The Reginald Perrin Omnibus (41 page)

‘I’ve come round here to offer you a job, Reggie,’ he said.

‘I don’t want charity,’ said Reggie.

Linda nudged Tom with her eyes.

‘It won’t be charity,’ said Tom. ‘A man of your experience has much to offer.’

He sat down beside Linda and put an arm round her waist.

‘I’m not a snob,’ he said. ‘But I don’t like the thought of Linda’s father working on a pig farm.’

‘Nor does Linda’s father,’ said Reggie.

‘I know you think being an estate agent’s a boring job,’ said Tom. ‘But there are some quite exciting challenges in the world of property.’

‘It’s not as boring as pig farming,’ said Reggie. ‘I accept with grateful thanks.’

‘Excellent. Well, who’s for quince wine?’ said Tom.

‘Claret for me,’ said Elizabeth. ‘I expect the quince is as horrible as all your other wines.’

‘Darling!’ said Reggie. ‘Darling!’

‘No doubt Tom has many talents, which we just don’t happen to have come across, but wine-making is not among them,’ said Elizabeth.

‘Darling!’ said Reggie. ‘Tom, I’m awfully sorry. I’m longing to try the quince wine.’

‘What’s up, mum?’ said Linda.

‘I think it’s about time we told the truth,’ said Elizabeth, and she left to fetch the claret.

‘I am sorry,’ said Reggie.

Tom opened the quince wine with some difficulty.

‘How did you get your black eyes, dad?’ said Linda.

‘A porker ran amok,’ said Reggie.

‘I’m not a pig person,’ grunted Tom, imitating a hairy question mark as he grappled with the recalcitrant cork.

At last the bottle was open. Tom poured Reggie a glass.

‘Aren’t you having any, Tom?’ said Reggie.

‘I like the sound of that claret,’ said Tom.

The evenings were drawing in, and already the light was fading.

Elizabeth entered with the claret, and three glasses.

‘It’s the last bottle,’ she said.

Reggie sipped his quince wine cautiously. It was much better than the sprout wine, but revolting.

Elizabeth stood with her back to Dr Snurd’s bloodshot representation of sunset at Faro, and read Mark’s letter. When she had finished Tom said: ‘Absence hasn’t made me fonder of Mark’s jokes.’

‘Listen who’s talking,’ said Elizabeth. ‘You’ve got about as much humour as the National Grid.’

‘Darling, stop being rude to Tom,’ said Reggie. ‘He’s come round out of the goodness of his heart to offer me a wonderful job and share his precious quince wine, which really is surprisingly good, though I don’t know why I should say surprisingly, and all you do is insult him. It’s a bit much.’

‘It’s all right,’ said Tom. ‘I’m under no illusions that either of you like me.’

‘That’s not true,’ said Reggie.

‘Yes it is,’ said Elizabeth.

‘Darling,’ said Reggie.

‘No,’ said Linda. ‘If mum feels that way, she may as well get it off her chest.’

‘It’s utter nonsense,’ said Reggie. ‘We’re very attached to Tom.’

‘The only thing that’s attached to Tom is his beard,’ said Elizabeth.

‘Stop it,’ hissed Reggie desperately.

‘Try calling him a bearded prig like you used to,’ said Elizabeth.

‘That’s true, dad,’ said Linda. ‘You did.’

‘I may have done,’ said Reggie. ‘It was … it was a term of endearment. Good old Tom, the bearded prig.’

‘Like pompous twit?’ said Elizabeth.

‘Yes!’ Reggie smiled anxiously at Tom. ‘Good old Tom. How is the pompous twit? That sort of thing. The sort of thing you only say to your friends. Shows how much I like you, eh, Tom?’ He turned to Elizabeth and whispered: ‘Shut up.’

Further conversation was prevented by a plane, carrying, it so happened, a party of Basle bank managers on their way to Aspreys.

‘Sorry, what did you say?’ said Reggie, shutting the french windows.

‘I said we’re on the flight path again,’ said Tom.

They finished the claret and Tom rose to leave.

‘I’m big enough to forget what’s happened,’ he said. ‘Glad to have you aboard, Reggie.’

‘Thank you,’ said Reggie. ‘And I’m sorry about …’ he glanced at Elizabeth ‘… tonight.’

‘It’s all right for you to be rude,’ said Elizabeth, ‘but not me.’

‘Well … you know … I mean at that time I was under pressure.’

‘Perhaps mum is,’ said Linda.

‘It’s different for a woman,’ said Reggie.

‘How?’ said Elizabeth and Linda.

‘It’s unladylike,’ said Reggie. ‘It’s embarrassing.’

‘Oh God!’ said Elizabeth and Linda.

Tom hastily poured the remains of the quince wine.

‘Cheers, everyone,’ he said.

‘Oh shut up, Tom,’ said everyone.

‘Why are you doing all this?’ said Reggie as they lay in bed in the dark.

‘What do you think?’ said Elizabeth.

‘I don’t know what to think,’ said Reggie.

Elizabeth switched her bedside light on.

‘Nothing can ever be the same again,’ she said. ‘You’ve got to understand that, Reggie. You’ve changed me. You’ve awakened a sleeping tiger.’

‘Ah! Well, that’s lovely. Who wants their wife to be …’

‘Dull and ordinary?’

‘No. Well, yes. I’m glad you’re a tigress, darling.’

‘You’re terrified.’

‘A bit. I mean can’t you find a better way of being a tigress than insulting poor Tom? Can’t we both find better ways together?’

‘We can try,’ said Elizabeth.

She kissed him and switched off her bedside light. Reggie switched his on.

‘I’m going to read,’ he said. ‘No point in trying to sleep till the Milfords come back.’

There was a loud crash of splintering glass. Reggie went cautiously downstairs. A brick lay on the living-room carpet, and a pane of the french windows was shattered.

Attached to the brick was a message. It said, in childish capitals: ‘Down with flashers.’

‘You’re pissing me about, old son,’ said Mr Pelham. ‘Pigs are conservative creatures. They don’t like change.’

‘I never knew there was so much to pigs,’ said Reggie.

‘People don’t, Reg,’ said Mr Pelham. ‘People don’t. Pigs are sensitive souls. How can you expect them to produce all that lovely gammon if they don’t know whether they’ coming or going?’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Reggie. ‘Honest.’

‘Goodbye, then, old son,’ said Mr Pelham. ‘Or is it only au revoir?’

‘No it bleeding isn’t,’ said Reggie. ‘It’s goodbye.’

July drew towards its close, and the days were sunny with brief heavy showers.

Elizabeth behaved very well at the jelly unveiling, all things considered.

There were some eighty people in the Wilberforce Rooms at the Cosmo Hotel. Among them were C.J., Tony, David, the editor of the
Convenience Foodstuffs Gazette
, the jelly correspondent of the
Daily Telegraph
, three dieticians, one of whom had an ulcer, two photographers, a Bible salesman who was in the wrong room, nine people with a sixth sense for free drinks, six people with a ninth sense for free drinks, and several representatives of the catering distributive trades.

At the far end of the stuffy room there was a table, concealed beneath a large dust-cover.

Four pretty girls with tight bums and hard faces dispensed free drinks. Free drinks are never served, they are always dispensed, perhaps in the hope that the unattractive verb will discourage excessive consumption.

The girls had large shining suns pinned to their starched uniforms. They were the Sunshine Girls, hired by C.J. for three hours. In the evening two of them would become the elastoplast girls and the other two would become the machine-tool girls.

C.J. made a speech, explaining that the actor who was to have unveiled the new slim-line jellies had broken his foot.

Tony Webster spoke next. He opined that the jellies were great, and explained that the female singer hired to replace the actor with the broken foot had gone down with a summer cold.

David Harris-Jones gave it as his considered opinion that the jellies were super. He told a joke about an Englishman, an Irishman and a jelly. People talked during his speech, and he dried up. ‘Everyone seems to be talking except me,’ he complained to an audience of himself.

Nobody heard him explain that they were lucky indeed to have their unveiling done by that legendary celebrity, the Manager of the Cosmo Hotel.

The manager pulled back a rope, and the dust-cover rolled off, revealing eight large, lurid and faintly surprised jellies wobbling on their dishes.

Elizabeth laughed out loud, but not all that loud, and only for about a minute and a half.

She behaved very well, all things considered, at the jelly unveiling.

Reggie behaved very badly, all things considered, at Norris, Wattenburg and Patterson.

Were there mitigating circumstances? There were indeed, gentle reader.

The previous evening, at supper, an unpleasant incident had occurred.

It was Reggie’s turn to cook the meal, and while they were eating their Chinese take-away, a brick sailed through the dining-room window and landed in the sweet and sour prawn balls. Reggie and Elizabeth were covered in glutinous orange-red sauce.

Elizabeth laughed.

‘I don’t see what’s so funny,’ said Reggie.

‘We look like a scene from a Sam Peckinpah film,’ said Elizabeth.

‘I don’t think it’s funny having bricks thrown through our windows,’ said Reggie. ‘They think I’m the man who flashed at that schoolgirl. I’m going to be blamed for anything unusual that happens on this estate.’

‘Never mind, you know you aren’t the flasher, that’s all that matters,’ said Elizabeth. ‘I mean you aren’t, are you?’

‘What a dreadful thing to say,’ said Reggie. ‘I’m your husband.’

‘Husbands have flashed in the past, and no doubt husbands will flash in the future,’ said Elizabeth, trying to clean some of the sauce from the tablecloth and chairs.

‘But I’m me, darling. I’m not a flasher,’ said Reggie. ‘You know that.’

‘I didn’t think you were the sort of man who faked suicide by leaving all his clothes on Chesil Bank,’ said Elizabeth.

Reggie grabbed her by the arm.

‘I’m not the flasher,’ he said.

‘All right. You’re not the flasher. I’m glad,’ said Elizabeth.

They cleaned the sauce off themselves in the kitchen.

‘We’ll have to move,’ said Reggie. ‘Bricks through windows, ostracised by neighbours who don’t even know what the word means, outcasts in our own home.’

The next day Tom took Reggie out with him to show a prospective client a beautiful little cottage, situated in a clearing, surrounded by Chiltern beech woods. Facilities were few, and so the cottage was a snip at only £29,995.

‘I’ll offer twenty-nine thousand,’ said the prospective client.

‘Twenty-nine thousand, five hundred,’ said Reggie.

‘What?’ said Tom and the prospective client.

‘I’ll offer twenty-nine thousand, five hundred,’ said Reggie.

The prospective client drove off in a huff and an Audi, and Tom turned on Reggie.

‘I offer you a job, out of the goodness of my heart,’ he said, ‘and the first time you come out with me, you outbid our customer. It’s the ethical equivalent of a doctor making love to his patients.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Reggie. ‘I just couldn’t resist it.’

‘It’s comparable professionally to a vet kidnapping his patients and entering them for Crufts,’ said Tom.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Reggie. ‘I suddenly felt that I needed a change.’

‘You’re going to get one,’ said Tom. ‘You’re sacked.’

‘Don’t worry, Tom,’ said Reggie. ‘Much better prospects are opening before me.’

‘This time it’s got to be for keeps,’ said Mr Pelham.

‘It will be, chief. Honest,’ said Reggie.

They walked out into the yard. It was a windy, cool, clammy day, the first day of the school holidays, and a caravan of schoolgirls was clopping down the lane from the Climthorpe School of Riding. Reggie waved and one of the girls waved back. This earned her a stern rebuke for unhorsewomanly conduct.

They looked down at a particularly enormous porker. The stench of the shit of four thousand pigs filled Reggie’s nostrils.

‘You can’t beat red cabbage with pork,’ said Mr Pelham.

‘No, and nobody makes red cabbage like my old Dutch,’ said Reggie.

Mr Pelham stroked the odoriferous giant affectionately. Reggie followed suit in more cautious vein.

‘Crackling,’ said Mr Pelham. ‘Nice crisp crackling, that’s the tops.’

‘It’s my favourite, is crackling,’ said Reggie. ‘My old Dutch makes cracking crackling.’

Mr Pelham gave him an affectionate scuff on the shoulder.

‘Good to have you back, son,’ he said.

On the last day in July, C.J. sat in his office facing David Harris-Jones and Tony Webster. Between them was an empty chair.

‘We’d better see her now,’ said C.J.

‘Great,’ said Tony Webster.

‘Super,’ said David Harris-Jones.

‘There’s nothing great or super about it,’ said C.J. ‘It’s sad.’

‘Sorry, C.J.,’ said Tony Webster and David Harris-Jones.

‘Send her in, Marion,’ barked C.J. into his intercom.

Elizabeth entered and sat in the empty chair. Tony and David avoided meeting her eye.

‘Did you dictate a letter to Elizabeth on the subject of soggy sponges, David?’ said C.J.

‘I did,’ said David Harris-Jones.

‘What did you say?’

‘I think – sorry, Elizabeth –’ began David Harris-Jones.

‘Nothing to be sorry about,’ said C.J.

‘Sorry, C.J.,’ said David Harris-Jones.

‘Get on with it,’ said C.J.

‘Sorry,’ said David Harris-Jones. ‘I said, as I recall: “Dear Sir, I am sorry” – sorry, C.J., but I was sorry – “I am sorry to hear of your complaint about soggy sponge in our frozen trifle. We have received no previous complaints of similar items deficient in the manner you describe – viz., sogginess of the sponge – and I would respectfully suggest that there must have been some error in the storing or unthawing of the said article or articles.’

‘A good letter, David,’ said Tony Webster. ‘Your best yet.’

‘What did Elizabeth actually type, David?’ said C.J.

‘“Dear Sir,”’ read David Harris-Jones.

He turned to Elizabeth.

‘Sorry, Elizabeth,’ he said.