand on the financial side. You know, whether they're sound or not. We've got a fair amount of work on but I wouldn't say we're established yet, exactly. For all I know the people behind us could make a decision tomorrow that would put us all out of work.'

  'Well, I shan't have a job in a week or two anyway.'

  'No, and there are plenty more about, so I'm not particularly worried.'

  'What about this Franklyn feller, the boss?'

  'Oh, he's all right. One thing about him is he can't stand - '

  But I don't get to know what it is Franklyn can't stand because just then Conroy sticks his head out of the other office and shouts me over:

  'Vic. You can come in now.'

  'I might see you later,'I say to Jimmy.

  'Yup. And astonishing good luck, mate.'

  The bird, Cynthia, doesn't even look up as I go past her and through the door Conroy's holding open for me. If it comes to that, why should she? But she's a real cool piece, all right. You can see that a mile off.

  And so's Franklyn, it strikes me, in a way. Or maybe preoccupied is a better word, and not much sense of humour to go with it.

  He scrapes his swivel chair back and leans across the desk to shake hands as I go into his office and Conroy makes with the introductions. Then he waves me over to one of the two straight chairs. There's a sheepskin-lined coat over the other chair so Conroy
stays on his feet, leaning his shoulders against the asbestos board wall, his hands in his trousers pockets. Franklyn hasn't done himself proud either. All there is is this biggish square double-sided desk in the middle of the lino, these two chairs apart from his swivel,- a bookcase with some fat technical tomes in it, and a coat stand with nothing on it. His hat's on his head, a trilby, stained a bit round the band and pushed back far enough for me to see the beginnings of sandy hair that I'll bet is going thin on top. He looks for all the world like a smallish independent builder and I guess he's a lot happier out on site than he is behind a desk.'

  'Albert tells me he's talked to you about the set-up here,'Franklyn says, 'and I can take his word for what you can do ... So the main thing now is whether you feel like coming and giving it a try.'He takes a fag from the Senior Service twenty on the desk and then offers the packet to me. We light up from his Ronson gas lighter. 'You're not in engineering at present?'

  'No, I left it to help a man I knew in his music shop. I thought there were some good prospects but he died a bit sudden.'

  'You want to come back into engineering now, though? You must do,'he says, as though it's a silly question, 'or you wouldn't have come all this way to see us.'

  'There's no future in being a shop assistant.'

  'Not much, I shouldn't think.'He rocks back in his chair and puts his knee to the edge of the desk. 'What about money?'

  'Well...'I wish now I'd brought this up with Conroy, but it's an awkward point sometimes because draughtsmanship can be a funny trade in that respect. We have a union and there are recognized minimum rates up to twenty-five; but some firms pay more and others a bit less and it can be the case in some offices that you're never sure how much the bloke on the next board is getting. Now I don't want to ask for either too much or too little, so I have to trot out the old formula.

  'I couldn't consider less than union rate,'I say, wondering if this is right or wrong and how he's going to take it.

  You see, all kinds of firms employ draughtsmen, from those with hundreds of men in offices all over the country, where a bloke hardly knows the name of the bod three boards away, to little concerns like this one where the boss himself knows everybody. In a big office there'll be red tape and wage scales laid down at top level, and you need a strong union representation to protect your rights. In a small firm there's likely to be more give and take. They might pay you a bit more than the rate but expect you to keep your eyes off the clock and not put in a bill for every odd hour of overtime you work. Again, on their side, pay for a long sick leave might be extended according to whether they like you and think you're playing fair. In a big firm they'll have to work to the book. So generally speaking, and taking cases as they come, shouting the odds in a little firm with a friendly atmosphere does nothing but stiffen relationships all round and make everybody worse off. And I don't want Franklyn to start out thinking I'm the sort of bloke who'll be quoting the rule book at every verse end.

  And then he asks me what the rate is and I have to say I'm not sure because I haven't been in the union since I left Whittaker's.

  Conroy looks blank as well. He's in the union but he can't quote the rate. 'Jimmy might know,'he says, and goes out, leaving Franklyn and me on our own.

  'I think Albert said you were married.'

  'Yes.'

  'But no children?'

  'No. Not yet.'

  'That makes you a bit more mobile, anyway.'

  'Yes. I was wondering about housing and all that.'

  'What sort of accommodation have you got now?'

  I tell him, a flat.

  'You'll find houses a bit more expensive than they are up north; but you shouldn't have any trouble getting rooms for the time being, with no children. Does your wife fancy moving down here?'

  'Well, she ...'I begin, and let it die as the door opens and Conroy comes in with a union vacancy list which he hands to Franklyn.

  'Did we advertise in this?'

  'I thought I'd get in touch with Vic first.'

  Franklyn says 'Mmm,'and looks at the wages table quoted in the list. 'Oh well,'he says in a second, 'there shouldn't be any trouble there.'He mentions a figure. 'I was thinking of that for a start. It's what . . .? Fifteen bob above the rate for the London area.'He looks at me.'If you'd start on that and see what happens after a few months.'

  'That seems fair enough.'

  Franklyn throws the list on to the desk. 'All I'm bothered about is keeping the job moving,'he says. 'Providing we can do that I'm ready to pay as much as my superiors will let me.'

  I nod. I can see that it's the work that interests him and all this chat about money is a bind he's got himself landed with.

  The phone rings and he reaches for the receiver.

  'Franklyn ... Yes ... Well I thought I'd made that plain, John ... Yes, he might do but I told him quite clearly this morning . . . Well I'm sorry I didn't tell you but how was I to know he didn't understand plain English? . . . Yes, well I'll be over in five minutes and he'd better have a good story. I won't have both ends played off against the middle.. . No, you did right to tell me... Look, if I have to pin a bloody notice up every time I tell somebody to do something it's time we all packed up ... Yes, five minutes, John.'

  He puts the phone down. 'I'll have to leave you, Albert. You give Vic any more information he needs to make up his mind.'He looks at me again. 'I don't want to rush you and I don't expect a decision now, but when can you let us know?'

  'Well... inside a week. Will that do?'

  'Yes, fine.'He gets up. 'If I don't see you again before you go, have a nice trip back.'He's struggling into his coat as he goes out.

  'Is that it, then?'I stand up, surprised that it's over so quick and easy.

  Conroy shrugs. 'What could he ask you, your twelve times tables? If I hadn't known you he'd have had to interview you a bit more, but what can you tell about any bloke really before you set him on?'

  'And what can you tell about a firm before you work there?'

  Conroy nods. 'It's a gamble on both sides.'He opens the door. 'Come on, we'll go and get a cup of tea and then I'll show you round the shops. What time train have you to catch?'

  I tell him the time of the last one which will get me my connections at the other end.

  'Oh, we'll see you catch it.'

  'All done and dusted; interviewed, classified and filed?'Jimmy asks when we're back in the main office.

  'It's in the envelope,'I say, and I'm pleased when he laughs because it's an old joke of ours from way back and the way he picks it up so quickly makes me feel at home with him like in the old days, and takes away some of the strangeness of this place.

  Running back through the town to the station with Conroy, the lights on now, the figures huddled in their coats against the cold (it seems colder here than at home), I wonder if these people and these streets will soon be as familiar as those in Cressley; and I try to project myself and Ingrid into this new life.

  But it's something I can't do. Behind all my thinking is a wall that I come up against when I try to think too far ahead for Ingrid and me. The best thing to do is take things one at a time, as they come. And this job ... well, it's not so much the job itself as a feeling somehow that I've got to take it to prove something to myself.

  5

  The trains north are pretty quick these days and with something to read the journey isn't bad. But Cressley isn't on the main line and the last bit, by diesel from Wakefield and a bus up through town, is what makes it all a bit of a drag.

  Sitting in the bus, seeing the lights of the town centre and thinking back over today, I've all at once got a hollow scared feeling in the bottom of my stomach. And I know just what it's saying to me. 'What do you want to go all that way off for, among people you don't know? Why don't you stay here? You know these streets and these people. You've lived here all your life. You belong here. You're safe here.'Yes, safe. You big soft nit. When are you going to stop hanging on to your mother's apron strings? Becau
se that's what it amounts to. This place, these people, the old familiar life; you get collywobbles at the thought of leaving them. 'Why not ring Whittaker's and ask for a job? They'll give you one. They liked you. They were sorry to see you leave. They'll be glad to have you back. Or if you don't want to go back there; have a change. There are plenty of other firms who'd take you on. Why trail two hundred miles for the sake of it? Ingrid doesn't want to go, does she? You're going to have to do a lot of talking to win her over. And is it worth it?'

  Is it worth it?

  I let myself into the flat with my key and rind it dark and empty, the fire out and a note to say Ingrid's round at her mother's and will I go and fetch her. And there's me expecting my slippers warming by the fire and supper waiting for me.

  The streets are cold and empty, the pubs shut now, and only a few late cars humming by on the main road. I never know what to expect from Ingrid's mother these days and I'm not too easy as I go up the path and ring the doorbell. Ingrid answers it.

  'Oh,'she says, 'you're here. I thought you'd got lost.'

  'I came straight round,'I tell her.'I didn't even take me coat off.'

  She walks away from me down the hall as I'm talking and I step inside and shut the door behind me, thinking as I always do when I see this hallway about the night I got drunk and Ma Rothwell let me in and we had our big bust-up.

  I'm pleased to see she's in a good mood, sitting in an armchair by the fire in her thick dressing-gown, and amiable Joe that I am, I take this at its face value. One of my troubles is that I don't dislike people very well. What I mean is, I can dislike somebody without holding it against him, and I'm easily won round.