Screwtop Thompson Read online

  “Would you like a sandwich?” he asked, opening the lid. “I’m supposed to keep papers in here, but to tell you the truth I hardly ever get round to reading them. Always get given lots of papers. In case I miss something, I suppose. Good job really. My wife says I never listen. Not properly. Still, it all goes down in the minutes. I’m just there to agree with everyone really. Salmon and cucumber, I think. Yes. Like one?”

  I said, “Thank you, no,” and he turned and smiled with bushy eyebrows raised.

  “You don’t mind if I…?”

  “No, no. Of course not. Bon appetit.”

  “Ah, merci.”

  The swallows were skimming low and it might rain soon. I could feel the dampness coming through from the bench, but it would have been rude of me to rise. So I waited while the archdeacon broke his bread alone. Silence had fallen, for the moment, on our small corner of the world. One of the flagstones between the bench and the door had a crack across it, from which moss grew. Some of the others had signs of weakness, here and there. I began to count them, from left to right, in my head, but the silence had become too much for my companion.

  “Lovely garden, don’t you think?”

  “Yes.”

  “Absolutely lovely. Abounds with flowers in summer. There’s a man comes from the council, twice a week. Sort of loan, I believe. Do you know him?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “Very nice man. Will always give you the time of day. Very nice. Always sweeps up.”

  “That’s good,” I said.

  “Yes indeed.”

  We smiled and nodded together. A moment passed.

  “Cost a lot, will it?” he asked. “This new roof?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Can’t be helped, I suppose. Nothing lasts forever.”

  I glanced at my watch.

  “Oh dear,” said the archdeacon, closing his lid and rising quickly. “Rather damp, this bench.”

  Here was the opportunity for me to rise as well, and we paced about upon the flagstones, turning our backs on the breeze that was getting up. The shrubs rustled as the archdeacon fastened his overcoat buttons, an empty briefcase clamped between his knees. In the tower high above a bell struck nine.

  “This always happens to me when I arrive early somewhere,” he said, preparing to see the funny side of it. “I end up being late.”

  We waited.

  “Aren’t there any others?” I asked.

  “Should be,” he replied. “Usually seven or eight at least.”

  “Perhaps we should try the front door again.”

  “Wasn’t it locked?”

  “Well, I thought you said it was.”

  He pulled a face. “Oh dear.”

  ♦

  The front door was not locked, but because of the archdeacon, we entered the cathedral late. The rest of the committee were waiting inside, still wearing their coats.

  “So sorry,” he explained. “Slight misunderstanding about which door.”

  His arrival brought in the fresh air from outside. They forgave him with a shiver.

  “Better late than never, Norman,” said the chairman, leading the way to where an antechamber had been prepared. There was a round table surrounded by wooden chairs with leather seats, and in the corner stood a cylinder-gas heater, pale flames nickering on the gauze. As we looked for our places the archdeacon took command.

  “Now I’m going to sit next to you because I know absolutely nothing about architecture!”

  He sat down in the treasurer’s seat beside mine, in spite of the card marked ‘Treasurer’. The chairman’s table plan was now upset. He tried to intervene. The archdeacon did not listen. He was telling me about his pen.

  “Gift from the last chancellor. Christmas 1972 it was. No, sorry, ‘71. Very nice man. Always exchanged gifts at Christmas. Without fail. Terrible loss and we miss him greatly. Never let me down, this pen.” He removed its cap, examined the nib and then replaced the cap again.

  “Won’t be needing it today, of course. Not with all these pencils Frank provides. Always a box of pencils. You wouldn’t believe it. If I had all the pencils…oh, we’re ready, are we, Frank? Sorry.”

  ♦

  The chairman, meanwhile, had made diplomatic moves and managed to rearrange the table plan without the archdeacon even noticing. At last we were all seated and the minutes of the previous meeting were read aloud.

  Beside me the archdeacon had fallen silent for the time being. As business proceeded and various points were raised, he carefully balanced his pencil at the edge of his pad. If he placed a finger on one end of the pencil, it would dip and touch the table surface. When he removed his finger it became level again. After half an hour he suddenly took up his pencil and wrote LIGHT BULB in block letters across one corner of the pad. The rest of the time he nodded and smiled, and gave the appearance of listening.

  At the end of the first session, the chairman addressed the archdeacon: “Unless you’ve got anything to add to that, Norman?”

  “No, no,” said my neighbour with confidence. “Sounds fine to me.”

  There then followed a welcome break for coffee and biscuits. Before I had a chance to stretch myself, a firm hand took me by the arm and led me over to a newly opened hatch.

  As he offered a plate of Malted Milks the archdeacon spoke in a low voice. “Not going too bad, is it?”

  “So far, no,” I agreed.

  “Not too bad at all. Odd that they haven’t mentioned the roof yet.”

  “Odd?”

  “Yes. Must be a trial for your patience.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “You being the architect and everything.” He looked at me. “You did say you were the architect, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, architect would be one way of describing me,” I replied. “I sort of plan things really. Set things up.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I see.”

  The archdeacon stirred sugar into his coffee before he spoke again. “But we will be getting onto the roof eventually, won’t we?” he asked.

  “Eventually,” I said.

  When we got back to the committee table the chairman had already been round tidying up. The archdeacon’s pencil, for example, had been returned to the holder in the centre of the table. Also the place cards indicating people’s status had been rearranged in the new order dictated by the archdeacon’s decision to sit next to me. As I resumed my seat I selected a pencil for the second session, and chose one for the archdeacon too.

  “How kind,” he remarked, preparing to balance it again at the edge of his pad.

  The second session continued in much the same way as the first, with a number of reports being read out and approved. After a while the archdeacon drew a circle around LIGHT BULB, the outline of which he renewed from time to time as the hours passed, until it became a dark ring surrounding the words. Then he added a pair of ears at the top of the circle, as well as some cats’ whiskers, before laying his pencil down.

  The gas-cylinder heater in the corner had taken the earlier coolness out of the room, and now, humming quietly, it began to devour the remaining fresh air. There were no windows that could be opened for ventilation, and because the walls were thick, few sounds came in from the world outside. Apart from the hourly chiming of the bell in the tower above, the discussions of the committee were all that could be heard.

  At one o’clock the chairman announced that it was time for lunch, and the archdeacon immediately got up and headed for the door.

  “Where are you going, Norman?” asked the chairman.

  “Just a little errand I’ve got to run,” replied the archdeacon. “Won’t be long.”

  “But we’re having a working lunch. There isn’t time for you to go wandering off anywhere.”

  The archdeacon looked dismayed. “I haven’t any sandwiches left.”

  “You can share mine,” I said.

  “Oh,” said the archdeacon, returning to his place. “Thank you. You’re
so very kind.”

  The other members of the committee all had packed lunches wrapped in silver foil. Some also had apples, while some had individual fruit pies or cakes. My sandwiches were plain Cheddar cheese, but there were enough for two.

  The archdeacon ate in silence as further conversation was exchanged around the table. Then, before the afternoon session began in earnest, he was permitted a brief stroll around the cathedral close, just to stretch his legs. I offered to accompany him and we went outside.

  “I must say,” he confided, as the door swung shut behind us, “I’ve never attended such a long meeting before. Seems to be going on forever.”

  “Well, there’s a lot to cover,” I said.

  “Oh yes,” he replied. “Yes, I can see that. Not that I’m complaining, of course. It’s all very interesting.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  The sky was dark. It had been raining. Our walk took us across wet flagstones and past the bench where we had sat that morning. We stopped to admire a hydrangea bush about to come into leaf. I glanced at my watch. We went back inside.

  At two o’clock we took our seats again, and now some papers were circulated. The archdeacon played a helpful role here, passing the numbered pages around in their correct order, and placing his own in a neat pile before him. It seemed important to him that the corners of the pages should all be exactly lined up with each other, and he spent some considerable time ensuring this was so. After that, there was nothing else for him to do but sit and listen. If his opinion on some issue was asked, he would agree wholeheartedly with the previous speaker, but most of the time he was left to his own devices. Due to the gas-cylinder heater, the air in the room had now become thick and heavy, and the archdeacon was unable to prevent his eyes from occasionally closing. Every now and then I would notice his head nodding slowly forward as he drifted almost to the verge of sleep. Yet he never fully succumbed, and the tap of a pencil or a slight change in the speaker’s tone of voice would be enough to snap his eyes wide open again. In this way the afternoon ticked past and gradually gave way to evening. Finally the bell in the tower above struck six and the meeting came to a close.

  As the chairman gathered up some papers he looked over the rim of his glasses at the yawning archdeacon.

  “Now don’t forget, Norman. Bright and early tomorrow morning,” he said.

  A puzzled look crossed the archdeacon’s face.

  “Tomorrow?” he asked.

  “Of course,” replied the chairman.

  “But I had no idea we were meeting tomorrow.”

  The room had become very quiet.

  “You’re not trying to wriggle out of this, are you?”

  “Well, no,” said the archdeacon, in an uncertain voice. “But I thought it was only supposed to be twice a week. That’s how it’s always been. Tuesdays and Thursdays.”

  The chairman rose from his seat and regarded the archdeacon. “Tuesdays and Thursdays are no longer enough,” he announced. “You’ll be expected to come in tomorrow, and the next day, and every day after that. There can be no backing out now. It was all agreed at the last meeting.”

  “Oh dear,” said the archdeacon, bowing his head. “I can’t have been listening properly.”

  The chairman looked at me and nodded slowly. I placed my arm around the archdeacon’s shoulder to offer some comfort.

  “But that’s always been your trouble, hasn’t it, Norman?” I said. “You never listen. Not properly.”

  ∨ Screwtop Thompson ∧

  4

  Hark the Herald

  The narrow stairway had a wooden banister on each side, and was carpeted in red. I came down five steps, turned at a small landing, and stopped to examine a barometer on the wall. There were five more steps below me. He was waiting at the bottom.

  “Morning, sir,” he said. “Did you manage to get a good night’s sleep?”

  “Oh, morning,” I replied. “Er…not quite, actually.”

  “I’m very sorry to hear that, sir. Any particular reason?”

  “Well, it’s just that the merrymaking seemed to go on for a bit too long.”

  “Merrymaking, sir?”

  “Yes.”

  “What sort of merrymaking?”

  “I could hear all this laughing and singing. It kept me awake.”

  “That’s very odd, sir,” he said. “None of the other guests have mentioned it.”

  “Oh…haven’t they?”

  “No, they haven’t. There’s been no one complaining about any ‘merrymaking’.”

  “Oh no, I’m not complaining,” I said quickly. “It’s just that I thought it went on a bit too long, that’s all.”

  His name was Mr Sedgefield. I’d met him late the previous evening when I first arrived, and he had put me in their ‘best single room’. Now he gave me a long, thoughtful look before speaking again.

  “Well we don’t want your Christmas spoilt, sir, so we’ll have to look into the matter.”

  “Thanks.”

  He remained at the foot of the stairs gazing up at me, and for the first time I noticed he was wearing a kitchen apron emblazoned with a smiling pink pig. I felt unable to continue my descent until he’d moved out of the way, but he showed no inclination to do this so I turned my attention once again to the barometer.

  “I see the pressure’s fallen overnight.”

  “Yes,” he said. “Should make for some very interesting seas during the next day or two.”

  “That’s what I was thinking. Might be nice to have a stroll along the clifftops later.”

  “If only we’d known your plans earlier, sir. You could have gone with the others. A whole party of them left not half an hour ago.”

  “What, without breakfast?”

  “Oh no, we made sure they all had breakfast first.”

  “Does that mean I’m too late?”

  “Of course not,” he said, stepping back at last and indicating the dining room. “You might have missed the bacon and eggs, but we can always rustle up some porridge.”

  I heard myself thanking him once again, and then continued my way downstairs. A large upright clock in the hall showed that it was five past nine. This didn’t strike me as an unduly late time to be coming down for breakfast in a guest house, but it was obvious that everyone else had already been and gone. All the tables in the dining room were bare apart from a small one in the corner by the window. This had cup, saucer and cutlery set for one.

  Mr Sedgefield ushered me towards it and I sat down just as another man appeared in the doorway and said, “Sugar, honey or treacle?”

  “Pardon?” I asked.

  “In your porridge.”

  “Oh, sorry. Er…treacle, please, if you’ve got it.”

  This second man also wore a kitchen apron, but his depicted a laughing cow rather than a smiling pig.

  “Righto,” he said, and next moment was gone again.

  “Years since I’ve had porridge with treacle in it,” I remarked to Mr Sedgefield.

  “Yes,” he replied. “We have things here you can’t often get in other parts of the country.”

  “Actually, I didn’t mean…” I began, but now he too had left the dining room.

  In the last few moments he’d discreetly placed a small coffee pot on the table, so I poured myself a cup and took the opportunity to glance at my surroundings. The walls were arrayed with paintings and framed photographs of maritime scenes, past and present. In one picture an ocean liner with red funnels departed from some great international port. In the next, a fishing smack unloaded at the quay. There were yachts in black-and-white ‘going to windward off Portland Bill’, and others in colour with their spinnakers billowing. Meanwhile, ancient triremes prepared for battle in the Aegean. The nautical decor had been made festive with berries and seasonal greenery, but it was overdone somewhat, so that the Victory at Trafalgar now lay partially obscured by sprigs of holly. I’d seen the same sort of thing in the hallway when I arrived. Every attempt
had been made to give the place a ‘yuletide’ feel, but behind the mistletoe and the tinsel there were always icebergs and distant lightships. It was the coastal setting that did it. This was a seaside guest house that catered mainly for summer visitors, and it was decked out according to their expectations.

  Yet the place had its attractions in mid-winter too, which was why I’d decided to spend Christmas here. Through the window I could see a silver gleam where the sky and the sea reflected one another. A perfect place for getting the New Year off to an optimistic start.

  The house stood on the clifftops above a cove. It had been built to withstand the extremities of weather, and although there were two storeys it was very squat and low. Hence the staircase with only ten steps. The rooms were small, and staying here somehow reminded me of being on board a ship. I’d arrived late the night before, when the place was in darkness. Mr Sedgefield had let me in and attended to everything, but I had been aware of someone else’s presence in the kitchen at the end of the hall. Presumably this was the man who’d asked me about my porridge. We’d had a bit of a chat about the weather, during which I’d learnt that we were ‘too far west’ to get any snow in ‘normal years’. Then I was given a mince pie and a glass of sherry before going up to bed.

  I had hoped to be lulled straight to sleep by the sound of waves gently breaking on the seashore. Instead, I’d been kept awake for some time by all this laughing and singing. I couldn’t tell what part of the house it was coming from, but it seemed to continue until the early hours. There were glasses tinkling as well.

  Now I had no objection to people enjoying themselves. After all, it was Christmas, the season of goodwill, and they were only having a little harmless fun. I just thought it went on for a bit too long really, so I resolved to mention it to Mr Sedgefield when I saw him in the morning. Finally, the merrymaking ceased and I slept at last, but I was so exhausted that I failed to wake until almost nine o’clock, and there was only porridge left for breakfast.

  ♦

  The treacle had been poured over the top, but I was allowed to stir it in myself. Meanwhile, Mr Sedgefield hovered around the dining room and ensured that my coffee cup was replenished frequently. I had to admit that the service was excellent, although he did tend to fuss a little.