London and the South-East

by David Szalay

  The first person he lets into the secret is Nayal, phoning him from the train home. ‘Hey! Nayal!’ he says. ‘It’s Paul.’

  Politely, Nayal tries not to sound too surprised. ‘Paul. Hello.’

  ‘How’s it going, mate?’

  ‘Um. Fine.’

  Paul says he wants to talk to him about something, and suggests they meet for a coffee, somewhere not too near the office. They meet the next morning in an Italian café on Museum Street.

  It is, for both of them, a strange situation. Nayal – smart, fortyish, with a neat moustache – never mixes with other members of the team out of work, and away from the safe, familiar environment of the sales floor he and Paul are strangers. He notices how different Paul is – how solicitous, how serious – and thinks, ‘What does he want from me?’ smiling mildly and stirring his coffee. When he has lit a cigarette (having first asked Nayal whether he minds), Paul comes to the point. He prefaces it with, ‘This is between you and me, mate.’ And Nayal nods. He is, Paul knows, nothing if not discreet. ‘I’m going to be leaving PLP,’ he says. Nayal pulls a surprised face. ‘I’ve been offered a job somewhere else. Somewhere quite a lot better actually.’

  ‘Well,’ Nayal says. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Yeah. And I’m hoping you’ll come with me. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.’ When Nayal hesitates, Paul says, ‘I’m not asking everybody. Just the best people.’ First smiling to acknowledge the flattery, Nayal says, ‘The thing is, Paul, I’m planning to leave PLP too.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘So …’

  Though he knows that it is unfair, and tries, unsuccessfully, not to let it show, Paul finds he feels extremely let down. It had not occurred to him that members of his team might have their own secrets, their own plots. Perhaps seeing his expression darken, Nayal says hurriedly, ‘I’m planning to finish EPM, of course.’ Paul ignores this. ‘So what are you going to do?’ he says.

  ‘Well, it’s supposed to be a secret. I’ve just bought a hundred thousand minutes of talktime between the UK and Pakistan.’

  ‘You’ve bought a hundred thousand minutes of talktime?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Oh. To resell it. Yes. So if you ever want to call Pakistan …’ The levity is misjudged. Paul does not even seem to notice it. He says, ‘So you’re not interested in …?’

  Nayal shakes his head sincerely. ‘I’m afraid not,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry, mate.’ In his frustration, Paul says this with an unintended edge. There is a tense silence while he stubs out his cigarette. The situation is unnervingly similar to a blowout – is in fact a blowout, an unexpected one – and they are both more familiar than they would like to be with the feelings of impotence and humiliation associated with them. Even Nayal – his famous sangfroid notwithstanding – is often twisted into noiseless fury by them, usually expressed in a slight cold smile. ‘So where are you going then?’ he asks, delicately.

  ‘Oh, another sales place, you know.’

  ‘Well, I’m sure it’s a wise move.’

  ‘I think so. Park Lane’s fucked.’

  Nayal smiles.

  They walk back to the office in silence.

  It has not been an encouraging start.

  Later, seeing Wolé Ogunyemi stand up and head for the smoking room, Paul waits for a minute or two, and then follows him. When he opens the door, Wolé is at the window, leaning out. There is no one else there. Wolé looks over his shoulder. ‘All right, Paul,’ he says. ‘All right, Wolé.’ Paul sits down wearily on one of the low chairs, and lights up. ‘How’s it going, mate?’ he asks. Wolé turns. ‘How’s it going?’ he says. ‘How is it going? Shit.’ He laughs, and Paul laughs too. ‘I wanted to have a word with you, actually,’ he says. And lowering his voice, ‘Strictly between ourselves.’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I’m serious. Tell no one.’

  ‘I won’t. Sure.’

  Paul lowers his voice further, almost to a whisper. ‘I’m leaving PLP, mate. I’ve been offered another job. A better one.’

  ‘Yeah? Lucky you.’

  ‘And I’m sounding some people out, seeing if they want to join me.’

  Suddenly Wolé’s face takes on a more focused, serious look. He too lowers his voice. ‘Where?’ he asks.

  ‘It’s a place called Delmar Morgan.’ Paul is whispering; the words ‘Delmar Morgan’, in particular, he more or less mouths in silence. ‘It’s a very good place,’ he says. ‘They’ve got excellent contracts. Much better than here. This place …’ With a small gesture he indicates their immediate environs. ‘This place is in serious trouble, mate. That’s obvious.’ Wolé nods thoughtfully, and after pausing for a moment to let the morbid prognosis sink in, Paul murmurs, ‘So, would you be interested – in principle?’

  Wolé looks thoughtful. ‘In principle, I suppose, yes.’

  And violating the hushed, smoky seriousness of the room, the door whoops opens. It is Murray. ‘All right, Murray,’ Paul says immediately in an overloud voice. Sensing something odd – he may even have heard Wolé’s ‘In principle, I suppose, yes’ – Murray hesitates. Then he says, ‘What’s up?’

  ‘What do you mean, “what’s up”?’

  Perplexed at Paul’s intensity, Murray shrugs and simply says again, ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Nothing’s fucking up. Nothing’s ever fucking up, is it, Wolé?’

  Wolé just smiles. Stubbing his cigarette out on the inner surface of the metal bin, he opens the door, and says, ‘I’ll see you gentlemen back up there.’

  When he has gone, they sit in silence for a while. Nothing unusual in that; the smoking room is a place of licensed silence. But this silence seems, to Paul, to tremble with tension. Murray himself seems tense and suspicious, as if aware that something hidden is happening. In the Penderel’s Oak at lunchtime, Paul had found himself unable to stop needling him with sarcastic quips and insinuations. For the past two days, in fact, whenever he has spoken to Murray, his words have emerged tinged with sarcasm, sneering. And now, sitting in silence in the smoking room, he wonders what Murray suspects – because he must suspect something. ‘I’ll see you upstairs,’ Paul says, pressing out his cigarette, and not looking Murray in the eye. Murray watches him as he stands up. ‘Have you got a problem or something, Paul?’ he says.

  ‘A problem?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Paul assumes a puzzled expression, and shakes his head. ‘What sort of problem?’

  ‘I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Paul stands there for a moment, and then without knowing why he says, ‘I saw you the other night, Murray.’

  ‘What night?’ Murray does not seem to understand.

  ‘Monday.’

  ‘Monday? What are you talking about?’

  ‘You know what I’m talking about. You were in the Penderel’s.’

  ‘Yes. And?’

  ‘You said you were going home.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘You didn’t go home.’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’ Squinting suspiciously, Murray says, ‘So what?’

  ‘You went to the Penderel’s,’ Paul says. ‘I saw you.’

  ‘I know. I saw you.’ Murray sees the surprise on Paul’s face – it is suddenly mottled with surprise – and waits for him to speak. He does not. ‘I saw you walk out the door,’ Murray says. ‘I was sitting up the bar, and Michaela said to me, There’s Paul. And I turned round and saw you walk out the door. And by the way,’ he adds, ‘you said you were going home as well.’

  ‘I was going home,’ Paul says. ‘I got a call from an old friend. We had a drink.’

  ‘Who was that?’

  ‘You don’t know him.’ He says this looking Murray straight in the eye, and then, ‘You and Michaela seemed to be getting on pretty well.’

  ‘Yes we did seem to be getting on pretty well.’ The
re is something about the way Murray says this – with leathery squinting defiance – that Paul does not like. ‘Do you often go in there on your own, then?’ he asks.

  ‘No, I don’t,’ Murray says shortly. ‘What’s this about?’

  Paul sees that he is only making things worse. It would be absurd for him to start levelling accusations at Murray, when he himself had said he was going home, and was also in the Penderel’s Oak. And absurd, as well, for him to play the jealous lover over Michaela. He is suddenly depressingly aware of the absurdity of that. ‘Forget it,’ he says quietly. ‘I’ll see you up there.’

  On the way back to the sales floor, he tries to put the whole thing out of his mind, and to the surprise of his team, throws himself with unprecedented energy into the hopeless cause of European Procurement Management. For what is left of Wednesday afternoon, and the whole of Thursday morning, he yells and storms, scolds, encourages and exhorts, with a maniacal energy they have never seen in him – an energy which seems to have exhausted itself by the time he gets back from the Penderel’s Oak, drunker than usual, with Murray and Andy, in the middle of Thursday afternoon, and on Friday morning he is deeply morose and untalkative. The previous evening, he met with Eddy Jaw.

  Since Paul had insisted that the meeting take place as far as possible from Park Lane Publications, Eddy had suggested that he visit the offices of Delmar Morgan itself. These were in Victoria, and Paul took the tube there after work, standing on the train with his neck folded sideways, his face in an armpit, pressed against the door by the human stuffing of the carriage so firmly that when it sprang open at Tottenham Court Road he was forced out onto the platform, and halfway along it, by the flood of people leaving the train. Unable to fight his way back on in time, he waited for the next one, which was so full that to make space he had to shove some other passengers further in, something which initially seemed physically impossible. ‘What are you doing?’ one of them shrieked. Another told him he was a ‘fucking twat’. ‘You can fuck off,’ Paul murmured, his face smeared against the dirty Perspex of the in-sliding door. At Oxford Circus, where he had to change to the Victoria Line, things were worse. And when he finally emerged into the evening at Victoria station, part of a moving mass of people pressed together, a sullen aggregate pouring out of the Underground, hurrying and pushing, it was of course already dark, and raining.

  In the downstairs lobby, he was told to take the lift to the fifth floor, where he stepped out into a quiet cream space, where a young woman, half hidden by a huge vase of white orchids, was sitting behind a walnut desk. She was on the phone. On the wall were the words DELMAR MORGAN, and Eddy’s elephant-head logo. She acknowledged Paul with a quick look and a half-smile, and held up a single finger, presumably to indicate that she would be with him in one minute. He stood there, looking around, pretending not to listen to what she was saying. She was very pretty, with black hair. And he thought, soon I will work here, and she will know me. It was quite exciting to think of himself working there. It occurred to him how important surroundings are, how it would be natural to work properly in a place like this. Working in a place like this, he thought, would give you confidence and self-respect. You would value yourself if you worked in a place like this. Paul has heard about offices with bowls of fresh fruit (peaches and stuff, not apples and bananas), and Gaggia espresso machines, and fridges full of Evian, and he wondered if they had those things here.

  He said, ‘I’m here to see Mr Feltman.’

  ‘And what’s your name, please?’

  ‘Paul Rainey.’

  ‘If you’d just like to take a seat, Mr Rainey.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Clearing his throat – his voice had been rather hoarse – Paul sat down. There was a glass coffee table strewn with newspapers – the Financial Times, The Times, the Telegraph – and some low modern leather chairs. He took the FT, and had started to look at the stories on the front page, when the receptionist said, ‘Mr Feltman will be with you in a minute, Mr Rainey.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Paul, and cleared his throat again.

  It was in fact ten minutes before Eddy appeared, wearing a complicated raincoat with epaulettes and carrying a tan leather briefcase. ‘All right, Gwyn,’ he said to the receptionist with a smile. ‘See you tomorrow, sweetheart. Paul. Sorry to keep you, mate.’

  ‘That’s all right.’

  ‘Let’s get out of here. Fancy a drink?’ His smile widened. ‘Course you do.’

  They went to a pub nearby. The Cardinal. Late Victorian in style, with funereal mahogany everywhere and elaborately frosted windows, it was full of office workers, and loud with their voices. Everyone was damp from the rain. ‘I don’t think there’ll be anyone from Delmar in here,’ Eddy said. ‘Discretion – you know.’ Paul nodded, looking around, without much hope, for an empty table. There was only one, occupying the short stretch of wall between the doors of the Ladies and the Gents, deep in the pub. He sat there, smoking, his back against the wall, studying the burgundy honeycomb of the ceiling, while Eddy got the drinks. ‘So, how’s it going?’ Eddy said, sitting himself down on the maroon leather seat of a stool. Paul was slurping his pint. ‘How’s what going?’ he asked.

  ‘You’ve been talking to people? Interesting them in making a move?’

  When, after answering in the affirmative, Paul told him that he had so far signed up only one salesman to come with him, Eddy frowned and said, ‘One? What do you mean?’ Paul started to explain about Nayal’s talktime idea. Eddy interrupted him. ‘You’re going to have to do better than that, mate.’

  ‘There’s a couple of others,’ Paul assured him. ‘A couple of others I haven’t spoken to yet.’

  ‘A couple? Two?’

  Paul nodded.

  ‘For fuck’s sake, mate! You’re supposed to bring a whole team. I was thinking eight or ten people.’

  ‘I thought you only wanted the best people,’ Paul said, reddening. He coughed.

  ‘Well, I was hoping you could get together eight or ten decent salespeople.’

  Paul murmured, ‘There’s probably not eight or ten decent salespeople in the whole of PLP.’

  ‘You can’t come with two or three people, mate.’ Eddy was smiling with a kind of sorrowful incredulity. ‘I’m sorry. You must be able to do better than that. I wanted you to bring your own team – that was the whole fucking point.’

  Paul nodded. ‘All right,’ he said. His voice was hoarse again. ‘What would be the minimum?’ he asked.

  ‘The minimum?’

  Tapping the ash from his cigarette into the big glass ashtray, Paul nodded like a naughty boy. ‘Yeah.’

  Eddy said he needed at least six people. On the way home Paul thought about this. If – if – Elvezia and Marlon agreed, that would make three. Li, four. Claire – under the circumstances there were no more doubts about whether to include her – five. And one more. Who? Dave? Paul frowned and shook his head. But it would have to be him. Andy had made one sale, months ago, and Sami and Richard had never sold a thing. As the squeaking train pulled out of East Croydon, he was suddenly aware of how stressed he was. The stress, the worry, the pressure, the subterfuge, he saw, were inevitable. And he started to wonder whether it was all worth it. What, after all, was the point? His job would still be to marshal muppets – the same muppets, for fuck’s sake, minus Andy, Richard, Sami (whose physical resemblance to a muppet was overwhelming) and Dundee. He thought about the line Eddy had mentioned from Taxi Driver on Monday night, and wondered whether he in fact sufficiently wanted whatever he was hoping to get from this move to make it worthwhile. And what was he hoping to get? He asked himself this as, rocking gently from side to side, the train whistled along its rails through the darkness between Croydon and Gatwick. He was not entirely sober. After only one drink Eddy had said he had to go somewhere, and they had parted, as on Monday, with him clambering into a black cab. Paul had walked to the station. There, impulsively, he had stopped in the Shakespeare, the transients’ pub opposit
e the main entrance, where he had had a pint or two while thinking things over.

  Later, still thinking them over on the train, he wondered what he was hoping to get from this move. The extra money was not the main thing. Unusually for a salesman, he is not principally motivated by money. He needs it, of course. Quite a lot of it – he spends perhaps two hundred pounds a week on alcohol alone. For a long while, though, he has been living within his means. For all their ubiquitous efforts, for all the money they have thrown at him in an attempt to make him want things, modern marketing and brand management have ultimately failed with Paul Rainey. (Perhaps it is simply his alcoholism that makes him more or less immune to them.) No, what he hoped to get from this move, he thought – as the train slowed, and an automated female voice announced its imminent arrival at Gatwick Airport – was what he had imagined while waiting for Eddy: a more positive sense of himself. Money played an essential part in this, of course; money, however, not principally as something to be spent. Money as pure success points, as an ultimate index of personal progress, of his very own economic expansion. What other trustworthy indices did he have? What he hoped for – he spelled it out it to himself as the train slid away from the pinkish glow of the platforms at Gatwick, and once more into the darkness – what he hoped for was simply a sense of progress. That, surely, was what he wanted. It was frightening to think how little progress he had made in the past five years. That was what his doomed attempt to stop the Felixstat had been about. And also an even more ambitious September attempt to quit smoking, an attempt which had lasted one long – very long – Monday morning. As soon as he entered the Penderel’s Oak at twelve, he had known for sure that it would fail. And if failure was inevitable, what was the point of struggling? It did occur to him that this was sophistry, that failure need not be inevitable, that he was simply allowing himself to fail, but by then he was already sweatily feeding his quids into the machine, muttering the usual stuff about it not being a good week for it and, as the fine shiny pack dropped into the tray, promising himself to quit the following Monday. And the following Monday, on the point of lighting his first of the day, a terse interior dialogue had taken place: