The holding music has changed since last time. Someone must have thought that a banging beat, distorted by feedback, would be more soothing than the classical music they used to have. You are number 8,627 in the queue… That’s what I’m expecting, all revved up for a fight. The sudden human voice startles me. My God – an actual person! ‘I’d like to make an appointment with a doctor,’ I say quickly.
‘We have nothing left for today,’ the woman says. Of course, I expected that too. You have to call, on the nail, at 8.30 a.m. One second over and you have no hope. In a splurge, it comes out: how I stopped taking my pills and don’t know whether to go back on them. How that doctor I saw last time, I’m not sure he was the right person for me – at least, if there’s someone else I could see?—
‘Oh, we have a dedicated weekly clinic now,’ she cuts in smoothly, ‘with a specially trained female doctor.’
I blink as a fat pigeon lands on top of the bin. ‘Oh!’
‘If you go on our website,’ she continues, ‘you can book yourself in.’
I thank her, still a little taken aback, and head down into the station. The train approaches and something switches in me. I don’t want to go home. What would I do there? Sit and stare at my new shelves? Take a hammer to them and smash them to bits? Or, more likely, arrange my numerous trinkets on them? (No, Cora, I do not like clean lines!)
No, I decide, I won’t do that. Instead, I cross to the opposite platform and take a train to Holborn. From there, I march along the street, feeling somehow lighter, towards a specialist shop I’ve never been to before. I know it, of course – everyone does. Established 1830, the sign says. Umbrellas * Walking Canes * Shooting Sticks.
For a minute or so, I hover outside, wondering if this is the right thing to do. Then a smartly dressed woman comes out and holds the door open for me. ‘Thanks.’ I smile and step inside and gaze around at the display-cases, bewildered by the array of patterns and styles.
‘Can I help you?’ asks a wiry young man with a slick moustache.
I clear my throat and try to stand a little taller. ‘I just wondered,’ I say, ‘if you have a man’s umbrella in a burgundy tartan, with a maple handle?’
38
‘Well, this is a beauty. You needn’t have gone to the trouble! But thank you.’ My heart lifts as Rupert admires the fine workmanship, the subtle burgundy pattern and the handle’s graceful curve. I don’t tell him that opening an umbrella indoors is supposed to be bad luck. I’m just relieved that he is apparently happy to see me, full of blustered apologies – no, not apologies exactly, just a muddled explanation: ‘…perhaps a bit hasty, Josie. Neither of us were at our best that day… You understand the importance of excellent customer service…’ Which, I suppose, could be interpreted as ‘sorry’ in Rupert’s language.
Having closed and thoroughly caressed the umbrella, he beckons me through to the back room. Here the new printer sits, apparently awaiting my return. ‘I know I’m being silly, but it’s bringing me out in hives…’
I blink at the supposedly baffling object and make us a couple of instant coffees, experiencing a small sense of satisfaction on being reunited with my special cup. ‘Did you make some changes to the ordering system before you left?’ he asks. Left? I didn’t ‘leave’ – I was pushed! At least I think that’s what happened.
Already, as I explain the basics of how the system works – and is unchanged – I sense his attention wavering. And when I quickly figure out the printer’s basic functions and run through those with him, I might as well be talking to the tape dispenser. Rupert is me, I realise, as the teacher droned on about West Yorkshire’s pivotal role in the Industrial Revolution while my mind wandered to more interesting matters. Such as Shane Calvert sitting a few desks away.
‘Honestly, Rupert,’ I say, snapping him back to attention, ‘it’s all quite simple.’
‘Oh, it’s easy for you!’
I laugh. ‘Why d’you say that?’
‘You’re young, you’re so much better at this kind of thing.’
‘Young,’ I repeat, smirking. Rupert is well educated; he went to some private school in Scotland, and then Cambridge. Not that I think it makes him better than me. But he didn’t attend a seventies-built comprehensive, all polystyrene tiles hanging off the classroom ceilings, and that RAAC concrete that apparently caused the entire building to collapse a couple of years ago. I wonder sometimes if his bluster is an act, a role he enjoys playing. He is a smart man, obviously – he established this shop, although Charles has expressed amazement that he managed ‘before you came along, Josie.’
And it seems that I’m back. Perhaps – as far as Rupert’s concerned – I never really went away. We get on with our respective tasks, although when lunchtime comes around, something is different. ‘No, I’ll go,’ he insists. ‘What would you like?’
‘Oh no, I’m fine,’ I say quickly.
He fixes me with an avuncular look. ‘My treat. Salmon and cream cheese bagel?’
I stare at him. As I’d only popped in, I haven’t brought a packed lunch. ‘That’d be lovely.’ Maybe we should fall out more often? ‘Thank you,’ I add with a smile.
There’s a flurry of customers while he’s out. A few casual walk-ins who opened the door with a hesitant, ‘Is it all right to just come in and have a look?’
‘Of course,’ I say. In fact, Rupert welcomes anyone, even if he doesn’t give that impression. He’d hate to be viewed as stuffy and exclusive. But even after a short break, I can see that the shop’s layout – with his giant desk at the front – is off-putting, and I’m formulating plans to switch things around, to give the whole place an overhaul. Once I’ve worked through the backlog of orders that he’s allowed to build up, I can do that.
Will he let me? When he dropped by earlier, Charles hinted that he would. ‘I think you can pretty much do anything you want to around here,’ he murmured with a smile. ‘So strike while the iron’s hot.’ I’ll have to be diplomatic, as Rupert likes to think he’s good with the ‘common people’, switching effortlessly from yacking with friends from his gentlemen’s club to a bunch of women down for the weekend from Manchester. But actually, ‘The North’ scares him. And when he returns with our bagels, and we eat them companionably together at either side of his fancy desk, it becomes apparent that something is causing him no small degree of concern. That it is, in fact, more alarming to him than the new printer.
‘I’m not sure I even want to go,’ he announces, crumpling up the cream cheese-smeared bag in his fist. ‘It’s not as if I’m an expert in the field.’
I look at him in bewilderment. ‘You’re not an expert on selling high-value art books, in an independent bookshop, in the digital age?’
‘Well, yes, I know a thing or two,’ he blusters, ‘but I’m really not much of a public speaker these days.’ I go to put on the kettle, and by the time I’ve returned to his desk I’ve just about figured this out. I know that Rupert belongs to several booksellers’ associations, and that there’s the occasional conference that he likes to swan along to with his pocket square just so. But it seems that this one is different.
