Confessions of a Travelling Salesman

by Timothy Lea

  ‘Where? Where?’ I croak, every second expecting giant Irish hands to tear me limb from limb.

  Mrs. O’H. flings open one of the windows. ‘Get out on the ledge.’

  ‘What!!’ To look down is to experience immediate vertigo. ‘I can’t get out there.’

  ‘You leave it out here again and I’ll ram it down the fockin’ child’s throat! !’ A key is turning in the lock.

  ‘Stand aside,’ I say hurriedly. I edge out onto the ledge and an icy wind nearly whips my balls off. This is it! God, if I ever get out of this alive I will never look at another woman again. But what chance do I have of getting out of it alive? Thirty stories up, stark bollock naked, half a gale blowing. I stretch out an arm and nudge one of my boots off the ledge. Oh my Gawd!! That might have been me.

  ‘Can’t a man have a few fockin’ jars without bein’ persoycuted in his own home? And what’s this? Are yew layin’ fockin’ booby traps for me now?’

  No doubt the good Mr. O’Hanrahan, weary after hard days and nights making life easier for the English motorist, has tripped over the Nugget. I speed up my crawl and get to a point on the ledge beyond the O’Hanrahan flat. Now, if I can stand up facing the wall I may be able to feel my way along until I come to a landing window.

  ‘– fockin’ rubbish, you wasteful slut!!’

  As I rise unsteadily to me feet and press the side of my cheek against the wall a window opens and the Nugget sails out into space followed by a stream of curses and four attachments. I close my eyes not daring to look down. Please God don’t let it kill anybody or Mr. Seamus O’Hanrahan see me. The window closes again and there is silence broken only by the sound of the wind trying to prise me off the side of the building. I edge further along the ledge and my outstretched hand touches glass. Could this be my happy landing? No it could not. As I come into a position to bring my naked body flush against the glass I can see that I am looking into a living room. A living room in which a family are sitting down to tea. Two adults are munching with their backs to the window and facing me across the table is a chubby toddler in a high chair. This little fellow obviously finds the spectacle of a naked man passing across the window highly amusing but the more he jabs his spoon at me and tries to persuade his parents to get in on the laugh riot, the more they demand that he shuts up and gets on with his nosh. Mum and dad resolutely refuse to turn round and, as I eventually fade out of sight, Junior has got so exasperated that he has flung his spoon on the floor and got smacked for his pains.

  By the time I get to a landing window I am colder than a penguin’s chuff and my old man has shrunk so much it looks like a constipated worm’s cast. Somehow I manage to push my clobber through the window and scramble after it and there I am. Half dead and listening to my teeth chattering like a xylophone solo.

  I struggle to get my clothes on but I am so cramped with cold and terror that it is very difficult. I have got my y-fronts up to knee level when the lift doors open and an elderly couple step out.

  ‘Evening,’ I say cheerfully and hobble past them trying to hang on to all my clothes. Their expression as the doors close is one I will never forget.

  By the time the lift gets to the ground floor I have got all my clothes – all the clothes I have left, that is – and this is just as well, because waiting outside the lift are five very determined looking policemen. Obviously someone has reported my little jaunt. Not surprising really when you think how many people must have been in a position for a quick shufti at my naked torso. If Sid had been here he would have taken a collection. The boys in blue eye me up and down suspiciously.

  ‘It’s terrible, isn’t it?’ I say quickly. ‘I couldn’t stand it.’

  ‘He’s still up there, is he?’ says one of the cops. I nod my head.

  ‘It’s the girl I feel sorry for. It’s a terrible business. Excuse me, but I must get to her mothers She lives down here.’

  I am hardly out of the lift before the ‘bules have piled into it and are zooming off to face new perils. Now I must move fast. They have only got to bump into Darby and Joan on the top floor and they will be right back again.

  The blood is now moving through my system a treat and I dart out of the front entrance and down a convenient underpass which brings me out by a bus stop, just as a large green job is pulling away. I hop onto it and am soon gazing up at the scene of my near disaster. Every window seems to have someone hanging out of it and the building looks like a troop ship coming into port.

  ‘Somebody threatening to do themselves in, I expect,’ says the conductor. He walks to the platform and leans out looking up at the block of flats.

  ‘Joomp ! !’ he shouts.

  CHAPTER NINE

  ‘We can’t go on like this,’ says Sidney.

  We are sitting in a cramped bed-sitting room listening to the smell of the curry from the Indian restaurant next door. It is the kind of pong that you can respond to with all your senses – a yellow cloud rolling towards you with a noise like a rubber mat being peeled off a wet window pane.

  ‘You mean Mrs. Bandanaike?’ I say, referring to our landlady.

  ‘No. Yes. Everything! How many of those bleeding things have we sold now?’

  I rack my brains. ‘Two – four – one on Thursday – then there were the four duds – the girls sold three – one that bloke threw out of the window – we had three returned – then there was the one that blew up – Friday was a good day, wasn’t it? We sold four. Now let’s see. Altogether, taking into account returns and damaged stock –’

  ‘Get on with it!’ hisses Sid.

  ‘Four.’

  ‘Four!’

  ‘It might be five. I can go and check the stock list.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have to check the bleeding stock list if we’ve only sold four! Oh, it doesn’t matter! We’re doomed. We’re up the spout.’ Sidney buries his face in his hands.

  ‘It’s not good, is it?’ I say soothingly.

  ‘“Not good”? Stuck in this bleeding dump eating curry buttees? It’s costing me two hundred quid every time we sell one of those bleeding cleaners.’

  ‘The product’s not right, is it?’

  ‘Not right! I had a look at one the other day. You know what it says on the bottom?’

  ‘No, Sidney.’

  ‘It says “Made in Hong Kong” in Japanese. I had it translated. They’ve never seen Mount Fuji, those bleeding things.’

  ‘That’s breach of contract, Sidney. It must be.’

  Sidney grimaces. ‘No. I checked that too. It never says anywhere that they were made in Japan; just to highest standards of Japanese craftsmanship and all that guff.’

  ‘Have you talked to Ishowi about this?’

  ‘I’m getting him up here. Why should he be lording it in Hoverton while we’re sweating our guts out in this bleeding dump?’

  ‘I thought you reckoned the north was a good idea, Sid?’ Sidney turns on me savagely. ‘Well, I was wrong, wasn’t I? Does that make you feel any better? They’re just the same lot of miserable, moaning gits as you get down in London only you can’t understand what they’re saying. Except for the coloured ones. They speak proper.’

  The sound of a gong punctuates Sidney’s outburst.

  ‘There goes the supper gong,’ I say. ‘Do you fancy anything?’

  ‘I never know whether it’s the supper gong or the temple gong in this place,’ moans Sid. ‘What is it? Curry on toast again, with stewed guavas to follow, I suppose. That woman can’t even make a decent cup of tea. Diabolical it is. You’d think she’d know how to do that, wouldn’t you? Bleeding stuff was probably growing in her back yard.’

  When Sid gets in this kind of mood it is difficult to reason with him, but I think the situation serious enough to continue trying.

  ‘You’ve actually paid Ishowi the money, have you, Sid?’

  ‘I’ve paid him some. The rest becomes due when the full consignment arrives at Hoverton.’

  ‘When does that happen?’

&
nbsp; Sid picks up a letter and waves it at me. ‘It’s happened. I got this from Ishowi today. “Honoured to inform you that nineteen thousand Nuggets arrived today, colour Yangtse-yellow”.’

  ‘That’s in China, isn’t it?’

  ‘I wish I was. Blimey! Nineteen thousand of the bastards. What are we going to do?’

  “Are you covered against fire?’

  ‘Timmy! Really! I don’t know where you get these ideas from.’

  ‘My relations mainly. Have you got a better idea?’

  ‘I’ve only had one idea – and that’s a thousand to one outsider. I know a big bullshitter who used to be at Funfrall Enterprises with me. He’s got his own import-export business now. If I go to him and suggest a merger, he’ll reckon I’m in trouble and, being the kind of sod he is, he might just try and buy me out for peanuts. I’ll lose on the deal, of course, but I paid so little in the first place I can’t go down too much.’

  Knowing Sidney, I am not so certain that I agree with his last statement but I don’t say anything.

  ‘What about the girls?’

  ‘I’ll give him the option of taking them over. They’re a good publicity gimmick!’

  ‘And what about Ishowi?’

  ‘He can go and start training to become a Kamikazi pilot any time he likes.’

  So next day Sid pushes off to see his old business associate and I make a half-hearted attempt at unloading a few more Nuggets. I don’t get very far because I bump into this bird who is having trouble starting her car. I don’t know much about engines but I get stuck into it and find that there is something wrong with the differential. By the time I have fixed it I am covered in grease and the bird offers me the use of the bathroom. Well, one thing leads to another, and by the end of the afternoon it is a question of vive le differential and the car is still in the garage.

  I decide to pack it in after that, the Nugget selling I mean, and I get back to Mrs. Bandanaike and the smell of curry that leaves footprints, just in time to be greeted by an enthusaistic Sidney.

  ‘I did it! I did it!’ he exults. ‘Brother but it was close though. The bleeding product worked so well he nearly agreed to my terms for a merger and was prepared to put up some promotional money. He couldn’t believe that I would ever sell out of such a good deal.’ Sidney hugs himself delightedly.

  ‘But you managed to pull it off, Sidney?’

  ‘Yeah, but it took a bit of doing. I had to persuade him that I was a bit gulliver – stupid, you know.’

  ‘Gullible? Yes, Sid. You were able to do that all right, were you?’

  ‘Eventually, Timmo. I had to box pretty clever though. Not let on too much.’

  ‘No, Sid.’

  ‘Not appear too sharp for the way I was trying to present myself. Know what I mean?’

  ‘Yes, Sid.’

  Eventually he has finished congratulating himself and he tells me that Ernest Truscott, that’s the name of the mug, wants us to introduce the Nugget to his sales force at a meeting they are having shortly. Truscott is very impressed by what he has heard about the Daughters of the Cherry Blossom and wants them there as well. Also, Ishowi in his Samurai clobber.

  We have a few celebratory drinks out of a bottle of nerve tonic Sid keeps especially for such occasions and decide that it would be a good idea to go round to the hotel and tell the girls about the new deal.

  ‘They’re nice girls,’ says Sid reflectively as we make our way to the Grand, ‘but they have been a bit disappointing saleswise. Didn’t have the tenacity I was expecting.’

  ‘I think you miscalculated there, Sidney,’ I say wisely. ‘They’re not pushy like English birds, are they? They’re taught to serve.’

  ‘I suppose you’re right. Maybe I should have given them more supervision. If only we’d have had a few bob for advertising they could have been very useful.’

  We go into the foyer of the Grand and Sid marches up to reception.

  ‘Are any of the Japanese ladies back?’ he says. The girl looks slightly surprised.

  ‘The masseuses, you mean? They’re all up in the sauna now, I think.’

  ‘How many Japanese have you got staying here?’ asks Sid.

  ‘Just the twelve,’ says the girl. ‘They’re the only ones we’ve ever had.’

  ‘Where is the sauna?’

  ‘Top floor. You’ll see the queue.’

  She is not kidding. We can hardly push our way out of the lift for the crowd blocking up the corridor. As we are pressed back against the wall Spring Fragrance goes past leading a pink-faced businessman who is sweating like a suet pudding. His collar stud has popped open and he is carrying his jacket over his arm.

  ‘Clum this way,’ says my little friend. ‘After lie down and deep massage you will feel differelent in all resplects.’

  ‘O-o-h,’ says the man ecstatically, ‘o-o-o-o-h!’ Immediately the crowd redoubles its efforts to get near the sauna and Sid and I have a fight on our hands to make any headway at all.

  ‘Two-timing little sluts!’ hisses Sid. ‘So this is what they’ve been up to. I could never understand why they were distributing all those leaflets.’

  He shoulders protesting customers out of the way and forces his way through the half-open door to the sauna. Happy Spirit is waiting inside with outstretched hands.

  ‘Two plounds pleese,’ she says.

  ‘Now, wait a minute –’

  ‘Two plounds or I blake your arm—Ah, Mr. No-get. It is you. Only one plound please.’

  I am looking past Sidney and when the door into the hot chamber opens it is like looking at a white seal colony. Fat, melting bodies are huddled together whilst nubile nippons in towelling togas pound and massage. They might be working out on heavy punchbags. In the outside chamber men are lying on divans and the air is heavy with the hum of Noggett Nuggets. Like giant vibrators they are being propelled up and down the backs of the dripping, groaning inmates, and in one case a slender nippon is actually walking up a man’s back with her Nugget.

  ‘This much better use for ploduct,’ says Happy Spirit persuasively. ‘Business vlery glood.’

  ‘Yes, but you’re supposed to be working for me!’ storms Sidney.

  ‘Slurely Mr. Ishowi told you about actlivities?’ says the girl sounding genuinely surprised. ‘I think that why we stayed in Hotel.’

  ‘Mr. Ishowi put you up to this, did he?’ snarls Sid, turning an unpleasant colour.

  ‘Oh yes. This is what he say we clum to England flor.’

  ‘What were you doing in Japan?’ I ask suspiciously.

  ‘Slame thing. We work for Mr. Ishowi in his whorehouse. The Golden Tearoom in heart of old Tokyo. Unfortunately, what goes on there slo unspleakably flilthy it closed down by Japanese authorities. The flightened Lord Longflord and Missy Whitelouse see it and export of family saloons diminish dlamatically.’

  ‘So you’re all geisha girls?’ gasps Sid.

  ‘Oh no. Much dirtier than that,’ says Happy Spirit pleasantly.

  ‘Where are the rest of the girls?’ I ask.

  ‘They below helping customers lie down comflortably.’

  ‘I’m going to kill that bastard Ishowi,’ grits Sid, ‘I’m going to tear him limb from limb.’

  ‘I wouldn’t fancy trying, myself,’ I say. ‘Come on, let’s see what’s happening downstairs.’

  When we get down to the St. Denis suite it is even worse. St. Denis would not like it at all. There is a long line of beds on either side of the largest room on which those who have had a sauna are supposed to be relaxing. Relaxing! Some of the things that are going on you would not credit if you saw them through your own flies. The tricks those six girls get up to are a living testimonial to the industry and ingenuity of the Japanese race. And the noise! Screams, giggles, screeches, moans.

  ‘I don’t know why the hotel doesn’t put a stop to it,’ I say.

  ‘Why don’t you ask the manager,’ says Sid. ‘He’s the one on the right of the third bed on the left. Better wait a minut
e though. He’s probably been taught not to speak with his mouth full.’

  It is terrible, isn’t it? I mean all the men are so fat and flabby. Dirty old sods, they should buy magazines and think about it.

  Sidney, of course, is furious. Not because he has any moral scruples but because he did not come up with the idea himself. As usual in such a situation he turns on me.

  ‘Blooming marvellous partner you are, aren’t you?’

  ‘What do you mean, Sid?’

  ‘Obvious idea like that staring you straight in the eyes and you don’t see it!’

  ‘What about you, Sid?’

  ‘That’s right! Blame me! Marvellous, isn’t it? I’m supposed to think of everything, aren’t I? I dream up the whole proposition and I can’t even leave you to chase up a bit of detail – I can’t drive myself twenty-four hours a day you know. I can’t have my eye on everything.’

  ‘Do me a favour, Sid.’

  ‘Well, it’s not good enough. These birds have been making monkeys out of us.’

  ‘They had a head start with you, didn’t they?’

  ‘Yes, well—hey! Wait a minute! Don’t start giving me any of your lip –’

  ‘You don’t need any, Sid. You look like half a rugby ball as it is.’

  ‘Now, listen! –’

  ‘I’m sorry, Sid. Just my little joke. Look, Sid, I don’t think you can blame the girls too much. They were only doing what Ishy told them.’

  ‘Ishy! I’ll make him wishy he’d never been borny! That bleeder was the one who demanded that the girls stayed in a hotel. He’s been making a fortune out of this caper while we’ve been eating blancmanges made with curry powder.’

  But, of course, Sidney cools down eventually when he realises that we want to present a united front to idiot boy Truscott. Settling up with Ishowi can wait until we have unloaded the Nuggets.

  For that reason he manages to keep something approaching a smile on his face when Ishowi glides into town on the four-twenty. To my relief he is alone.

  ‘Ah so,’ he says. ‘Thanks to British Rail we meet again.’