The Dust and the Heat

by Michael Gilbert

  “How’ll we know when things are warming up?” said Fred.

  “You’ll know all right.”

  Sam Snorter’s Snack Bar was a one-storey brick building with a counter across the far end, some tables and chairs in the open part and not much else. Sam was sitting behind the counter keeping one eye on the tea urn and the other on his evening paper. He could do this because he had a marked squint. He was a tired-looking man with a white face and bilious pouches under the eyes. He didn’t trouble to look up when two new customers walked in.

  Oliver was sizing up the opposition. There were five of them, he noted with satisfaction, and no strangers present. It could hardly have been arranged better. Three of them were sitting at one table and Palmer, with one man, at another. When they came in there had been a clatter of conversation and laughter. Now there was a complete silence, broken only by the hissing of the tea urn and the crunching of Challen’s feet as he walked through some spilt sugar on his way to the counter.

  It was the silence which made Sam look up. He said, “What can I do for you, gentlemen?”

  Oliver rested one elbow on the counter, looked round the room, and said, “For a start you might open one of the windows. There’s a nasty sort of smell in here. Can’t you smell it?”

  “Horrid,” said Challen. “Do you think perhaps something’s died under the floorboards?”

  “Might be a rat,” said Oliver.

  Sam blinked at them. He could feel trouble coming. The nearest telephone was the box outside the station. There was no way out through the kitchen.

  Palmer got up, walked across, and said, “You don’t like it in here, why don’t you — off?”

  “Well,” said Oliver, “if it isn’t Mr Palmer. Been breaking any more arms lately, Mr Palmer?”

  He was resting comfortably on the balls of his feet as taught by his boxing instructor at school.

  “Any more of your vans come on our premises they’ll get the same treatment.”

  “So – you admit you did it on purpose.”

  “I’m admitting nothing. I’m just warning you.”

  “You’ve got it all wrong,” said Oliver. “You’re not warning me about anything. I’m warning you, you big, yellow bag of gas and wind, that if you touch one of my men again–”

  He was halfway through this carefully constructed sentence when Palmer started to swing at him. Oliver shifted his weight back, came forward again as Palmer tried to recover, and hit him very hard and very low. Palmer made a noise which was halfway between a gasp and a scream and folded forward, clasping the bottom of his stomach. Oliver picked up a bottle of tomato sauce from the counter and cracked it over his head. The bottle broke, and the sauce ran down over Palmer’s head and neck and down inside his collar in a thick, brownish-red stream.

  By this time there was a lot more action going on. The other four men had pushed back their chairs and closed in on the group by the counter. Sam, who had slipped under the counter and scuttled towards the street door, was unlucky enough to meet the reinforcements coming in. He was knocked down and trodden on by McGlashan.

  It was an interesting fight. Though reduced to four by the early elimination of Palmer, Snyder’s men showed themselves no mean exponents of the art of rough-housing. One of them knocked Tom Everton down with a sweeping blow with a chair, and was in turn felled by Challen with a backhand blow with a cake-stand. Oliver, grappling with another man, tried to remember the principles of the Harai Goshi, or sweeping loin throw, to be followed by the Jigoku Jime, or hell-strangle. The first was reasonably successful, and they went down on to the floor together. In executing the second he got his left hand in the wrong place and was bitten in the wrist. At this point someone kicked him in the face, and he rolled under the counter to recover.

  The decisive blow was struck by McGlashan. He picked up the hissing tea urn, twisted it off its gas pipe, and threw it at the two of Snyder’s men who were still on their feet. One of them, trying to get out of the way, slipped and cracked his head on the corner of the table and went down. The other caught the urn, screamed and dropped it. It fell on the man on the floor.

  The smell of escaping gas was overpowering.

  “Time we left,” said Oliver.

  “You’re quite clear,” said Mr Stackpool, “that it was Snyder’s men who started it.”

  “Absolutely,” said Oliver. “In front of witnesses. He swung at me. I had to defend myself.”

  “Of course,” said Mr Stackpool. “Certainly you had to. I should say that the state of your own face is a clear case of res ipsa loquitur.”

  “I don’t know what that means,” said Oliver, “but it’s damned sore.”

  He had a puffy eye, and below it a purple laceration turning yellow at the edges, reaching to the corner of his jaw. His left wrist was bandaged.

  “You went into the cafe to enquire about the accident, and they set on you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And you defended yourself?”

  “To the best of my ability,” said Oliver.

  “And some of your employees happened to be passing by and came to your rescue?”

  “They certainly did.”

  “I don’t think,” said Mr Stackpool, who had been carefully writing down Oliver’s replies in longhand, “I don’t think that we need fear any charge which Mr Snyder’s men may bring. Indeed, I was wondering whether it might not be good tactics for us to bring some charge against them.”

  “Certainly not,” said Oliver. “We’re very good friends now. I didn’t tell you what happened afterwards. Both parties bolted when the gas started escaping, and by coincidence we bolted to the same pub. There didn’t seem to be much point in starting fighting all over again, so we started drinking and had a hell of a party. Luckily no one had been badly hurt – I was the worst, and really, it was nothing compared to a guest night in our mess.”

  Mr Stackpool gaped at him and said, “If that is so–”

  “We soon found out what I’d suspected all along, that it was old Snyder who was egging them on. Incidentally, if he’s prepared to go to those extremes, we must be worrying him more than I thought. No, the person I want you to square is the café proprietor. We did a bit of damage there.”

  “Yes, indeed,” said Mr Stackpool. “When I got your telephone message I went straight round to see him. Luckily he hadn’t made any specific complaint to the police, although I think he might have done if I’d been half an hour later.”

  “Good for you,” said Oliver. “How much did he want?”

  “I pointed out that it must be better for him to be paid promptly for the damage than to go in for two lots of court proceedings. He’d have to bring a criminal charge, you see, before he could hope to recover damages.”

  “I bet you sounded convincing,” said Oliver. “How much?”

  “He suggested fifty pounds.”

  “That means the real damage is twenty-five. Offer him thirty, in notes, and he’ll jump at it.”

  “Bis dat qui cito dat,” said Mr Stackpool. He was having a good morning with the classics. “Talking of offers, a rather interesting one arrived on my desk this morning. It’s from Headingly Hewson. They say that they are authorized to offer the sum of–” He paused for a moment to let the full effect sink in, “two thousand pounds for a surrender of your right of way over their client’s property, provided that they can have a definite answer, yes or no, by the end of the month. That is in two weeks’ time.”

  “Naturally we say no to that.”

  “You say–?”

  “Of course.”

  “It seemed to me,” said Mr Stackpool faintly, “to be a very substantial figure.”

  “They’ll go a lot higher than that. Time’s on our side. They’re worried about all this new planning legislation. If they don’t clear the thing and start building soon they mayn’t be able to start at all.”

  “You think they’ll go higher than two thousand?”

  “That’s just the
ante. It’s not the real bid at all.”

  “I wish I could share your confidence,” said Mr Stackpool sadly. He had already worked out the negotiating fee and the legal costs payable on the surrender of a right of way for two thousand pounds and it had brightened his morning for him.

  “Don’t you worry,” said Oliver, “I may know next to nothing about the law, but I’ve played a lot of poker.”

  “You ought to see his face,” said Challen to Dumbo. “It looks as if a tank ran over it. It was a lovely scrap though.”

  “What he’s got to realize,” said Dumbo severely, “is that the war’s over. He can’t go round behaving like that. Sooner or later he’s going to get into bad trouble.”

  “We shan’t have any more trouble from Snyder’s people. By the time we all got slung out of the Duke last night we were blood brothers.”

  “I don’t mean that sort of trouble, but Snyder’s a vindictive man. He’s not going to sit down under this.”

  “Sit under it, or sit on it,” said Challen. “I don’t see what he can do.”

  Dumbo ignored this. He said very seriously, “Someone’s got to put the brakes on. You’ve got to help.”

  “I’ll do what I can, of course, but if he won’t listen to you I don’t suppose he’ll listen to me.”

  Dumbo said, “I remember him once, in the mess, after one of our wilder guest nights, putting four little tables one on top of the other. He started a game of follow-my-leader. First we all crawled under the bottom table. Then we went through the gap between the first and second tables. Then he did a sort of flying dive between the second and third tables. A lot of people fell out at this point because it was bloody dangerous, but quite a few did it. One man broke his glasses and another split his blue patrols. Then, before we could stop him, Oliver did a terrific sort of salmon-leap over the third table and under the fourth. He slid down the other side in a heap, rolled over and got up laughing. Only one other person was stupid enough to try it and he broke both wrists.”

  “He’s a whole-hogger,” agreed Challen. “You remember that night at Wolfsberg? When he shot those three Germans.”

  “That’s different. They were trying to rescue a prisoner.”

  “True enough,” said Challen. “All the same, like you said, the war was over. I’d have fired at their legs.”

  Oliver came in, and said, “Who’s shooting at who?”

  “Challen’s shooting a line,” said Dumbo. “What have you been up to?”

  Oliver told them.

  “You turned down two thousand. That was pretty cool. We could have used it for that extension shed we’re planning. If Blackett lands us the NAAFI contract for hair cream we shall need a lot more space. They eat hair cream in the Air Force.”

  “He’ll get us the contract all right,” said Oliver. “As soon as it’s signed he’s leaving the army and joining us. All the same, I suggest we back-pedal a bit over the idea of building this extension. I’ve got other ideas.”

  “Such as?”

  “Too early to say,” said Oliver. “I’ll let you know as soon as I’ve worked it out a bit more.”

  “You’ll let me know,” said Dumbo, “just as soon as you’ve committed us to a point where we can’t possibly turn back.”

  “Admit that we’ve done all right so far,” said Oliver. In spite of the livid bruise down one side of his face, he was looking remarkably cheerful. “The first year we made a small loss. Nothing crippling, and we shouldn’t have been in the red if we hadn’t spent so much on new equipment. The first six months of this year we’re well on the right side. Now’s the time to start planning for the big money. I’ve got a feeling that the tide’s running in our favour. I feel that sometimes when I’m playing cards. That’s the time to stake big.”

  “Last time you felt like that, if I remember rightly, you had a full house and the man on your left had four queens and you had to borrow from me to pay your next two mess bills.”

  “We all make mistakes,” said Oliver. “But I’m not wrong about this. I feel strong enough to take on ICI and Unilever together with Boots thrown in.”

  “I’m glad you’re feeling strong,” said Dumbo, “because there’s a job to be done right now. Someone’s got to see Mrs Williams.”

  “Mrs Williams?”

  “Len Williams’ wife. She wants us to give Len a job. Not the job he had before. Any job. On the packing line or the despatch. Something to keep him busy. She says that if he doesn’t get something soon he’ll go mad. Literally.”

  “You can’t be serious,” said Oliver. “Williams is damn lucky not to be in prison. You know what our auditors told us. He’d not only been taking drugs out of our stock for himself, he’d been fiddling the petty cash as well – probably to buy more of the stuff outside.”

  “I know,” said Dumbo. “I know, but if we gave him a job where he couldn’t get his hands on anything–”

  “He can’t work as a packer in a place where he’s been boss. It’s psychologically impossible. Anyway, if he wants a job there are lots of other places. Why should he come to us?”

  “I suppose,” said Dumbo slowly, “that he feels we owe him something for the work he did keeping the place going during the war when there was no one else to do it.”

  “Anything we owed him,” said Oliver, “was paid back, with interest, when we kept him out of jug. Now, let’s have a look at those indents.”

  7

  “The man’s a crook,” said Arthur Strickland.

  “He’s clever,” said Francis.

  “He’s too clever by half,” Arthur swirled the remains of his whisky a little pointedly round the heavy cut-glass tumbler and swallowed it.

  Francis said, “The decanter’s on the sideboard. Help yourself. Whilst you’re up you might put another log on the fire. I told Serena I’d sit up for her.”

  “Five thousand pounds,” said Arthur as he reseated himself. His face was a reddish purple and the heat of the fire was combining with the whisky to make him sweat. “Five thousand pounds, all for nothing.”

  Francis said, “It wasn’t nothing as far as we’re concerned, was it? What figure did the Pru put on the completed building?”

  “Two hundred thousand,” said Arthur. A measure of complacency had crept back into his voice. “They’ll put up three quarters of it, in instalments of course, and the building goes up.”

  “It seems to me,” said Francis, “–although everyone knows, of course, that I’ve got no head for business – but it does seem to me that when you’re doing a deal involving nearly a quarter of a million, all told, five thousand pounds isn’t a lot to pay for something that can make or break the whole thing.”

  “It’s a lot to pay for a pathway. That’s all it was. The right to drive cows across someone else’s field.”

  “Come to that,” said Francis, “two hundred thousand pounds is a lot to pay for a field. Even when it has got a factory on it.”

  Arthur Strickland stared at him curiously. His brother had been in rather an odd mood lately. Francis was, of course, intellectual. When he said the word, even to himself, Arthur managed to import a sneer into it. But in matters of business Francis had usually been content to play second fiddle, leaving the decisions to him. Arthur wondered if this odd mood might be connected in some way with his friendship with Oliver, which had been growing more marked in the last six months; a friendship which, Arthur noticed, he had not been invited to share.

  There was a possible motive for Oliver’s buttering up of Francis which salvaged his self-esteem.

  “Where is Serena?” he said abruptly.

  “She’s been to a Pony Club committee meeting over at St Albans. Oliver offered to fetch her. It was kind of him. He knows I hate driving at night.”

  “Hm,” said Arthur.

  “You know,” said Francis, “the real trouble with you is you’re jealous.”

  Arthur, whose mind was on Serena, said, “What the hell do you mean?”

  “You’re
jealous of Oliver. He does all the sort of things you do, but he does them better. When he pinched a lot of that man Snyder’s business you laughed and said, ‘Jolly good show. There’s an example of free enterprise for you!’ When he takes five thousand pounds off you, he’s a crook.”

  “Oh, balderdash.”

  “You’ve both got exactly the same outlook on business. Devil take the hindmost and the weakest to the wall. Instead of fighting each other, you ought to amalgamate.”

  Arthur looked up sharply. There was something here he didn’t understand. Something which needed probing.

  “Is this your bright idea? Or did Oliver suggest it to you by any chance?”

  “It cropped up in conversation. It was just an idea. We didn’t go into details.”

  “It’s a damned silly idea. It wouldn’t work at all. We’re engineers. They’re cough-drop merchants.”

  “They do a bit of engineering.”

  “They do repair work. That’s not engineering. Their money’s in cough mixture and hair cream.”

  “They seem to be doing quite well at it.”

  “They’re doing all right,” agreed Arthur. “I’ve never denied that he’s clever. After all, he’s turned a loss on the first year into something damned near a five-figure profit this year.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I hear things,” said Arthur.

  “Figures like that aren’t published. How can you possibly be sure? You’re only guessing.”

  “If you want to know,” said Arthur, “one of the young chaps who does his audit is a pal of the accountant who does ours. I believe they were articled together. I suggested to our chap he might get the figure out of his friend.”

  “In confidence, of course.”

  “Well, yes,” said Arthur uncomfortably. “In confidence.”

  “A confidence he immediately broke by disclosing the figure to you.”