London and the South-East

by David Szalay

  ‘Marlon!’ Andy called respectfully, in a sort of stage whisper, across the desks. ‘Marlon!’ When Marlon finally looked up, Andy’s smile widened. ‘Have you seen Murray?’ he said. Unfitting the lid of his coffee, Marlon shook his flesh-toned head.

  ‘I think he’s hiding from you. He thinks you’re going to punch his lights out.’

  ‘Will you get on the fucking phone?’ Paul said to Andy. He looked at his watch. Three thirty-eight. Twelve minutes.

  The smoking room was cold and, despite the wide-open window, smoky; grey, and loud with the perpetual groan of the traffic where Kingsway and Holborn meet. The cleaners seem to have permission not to clean it, though they all smoke themselves, and big, abandoned newspaper pages stirred in the chilly draught when the door croaked open. Unusually, Paul had the narrow space to himself, and taking advantage of this, he dragged a slick of phlegm up from his mid-throat and spat it into the metal bin. On his way there, he had almost met Lawrence, the director of sales. For the sake of his health, he was going to walk down the two flights of stairs, but he had heard Lawrence’s nasal whine speaking to someone in the stairwell, and had tiptoed back up and taken the lift. This had made him feel quite small. ‘Fucking Lawrence,’ he said, quietly, to the empty room – an act of defiance so minor that it only increased his sense of oppression.

  Lawrence, it seems, has become obsessed with the underperformance of Paul’s team. And his team is underperforming. There are only three more weeks of selling left on European Procurement Management, and the sales target looks more implausible every day. Paul knows, in fact, that it will be missed, but he still tells Lawrence not to worry, that there’s ‘a lot out there’. Which there isn’t – so when Lawrence presses him for details of what, exactly, is ‘out there’ the evasive sketchiness of his answers tends to lead to unpleasantness. The publications, in any case, never meet their sales targets – not European Procurement Management, not the in-flight magazines, not Asian Procurement Management, or International Finance and Financial Policy Review, or any of the others. The targets are not so much targets as notional figures – aspirations at best, ambitions that everyone, even Lawrence, has tacitly accepted will never be achieved (though they are raised a little every year), unattainable standards condemning the salespeople – all of them, ultimately – to the misery and stress of perpetual, soul-wearying failure. This is the same for Tony’s team, and Simon Beaumont’s, and Neil’s, and the Pig’s – so why, Paul wondered self-pityingly, sitting on the low chair, its brown wool torn to reveal yellow foam (which has itself been picked away by nervous fingers), does Lawrence single him out?

  Lawrence’s obsession with Paul’s team and its failings has, over the past few weeks, focused more and more intensely on Andy. On the phone Andy does not even sound desperate any more; he just sounds dead. Paul had had high hopes for Andy. He had nurtured him, bought him little presents (a bong, a Zippo with a marijuana leaf on it), bought him pints in the Penderel’s Oak – all of which was, of course, substantially self-interested, Paul being on an override and getting a few per cent whenever a member of his team makes a sale. Andy was posh, plummy – unintimidated by talking to other posh people, or foreigners. On the phone he could sound much older than he was. As the weeks passed, however, it became obvious that, in some subtle way, he had the wrong vibe, the wrong something, the wrong je ne sais quoi. And perhaps most importantly, not enough need. Paul thinks that he must be getting money from his parents – or someone – because not having made any sales since then, he has not been paid since June.

  Andy starts to stutter as soon as he sees Lawrence walk onto the sales floor. Looming over him, Lawrence presses the earpiece of Andy’s phone to his head (he has an odd way of holding the earpiece – in the palm of his long, hairy hand), and stopping his other ear with his index finger, he listens, with his eyes shut, to Andy’s pitch. ‘Good morning,’ Andy says, his voice shaking in a way that it only does when Lawrence is listening in. ‘Could I speak to Dr Rüthke, please.’

  ‘Who is it, please?’ A German secretary’s voice.

  ‘It’s David Lloyd.’

  ‘And where are you calling from, please?’

  ‘I’m calling in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management.’

  ‘What is it concerning?’

  ‘Is Dr Rüthke there?’

  ‘What is it concerning, please?’

  ‘I’m calling in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘I’m calling in association with –’

  ‘Could you send a fax?’

  ‘There wouldn’t be any point sending a fax.’

  ‘Please – could you send a fax?’

  ‘I don’t have a fax. I’m calling in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management. I need to speak to Dr Rüthke. Is he there?’

  ‘Are you selling something?’

  Andy laughs in the way that salesmen usually do when they’re about to deny that they’re selling something. ‘No,’ he says, laughing, ‘I’m not selling anything. I need to speak to Dr Rüthke. Is he there?’

  A towering blue-suited presence at his shoulder, well inside his personal space – Andy can smell him, his BO, his halitosis, his aftershave – Lawrence’s eyes squeeze more tightly shut.

  ‘Rüthke.’

  ‘Oh. Good morning, Dr Rüthke,’ Andy says, moving uneasily in his chair. ‘My name is David Lloyd, and I’m calling in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management. From London. How are you?’

  There is a short silence. ‘Yes?’ Dr Rüthke says, impatiently.

  ‘Um, I’m calling … I’m calling from the … I’m calling from Park Lane Publications,’ says Andy. ‘We publish European Procurement Management, in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you know the International Federation of Procurement Management?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, it’s an international organisation made up of the national institutes. I understand you’re involved in the manufacture of industrial thermostats, Dr Rüthke?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, I’m putting together European Procurement Management, in association with the International Federation of Procurement Management. It’s published twice a year, in January and June, and goes out to the purchasing managers of Europe’s thousand leading multinational companies, such as Philips, Hoechst and BMW. I’m putting together the January 2005 edition of the publication, in which there will be a major section on industrial thermostats. We have a limited amount of advertising positions available in this section and I’m calling Europe’s leading industrial thermostat manufacturers –’

  ‘We are not interested.’

  ‘Not interested in what?’

  ‘Not interested in advertising in this publication.’

  ‘Who are your main clients, Dr Rüthke?’

  ‘We have a very limited number of clients.’

  ‘Can you give me some examples?’

  ‘We are not interested. Thank you.’

  At this point, his mouth in close proximity to Andy’s enflamed left ear, and in a vicious monotone whisper, Lawrence starts to dictate a pitch of his own, kicking the desk until Andy takes it up. Lawrence’s pitch, though, is no more successful than Andy’s – is in fact almost identical, except that Andy’s delivery, previously flustered and faltering, suddenly has the flat, hesitant and disconnected feel of a simultaneous translation. When Dr Rüthke is still not interested – and increasingly irritated by the inexplicable pauses that have started to appear in the middle of Andy’s sentences – Lawrence drops the earpiece onto the desk and, with spittle accumulating in the corners of his mouth, shouts, ‘For God’s sake! For God’s sake – get angry!’

  The Gents, with their pinkish marble surfaces and warm halogen lights, were put in for the previous tenants
of King’s House – obviously a posher company than Park Lane Publications Ltd. Finding one of the stalls occupied, Paul tapped the varnished wood of the door. ‘Murray?’ he said, after a few moments of unforthcoming silence. ‘It’s me.’ Silence still. ‘I know you’re in there.’ Paul looked at his watch. Three forty-nine – time to call Flossman. ‘Murray, I know you’re in there.’

  ‘What?’ Murray’s voice, deadened by the door, was irate.

  ‘Are you planning to do any work this afternoon?’ Paul said, irate himself.

  There was another long pause, then Murray said, ‘I’ll be along in a minute.’

  Paul sighed, and for a moment, thinking vaguely of Michaela – the petite Kiwi barmaid from the Penderel’s Oak – he inspected himself in the mirror. Often, he and Murray perch up at the bar, imagining themselves to be flirting with her. They watch her always-smiling small figure as she moves, wearing a tight black skirt, twee blouse and clip-on bow tie; and often, in the dead heart of the afternoon, when even the Penderel’s Oak is quiet – the only sounds the automated pippings and whirrings of the fruit machines, and the mumble of the traffic from outside – they lounge there, making innuendo-laden small talk with her, and offering her cigarettes, which she accepts, and drinks, which she doesn’t.

  Paul shoved a puffy hand through his pepper-and-salt hair. He is not handsome. Shortish, plump, his face unevenly flushed and already showing split mauve capillaries here and there, he looks ten years older than he is, which is thirty-nine.

  On the sales floor, he lifted the white handset of his phone and was about to start entering Flossman’s number when he saw the note, unobtrusive among the papers that completely cover the surface of his desk. It was written with a purple highlighter pen in Andy’s almost retardedly childish handwriting. It said: Flosman called. Paul looked at Andy, who was on the phone, and seemed to be trying to avoid his eye. ‘Oi, Andy,’ he said. ‘What did Flossman say?’ Andy just shrugged and shook his head. ‘When did he call?’ Paul said. Andy put his phone on mute for a moment. ‘A few minutes ago.’

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘What do you mean nothing?’

  Andy shook his head, and unmuted his call. Frowning, Paul entered Flossman’s number into his phone. The long tone, once, twice, then …

  ‘Flossman.’

  Expecting ‘Koch’, Paul was taken by surprise. He sat up straight and, his face forming itself into a wide, insincere smile, said, ‘Dieter. Charles Barclay here.’

  ‘Ah, Mr Barclay, we speak at last!’

  ‘Better late than never, Dieter.’

  ‘Yes indeed.’

  ‘How you doing?’

  ‘I’m very well. But I think that’s just because it’s the weekend tomorrow!’

  ‘Yeah, I know what you mean. I do know what you mean.’

  ‘What can I do for you, Mr Barclay?’

  ‘Well, it’s about this ad, Dieter. My secretary said we still haven’t got that fax through yet. I think she called, um …’ Paul pretends to have forgotten Frau Koch’s name. ‘She called your secretary, who said she’d send it through. She doesn’t seem to have done that though. I’m sorry to get you involved in this, Dieter, it’s just that I’m going to be away next week … There’s … Well, in the States, and if we could get this wrapped up before I go …’ His voice is slow and level and unworried. He has done this so many times before, has been in precisely this situation so many times, that his mind is unengaged, and his eyes wander over the mess of his desk, while his mouth gets the well-worn words out. ‘So if you could just make sure we get that this afternoon, Dieter …’

  ‘Yes, Mr Barclay. But we have decided against this.’

  Said as though it were something insignificant.

  There are innumerable moments like this, of course, and the humiliation stings because they demonstrate so starkly – after all the standard banter, which sets the salesman and the prospect up as equals – the underlying asymmetry of the situation. Stunned, furious – feeling as though he has been physically struck – Paul says, in a voice which still sounds almost unflustered, ‘Right. I thought the decision had already been made though, Dieter. I thought you’d decided to go ahead.’ That was undoubtedly the impression that Dieter had given him. He had said, ‘This is something we will be doing.’ He had said, ‘We will confirm this today.’ He had said, ‘We think this is a good idea.’

  Now he says, ‘Yes, but I think we have other priorities at the moment.’

  Paul is suddenly unaware of the humming sales floor around him, is aware only of Flossman’s disembodied presence in the white plastic handset of his phone. In short sickening pulses, during which the sales floor comes back, briefly and intensely real, he feels the appalling, ridiculous tenuousness of this link with Flossman – the link on which everything depends. During these moments, Flossman seems not even to exist. And yet Flossman is everything. ‘Dieter, if I could ask you, let me just ask you, what are your priorities?’ And without waiting for him to answer, ‘Remember that European Procurement Management is sent to the purchasing managers of Europe’s top one thousand manufacturing companies, companies like Philips, Hoechst and BMW.’ It is the sort of line Paul usually eschews, the sort of line that his style of selling has eliminated, but in situations like this – with panic setting in – what else is there? The oblique, modernist style is useless here. Faced with traditional salesmanship, however, Flossman immediately sounds weary. ‘Yes,’ he says, sighs, ‘I understand.’

  ‘So, if I could just ask you, Dieter, what are your priorities?’

  ‘Well …’ He seems to be on the point of answering – of telling Paul what his priorities are – when he hesitates, and says, ‘But we have decided not to do this. Thank you for thinking of us, Mr Barclay.’

  Paul experiences a moment of pure frustration. Frustration that there is no way to force Flossman into the publication. There is, in fact, no point prolonging the call any further – contrary to the orthodoxy of the training room, it is more or less impossible to turn a situation like this around. Experience informs Paul of this, and, normally, he would wind up with a bruised, embittered goodbye. His voice is still level, though nothing remains of the laconic tone with which the call began. He says, ‘I understand, Dieter. I understand. If I could just ask you though – who are your most important clients?’

  The conversation is now an undignified tussle – demeaning to them both – and Flossman is openly impatient. ‘I … I don’t know, Mr Barclay. I must tell you, we are not interested.’

  ‘But you said you were interested last week.’

  ‘Yes, but now we are not interested.’

  Despite his enormous sense of injustice, of having been misled – lied to even – Paul knows that it would be useless, worse than useless, to dispute what Flossman said and meant or didn’t mean last week. All the power in the situation is, as always, with the prospect, and Paul is terribly aware of his own powerlessness. He says, ‘You have clients in the automotive industry?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Such as which companies?’

  ‘Mr Barclay –’

  ‘DaimlerChrysler?’

  ‘Yes. Mr Barclay, I have told you –’

  ‘Could I just –’

  ‘I have told you we are not interested.’

  ‘What I was going to say, Dieter –’

  ‘If you have anything to say, please send me a fax.’

  ‘Let me just say this – is General Motors a client of yours?’

  Flossman sighs. ‘No,’ he says. ‘Now, Mr Barclay …’

  To persist, Paul knows, is totally futile. Flossman now dislikes him. Flossman is irritated, even angry. Nevertheless, he says, ‘What I wanted to say, Dieter, what I wanted to say is that I’m constantly speaking with … Actually, just today, for example, I’ve just come from a lunch meeting with a chap in GM – very senior individual on the purchasing side …’

  ‘This is bullshit,’ Flossman
says dismissively.

  For a moment Paul is so shocked, so insulted, that he is speechless. In sixteen years of selling, surprisingly perhaps, no prospect has ever openly put it to him that he is lying. Of course, there has been insinuation, there has been euphemistic scepticism, there has been innocent incredulity. Never this.

  ‘What did you say?’ He is stunned, his voice quiet.

  Flossman laughs edgily, aware of having transgressed something, some etiquette – and also, it seems, elated to have done so. ‘You are speaking bullshit,’ he says, with a smile in his voice. The outrageousness of this is simply too much. Paul’s face blooms an alarmingly deep red. ‘I am speaking bullshit?’ he says hoarsely. ‘I am?’

  ‘Yes, you –’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You are speaking –’

  ‘No.’

  ‘– bullshit. You are –’

  ‘You are speaking bullshit, Flossman.’

  ‘– a liar, Mr Barclay.’

  ‘– speaking bullshit, Flossman.’

  Flossman is laughing.

  ‘You are speaking bullshit, Flossman!’ Paul shouts it several times more, his hatred – ardent and humiliated – the hatred of the long-oppressed for the oppressor. Suddenly, though, there is no one there, no one on the end of the line. A small plastic silence. It is finished, and pulling his jacket from his seat, ignoring the looks that are fixed on him from all over the suddenly quiet sales floor, he sets off purposefully, urgently, for the Penderel’s Oak.

  2

  A PAINFUL KNOT of self-hatred, Paul wakes, as usual, in the pre-dawn darkness. Unseen, the seconds tick, trudging over the eventless desert, the depression of the hours of darkness – and the depression is huge, immediate, though he knows that in the morning it will look melting and pale, like the moon will in the sky. The morning, however, seems infinitely distant. Though the pain is located mainly in his head, stirring slightly under the duvet he starts to find mysterious secondary pains everywhere, especially down his left side. If only it were possible to smother himself in sleep again – to sink into insensible fathoms with his eyes stuck shut. If only it were possible … And now, worse, things are whelming up – surfacing – memories – he is unable to stop them. Yesterday afternoon and Flossman. It is all still there, exactly as it was.