Alfred settled back into the leather armchair, which was rubbed
to a shine on the arms and seat from all the powerful and self-regarding bodies
that had sat in it over the years, and resolved to change things. He was a man with a plan, or rather a
scheme.
Slim, grey-haired, with compact features and a neat, unfussy
dress sense, Alfred was relaxing in the company lounge. It was a broad low room with soft, easy
lighting and a fully glazed end wall, offering a panoramic view over the
city. The lounge was scattered with easy
chairs and dark wood coffee tables. It
was a little early for lunch and a little late for morning coffee, but not many
people in the company could touch Alfred.
He had a near-flawless record, yet he was known as a workhorse rather
than a creative savant, and this meant he was just outside the top spots. He was a partner, but not a senior director,
a position he coveted. There was a
rumour, fanning out from the water-coolers, that a place at the big dicks’
table would be available sometime soon.
Mr Claridge was surely ready for retirement; that heart scare last year,
grandchildren arriving, and so on and so on.
However, Alfred well knew that there would be competition.
As he was pondering this, Alfred’s foremost rival entered
the company lounge. Jeffery Sharp,
‘Jeff’ to all and sundry, was younger than Alfred, and much bigger. He was a fat man, but not with big wobbling
rolls. He seemed to have a solid cushion
under his shirt, extending all the way down from the top of his chest to below
the waistband. From this wide jar of
flesh, his legs tapered rapidly to narrow ankles. In his preferred black pinstripe suit, he was
a geometry lesson; in profile, a cylinder balanced atop two scalene triangles,
finished with a squat pint-glass of a head, missing only a handle out of the
back.
Jeff loomed over Alfred as he bellowed, “Morning Alfred,
you’re taking it easy already?” He spoke
at high volume in any context, which did nothing to diminish his air of
self-importance.
“Why yes, Jeffery.
Would you join me?” replied Alfred, in a far more considered tone. “Let’s have a drink; it is Friday after
all.” He knew this would get the other man
sitting down.
While Jeff made himself comfortable in the chair opposite
Alfred’s, Alfred collected two glasses of scotch with a drop of water from the
minibar in one corner. Knowing Jeffery
wouldn’t know the difference, he poured Jeff the cheapest blend, and himself a
Campbelltown single malt, which was older than his daughter by a few
years.
Sitting back down, Alfred asked, “How’s the Fincher account
coming along?” He was aware that the
combination of alcohol and the chance to share his own brand of pugnacious
self-promotion was the best way to loosen Jeff’s mind and tongue.
“Smashing, old fella!” yelled Jeff. “Should be able to drain
at least another half a mil out of that one, and still leave satisfied
customers behind!”
“Ah, well done Jeffery.
That will be very helpful for the company, I’m sure.” Alfred allowed his eye to slyly run up and
down his adversary, noticing with distaste how Jeff’s trousers pulled tight at
the crotch, his belly resting heavily on the top of his thighs, completely
engulfing his belt.
Jeff gulped noisily.
“What is this fine stuff?”
“You’re drinking a 18-year-old Speyside single malt there,”
Alfred lied. “One of the few independent
distillers left in the region.”
“Excellent! I should
learn more about whiskey. I’ll bet they
are always on it up there.” Jeff’s eyes
went skywards; the senior director’s lounge was directly above the one in which
they were sitting.
Alfred could sense his opportunity. “I suppose you’ve heard all the juniors’
chit-chat?”
Jeff entered his element with a harrumphing sound. “Claridge is done! I couldn’t be more sure. The old bugger is just clinging to that table
upstairs with his fingernails!” He
paused. “You wouldn’t be interested in… taking his place, would you, old
lad?”
Alfred and Jeff connected gazes for a moment. Alfred considered whether he had misjudged
this man; perhaps he was craftier that he had taken him for. He would have to move carefully.
“Oh, I’m not so far from retirement myself… But if the company could benefit from my
experience, I couldn’t turn them down.”
Jeff sat back and laughed, a performance of a laugh, room-filling
and aggressive. “Ho, nice dodge my
man. I’ll be less coy – I deserve a seat
at that table. When Claridge shifts out,
I should be in there.”
He swigged at his whiskey, proud of his challenge to the
other, tasting the thrill of his unabashed mercilessness.
“In fact,” said Jeff conspiratorially (if such a loud voice
could be considered conspiratorial), “I’d say there’s already room for someone
like me.”
“Oh, do go on,” invited Alfred, crossing his legs and
looking deliberately dandyish. “Let us
speak… freely. You believe you could
replace any one of them. Could you rank
them?”
Jeff licked his lips.
They had hit on one of his favourite topics. He had spent many hours considering the
precise nature of the incompetence of each senior director.
“Well… Anyone would put Smythe rock bottom. He’s a yes-man, never pushed a client for
more cash his whole career. He’s a total
flop, couldn’t negotiate his way through a turnstile. By all accounts, useless with women too. Smythe is only up there because he was a bootlicker
for Clarendon-Smith for so long. You no
doubt heard about how he let the Festinger account go? What a drip.”
Alfred gently touched the tip of his nose with his finger and
gestured for Jeff to continue.
“That old battle-axe would have to be next worst. Mrs Hampshire, Havisham more like!” Jeff guffawed at his own literary
cleverness. “I just imagine her as some
kind of spinster dominatrix, whips and chains, probably using them on old
Rupert Ritherdon! Ha ha! She’s a right old sort, eh? I love how she browbeats the big clients,
makes them run home to their mummies. She’s
a hack, though; doesn’t know the first thing about the nuances of international
trading.”
Jeff was warming to his theme more and more. Alfred sat quietly, paying out the rope,
counting off the knots as Jeff accelerated his rhetoric.
“Third worst would have to be Danielson. Oh Danielson, he’s a slippery one, no
mistake. Have you heard how he schmoozes
with the big money? He’s all over them
with gifts, trips to see the dancing girls, and his promises of a ‘personalised
service.’ As if mate. He can’t keep them happy for more than five
minutes. He barely knows the numbers,
let alone how to smooth over them for clients.
“So that just leaves Ritherdon and Clarendon-Smith, apart
from Claridge, who’s out of the picture anyway.
The two don’s! Ha ha! In their dreams. Ritherdon’s the weaker of the two, I suppose. He’s never aggressive enough. He puts on a show but can’t snare the really lucrative deals. I’ve made twice as much for the company as
him. No balls, that chap. At least he has a bit more business acumen
than Danielson, although that’s not saying much.”
“Indeed,” Alfred murmured, sipping his whiskey. His eyes flickered towards the ceiling,
confident that all the directors were in their lounge above. They tended to review the week’s successes over
coffee on Friday mornings, so they could get away early to their second homes
on the coast for the weekend.
“Clarendon-Smith,” Jeff continued, “is a slightly different
animal. He is the only one of them who’s
any use. I can respect a man who drops a
client or a consultant like he does, when he’s finished sapping them dry. I’d say he’s the only one roughly on my
level. So he’ll top my ranking.”
There was a pause, during which Jeff drained his glass.
“Well, thank you for sharing your insights,” said Alfred,
working hard to mask the sarcastic slant of his voice. “You seem to have it all worked out.”
“That’s right!” shouted Jeff, standing up. He had made himself heard, imparted some
wisdom to someone less capable than his magnificent self, and thus he was
done. “Now, old chap, good chat, must
get back to the desk. I have a
conference call with the Beijing office.”
With that, Jeff Sharp departed, leaving a deep dent in his armchair
and an unpleasant lingering odour of egotism.
Alfred sat very still in his seat for a minute or two,
expressionless. He listened to the muffled,
yet obviously raised, voices from upstairs.
Then, gradually, he permitted himself a smile that began slowly at the
corners of his mouth, and spread over his whole face.
He recalled his little visit to the senior director’s lounge
just thirty minutes ago.
Alfred had opened the door ever-so carefully, confirming
there was no one inside. He checked the telephone
in the corner for its extension number, since the line to the senior director’s
lounge wasn’t listed in the company phone book.
He found the digits displayed on its little rectangular screen. Then he dialled the phone in front of him
from his mobile. As soon as it rang, he
hit the speaker button and said hello into his mobile, to check it came through
clearly. Alfred sat down on the arm of
one of the chairs across the room, and slid the mobile underneath. He spoke to himself at normal conversational
volume: “Jeffery Sharp will never enter
this room,” twice over like a mantra.
The telephone on the table in the corner repeated his words along with
him, Alfred noted to his great satisfaction.
He stood and smoothed off the arm of the chair where he had
reposed; then Alfred left the room silently.
He walked downstairs to the junior lounge, holding his mobile phone with
care so as not to accidentally cut the connection to upstairs. Alfred settled in his chair, slid the mobile
underneath and waited for his opponent’s arrival.
Now, after Sharp’s departure, he chuckled to himself,
reaching underneath his chair and hanging up the call that his mobile phone had
been making for the past half hour.
Alfred went back to the minibar and poured himself another scotch; it
tasted all the more gratifying as he reflected on the now inescapable demise of
one Jeffery Sharp.
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