Pride and Avarice

by Nicholas Coleridge

  Reading all this unhelpful rubbish in the newspapers, all alone at Chawbury, Miles rang half a dozen of his top executives and gave them an ear-bashing. ‘Pendletons remains twice the size of Freeza Mart in revenues, and forty percent ahead in profits. Why aren’t I reading this anywhere?’ All in all, it was a bad week for Pendletons and Miles felt thoroughly fed up about it.

  Laetitia’s funeral was a private affair for family and a few old friends, held in the village church in Longparish. Had Miles had his way, it would have been vastly bigger and more public in one of the thousand-capacity social London churches, with the great and good strongly in evidence, plus influential politicians, institutional investors, business editors and selected Pendletons supermarket staff. Miles had an idea of busing in managers and checkout staff from all over the country, as proof of the esteem in which the Pendleton family was held. He thought it would be a timely reminder of the power and patronage of the controlling family, as well as free publicity for the supermarket. He was sure the television evening news could be persuaded to cover it, if they got it right.

  But James, grief-stricken and racked with guilt that the accident should have happened in one of his own stores, refused to contemplate anything of the sort: ‘I’m not having it turned into a circus.’ So the opportunity was missed and Miles felt he was asked to do his job with one hand tied behind his back.

  Instead, there were no more than a hundred mourners in the little Saxon church; the widower standing at the door between his son Hugh and his Pendleton brothers, Nick, Michael and Otto, greeting friends and neighbours as well as representatives from some of Laetitia’s museums, galleries and charities. Davina, at Miles’s insistence, travelled down with him from London, since Miles hadn’t yet informed James they’d split up, and felt it was important to put on a show of unity. A second vehicle from Straker Communications followed in convoy, containing Rick Partington the MD and half a dozen key account personnel on the Pendletons’ business. It was important to be seen to show support at this difficult time.

  Occupying his reserved seat in the second pew, immediately behind the family, Miles looked round the church to see who else was there, and to ensure as many mourners are possible noticed his premium placement. Disconcertingly, almost the first people he spotted were Ross and Dawn, in the third pew across the aisle. Ross looked grim and sober in a dark overcoat with a Remembrance Day poppy in his buttonhole. Dawn, caramel coloured from the sunlamp, wore a flamboyant black hat with feather and veil, and gave James a fleeting smile of sympathy when their eyes met, before reverting to her sad funeral face. It always surprised Miles how well Laetitia and Dawn had got on, when they had nothing in common. Dawn had been pushy where Laetitia was concerned, and he reckoned Laetitia was simply too kind to rebuff her.

  As the service was about to start, and the pallbearers were forming up outside to carry the coffin into the church, Miles noticed Serena and Robin slipping into a back pew. Serena looked very tasty, he thought, with her porcelain white skin and red hair pinned up under a black hat. Like Dracula’s niece.

  For a brief moment, they locked eyes, and Serena tilted her head quizzically. Miles wondered whether the time hadn’t come to re-kindle that particular liaison.

  Debbie’s new job opportunity came out of the blue. She hadn’t applied for it, or even thought about moving, as she’d only been at the Meurice for eighteen months. But when the offer came, she knew she had to go for it. It was irresistible, and completely different to a big city hotel, so she’d be learning an entirely new set of skills.

  The overture came from the assistant manager of her previous hotel, the Buckingham Park at Stoke Poges, whom she had always liked. Paul had recently been offered the promotion of a lifetime, to become launch general manager of a new Zach Durban hotel in the Maldives, and he wanted Debbie to join him as his food and beverage director. As he explained it, the Grand Maldives Retreat and Spa wasn’t going to be a five-star place, or even a six-star, but was aiming to become the archipelago’s first seven-star resort. Durban’s International Leisure and Casino Group was investing $250 million in the development, had already purchased a mile-long island in a coral attol and embarked on building forty luxury bungalows, each with private pool, as well as ten cabanas on stilts in the bay. The only means of reaching the resort would be by a fleet of hotel helicopters from Male, which would land on a pontoon in the sea. Concealed in the middle of the island, amidst copious undergrowth, would be Zach Durban’s trademark ‘Cuisines of the World’ restaurants, serving everything from Chinese to Russian specialities, Chinese and Russians being forseen as the dominant guest nationality.

  Everything about the assignment thrilled Debbie. She couldn’t think of any hotel she’d rather work at next. For one thing, it represented an enormous promotion for her, and a massive vote of confidence from Paul. Secondly, to be part of a start-up was every hotelier’s dream. She’d be picking her whole team virtually from scratch, waiters and barmen, chefs and front-of-house; she’d need to hire over 150 people, Paul told her. A few staff could be transferred from other Zach Durban properties around the region, and some she’d headhunt from rival luxury resorts, but the majority would have to be trained from scratch. That was the part Debbie looked forward to the most. She would have to conduct interviews throughout the Maldives, pick a hundred or so novices on the basis of instinct, ship them over to the sandbar with their families and within six months turn them into top class staff at a seven-star resort. It wasn’t going to be easy, but she relished the challenge.

  There was a third reason, too, she was excited, though she knew it wasn’t a noble one. She longed for sunshine. All her life she’d had a thing about the sun, she found it mood altering. And all her life she’d lived under grey skies, in Droitwich, Hampshire, Berkshire and now, even in Paris, the weather was depressing half the time. When she prepared the weather cards for the breakfast trays, she noticed how seldom she ticked the sunny symbol.

  Paris had been a priceless opportunity, she’d learnt so much; you couldn’t regret living in a city like Paris. But it had frequently been lonely, especially at the beginning. She had spent more time than she cared to remember sitting in those grand, formal parks on her afternoons off, watching the world go by, knowing nobody, killing time until her next shift. The second year had been better because her French improved until she was almost fluent, and then she’d met a guy, one of her opposite numbers at the Plaza Athénée. He was Danish and completed the hotel training course at Lausanne, which Debbie always wished she’d done herself. They’d spent four months together, much of it in bed, pulling every favour at their respective hotels to ensure their shifts and nights off coincided. But eventually they discovered they didn’t have so much in common after all, and Debbie ended it three months ago. That was another reason to leave Paris: a fresh beginning.

  Taking a deep breath, she handed in her notice at the Meurice, having been promised a contract by International Leisure and Casino Group (ILCG). Paul rang her twice a week to update her on progress, and Debbie spent her evenings on her laptop making lists and timelines of everything she’d need to do. It was going to be a massively full-on assignment.

  Paul told her to expect a call from the hotel’s PR agency, which he said was preparing a press release to go out to the travel industry and media. ‘They just need some CV background, the hotels you’ve worked at before, that kind of thing. There’ll be biogs of the key appointments, so when you get the call, that’s what it’s about.’

  Debbie was duly rung by a pleasant-sounding girl from Straker Communications, who wrote down her details and promised to send her a copy when it was ready. ‘I’d love that,’ Debbie said. ‘I’m going to send it on to my dad. I’ve never been in a press release before, this is my first one.’

  It surprised her when her new employment contract didn’t arrive by the end of the week, nor the press release. It was odd, because they’d definitely said she’d receive the contract by Tuesday. She was about to ring P
aul when he rang her himself, sounding embarrassed.

  ‘This is so weird, Debs. I don’t know what to say, but have you done something to upset a high-up in Zach Durban’s company?’

  ‘I’ve never met anyone from it. At least I don’t think so. Why?’

  ‘Because they’ve put a block on hiring you. I’ve been having a major row about it for three days, but they won’t budge. I’m really sorry.’

  ‘But why Paul? Didn’t they say why?’

  ‘That’s the strangest thing, I haven’t managed to speak to anyone who knows the reason. They just say it was someone very high up, they don’t know the name. An edict came from head office.’

  ‘I don’t believe this. You really mean I’ve lost the job? I mean, I’ve already resigned from here.’

  ‘I’m sorry Debbie. I can’t understand what’s gone wrong, I’m still trying to find out.’

  ‘Thanks Paul. It’s not your fault, I’m not blaming you. But if you do discover, let me know, won’t you?’

  She put down the phone, feeling utterly defeated. How could this have happened? Who would do something like this to her?

  Archie had barely completed his six-month trial period before earning a second promotion. His self-assurance and glibness were spotted by Freeza Mart’s Corporate and Investor Relations department, and he was offered a position as number four in the team, liaising with institutional shareholders and managing corporate PR. Instead of slaving among the densely-populated pods and hutches of the lower storeys, Archie found himself on the thickly-carpeted corporate floor, barely a dozen doors along from Ross’s own office, and sharing the same executive washroom. Settling into his big shared space with its drinks fridge and plasma TV, Archie felt things were definitely looking up. The money was better too and so was his expense account. It took him no time to adapt to his new life of taking investors to lunch at Christopher’s Bar and Grill or One Aldwych, or any of the expensive places he favoured across the bridge from his office. The corporate culture at Freeza Mart normally frowned on expense claims, or anything beyond no-frills budget travel, but this rule did not apply to Corporate Relations who lived high on the hog.

  The success of the department was measured by its ability to manage investor expectations and the shareprice. At lunch after lunch, Archie found himself speiling the Freeza Mart growth statistics, with half a million square feet of new retail space scheduled to open each quarter, nine new superstores and a farmers market concept being rolled out in city centres. At the same time, Freeza Mart was considering a Spanish supermarket acquisition, their first venture into Continental Europe. Archie noticed a procession of small, moustached execs parading in and out of Ross’s office, ‘reeking of garlic,’ as he told Gemma.

  One of Ross’s business maxims was an insistence on transparency with shareholders at all times. If they were in danger of missing a growth target or disappointing analysts’ expectations, he made a point of telling them ‘the earlier the better, I’d sooner surprise them with a slightly better than expected result than catch them unawares with bad news.’ Archie found this straight dealing a liability. His instinct was to put an optimistic spin on everything and watch the shareprice jump. At the same time, he became expert at talking competitors’ shareprices down, with a bearish word here and a downbeat market rumour there. Over lunch he would let slip, as though by accident, that he’d heard Tesco was trading down year on year, or that Pendletons was about to be refused an important planning consent for a new store. It gave him a kick to watch his lunchdate dump millions of shares later in the afternoon.

  Knowing how deeply Miles was engaged in boosting Pendletons’s shareprice, Archie derived special satisfaction from talking it down. When the price dropped below five pounds for the first time in four years, on rumours of a profit warning, Archie could imagine his father’s fury, and was tempted to ring him up and tease him. But they hadn’t spoken for months, not since he moved in with Gemma. According to Davina, Miles regarded Archie’s job at Freeza Mart as an act of treachery. ‘Perhaps you should give him a ring some time,’ Davina suggested. ‘I’m sure he’d like to hear from you.’ But Archie wasn’t so sure. Instead, he got his kicks from undermining Pendletons’s stock.

  A bonus of working in corporate relations was the extra status it gave him around the building, especially with the honeys in Direct Response on the eleventh floor. It amused him to take a detour between their tightly-packed desks, and enjoy the admiring glances that followed him. Or he’d sway up to the water cooler, reeking of wine from his expensive lunch, and chat them up.

  One afternoon he noticed a pretty new face he’d not seen before, though she did look vaguely familiar, he didn’t know why. She had shoulder-length brown hair and was dressed in a fitted black suit. Early twenties, Archie reckoned.

  ‘So, what’s a babe like you doing in a place like this, then?’ he said, patting her on the bottom.

  ‘Working for Dad for a month. I’m between jobs.’

  ‘We should have a drink one evening. I bet you like cocktails.’

  The girl looked at him oddly, then said, ‘You don’t recognise me, do you? It’s Debbie. You live with my sister. Gemma, remember?’

  ‘Oh fuck,’ said Archie. ‘And double fuck. Look, just forget I said that. It was only a joke. Don’t say anything to Gemma.’

  54.

  ‘I’m so glad I came up here. I should have done it ages ago when you first asked, but it always feels like it’s so difficult to get away.’ Hugh Pendleton and Peter were tramping along the beach beneath the cottage, scrunching over bladderwrack and sea lace, enveloped by the bleak emptiness of it all. Even after all these months, Peter couldn’t contemplate the view without shivers up his spine.

  ‘The past few months have been knackering,’ Hugh said. ‘First the shock of Mum dying and all that business, the press and everything, and trying to take care of Dad who took it quite badly. And then all sorts of challenges at work, one after another, non-stop crisis management. For the last couple of days I’ve been away at a so-called blue sky conference at a hotel in Crawley. A hundred senior managers, with keynote speeches and incentive coaches and break-out sessions, almost all of it a complete waste of time. You can’t imagine.’

  ‘Actually, I can imagine. You were staying at the Crawley Fair-lawns Convention Hotel?’

  ‘How on earth did you know that?’

  ‘You’ve still got the hotel name tag pinned on your jacket.’

  Hugh groaned and pulled it off. ‘Anyway, now I’m actually here it feels like a million miles away. Another world. I’m so envious of you living here all the time. Writing songs on the beach. I’d love to do that. Not that I can write music, but the principle.’

  ‘You could though, couldn’t you? Quit the rat race, I mean. I’m sure you don’t need the money. Sorry, that sounds rude.’

  ‘Fair point. And probably true I suppose. But in our family you have to work. Everyone does. Dad, all my uncles, even my mother never stopped working at her charities and ballets. If I announced I was giving up, there’d be such disapproval. Particularly if it was me, because I’m meant to be the big white hope of the next generation, the next chairman-but-three after all my uncles have had their turns. But you’ve seen the zero responsibility I’m given … you’ve seen me at enough meetings, taking the notes, pouring the coffee, learning by example from my elders. In our family you get to take your first solo business decision when you’re about fifty, and only then if half your cousins sign off on it too.’

  ‘I thought you liked your job? You always give that impression.’

  ‘Well, I don’t particularly. I try to, of course, I’m not so bad at it either, though it gets quite frustrating sitting there watching my family screw up. Actually that’s an exaggeration. We’re still making a lot of money. But every year we lose a bit more share to competitors, and our margins erode while everyone else’s grow. And we’ve been too cautious overseas, so everyone’s got in ahead of us. I’ve been pushing them fo
r years to go into California, but we never did and now Ross Clegg’s in there doing a brilliant job.’

  ‘Ross is still public enemy number one, I take it?’

  ‘That’s what your father was lecturing us about yesterday. I should have told you, he was speaking at the Conference. The opening keynote speech: Keeping Pendletons ahead in the PR war. He was scathing about Ross. Said he’d lost interest in his business, shoots pheasants midweek through the shooting season. If only it were true. Wishful thinking by your dad, I fear.’

  ‘Did you talk to him?’

  ‘Sure. He only came down for his speech, he didn’t stay at the hotel, but we talked about Mum—and about you. I said I was coming up here after the Conference.’

  ‘You did? He doesn’t even know I’m in Scotland.’

  ‘He does now. Sorry if I’ve let the cat out of the bag, I didn’t realise. Anyway, he sent you his regards, sort of.’

  ‘I bet he was dissing my music. He usually does.’

  ‘Well, he did mention something about caterwauling. And recommended I bring earplugs. But he’s always like that, isn’t he? It’s his style.’

  ‘I guess. It gets pretty wearing when you live with it, especially when it’s aimed at you all the time.’ Then Peter asked, ‘How was he looking? You heard he and Mum have split? I talked to her yesterday—she sends you her love, by the way. She said Dad’s being hell over the divorce. Playing hardball, won’t agree a thing. She sounded quite down.’