The Barbershop Seven

by Douglas Lindsay

  'Excellent,' said Hemingway.

  'You sure the Margies and Joes are going to know what a l'aisselle is?' asked Fitzgerald.

  It was no big deal questioning Orwell. He was quite happy to answer all critics from within, because he was comfortable with his own ball-breaking confidence. His men all knew they could say what they wanted. No Tony Blair or Margaret Thatcher this man. Critics were welcome.

  He smiled and patted Fitzgerald on the back as he walked past him, folder back under his arm.

  'The woman's going to be putting the stuff on her armpits at the time, Hugo. If some people are just too stupid to work out what the hell a l'aisselle is, do we actually want them to buy the damned product?'

  Laughing at his own line, he turned once more and embraced the three of them with a smile.

  'You cool with the rest of it, Piers?' he asked.

  'Sure,' said Hemingway.

  And with that, Orwell was gone.

  The door closed and once again the room was silent, the only noise the sounds of a cold London in March. Wodehouse turned away once more and looked down at the hypnotic river below. Fitzgerald stared at the table and felt a little foolish.

  'Right,' said Hemingway, 'you heard the man. Let's get on with it, there's plenty more to sort out.'

  'Totally,' said Wodehouse.

  Bloody suck up, thought Fitzgerald.

  The Black Eye Of The Gull

  'Will the rain ever stop?'

  Barney Thomson turned away from the window of the shop and looked behind him. He could see Igor in the back room making another cup of tea. Back hunched, bending over the worktop. Fifth cup that day, not yet eleven o'clock. Nothing much else to do.

  Barney stared at Keanu. The lad was kicked back, feet up on the edge of the counter, nearing the end of The Lost Children of Ngor Lak. Had so far managed to stay awake.

  It had been a long slow winter, the three of them hanging on until the spring rush. If it ever came. Barney had begun to think that maybe it was time he went on the move again. He didn't need to sell the shop. He could leave Igor in charge, Keanu would be able to take care of the haircutting, and Barney would have the safety net to return to should his peregrinations be unfulfilling. Maybe they would take in enough money for the two of them to get by if he wasn't around.

  'What?' asked Barney.

  Keanu looked up. He was smiling.

  'What?' he said.

  'You said something,' said Barney. 'About the rain.'

  Keanu looked mildly curious, thought about it for a second, but couldn't remember having said anything for the previous twenty minutes. Shook his head, looked back at the book. Immediately started smiling again.

  Barney stared around the room. He'd known it wasn't Keanu who had spoken. Hadn't been his voice. He shivered, looked back out of the window.

  Igor appeared at his side, two cups of tea in hand, Keanu's already placed at his side. Barney took the cup and nodded. Igor stood beside him and the two of them stared across the road, across the white promenade wall, out to sea.

  A single seagull circled slowly across the road, and then came to rest on the wall across from the shop. It turned and looked at Barney, seemed to stare straight into his soul. Igor shivered and glanced at Barney.

  The gull had haunted Barney Thomson in the past, but had not been seen in over two years. Two weeks previously, however, it had reappeared.

  'Arf,' muttered Igor.

  Barney nodded. 'I know, my hunchbacked little friend,' he said. 'He's back.'

  'Who's back?' asked Keanu, appearing beside them.

  Barney glanced back at the book, now placed on the counter.

  'What happened?'

  'The Kate Winslet and Helena Bonham-Carter characters just had sex, but they're done now and it got a little flat afterwards. Thought I'd take a break. Maybe a customer'll come in.'

  Barney smiled. Not much chance of that. There was barely anyone walking along the street, never mind coming in looking for a haircut of any description.

  'Ah, the seagull's back,' said Keanu, noticing the bird staring at them from across the wall. 'I guess some weird shit's about to go down.'

  'You think?'

  Keanu nodded, then placed a hand, the one which didn't have an obligation to a cup of tea, on Barney's shoulder.

  'You know, my haircutting genius of a friend, that once that wee fella pitches up, gloom, mayhem and disorder cannot be far behind. I say, bring it on. It's about time something happened around this joint.'

  'Arf,' said Igor.

  Barney didn't reply. He stared into the black eye of the gull across the road. The notion struck him. This was his fate. How many years had he been looking into the black eye of the gull? Now here he was, too restless to settle, too tired to face more gloom, mayhem and disorder.

  The weight of his unhappiness settled on the shop. The wind forced the rain against the window, chains clanked across the street. Two old women scowled past, their heads bowed to the weather, on their way to the Post Office. If it was still in business. A car drove by spraying water across the pavement. Human life moved on. Once more the main street was deserted. The three men stood and looked across at the gull.

  Igor saw them first, staring along the street in the direction of Kames. Slowly Barney and then Keanu picked up on his gaze, and they followed his look along the road.

  Two men, dark suits, black ties, black, expensive shoes. No overcoats, seemingly oblivious to the weather. They walked at a steady pace, eyes straight ahead. They were on the other side of the road, but there was no doubt where they were heading.

  'And as if by magic ... ' said Keanu.

  'Hmm,' said Barney. 'I don't think it's magic.'

  Keanu looked back at the gull as it shuffled backwards off the white promenade wall and turned and flew away out across the sea. He waved his cup in its direction.

  'How does he know? I mean really, it's a dumb-ass seagull, but it knows when there's shit about to happen. How weird is that?'

  Neither Barney nor Igor answered. Barney knew, but he wasn't about to get into some strange discussion which might, frankly, verge into metaphysics and the nature of good and evil.

  The two men crossed the road without checking for traffic. They still hadn't looked at the barbershop, but it was obvious that this was their intended destination. Suddenly Igor and Keanu got the sense of what was about to happen. These two men were coming for Barney, and even though it might not be in any particularly invasive way, even though they weren't about to force Barney to go with them, they knew that Barney would go.

  They looked at Barney. Barney stared straight ahead, his eyes never leaving the two men as they neared. Suddenly the dull idyll of the barbershop was about to be shattered, as surely as if a bomb had been dropped on them.

  The door opened. The two men walked in. They looked like Federal Agents. Men on a mission, at the very least on a mission to be inordinately cool. They left the door open. They weren't staying.

  Keanu and Igor waited for them to produce badges and guns. The announcement of their government credentials. Barney glanced at his jacket on the peg on the wall. Looked back out to sea, to see whether the gull was still in the area. The cold day, the grey sea looked back at him.

  'One of you is Barney Thomson,' said one of the men. His voice was too high-pitched for his clothes, had a thin east London accent.

  'We're from PricewaterhouseCoopers,' said the other guy, in what sounded like a staged American accent.

  'Why the fuck are you dressed like that, then?' said Keanu, annoyed at these men who were about to shatter his sylvan barbershop bliss.

  'Mr Thomson,' said High Pitch, looking directly at Barney now, 'we're headhunters for a firm in the City. Our client, Mr Bethlehem of Bethlehem, Forsyth & Crane, is looking for a personal barber.'

  Keanu looked disdainfully at them, the questions queueing up in his mouth. Why Barney? How had they even heard about Barney? Were they going to give him a trial? An interview? What was so spe
cial about Barney?

  The questions stalled at the last one. Barney had a few questions himself, but he didn't need to ask them. This moment had been coming for a while.

  Barney put his hand on Igor's shoulder and squeezed. Igor looked sorrowfully up at his boss. The shop had been gripped by sadness. If the men in suits felt it, they were at least oblivious to the fact that they had caused it.

  'Arf,' said Igor. Even Keanu understood him. You can't go. Not like this, not just suddenly dropping everything. This is your home. This is your job. We're your friends. This is your life. We need you ...

  Barney squeezed Igor's shoulder more tightly then let go. He felt the weight of sudden sadness even more heavily than the others. An instant oppressive melancholy, that staying in the shop would not conquer.

  'Sorry,' he muttered to Igor. 'I'll get my coat,' he added, talking to the men in suits, then he patted Keanu on the arm as he walked past.

  Two and a half minutes later, Barney Thomson walked from his barbershop in Millport and neither Igor nor Keanu knew if he would ever be back.

  Like A Virgin

  The waitress appeared beside him, as she had done repeatedly throughout his one hour stay. She was always more attentive to customers whom she found attractive – she was no different from any other member of the world's waiting collective – and Barney had the disenchanted look about him that she so loved in men. Tired eyes, but eyes that showed depth and intelligence and wisdom. She had tried to make conversation, but he hadn't been interested, and she'd consequently found him all the more beguiling.

  'Can I get you anything else?' she asked, the third time she'd used those words to start her approach, a poor second to is everything all right for you, sir?

  Barney looked up. Confident enough in himself to recognise her attraction, but not interested. He knew he had the look about him, the look of the traveller, the look of one who walked amongst men, restless and weary. Women loved that, but he also knew he could never be as interesting as they hoped he was going to be. He was running from life and the strangulation of attachment and community; he was no warrior.

  'I'm all right, thanks, Selina,' he said. 'I should be going shortly.'

  'You can't go out in that,' she said, wishing that every word which left her mouth could be more erudite.

  'Places to go,' said Barney.

  Selina, name-badged to an adoring world, stared at him and wondered where it was that this man had to go to. Somewhere dangerous, she imagined. The eyes said as much. The rest of the people in here were taking a break from shoe-shopping or were about to go off to meet their mother-in-law or their accountant. But this man, who'd drunk three cups of tea and eaten two pieces of cherry pie, he would have grander designs.

  'All right there, darlin',' said a man's voice behind her. 'You going to stand there ogling that bloke all day? Get us a cheese sandwich, luv.'

  Selina smiled at Barney, no trace of embarrassment.

  'Got to go,' she said.

  Barney smiled, said nothing.

  'You're welcome,' Selina added as an afterthought, and turned round to the next table, to the man who was after some mature cheddar.

  Barney turned and looked once more out of the window. During the brief intercourse with the waitress the rain had begun to ease, although not yet enough for anyone to venture out from under cover. He checked his watch again, lifted the cup to his mouth, and looked outside at pools of water dancing with the raindrops.

  ***

  Thirty-five minutes later, Barney was off the Docklands Railway, and walking the short distance to the building which housed the offices of Bethlehem, Forsyth & Crane. Checked the small gold nameplate screwed into the wall, pressed the buzzer and waited. The rain had all but ceased, but there was a cold wind bustling down here from the river, and he pulled his jacket tightly around him.

  'Hello?' crackled at him, and he looked up into the small camera which was showing him to the receptionist and the security guards on each level of the building.

  'Barney Thomson, barber,' said Barney, and immediately the door buzzed. He pushed it open and he walked into the domain of the seventh largest advertising agency in Britain. Up some stairs, around a corner, through another door and he was into reception.

  The waiting area suggested everything you'd expect from a modern, chic, marketing operation. Sleek, minimalist Scandinavian furniture in pale colours; a few stark modern pictures of nothing in particular, painted in pallid blues and yellows; abrupt chairs, built for style rather than comfort; and a tremendous feeling of freshness and light and cleanliness. Almost as if there was a giant invisible panty liner soaking up all the dirt and darkness and grime.

  They made TV adverts in offices like this.

  The receptionist was sitting behind a clean-lined desk of pale brown veneer, straight-backed and elegant, her fingers surgically attached to her keyboard. She wore one of those little mics in front of her lips, as if she was Madonna and at any minute was liable to start gambolling full-chested around the room singing Like A Prayer. She went by the name of Imelda Marcos – not the Imelda Marcos, mind, although she was partial to a new pair of shoes – and was ready for Barney with a clipped smile and eyebrows that met in the middle.

  'Mr Thomson?'

  'I was ten seconds ago,' said Barney. Already tired of the purity of it all. If there had been a marketing agency reception on The Little House On The Prairie, it would've been this clean and wholesome.

  'You're three and a half minutes early,' said Imelda, the smile vanishing, never to return. 'Would you like a drink?'

  'What've you got?' asked Barney, looking around the area and choosing to sit down in an ergonomically designed comfy chair, with cushioning to suit the average Scandinavian backside.

  Imelda Marcos's back was up. There'd been the ten seconds ago sarcastic remark, and now the bloke had had the temerity to sit down without first being offered a seat. Her voice rattled out, Gatling gun rapid-fire. Barney was a Zulu and she was Welsh.

  'Latte, espresso, decaf, New York decaf, cappuccino, Earl Grey, lapsang souchong, Darjeeling or iced hydrogenated mineral water?'

  Barney crossed his legs. 'A cup of tea would be nice,' he said. 'PG Tips if you've got it.'

  Imelda gave him the Stare for a few seconds, pressed a quick button and spoke into her Like A Prayer microphone.

  'Cup of English Breakfast for Barney Thomson,' she clipped. 'No sugar.'

  ***

  First there were The Folk Who Filled The Vacancies, then there was Personnel, then Human Resources. Bethlehem, Forsyth & Crane had a Miscellaneous Anthropoid Department. Situated on the third floor, MAD employed nine people. The head of the department rarely conducted interviews himself. However the hair of his employees was something about which Thomas Bethlehem felt very strongly, and he had asked Anthony Waugh if he wouldn't mind taking charge of the barber interviews. The proximity of the two dictates that the state of your hair impacts on the state of your brain, Bethlehem had once ridiculously pronounced, although he hadn't meant it. Still, he liked his employees well turned out and deliciously manicured.

  Waugh was a seventh generation Oxford graduate, brought in by Bethlehem at great expense from Saatchi to help attract superior quality staff. Waugh had come for the money, and had no intention of ever settling at what was a smaller company. He was not entirely unlike those highly paid overseas dumplings who sign for Rangers and Celtic for a couple of years, before leaving for England; except that he was genuine top quality – he was Christian Vieri rather than Daniel Cousin – and the top three London agencies hadn't understood what he was playing at working for BF&C.

  Bethlehem wanted to conquer the business in Britain, he wanted to be a player on the international scene, he wanted to do it from the base which he already had, and he'd known the only way to get there was to hire the best people. And the way to get the best people was to hire the best human resources man he could get hold of. Anthony Waugh had not come cheaply, but he'd had his price, same as
everyone else on the planet.

  'You worked for the Scottish First Minister?' said Waugh, looking up from a piece of paper Barney couldn't read. Waugh was bored. He was no fan of Bethlehem, and considered that he was doing this absurd barber thing more as a favour to the boss, rather than under some sort of diktat. However, he'd never had any intention of spending his day interviewing a stream of haircutters to find out if they knew what a mullet was. He had used his contacts, he had sent out his people, and he had selected his man. This pretence at an interview was to keep it all above board, keep Bethlehem happy, and would allow him to tick another box on the way to his big city bonus. To all intents and purposes, however, Barney already had the job.

  'Not for long,' said Barney. 'Just a few days. Didn't really work out.'

  Waugh scanned the next couple of lines, even though it was already in his head.

  'Since then you've worked in Millport, but from the fact you're here, I guess you're not settled there. The peripatetical man who can't settle, is that you?'

  'More Incredible Hulk than Aristotle,' said Barney.

  'He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god,' said Waugh, quoting the legendary Greek marketing executive.

  Barney smiled. Not a lot you can say to people when they're going to quote ancient philosophy at you. A neat little one liner from the livid green giant might have been appropriate, but then the big fella never really did say much that was worth repeating.

  'Sometimes the soul needs to wander as much as the mind,' he said, saying what the Incredible Hulk was probably thinking under all those rage issues that kept coming to the surface.

  'Indeed,' said Waugh. 'And how long d'you think you'll work for Mr Bethlehem before your mind and soul need to wander?'

  Barney shrugged. 'You people asked me to come here,' he said. 'You'll get what you pay for. I'm not promising you anything, except that I can do any haircut that any of your employees will ask for.'