Rest Assured (6 page)

‘And you've had a certain amount of success, Frank, on which I congratulated you at the time. But the two new orders you secured represent about a quarter of the business we have now lost, as Brownlee take their custom elsewhere.'

‘Yes, sir. I realize that. Hopefully the new orders will develop into greater quantities when the clients are satisfied with our products.'

‘Hopefully they might, yes. But both of them are small firms. It will take them many years to grow to the size of Brownlee, even if they are successful. They are the kind of business we should pick up, I'm not disputing that. But not at the expense of the Brownlee custom, Frank.'

‘The two things aren't connected, sir.' Belatedly, the salesman became more aggressive. ‘I didn't neglect Brownlee to secure these other outlets. The cancellation of the Brownlee order hit me like a bolt from the blue on Tuesday.'

‘I see. Well, I accept that, Frank. The question we have to ask is whether it should have hit you like that. Clients, especially big and long-established clients, need to be kept warm. Do you honestly think that you shouldn't have seen this coming? Are you quite sure that there was nothing you could have done to anticipate it and possibly prevent it?'

The man opposite him squirmed a little on his upright seat. He was used to enlarging on the excellence of what he could offer to people who knew nothing of his background and little about the firm he worked for. This man knew all about him, and far more about the financial health of this company than he ever would. You couldn't spin yarns here; you couldn't pull the wool over this man's eyes. Even those clichés seemed third-hand and useless here; he realized in his discomfort how heavily he dealt in clichés during his working day.

The old, well-worn phrases got you by, with people who didn't know you or whom you met only occasionally in the course of your work. But this man knew him too well to be sidetracked by the conventional bits of jargon. The trouble with being a salesman was that you presented only one side of a case for all of your working life: that was what everyone expected you to do, in order to sell your product. But it also meant that no one was disposed to believe you, even when you spoke the most heartfelt truth.

He tried to produce his usual cheerful air, but felt himself failing miserably as he looked into the round, experienced face opposite him. ‘I got no warning of this, sir. The MD at Brownlee seemed perfectly happy with our goods and our service when I last saw him. I – I could perhaps have kept in touch with him a little better in the intervening period, but I don't think it would have made any difference to the decision he made last Tuesday.'

‘You may well be right in that, Frank. But as you didn't contact him, we'll never know, will we? I shall be seeing the Brownlee board member who oversees most of their buying at a conference next week. I'll have a word with him there and try to see whether this switch to another supplier is irrevocable, or whether we have a chance of getting back with them in the future.'

‘Thank you, sir. I'm sure that you'll find that—'

‘What about the other clients on your patch? Are you happy that none of them is going to defect to the competition?'

‘I don't think that is likely to happen, sir.'

Tiler let that limp statement hang in the air for a moment, allowing his man to hear and endure the flaccidity of it. ‘Better make sure it doesn't, eh, Frank? Better keep the buyers warm and make sure they appreciate how good our products are and how keen our prices are. What Brownlee have done will get around, as you know, and other people will be asking themselves whether they've got the best deal possible in these cut-throat times.'

The chastened man gave his assurances and left. Geoffrey Tiler looked at his desk unseeingly for a long moment. He didn't like himself much at times like this. But these things surely had to be done. Salesmen expected it, when a major contract was lost, even when there was no omission on their part. It was part of the efficient running of a successful business: you couldn't appear slack. You had to keep people up to the mark.

And it would be the weekend in an hour or two. He would get away from this office and this factory and enjoy playing an entirely different role. No, that was wrong: he would be himself, rather than merely playing the role he played here. As near to himself as he would ever get nowadays, certainly. Sometimes he longed for those student days when everything had seemed black and white and simple. For the days when the opposition had been fascists or reactionaries and you were going to create a new and better world.

Laura brought him the letters to sign. He did that with a series of brisk flourishes, then looked up at her with a smile. ‘POETS day, Laura. Piss off early, tomorrow's Saturday. Do people still use that expression?'

She was mildly shocked that he had voiced a word like that. It was common enough nowadays, but she'd never heard it from Mr Tiler before. ‘I think they do, yes, sir.'

‘Well, we should heed them, then. Get away by half past four, today. Even earlier, if you can. Clear your desk and bugger off.'

Another word she didn't usually get from him. ‘Thank you, sir. That's very kind of you and I shall do that.' It was curious that when he made concessions, her own language seemed to become more formal than usual. ‘There's just one thing, sir. I have a note in my diary. You asked me to remind you about Mrs Tiler's birthday. It's on Monday.'

Laura spoke tentatively. Her boss had been divorced for two years now, and you could never tell how people would react to former spouses. If they were feeling bitter, they might even revile you for raising the subject.

Geoffrey Tiler didn't revile her. He smiled softly – even, she thought, a little regretfully, but that might have been just her sentimental streak. ‘Arrange for some flowers to be delivered to her, will you – just my name, no other message. Carnations, I think. She was always fond of carnations.'

‘I'll do that, sir. I'll arrange it now, before I go.' Laura made a note she did not need and stood up. She knew his wife's first name for the flowers. It was sad that neither of them had mentioned it here. ‘Thank you for letting me finish early today, sir. I'll get the supermarket shopping out of the way today and have the weekend to myself.'

Geoffrey's own working week was finished now. He made a note or two for the Monday and Tuesday and listened to the noises in the anteroom as Laura cleared her desk and prepared to leave. Only when she had gone did he lock his desk and move out to the big maroon BMW.

He was soon out of Wolverhampton and driving swiftly west. He tried to relax, not race along, so that he could enjoy the journey and the late-spring countryside. The chestnuts were at their best now, like vast candelabras with their upright white or red blossoms. They'd been scarcely in leaf when he'd passed along this road three weeks ago. How quickly nature moved at this time of the year. Changing the face of the earth almost as quickly as human life itself changed at times.

Once he was through Bridgnorth, the route became ever more rural. He liked that; it seemed to be marking the transition from his working life to the weekend and the real Geoffrey Tiler. He felt himself relaxing, but at the same time his veins throbbed with anticipation. He was fifty now, but he hadn't felt like this since he was a young man. Was he being slightly ridiculous, or just realizing his potential? He preferred the latter verdict, even if it involved some self-deception. This was the best of himself, so why not go along with it?

He greeted the man who lifted the barrier for him at Twin Lakes cheerfully. He glanced up at the sign above his head which read ‘TWIN LAKES – REST ASSURED' and thought happily that it was much more accurate than most advertising slogans.

The Ford Focus was already neatly parked near the home by the lake and his heart leapt at the sight of it. He forced himself to park carefully, then climbed out and turned quickly to the figure he knew would be waiting. He held out both hands, felt them taken firmly in the grasp of the tall, slim figure who stood smiling in the doorway of the unit. They held hands and looked at each other approvingly for a moment, then clasped each other in a long, unhurried embrace.

Geoffrey Tiler was quite breathless when he eventually stood back. He said, ‘It's so good to see you, Michael!'

Elfrida Potts was much the more awkward of the two. Wayne Briggs seemed quite confident and perfectly at home here.

He became more confident each time they had sex. She'd had to show him the way at first, and he'd come like a steam engine inside her, before she was really ready for him. But Freda didn't mind that. She enjoyed his excitement, rejoiced in the feeling that she could have this effect on a handsome young boy like Wayne. They'd done it three times in the few hours since they'd arrived at Twin Lakes, and he'd become more assertive and more skilful each time. You could do wonderful things with youth at your disposal, she thought. It was a long time since she had been this excited. Plainly Wayne was good for her.

And she was good for Wayne, wasn't she? She was helping him to grow up, marking his transition from boy to man and helping him through it. He was lucky to have an experienced older woman to guide him through that.

Not that Freda was all that experienced. She'd tried to tell him that, to convey to him that she wasn't some slapper who went for anything in trousers; that she'd had men before, but been choosy about them. She didn't think he'd registered much of what she'd said; he'd been far too excited at the time.

‘You're quite a woman, Freda.' Wayne fingered the clasp at the top of her skirt, ran his hands down over her buttocks.

He was enjoying using her first name, enjoying the free exploration of her bottom even more. He'd be wanting her naked again soon, and it wasn't long since she'd dressed. Freda wondered what he would say to his mates at school about this. Would he boast about doing it with the teacher who kept them all in such strict order? Would he tell them how he'd held her moaning and helpless in his arms? Would he quote the things she'd said to him in her passion? Would he tell them about the things she'd asked him to do to her and the pleasure they had brought?

This was madness. She had always known it was madness. If she'd wanted a toy boy, why hadn't she got someone over eighteen, someone who wasn't a pupil? Someone who wasn't jailbait. She'd heard one of the men teachers use that phrase in the staff room, when he'd been talking about one of the young minxes in the sixth form who he said had a crush on him. He hadn't been talking to her, of course. No one thought that staid Mrs Potts would get herself involved in anything like this.

And yet here she was, being rogered for fun in the mobile home she and Matthew had bought to get away from it all at the weekends. ‘Rest Assured', it said at the entrance, and until now that had seemed appropriate. But there was going to be no rest for her this weekend, that was for sure. Wayne had whispered in her ear that he was going to fuck the fanny off her, and she had found his words enormously and unexpectedly exciting. Quiet Mrs Potts, thirty-five years old and the conscientious head of history, was being rogered rigid and enjoying it.

Wayne would get tired of her. She'd told herself that from the start, just as she'd told herself not to get involved. She couldn't expect him not to move on: he was only sixteen. She was his rite of passage. In ten years, five years even, he'd be looking back and saying that she'd been just that. But where would she be in five years? In deep trouble, unless this boy kept his mouth shut. She made herself think of him as a boy, to remind herself of the dangers she was inviting by being here with him. But the danger was part of the attraction, just as his youth and inexperience were part of the attraction.

She said, ‘Do you play golf, Wayne?' She didn't like the name, but she made herself use it. He couldn't be just a sex object, if she kept using his name and showing her affection.

‘No. It's a game for old men and ponces in daft trousers, innit?'

‘Some people think so. But the people who scoff don't always know much about it. I could teach you, if you like. I'm not a good player, but I know the rudiments.'

‘Rudiments, eh?' He grinned and savoured the word. ‘You're good at being rude, anyway, Miss.' He giggled and ran his hand round the inside of her skirt top, stroking the soft skin of her belly below her navel.

‘It's not Miss! That's for school, not here!' She spoke with a feeling of panic, realizing that he would never recognize the need for caution as clearly as she did. ‘You're my nephew here, remember? I'm your Aunt Freda.'

She'd settled on that because no one was going to believe she was his sister and she certainly wasn't going to be his mother. Wayne giggled. ‘I like that. Aunty Freda. Take your skirt off and your drawers down and sit on my prick, Aunty Freda.'

‘Don't be silly, Wayne! We can't just make love all of the time, you know.' But a small part of her said that they could; that what he had just suggested would be a new position and very exciting. She said firmly, ‘It's a lovely evening outside. If you don't want to try golf and you don't want to sail on the lake, at least we should go for a walk. We'll probably have the woods to ourselves.'

‘Want to do it outside under the leaves with the birds singing above us, do you, Freda? Well, I'm game if you are. Al fresco, they call it. Didn't think I'd know that, did you? I'm not as thick as you think, you know.'

‘I know you're not thick, Wayne. I always knew that. You're a bright boy who isn't making the most of himself. I want to help you to do that.'

‘And you are, Miss! Sorry, you are, Freda. I've never felt such a man. You can feel it, if you like.'

He reached for her hand, but she slipped away from him. ‘You're a lecherous adolescent, that's what you are! And we're going for a walk. Then we'll have something to eat. I'm not just a pretty face, you know. I can cook.'