Twice Shy

'I didn't know he had any actual tapes,' she said. 'But of course he was always around. It was his job, you know, collecting the day-sheets from all the departments and bringing them to me. He'd always hang around a bit, especially the last few weeks, asking how the computer worked, you know? I showed him how it came up with all the quantities, how much salt, you know, and things like that, had to be shifted to each department, and how all the orders went through, mixed container loads to Bournemouth or Birmingham, you know. The whole firm would collapse you know, without the computer.'

'What make is it?' I said.

'What make?' They all thought it an odd question, but I'd have gambled on the answer.

'A Grantley,' Janet said.

I smiled at her as inoffensively as I knew how and asked her if she would have let Chris Norwood run his tapes through her Grantley if he'd asked her nicely, and after some guilty hesitation and a couple of downward blushes into her rum and coke, said she might have done, you know, at one time, before they discovered, you know, that it was Chris who was stealing their cash.

'We should have guessed it ages ago,' Carol said, 'but then the things he took, like our sandwiches and such, and things out of the office, staples, envelopes, rolls of sticky tape, well we saw him take those, we were used to it.'

'Didn't anyone ever complain?' I said.

Not officially, the girls said. What was the use? The firm never sacked people for nicking things, if they did there would be a strike.

'Except that time, do you remember, Janet?' Carol said. 'When that poor old lady turned up, wittering on about Chris stealing things from her house. She complained, all right. She came back three times, making a fuss.'

'Oh sure,' Janet nodded. 'But it turned out it was only some odd bits of paper she was on about, you know, nothing like money or valuables, and anyway Chris said she was losing her marbles, and had thrown them away, most like, and it all blew over, you know.'

I said, 'What was the old lady's name?'

The girls looked at each other and shook their heads. It was weeks ago, they said.

Akkerton said he hadn't known of that, he'd never heard about the old lady, not down with his Veg.

The girls' boyfriends arrived at that moment and there was a general re-shuffle round the tables. I said I would have to be going, and by one of those unspoken messages Akkerton indicated that I should see him outside.

'O'Rorke,' said Carol suddenly.

'What?'

'The old lady's name,' she said. 'I've remembered. It was Mrs O'Rorke. She was Irish. Her husband had just died, and she'd been paying Chris to carry logs in for her fire, and things like that that she couldn't manage.'

'I don't suppose you remember where she lived?'

'Does it matter? It was only a great fuss over nothing,'

'Still…'

She frowned slightly with obliging concentration, though most of her attention was on her boyfriend, who was tending to flirt with Janet.

'Stetchworth,' she exclaimed. 'She complained about the taxi fare.' She gave me a quick glance. 'To be honest, we were glad to be rid of her in the end. She was an awful old nuisance, but we couldn't be too unkind because of her old man dying, and that.'

'Thanks very much,' I said.

'You're welcome.' She moved away from me and sat herself decisively between her boyfriend and Janet, and Akkerton and I went outside to settle our business.

He looked philosophically at what I gave him, nodded and asked me to write my name and address on a piece of paper in case he thought of anything else to tell me. I tore a page out of my diary, wrote, and gave it to him thinking that our transaction was over, but when I'd shaken his hand, said goodbye and walked away from him he called after me.

'Wait, lad.'

I turned back.

'Did you get your money's worth?' he said.

More than I'd bargained for, I thought. I said, 'Yes, I think so. Can't really tell yet.'

He nodded, pursing his lips. Then with an uncharacteristically awkward gesture he held out half of the cash. 'Here,' he said. 'You take it. I saw into your wallet in the pub. You're nearly cleaned out. Enough's enough.' He thrust his gift towards my hand, and I took it back with gratitude. 'Teachers,' he said, pushing open the pub door. 'Downtrodden underpaid lot of bastards. Never reckoned much to school myself.' He brushed away my attempt at thanks and headed back to the beer.

CHAPTER 6

By map and in spite of misdirections, I eventually found the O'Rorke house in Stetchworth. Turned into the driveway. Stopped the engine. Climbed out of the car, looking at what lay ahead.

A large rambling untidy structure; much wood, many gables, untrained creeper pushing tendrils onto the slated roof, and sash window frames long ago painted white. The garden in the soft evening light seemed a matter of grasses and shrubs growing wherever they liked; and a large bush of lilac, white and sweet-scented, almost obliterated the front door.