A Day at the Races
A Day at the Races
By Keith Armstrong
Copyright © Keith Armstrong 2013
First Published in Ireland, in 2013,
in co-operation with Choice Publishing, Drogheda, County Louth, Republic of Ireland
www.choicepublishing.ie
ISBN: 978-1-909154-21-6 (Paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-909154-34-6 (eBook)
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Keith Armstrong asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
Dedication
Dedicated to Rosemary who has encouraged and supported me over the years in all my business ventures and without whose continued support, life would have been very difficult.
About the Author
Keith Armstrong was born in Lancashire, England, but emigrated to Ireland in 1967. He has been involved in textile design and creation all his working life, exporting his own Companies creations all over the world for a wide range of fabric uses, from apparel to home furnishings. Art has always played a major part in his creativity in textiles. Since semi retirement a few years ago, he has been more involved with oil painting covering a wide range of subjects and he has exhibited his work. He is also an accomplished portrait painter and has several high profile people as his subjects.
A day at the races is his first novel and is based in the north of England in and around the Manchester and Salford areas set in the mid nineteen nineties. The idea for the novel first came to him in 2002 but it’s only in recent years since his retirement that he has been able to devote more time to it and complete the work.
Chapter 1
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Mike Ireland took the film off the Hell Drum Scanner and placed it into the Luth Film processor.
‘Thank god for that, he thought. That’s the last of the scans needed for that particular job.’
As the leading edge of the film passed over a photo sensor, it started the processor from its standby position. The processor sprang into life and swallowed the film through its wide throat and sent it on its way, through a series of baths from developer, fixer, and wash and then into a dryer. The film would then drop into a basket fully processed and finished at the other end. This whole process would take less than five minutes.
He glanced at his watch and saw the time was 9.30 p.m. He had been at work since 6.30 a.m. and it had been a long day. He was a man down after his scanner operator phoned in sick, so he stepped into the breach to clear some of the backlog.
“Tony I am off for a beer. The last of the scans for “Gardener’s Weekly” is on its way through the processor now. Would you please check the highlights and shadows and density for me, and if everything is ok place the film in the pouch with the rest of the job and leave it in the Planning Department for the early morning shift?”
“Sure thing Mike, goodnight, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Night Tony, and thanks.”
Mike was almost thirty-six years old, of slim build, and was six feet two inches tall with sandy coloured hair. He had deep stress lines etched into his forehead, caused by the constant day-to-day worry and pressure of meeting publisher’s deadlines and, as a result, he looked considerably older than his actual age.
He stepped out of the offices of the New Hurricane Press and sniffed the cool Salford air. There was a thick fog and the smell from the bitumen factory on one side and the Manchester Ship Canal on the other side of Printing Works, hung heavy in the dense atmosphere. He pulled up the collar of his coat, turned and walked briskly towards The Old Duke Pub.
As he approached the Pub, through the gloom he could see the car park was quite full. As he opened the bar door it was busier than normal, then he remembered that Wednesday was darts night and the Old Duke would be playing a home match that night.
As he pushed his way through the crowd he acknowledged a few faces he recognised, gladiators down from the White Lion Pub, to do battle with the A Team at the Duke.
Maria, who was a truly buxom barmaid, pushed a large tray of sandwiches in front of him.
Maria was thirty-five years old, a beautiful looking girl who, when in her teens, entered and won numerous beauty contests. She had been Miss Lancashire, Miss Blackpool and had come second in the Miss United Kingdom Contest, but when she got married her husband put a stop to it all. She had shoulder length blonde hair sparkling blue eyes, and when she smiled revealed perfect white teeth. She was still slim but had developed an awesome pair of breasts over recent years, and showed more than ample cleavage on this night.
“Hi Mike, have a sandwich, you look like you could do with one.”
“Thanks Maria, I will, it’s been a long day and I didn’t get much time for lunch today.”
“You poor soul, would you like me to have a word with Mr. Clarke, your MD, you know he drinks in here the odd time?”
He smiled “No thanks love, I’ll survive.”
He reached out and took a couple of sandwiches. They felt freshly made, no doubt by the fair hand of Maria. It was customary on darts night to put on snacks when there was a darts team visiting. Sometimes they served typical Northern food like Lancashire Hotpot or Potato Pie, pure gourmet food … at least to a Northerner. However in this instance, just plain old sandwiches.
“Thanks Maria, have you seen Moxie he is supposed to be here?”
“Yes he is in the rear lounge with Fisher and Frank and the rest of the lads.”
“O.K love that’s great, would you bring me a pint of bitter over and whatever the lads are drinking when you get chance?”
“Right away Mike.”
As he headed towards the lounge, he peered in the door, and through the smoke haze saw them deep in conversation in one corner of the room.
“Hello lads, sorry I am late I got held up at work as usual, have you been here long?”
They all looked up and acknowledged him.
“Hello Mike its getting late we thought you weren’t coming, oh I see you have been sampling a couple of Maria’s gourmet delights.” remarked Fisher.
“I wouldn’t mind sampling her couple of delights.” Said Linton.
Mike smiled at him.
Shortly afterwards Maria appeared with their drinks and placed them on the table. Mike paid here and the rest of them looked on, their eyes transfixed on her magnificent chest.
As she left, Fisher turned to Mike.
“I suppose in your line of work you handle tits as big as that every day?”
“Not every day, only when Vicars Monthly is in for printing.”
Laughter filled the air. The New Hurricane Press were general printers but also published about 20 different magazines every month, covering soft porn to gardening, show jumping and local authority news. Vicar’s monthly was the slang term for a soft porn publication that they printed since the laws on sex and nudity had become more liberal. He didn’t like being involved in this particular production but he had no option, it was all work for the printing presses and if they didn’t do it, the competition would.
Mike was Production Manager and as such was in charge of all of the pre-press and printing departments. He was responsible for all the artwork, scanning of all separations and make up, right through to the printing plates, to the finished printed and bound item. He was a hands on kind of person and when the work flow demanded, he would get stuck in and do what was necessary to relieve the bottleneck in any one department, as he was fully trained in every aspect of the job.
“I suppose you get great job satisfaction handling all that meat?” said Frank.
A smile came across Mike’s face.
“Don’t get me wrong, I like the work but the pressure gets to you sometimes, because these editors sit on their arses all month knowing full well what they are going to have in their next publication. Unfortunately they leave it to the last minute before they give it to us, and we are then left with only a couple of days to do all the repro and printing.
It’s the same every month, it never changes and I doubt if it ever will, they just don’t seem to get it, its like they want to cause you as much stress as possible because they feel its their right because they are the customer. One day we will miss a deadline and as Production Manager it will be my fault, sometimes I feel like throwing the bloody lot in.”
“At least it’s a job,” said Fisher “Moxie doesn’t have one.”
“Since when Moxie?”
“It’s a long story Mike, this week has been the worst of my life.”
“Sorry to hear that Moxie, I thought you sounded a bit down on the phone I didn’t realise you had lost your job, I thought you were their number one salesman?”
“I have been Mike for the past five years but cars sales have slowed down over the past six months, mainly because of the downturn in the economy. I have had two warnings from Miller in the last three months about my performance. He didn’t accept that car sales in general were down, he said I wasn’t performing up to scratch, so tonight he asked me for my car keys, he paid me up, and as I left his office he said.”
“By the way Patricia Noble that young barmaid at the Flying Shuttle you have been seeing, is the grand daughter of one of my closest friends.”
“I said to him I didn’t realise you had any friends, plus that’s none of your business what I do outside working hours, that is entirely my own affair. It’s also just occurred to me now, I bet you are the bastard who told my wife.”
“Don’t know what you are talking about.” said Miller.
Moxie started to elaborate.
“You know that young barmaid Trish I was seeing at the Flying Shuttle for the best part of a year, well it turns out its Millers friends grand daughter but I had no idea, plus she never said there was any connection or that she even knew Miller. So rather than fire me the instant he found out, he gave me a warning three months ago and, has bided his time so it wouldn’t look like unfair dismissal?”
“But that is unfair dismissal, you should take him to court.”
“Look Mike car sales are the only thing I am good at, and if I start creating waves, no other company will touch me. Especially in this town, with Miller having a bloody stake in nearly every car showroom in Salford.”
Frank left the table to go up to the bar for cigarettes.
“That’s not all, somebody rang Delores at work and told her I had been seeing Trish, she went totally ballistic when she came down to the garage yesterday to see me. I tried to bluff my way out of it but she knew too much. She went absolutely ape shit out on the car park. All the mechanics came out to watch, she hit me full in the nose with her handbag, called me a bloody gigolo and stormed off at about a hundred miles an hour.
When I got home last night she had taken some of her clothes and I assumed spent the night at her mothers. I thought it best to let her cool down before I attempted to talk her round. When I got home tonight she had taken the car and the house was stripped of contents, plus there was a little note telling me she had cleared the bank account and I would not find her, the bitch. I tried to get cash from the hole in the wall, but the account is overdrawn way over our limit and at this point in time, I only have the cheque that I got from Millers car sales.”
Frank returned from the bar, he had been well briefed on the situation by Moxie.
“That bitch deserves to get the crap kicked out of her for what she did to Moxie, personally I think she over reacted, but that’s women for you, a woman scorned hey, and you lot wonder why I never got married.”
“What are you going to do?”
“To be honest, I don’t know Mike, but whatever it is it will have to be quick. I have payments on the car that Delores has pissed off with, plus the mortgage and half the contents of the house are on the drip. I am going into the bank to see if they will allow me a bit more on my Overdraft, until I get sorted with another job.”