by David Lodge
Charles was amused by this story when Robyn rang him up later that evening. But, like Penny, he was surprised Robyn had agreed to be nominated as Arts Faculty Shadow.
“It’s not your sort of thing, is it?”
“Well, I am supposed to be an expert on the industrial novel. Swallow made a great point of that.”
“But not in a realist sort of way. I mean, you’re not suggesting that there’s any possible relevance—”
“No, no, of course not,” said Robyn, anxious to disown the taint of realism. “I’m just trying to explain the pressure that was put on me.” She was beginning to feel that she had made a mistake, and allowed herself to be exploited. It was a rare sensation for Robyn, and all the more unpleasant for that.
This suspicion hardened into certainty in the days that followed. She woke on the morning appointed for her initiation into the Shadow Scheme with a heavy heart, which the weather did nothing to lighten. “Oh no,” she groaned, pulling the bedroom curtain aside on a sky swirling with snowflakes, like a shaken paperweight. A thin layer already covered the frost-hardened ground, and clung delicately to tree-branches, clothes-lines and back-garden bric-à-brac. She was tempted to use the weather as an excuse to postpone her visit to J. Pringle & Sons, but the work ethic that had carried her successfully through so many years of study and so many examinations now exerted its leverage on her conscience once more. She had already postponed the exercise by one week, because of the AUT strike. Another cancellation would look bad.
Over breakfast (no Guardian was delivered, doubtless because of the snow) she pondered the question of what clothes to wear for the occasion. She possessed a boiler suit bought recently from Next, which seemed in theory appropriate, but it was bright orange, with a yellow flower appliquéd on the bib, and it might, she thought, lack dignity. On the other hand, she wasn’t going to show excessive respect by wearing her olive-green tailored interview suit. What did a liberated woman wear to visit a factory? It was a nice semiotic problem. Robyn was well aware that clothes do not merely serve the practical purpose of covering our bodies, but also convey messages about who we are, what we are doing, and how we feel. However, she did in the end let the weather partly determine her choice: a pair of elephant-cord trousers tucked Cossack-style into her high boots, and a chunky-knit cardigan with a shawl collar worn over a Liberty print blouse. On top of this outfit she wore her cream-coloured quilted cotton jacket and a Russian-style hat made of artificial fur. Thus attired, she ventured out into the blizzard.
The little Renault already looked sculpted out of snow, and the key would not turn in the frozen door-lock. She freed it with a patent squirt imported from Finland, and hastily discontinued, called Superpiss. Charles had given it to her for a joke, suggesting she use it as a visual aid to introduce Saussurean linguistics to first-year undergraduates, holding the tube aloft to demonstrate that what is onomatopoeia in one language community may be obscenity in another. The snow adhering to the car windows created a sepulchral gloom inside, and Robyn spent several minutes brushing it off before she attempted to start the engine. Amazingly, perversely, and rather to her regret (a flat battery would have been a cast-iron excuse to abort the visit) the engine fired. With the Rummidge A to Z open on the passenger seat beside her, she set off to find J. Pringle & Sons, somewhere on the other side of the city: the dark side of Rummidge, as foreign to her as the dark side of the moon.
…
Because of the weather Robyn decides not to use the motorway, and, finding the residential backstreets treacherous and strewn with abandoned vehicles, she joins a long, slow-moving convoy of traffic on the Outer Ring—not a purpose-built road, this, but a motley string of suburban shopping streets and main roads, where the snow has already been churned into filthy curds and whey. She feels as if she is negotiating the entrails of the city in the slow, peristaltic procession. Stopping and starting, grinding forward in low gear, she passes shops, offices, tower blocks, garages, car marts, churches, fast-food outlets, a school, a bingo hall, a hospital, a prison. Shocking, somehow, to come across this last, a gloomy Victorian gaol in the middle of an ordinary suburb where double-decker buses pass and housewives with shopping bags and pushchairs go about their mundane business. Prison is just a word to Robyn, a word in a book or a newspaper, a symbol of something—the law, hegemony, repression (“The prison motif in Little Dorrit is a metaphorical articulation of Dickens’ critique of Victorian culture and society”—Discuss). Seeing it there, foursquare in sootstreaked stone, with its barred windows, great studded iron door, and high walls trimmed with barbed wire, makes her think with a shudder of the men cooped up inside in cramped cells smelling of sweat and urine, rapists and pimps and wife-beaters and child-molesters among them, and her heart sinks under the thought that crime and punishment are equally horrible, equally inevitable—unless men should change, all become like Charles, which seems unlikely.
The convoy crawls on. More shops, offices, garages, takeaways. Robyn passes a cinema converted into a bingo hall, a church converted into a community centre, a Co-op converted into a Freezer Centre. This part of the city lacks the individual character of Robyn’s own suburb, where health-food stores and sportswear boutiques and alternative bookshops have sprung up to cater for the students and liberal-minded yuppies who live there; and still more does it lack the green amenities of the residential streets around the University. There are few trees and no parks to be seen. There are occasional strips of terraced houses, whose occupants seem to have given up the unequal struggle against the noise and pollution of the Ring Road, and retreated to their back rooms, for the frontages are peeling and dilapidated and the curtains sag in the windows with a permanently drawn look. Here and there an effort has been made at renovation, but always in deplorable taste, “Georgian” bay windows or Scandinavian-style pine porches clapped on to the Victorian and Edwardian façades. The shops are either flashy or dingy. The windows of the former are piled with cheap mass-produced goods, banks of conjunctival TVs twitching and blinking in unison, blinding white fridges and washing-machines, ugly shoes, ugly clothes, and unbelievably ugly furniture, all plastic veneers and synthetic fabrics. The windows of the dingy shops are like cemeteries for unloved and unwanted goods—limp floral print dresses, yellowing underwear, flyblown chocolate boxes and dusty plastic toys. The people slipping and sliding on the pavements, spattered with slush by the passing traffic, look stoically wretched, as if they expect no better from life. A line from D. H. Lawrence—was it Women in Love or Lady Chatterley?—comes into Robyn’s head, “She felt in a wave of terror the grey, gritty hopelessness of it all.” How she wishes she were back in her snug little house, tapping away on her word-processor, dissecting the lexemes of some classic Victorian novel, delicately detaching the hermeneutic code from the proairetic code, the cultural from the symbolic, surrounded by books and files, the gas fire hissing and a cup of coffee steaming at her elbow. She passes launderettes, hairdressers, betting shops, Sketchleys, Motaparts, Currys, a Post Office, a DIY Centre, a Denture Centre, an Exhaust Centre. An exhaustion centre is what she will soon be in need of. The city seems to stretch on and on—or is she going round and round the Ring Road in an endless loop? No, she is not. She is off the Ring Road. She is lost.
Robyn thinks she must be in Angleside, because the faces of the people slithering on the pavements or huddled miserably at bus-stops are mostly swarthy and dark-eyed, and the bright silks of saris, splashed with mud, gleam beneath the hems of the women’s drab topcoats. The names on the shopfronts are all Asian. Nanda General Stores. Sabar Sweet Centre. Rajit Brothers Import Export. Punjabi Printers Ltd. Usha Saree Centre. Halted at a red light, Robyn consults her A to Z, but before she has found the place on the map, the lights have changed and cars are hooting impatiently behind her. She takes a left turn at random, and finds herself in an area of derelict buildings, burned out and boarded up, the site, she realizes, of the previous year’s rioting. Caribbean faces now preponderate on the pavements.
Youths in outsize hats, lounging in the doorways of shops and cafés, with hands thrust deep into their pockets, gossip and smoke, jog on the spot to keep warm, or lob snowballs at each other across the road, over the roofs of passing cars. How strange it is, strange and sad, to see all these tropical faces amid the slush and dirty snow, the grey gritty hopelessness of an English industrial city in the middle of winter.
Halted on the inside lane, Robyn catches the eye of a young West Indian with Rastafarian dreadlocks, hunched in the entrance of a boarded-up shop, and smiles: a friendly, sympathetic, anti-racist smile. To her alarm the young man immediately straightens up, takes his hands out of the pockets of his black leather jacket, and comes over to her car, stooping to bring his head level with the window. He mouths something through the glass which she cannot hear. The car in front moves forward a few yards, but when Robyn inches forward in turn the young man lays a restraining hand on the Renault’s wing. Robyn leans across the passenger seat and winds the window down a little way. “Yes?” she says, her voice squeaky with suppressed panic.
“You want soom?” he says in a broad Rummidge accent.
“What?” she says blankly.
“You want soom?”
“Some what?”
“The weed, man, wudjerthink?”
“Oh,” says Robyn, as the penny drops. “No thank you.”
“Somethin’ else? Smack? Speed? You nime it.”
“No, really, it’s very kind of you, but—” The car ahead moves forward again and the car behind hoots impatiently. “Sorry—I can’t stop!” she cries and lets out the clutch. Mercifully the traffic progresses for fifty yards before it stalls again, and the Rasta does not pursue her further, but Robyn keeps a nervous eye on her rear-view mirror.
Robyn sees a roadsign to West Wallsbury, the area in which J. Pringle & Sons is situated, and gratefully follows it. But the snow, which has been slight in the past half-hour, suddently begins to fall fast and furiously again, limiting her vision. She finds herself on a dual carriageway, almost a motorway, raised above the level of the neighbouring houses, and with no apparent exits. She is forced to go faster than she would choose by the intimidating bulk of lorries nudging up behind her, their radiator grilles looming like cliffs in her rear-view mirror, the drivers high above, out of sight. Every now and again one of these vehicles swings out and surges past, spattering her side windows with filth and making the little Renault stagger under the impact of displaced air. How can these men (of course they are all men) drive their juggernauts at such insane speeds in such dreadful conditions? Frightened, Robyn clings to the steering wheel like a helmsman in a storm, her head craned forward to peer past the flailing windscreen wipers at the road ahead, ribbed with furrows of yellow-brown slush. At the last possible moment, she glimpses a slip-road to her left and swerves down it. At the bottom there is a roundabout, which she circles twice, trying to make sense of the direction signs. She takes an exit at random and pulls up at the side of the road to consult her A to Z, but there are no street names visible which would enable her to orient herself. Seeing the glow of a red and yellow Shell sign ahead, she drives on and pulls into the forecourt of a self-service petrol station.
Inside the little shop, a doleful Asian youth wearing finger mittens, walled in behind racks of cheap digital watches, ballpoint pens, sweets, and music cassettes, shakes his head and shrugs when she asks him the name of the street. “Do you mean to say that you don’t know the name of the street your own garage is in?” she says sharply, exasperation overcoming sensitivity to racial minorities.
“An’t my garridge,” says the youth in a broad Rummidge accent. “Oi juss work ’ere.”
“Well, do you know if this is West Wallsbury?”
The youth admits that it is. Does he know the way to J. Pringle & Sons? He shakes his head again.
“Pringle’s? I’ll take you there.”
Robyn turns to face a man who has just entered the shop: tall, heavily built, with bushy sideboards and moustache, a sheepskin coat open over his three-piece suit.
“With pleasure,” he adds, smiling and looking Robyn up and down.
“If you would just show me the route on this map,” says Robyn, without returning the smile, “I’d be most grateful.”
“I’ll take you. Just let me settle with Ali Baba here.”
“I have a car of my own, thank you.”
“I mean you can follow me.”
“I couldn’t put you to that trouble. If you would just—”
“No trouble, my love. I’m going there myself.” Seeing the doubtful expression on Robyn’s face, he laughs. “I work there.”
“Oh well, in that case… Thank you.”
“And what brings you to Pringle’s?” says the man, as he signs his credit card slip with a flourish. “Going to work for us, too? Secretary?”
“No.”
“Pity. But you’re not a customer, I think?”
“No.”
“So… what? Are you going to make me play twenty questions?”
“I’m from Rummidge University. I’m, er, taking part in, that is to say… I’m on a kind of educational visit.”
The man freezes in the act of stowing away his wallet. “You’re never Vic Wilcox’s shadow?”
“Yes.”
He gapes at her for a moment, then chortles and slaps his thigh. “My word, Vic’s in for a surprise.”
“Why?”
“Well, he was expecting… someone rather different. Older.” He snorts with suppressed laughter. “Less attractive.”
“Perhaps we should get on,” says Robyn frostily. “I’m going to be very late.”
“No wonder, in this weather. I’m a bit late myself. Motorway was a shambles. I’m Brian Everthorpe, by the way. Marketing Director at Pringle’s.” He produces a small card from his waistcoat pocket and presents it.
Robyn reads aloud: “Riviera Sunbeds. Daily and weekly rental.”
“Oops, somebody else’s card, got mixed up with mine,” says Brian Everthorpe, exchanging the card with another. “Nice little business that, as a matter of fact, Riviera Sunbeds. I know the people. I can arrange a discount if you’re interested.”
“No thank you,” says Robyn.
“You get a marvellous tan. Good as a trip to Tenerife, and a fraction of the cost.”
“I never sunbathe,” says Robyn. “It gives you skin cancer.”
“If you believe the newspapers,” says Brian Everthorpe, “everything nice is bad for you.” He opens the door of the shop and a flurry of snow blows in. “That’s my Granada over there by pump number two. Just get on my tail and stick to it, as the bee said to the pollen.”
…
Brian Everthorpe led Robyn a tortuous route through streets lined with factories and warehouses, many of them closed down, some displaying “For Sale” or “For Lease” signs on them, some derelict beyond the hope of restoration, with snow blowing through their smashed windows. There was not a soul to be seen on the pavements. She was glad of Everthorpe’s guidance, though she disliked his manners and resented his evident desire to stage-manage her arrival at Pringle’s. At the entrance to the factory, he engaged the man controlling the barrier in some kind of argument, then got out of his car to speak to Robyn. She lowered her window.
“Sorry, but the security johnny insists that you sign the visitors’ book. He’s afraid Vic’ll bawl him out otherwise. Bit of a martinet, Vic, I should warn you.” His eye lit upon the little tube on the dashboard. “Superpiss! What’s that for?” he chortled.
“It’s for unfreezing car locks,” said Robyn, hastily stowing it away in the glove compartment. “It’s made in Finland.”
“I’d rather use my own,” said Brian Everthorpe, enjoying the joke hugely. “It costs nothing, and it’s always on tap.”
Robyn got out of the car and looked through railings across the car park to a brick office block and a tall windowless building behind it, a prospect almost as depressing as the prison she h
ad seen that morning. Only the carpet of snow relieved its drabness, and that was being rolled up by a man driving a small tractor with a scoop on the front.
“Where are the chimneys?” she asked.
“What chimneys?”
“Well, you know. Great tall things, with smoke coming out of them.”
Brian Everthorpe laughed. “We don’t need ’em. Everything runs on gas or electricity.” He looked at her quizzically. “Ever been inside a factory before?”
“No,” said Robyn.
“I see. A virgin, eh? Factorywise, I mean.” He grinned and stroked his whiskers.
“Where’s the Visitors’ Book?” Robyn enquired coldly.
After she had signed in, Brian Everthorpe directed her to the section of the car park reserved for visitors, and waited for her at the entrance to the Administration Block. He ushered her into an overheated wood-panelled lobby.
“This is Dr. Penrose,” he said to the two women behind the reception desk. They gaped at her as if she was an alien from outer space, as she shook the snow from her fur cap and quilted jacket. “I’ll tell Mr. Wilcox she’s here,” said Brian Everthorpe, and Robyn thought she saw him wink for some inscrutable reason. “Take a seat,” he said, indicating a rather threadbare sofa of the kind Robyn associated with very old-fashioned cinema foyers. “I won’t be a tick. Can I take your coat?” The way he looked her up and down made Robyn wish she had kept it on.
“Thanks, I’ll keep it with me.”
Everthorpe left, and Robyn sat down. The two women behind the reception desk avoided her eye. One was typing and the other was operating the switchboard. Every minute or so the telephone operator intoned in a bored sing-song, “J. Pringle & Sons good morning kin I ’elp yew?,” and then, “Puttin’ yew threw,” or “Sorree, there’s no reply.” Between calls she murmured inaudibly to her companion and stroked her platinum-blonde hair-do as if it were an ailing pet. Robyn looked around the room. There were framed photographs and testimonials on the panelled walls, and some bits of polished machinery in a glass case. On a low table in front of her were some engineering trade magazines and a copy of the Financial Times. It seemed to her that the world could not possibly contain a more boring room. Nothing her eye fell upon aroused in her the slightest flicker of interest, except a bulletin board with removable plastic letters which declared, under the day’s date: “J. Pringle & Sons welcomes Dr. Robin Penrose, Rummidge University.” Noticing that the two women were now looking at her, Robyn smiled and said, “It’s Robyn with a ‘y’ actually.” To her bewilderment they both dissolved into giggles.