As the Crow Flies (93 page)

“It
has recently come to light,” answered Selwyn, “that Mr. Trentham has, during
the past year, been building up a considerable holding in the company on
borrowed money, causing him to accumulate a large overdraft an overdraft, I am
given to understand, he can no longer sustain. With that in mind he has sold
his personal holding in the company some twentyeight percent direct to the
Hardcastle Trust at the going market rate.”

“Has
he now?” said Daphne.

“Yes,”
said Charlie. “And it may also interest the board to know that during the past
week I have received three letters of resignation, from Mr. Trentham, Mr.
Folland and Mr. Gibbs, which I took the liberty of accepting on your behalf.”

“That
was indeed a liberty,” said Daphne sharply.

“You
feel we shouldn’t have accepted their resignations?”

“I
certainly do, Chairman.”

“May
one ask your reasons, Lady Wiltshire?”

“They’re
purely selfish, Mr. Chairman.” I thought I detected a chuckle in her voice, as
Daphne waited to be sure she had the full attention of the board. “You see, I’d
been looking forward to proposing that all three of them should be sacked.”

Few
members of the board were able to keep a straight face at this suggestion.

“Not
to be recorded in the minutes,” said Charlie, turning towards Jessica. “Thank
you, Mr. Selwyn, for an admirable summary of the present situation. Now, as I
cannot believe there is anything to be gained by continuing to take over those
particular coals, let us move on to item number five, the banking hall.”

Charlie
sat back contentedly while Cathy reported to us that the new facility was
making a respectable monthly return and she could see no reason why the figures
should not continue to improve for the foresee able future. “In fact,” she
said, “I believe the time has come for Trumper’s to offer its regular customers
their own credit card as...”

I
stared at the miniature MC that hung from a gold chain around Cathy’s neck, the
missing link that Mr. Roberts always insisted had to exist. Cathy was still
unable to recall a great deal of what had taken place in her life before she
had come to work in London, but I agreed with Dr. Atkins’ assessment that we
should no longer waste our time with the past but let her concentrate on the
future.

None
of us doubted that when the time came to select a new chairman we wouldn’t have
far to look. The only problem I had to face now was how to convince the present
chairman that perhaps the time had come for him to make way for someone
younger.

“Do
you have any strong feelings about upper limits, Chairman?” asked Cathy.

“No,
no, it all makes good sense to me,” said Charlie, sounding unusually vague.

“I’m
not so sure that I’m able to agree with you on this occasion, Chairman,” said
Daphne.

“And
why’s that, Lady Wiltshire?” asked Charlie, smiling benignly.

“Partly
because you haven’t been listening to a single word that’s been said for about
the last ten minutes,” Daphne declared, “how can you possibly know what you’re
agreeing to?”

“Guilty,”
said Charlie. “I confess my mind was on the other side of the world. However,”
he continued, “I did read Cathy’s report on the subject and I suggest that the
upper limits will have to vary from customer to customer, according to their
credit rating, and we may well need to employ some new staff in future who have
been trained in the City, rather than on the high street. Even so, I shall
still require a detailed timetable if we’re to consider seriously the
introduction of such a scheme, which should be ready for presentation at the
next board Meeting. Is that possible, Miss Ross?” Charlie asked firmly, no
doubt hoping that yet another example of his well-known “thinking on his feet”
had released him from the jaws of Daphne.

“I
will have everything ready for the board to consider at least a week before our
next meeting.”

“Thank
you,” said Charlie. “Item number six. Accounts.”

I
listened intently as Selwyn presented the latest figures, department by
department. Once again I became aware of Cathy questioning and probing whenever
she felt we were not being given a full enough explanation for any loss or
innovation. She sounded like a better informed, more professional version of
Daphne.

“What
are we now projecting will be the profit forecast for the year 1965?” she
asked.

“Approximately
nine hundred and twenty thousand pounds,” replied Selwyn, running his finger
down a column of figures.

That
was the moment when I realized what had to be achieved before I could convince
Charlie he should announce his retirement.

“Thank
you, Mr. Selwyn. Shall we move on to item number seven?” said Charlie. “The
appointment of Miss Cathy Ross as deputy chairman of the board.” Removing his
glasses, Charlie added, “I don’t feel it will be necessary for me to make a
long speech on why... “

“Agreed,”
said Daphne. “It therefore gives me considerable pleasure to propose Miss Ross
as deputy chairman of Trumper’s.”

“I
should like to second that proposal,” volunteered Arthur Selwyn. I could only
smile at the sight of Charlie with his mouth wide open, but he still managed to
ask, “Those in favor?” I raised my hand along with ail but one director.

Cathy
rose and gave a short acceptance speech in which she thanked the board for
their confidence in her and assured them of her total commitment to the future
of the company.

“Any
other business?” asked Charlie, as he began stacking up his papers.

“Yes,”
replied Daphne. “Heaving had the pleasure of proposing Miss Ross as deputy
chairman I feel the time has come for me to hand in my resignation.”

“But
why?” asked Charlie, looking shocked.

“Because
I shall be sixty-five next month, Chairman, and I consider that to be a proper
age to make way for younger blood.”

“Then
I can only say... “ began Charlie and this time none of us tried to stop him
making a long and heartfelt speech. When he had finished we all banged the
table with the palm of a hand.

Once
order had been regained, Daphne said simply, “Thank you. I could not have
expected such dividends from a sixty-pound investment.”

Within
weeks of Daphne’s leaving the company, whenever a sensitive issue came under
discussion with the board Charlie would admit to me after the meeting was over
that he missed the marchioness’ particular brand of maddening common sense.

“And
I wonder if you’ll miss me and my nagging tongue quite as much when I hand in
my resignation?” I asked.

“What
are you talking about, Becky?”

“Only
that I’ll be sixty-five in a couple of years and intend to follow Daphne’s
example.”

“But..”

“No
buts, Charlie,” I told him. “Number 1 now runs itself more than competently
since I stole young Richard Cartwright from Christie’s. In any case, Richard
ought to be offered my place on the main board. After all, he’s taking most of
the responsibility without gaining any of the credit.”

“Well,
I’ll tell you one thing,” Charlie retorted defiantly, “I don’t intend to
resign, not even when I’m seventy.”

During
1965, we opened three new departments: “Teenagers,” which specialized in
clothes and records with its own coffee shop attached; a travel agency, to cope
with the growing demand for holidays abroad; and a gift department, “for the
man who has everything.” Cathy also recommended to the board that after almost
twenty years perhaps the whole barrow needed a facelift. Charlie told me that
he wasn’t quite sure about such a radical upheaval, reminding me of the Fordian
theory that one should never invest in anything that eats or needs to be
repainted. But as Arthur Selwyn and the other directors seemed in no doubt that
a refurbishment program was long overdue he only put up token resistance.

I
kept to my promise or threat as Charlie saw it and resigned three months after
my sixty-fifth birthday, leaving Charlie as the only director who still
survived from the original board.

For
the first time in my recollection, Charlie admitted that he was beginning to
feel his age. Whenever he called for the minutes of the last meeting, he
admitted, he would look around the boardroom table and realize how little he
had in common with most of his fellow directors. The “bright new sparks,” as
Daphne referred to them, financiers, takeover specialists, and public relations
men, all seemed somehow detached from the one element that had always mattered
to Charlie the customer.

They
talked of deficit financing, loan option schemes and the necessity to have
their own computer, often without bothering to seek Charlie’s opinion.

“What
can I do about it?” Charlie asked me after a board meeting at which he admitted
he hardly opened his mouth.

He
scowled when he heard my recommendation.

The
following month Arthur Selwyn announced at the company’s AGM that the pretax
profits for 1966 would be 1,078,600. Charlie stared down at me as I nodded
firmly from the front row. He waited for “Any other business” before he rose to
tell the assembled company that he felt the time had come for him to resign.
Someone else must push the barrow into the seventies, he suggested.

Everyone
in the room looked shocked. They spoke of the end of an era, “no possible
replacement,” and said that it would never be the same again; but not one of
them suggested Charlie should reconsider his position.

Twenty
minutes later he declared the meeting closed.

I
t was Jessica
Allen who told the new chairman that a Mr. Corcran had phoned from the Lefevre
Gallery to say that he accepted her offer of one hundred and ten thousand
pounds.

Cathy
smiled. “Now all we have to do is agree on a date and send out the invitations.
Can you get Becky on the line for me, Jessica?”

The
first action Cathy had proposed to the board after being elected unanimously as
the third chairman of Trumper’s was to appoint Charlie as Life President and
hold a dinner in his honor at the Grosvenor House Hotel. The occasion was
attended by all Trumper’s staff their husbands, wives and many of the friends
Charlie and Becky had made over nearly seven decades. Charlie took his place in
the center of the top table that night, one of the one thousand, seven hundred
and seventy people who filled the great ballroom.

There
followed a five-course meal that even Percy was unable to fault. After Charlie
had been supplied with a brandy and had lit up a large Trumper’s cigar, he
leaned over and whispered to Becky, “I wish your father could have seen this
spread.” He added, “Of course, he wouldn’t have come unless he’d supplied
everything from the meringues glaces to the tread.”

“I
wish Daniel could have shared the evening with us as well,” Becky replied
quietly. A few moments later Cathy stood and delivered a speech that could have
left no one in any doubt that they had elected the right person to follow
Charlie. Cathy ended by inviting the assembled company to toast the health of
the founder and first Life President. After the applause had died away, she
bent down and removed something from beneath her chair. “Charlie,” she said, “This
is a small memento from us all to thank you for the sacrifice you once made in
order to keep Trumper’s afloat.” Cathy turned and handed over an oil painting
to Charlie, who beamed in anticipation until he saw what the subject was. His
mouth opened and his cigar fell on the table as he stared in disbelief. It was
some time before he could let go of The Potato Eaters and rise to respond to
the calls of “Speech, speech!”

Charlie
began by reminding his audience once again how everything had begun with his
grandfather’s barrow in Whitechapel, a barrow that now stood proudly in the
food hall of Trumper’s. He paid tribute to the colonel, long since dead, to the
pioneers of the company, Mr. Crowther and Mr. Hadlow, as well as to two of the
original staff, Bob Makins and Ned Denning both of whom had retired only weeks
before he himself had. He ended with Daphne, Marchioness of Wiltshire, who had
loaned them their first sixty pounds to make it all possible.

“I
wish I was fourteen years old again,” he said wistfully. “Me, my barrow, and my
regulars in the Whitechapel Road. Those were the ‘appiest days of my life.
Because at ‘cart, you see, I’m a simple fruit and vegetable man.” Everybody
laughed, except Becky, who gazed up at her husband and recalled an
eight-year-old boy in short trousers, cap in hand, standing outside her father’s
shop, hoping to get a free bun.

“I
am proud to ‘ave built the biggest barrow in the world and tonight to be among
those who ‘ave ‘elped me push it from the East End all the way into Chelsea
Terrace. I’ll miss you all and I can only ‘ope you’ll allow me back into
Trumper’s from time to time.”

As
Charlie sat down, his staff rose to cheer him. He leaned over, took Becky by
the hand and said, “Forgive me, but I forgot to tell ‘em it was you what
founded it in the first place.”