Working Wonders (24 page)

Fay was sitting on his knee, carefully. She half-smiled in response. A couple of weeks in Ross’s office and he had finally worn down her resistance. There had been so much shouting, so many whispered threats down the phone to Ross’s carefully placed friends in town, so many closeted meetings and private chats with odd-looking men from amusement companies, chocolate concessions … She just didn’t care any more. She stared at Ross blankly.

‘Bloody brilliant, boss,’ said Dave. ‘We’ve got those cress-munching bastards.’

‘So, what now, darlings?’ Ross was wondering whether he could stick his hand up Fay’s shirt. Probably.

‘Christmas, innit?’ said Dave.

‘God, so it is. I think we need a celebration – to drink to our very lucrative new year. A proper party, huh, angel?’

‘Whatever,’ said Fay.

‘And see if we can’t think up a bit more fun and games for our rivals, eh?’ said Ross. ‘It’s all gone entirely too quiet. Let me see … Christmas party. What does he like, Fay-ona?’

Fay slumped her shoulders. ‘Well …’

‘Um, hi.’ Cathy peeped her head round the door.

‘Hey,’ said Arthur, smiling. ‘Come in.’

‘I just wondered …’ she began. Sandwiches came over to say hello. ‘Hello, you little sick doggie.’

‘Don’t worry about him,’ said Marcus. ‘Worry about Nurse Gunterson here.’

‘Ha ha,’ said Sven, but it was clear he was still suffering from lack of sleep.

‘What is it?’ said Arthur.

‘Well, I was just speaking to the temp and – well, we usually organize the Christmas party.’

‘Really?’ said Arthur. ‘How long has the temp been here now?’

Everyone shrugged.

‘Fifteen years?’ said Cathy. ‘That’s as long as I’ve been here.’

‘Well,’ said Arthur. ‘Hmm. Christmas party.’

‘There’s always been a budget for it before.’

‘I think we need a party,’ said Marcus. ‘Although we can’t really afford it,’ he added rapidly.

‘You’ve
got
to have a Christmas party,’ said Cathy reprovingly.

Arthur thought back to the other Christmas parties he’d attended during his time there. They were normally pretty dreary affairs, held in the lobby where people either stood around sadly playing with glasses of warm white wine and wearing party hats in a pathetic manner, or got royally pissed up and started doing shadow boxing on an improvised dance floor. He winced. Fay used to prod him in the back and try and get him to talk to people higher up in the office, and she used to flirt with Ross. Yeugh. That gave him a sticky feeling even now. Then she’d drive him home, berating him for the fact that another year had gone by with … well, with nothing. He thought of it with sadness.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Cathy, you’re right. We have to have a Christmas party. But we’re not going to have a crappy one here like we normally do.’

Cathy’s face fell. ‘But I’ve got the comedy post-it garlands all ready.’

‘Sorry, but that doesn’t matter. This year we’re getting out of the foyer and we’re going to have fun. Things are different now.’

‘Ooh, can we all go to London’s West End?’ said Cathy hopefully.

‘Not that different. But book somewhere nice. Everyone’s worked really hard this year, and next year’s going to be really important, so …’

‘Shall I spike the punch again?’

‘Yes, I think so. What do you think, Sven? Sven, put that dog down.’

Sven was clinging onto Sandwiches and gently patting his scar. Sandwiches was writhing and snortling and making unappreciative noises.

‘You’re stifling that dog,’ said Cathy.

‘I know. But I nearly lost him,’ said Sven. ‘I don’t know what else to do.’

‘Not fall in love with your dog,’ said Arthur.

‘I am NOT!’

Arthur backed away. ‘Party! Party! Beer!’ he said, holding up conciliatory hands.

Sven sniffed.

‘Lots of lovely beer …’

‘And punch,’ said Cathy.

‘What are we doing?’ said Gwyneth again.

‘We’re knocking on doors to see if people will take lights,’ said Rafe, looking through his very optimistic artist’s illustration of street after street of happy people looking up at their illuminated marvels.

‘And sometimes they give us food,’ said Sven. Sandwiches backed him up. Man and dog were doing extremely well on this mission. Sandwiches was in danger of getting as fat as his master. Sven was also showing as much enthusiasm for this as anything else so far; Arthur suspected that a corner of his mind truly believed that somewhere, out there, was a naked nymphomaniac waiting for someone – anyone – to come to the door.

Rafe and Gwyneth, on the other hand, were doing slightly less well.

‘What if they think we’re from some weird religious sect out to kidnap their brains?’

‘Tell them you’re not.’

‘That’s exactly what someone from a weird kidnapping religious sect would do.’

An old woman barged up to them in the street with a shopping basket pushed out in front of her. She was tiny and mean-looking. ‘Excuse me, are you from the council?’

‘Um … yes, I suppose so, kind of …’ said Rafe. Gwyneth shook her head furiously.

‘Well, when are you going to do something about my heating?’

‘About your what?’

‘It’s my cats, you see. It’s too cold for them.’

‘No, actually, we’re not from the … um, cold cat department.’

‘That’s what they all say,’ she said cryptically.

‘We wondered if you might like to put up some lights,’ said Rafe. ‘To decorate the house next year.’

‘What?’

‘We’re trying to light up the street. Jolly things up a bit.’

‘Isn’t that what them streetlights are for? And I’ll tell you another thing, Mr Bloody Politician, my council tax is an absolute disgrace.’

‘So, if we provided you with the lights and the electricity …’

‘You’re going to pay for my electricity?’

‘Um, some of it …’

The old lady’s eyes narrowed. ‘Come in and have some tea.’

‘You realize if we promise free electricity to people, our budget is going to overshoot by about fifteen squillion pounds?’ Gwyneth pointed out to Rafe as they walked down the old lady’s garden path.

‘But she was so
lovely
!’

‘Yes, because you stroked her cats and told her you were going to give her all the money. Which we’re
not
.’

Rafe gave her a puppyish look.

‘Don’t try that look on me. I’ve played with the experts: Sandwiches can’t get a morsel out of me.’

‘But we’re doing …’

‘Good, yes I realize, Sir Lancelot.’

He smiled and bowed deeply. ‘And you ma’am …’

She laughed. ‘Yes, that’s exactly the kind of behaviour we need in a suburban street in Coventry.’

Eyes flashing, he dashed off ahead to a puddle and made to take off his coat and lay it on the ground.

‘Wrong period entirely.’

‘I’d still do it.’

‘I’d still ignore it.’

He sighed and picked up his jacket.

‘Next house, then?’

‘Next house.’

But they bumped into Sven, who’d already sorted it out and was waving a cheery goodbye.

‘So you’re saying, just for putting on my lights I can pat your dog whenever I like?’ said his old lady.

‘Yup.’

Their moods, however, darkened as they went back to the office, looking at the huge pile of paperwork which continued to descend on them daily; endless forms and rules and specifications for the paper-devouring burghers of Brussels.

Arthur was squinting at a brochure through one eye. He smiled wryly.

‘Why are you smiling?’ said Sven grumpily.

‘Nothing. Just something ironic, that’s all.’

‘Ooh,
ironic
. Very clever. What?’

‘You wouldn’t understand.’

‘I wouldn’t
understand
? I will tell you, I am the absolute expert at the ironic quip.’

‘Wow. Ironically, in trying to prove how much you understand irony, you’ve done quite the opposite.’

‘I knew that.’

‘No you didn’t!’

‘Dickhead,’ said Sven, quietly, leaving Arthur time to get back to his brochure, which had turned up on his desk out of nowhere. It was for an out of town evening attraction called ‘Mediaeval KNIGHTS!!!!!’ It promised jousting, wenches, ale and large hunks of roasted meats. Arthur looked at it, smiling. He could tell them a thing or two about ancient knights … except, of course, he couldn’t really. Ever since Lynne’s faintly alarming revelation, he’d rather put it to the back of his mind. Suddenly, he wondered where Lynne was. It was hardly fair. Didn’t really justify her salary.

‘Marcus!’ he shouted. ‘What do we pay the company therapist?’

‘There isn’t a company therapist,’ said Marcus, without breaking concentration with Rafe.

Of course not. Arthur looked around the office, noticing the charts, maps, diagrams … All the way out into the open-plan area there was a general sense of purpose, of people getting on with doing busy things in a useful way. He felt a quiet sense of pride. In the corner, Rafe was arguing with Marcus yet again about the possibility of a small railway system. Marcus’s time-honoured automatic ‘no’ to everything was being steadily worn down, Arthur noticed, by Rafe’s boundless and seemingly endless enthusiasm, not to mention the train set that was still running round the room, usually closely followed by Sandwiches. Gwyneth had a studied and serious look on her face as she put together the official bid papers. They’d decided to mostly let her do those, as she had an ability – rare in this office – to handle documents without getting jam on them.

He looked round and noticed Cathy and the temp at the door of the boardroom. They seemed to be arguing with someone. He caught a glimpse of something colourful and wandered over.

Why were there two jesters in full motley juggling brightly coloured batons over the top of the office? Everyone had stopped work to watch them.

‘Um, what’s this?’

One of the jesters stopped immediately and, without blinking, the other caught eight clubs with a flash of his wrist. Arthur shook his head.

‘Who are these people?’

‘The Wandering Jesters at your service,’ said the nearest man, bowing low from the waist until his bells touched the floor.

‘Oh God, is it somebody’s birthday?’ said Arthur, looking around. ‘Is this man about to start taking his clothes off?’

‘No, no,’ said the man. ‘We go where we are needed and we hear you have a fair?’

‘What?’ said Arthur. ‘Well, maybe … possibly … NEXT YEAR!’

Both jesters made elaborate faces of misery. ‘But you shall need us again, yes?’

The second jester was looking worriedly behind him. Arthur followed his gaze. Filing in was a long collection of the most oddly dressed people, attired mainly in hessian. On a word from the one at the front, they all brought out strange-looking instruments and, on a count of three, began to play a beguiling tune.

Gwyneth and Sven joined Arthur in the doorway.

‘Are those
minstrels
?’ said Gwyneth.

‘I don’t know,’ said Arthur. ‘Depends whether they melt in your mouth or your hand.’

‘Who do you think they were?’ asked Gwyneth, once they’d finally been persuaded to leave (and after an encore of ‘Greensleeves’).

‘New Age travellers, I expect,’ said Marcus spiffily. ‘They looked absolutely filthy.’

‘Don’t be … oh,’ said Gwyneth. ‘Yeah, I suppose they would be filthy, eh?’

Arthur, however, was still looking around the office. People were actually coming to him! Word was getting around! With a start, he realized he liked his job.

Well, they deserved a decent party. And, even if it was only a private joke for him, he reckoned Mediaeval Knights was the kind of place to be. And hopefully Gwyneth would be the only wench for him.

‘Did you send it to them?’ Ross asked lazily. Fay nodded.

‘Do you think it’s the kind of thing they’ll go for?’

‘He will,’ she said firmly. ‘He was always complaining about the Christmas party, and why couldn’t they go to such and such. Plus, he loves knights and mediaeval things.’

‘Great,’ said Ross, rubbing his hands together. ‘Ooh, I am looking forward to this so much.’

He glanced at the calendar on his wall. ‘Let’s see – six weeks till presentation day, huh?’

Dave nodded dutifully.

‘But Arthur doesn’t know that. Howard’s done his stuff, right?’

Dave nodded, then shook his head, then nodded again just to be sure.

‘Right. This’ll rile them. It’s psychological warfare, innit?’

‘What are you then, some kind of warlord?’ said Fay.

Ross leaned over suddenly and thumped the table, hard. ‘Yeah!’ he said loudly. ‘Yeah, I bloody am. This is about territory, darling. This is about land, and money and power, and you either fight for that or you don’t. Okay?’