You Don't Have To Be Evil To Work Here, But It Helps (32 page)

‘No, please don’t bother,’ Colin said quickly, and she laughed, ‘Bye,’ he said, and fled.

Our lot, he thought as he mounted the last stair and slowed down; and what was all that stuff about tracking their prey by scent? One thing was for sure: he was meeting a lot of new and interesting people these days.

True love. Rosie could smell true love, and—

And a fat lot of good that was going to do him if he never saw Fam again; which was likely, since he didn’t know where to find her, and he doubted very much whether she’d be coming round looking for him, given the circumstances of their last meeting.

On his desk was a pile of paper. It looked difficult and technical, something to do with shift rotations and hourly productivity ratios, and he ignored it. Leave it there long enough and it’d eventually turn into coal, maybe even diamonds.

Instead, Colin tried to focus on the miserable tangle that his life had recently become.

Not so long ago, he’d decided against running away to Vanuatu on the grounds that, although everything else had turned extremely weird and smelly, there was still a chance that he might be able to make a go of it with Fam - his one true love, as he’d just found out. Indeed; but apparently that wasn’t allowed, in which case there really wasn’t anything to keep him here, and every reason for him to clear out as soon as possible.

I’m not really a coward, he thought, or a pathetic loser or any of the other things I use as excuses for not trying. I think my problem’s always been history and geography. I’m Dad’s son, I’m here at Hollingshead and Farren, of course I’ll never have a life if I stay here and let it all wash over me. But if I went somewhere else, where nobody knows me—

Someone - something - was standing over him; something that could open his office door without making a noise. ‘You’re wanted in the machine shop,’ Oscar said.

Colin looked up. ‘Me?’

‘Yes. You’re in charge. You have to go there and take command.’ An image of James T. Kirk on the bridge of the Enterprise flashed into Colin’s mind. Me? Take command? Yes, but not of a machine shop. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I can’t come right now.’

‘That is untrue,’ Oscar said, sounding puzzled. ‘You have no other duties.’

Colin looked up; looked the thing, the quintessence of human nightmares, in what he assumed was its eye. ‘That’s the point, actually,’ he said. ‘I’ve got no duties at all. I don’t owe anybody anything. Except,’ he added, ‘possibly me. Sorry, just thinking aloud.’

‘I do not understand.’

‘No,’ Colin replied, ‘I don’t suppose you do, but never mind. Try this.’ He took a deep breath; he was about to be rude to the Devil, and he still wasn’t really used to being rude to anybody. ‘I quit. I’m leaving. Okay?’

‘You’re leaving.’ Oscar twitched. ‘Humour,’ it said.

‘No.’

‘No humour?’

‘Not humour. Serious.’

‘I see.’ There was something about the way Oscar said it. Colin had expected anger, but it wasn’t that at all. Quite the reverse; it was something a bit like the still, tense excitement of an angler who sees his float bob. ‘You wish to abandon Hollingshead and Farren.’

‘Yup.’

Oscar quivered slightly, like a spoilt dog watching a sandwich. ‘You intend, then, to forfeit the contract.’

‘Y—’ Colin managed to bite back the rest of the word in time. ‘How do you mean?’ he said.

There was a kind of too-good-to-be-true sag in Oscar’s voice. ‘What I said. You wish to leave the firm and in order to do so you must forfeit the contract. Is that your intention?’

‘I—’ Colin pulled himself together. All his life he’d said ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to questions he didn’t understand, rather than admit his ignorance. This time, however, he wasn’t going to do that; not if it was a choice between saving face and saving the rest of him. ‘I’m not very good at legal jargon,’ he said. ‘What exactly does “forfeit” mean?’

Oscar sighed. ‘Quite simple,’ it said. ‘If you leave the firm, it constitutes a fundamental breach of contract, as set out in section 6, paragraph 9, subsection (b) (ii).’ Colin was impressed in spite of himself; Oscar could pronounce brackets. ‘’In the event of unilateral breach by one party, the full consideration falls due immediately on demand.’’

‘You’re doing it again,’ Colin said. ‘Jargon. Try that again in plain English.’

Oscar seemed almost embarrassed. ‘I am sorry,’ it said. ‘I am not proficient at plain English. It is not much used where I come from. We do not find it conducive to—’ It hesitated. ‘To productivity. Perhaps,’ it went on, ‘this is not the best environment for a discussion of this sort. I believe it is traditional to conduct vital negotiations while eating food. Let’s do lunch.’

‘I’d rather not, thanks.’

‘Are you sure? I can provide you with a suitably extended spoon. Humour,’ it added, hopefully.

‘I think we should get this straight right now. What are you trying to tell me? What’ll happen if I just walk out and don’t come back?’

It was as though Oscar had closed down or gone off-line; it stood still and quiet for a long time, to the point where Colin began to wonder if he’d killed it. ‘You want me to tell you that?’ it said at last.

‘Yes.’

‘Very well. Should you act in the manner you have outlined, the contract will have been breached. We will no longer have to provide workers and material support to your business, and you—’ Another pause; was Oscar feeling squeamish about something? Surely not. ‘You will have to fulfil your obligations under the contract immediately. Do you understand me?’

Colin wilted like a flat tyre. So that was that. If he walked out, Dad would have to go to Hell straight away: not pass Go, do not collect two hundred pounds. Simple as that, once you pared away the legal gibberish.

‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’

‘So I’m stuck here, then. Indefinitely.’

Oscar shook its head. ‘Not indefinitely,’ it said. ‘For the term of your father’s natural life.’

‘Ah.’

‘And now,’ Oscar said, ‘you must go to the machine shop and exercise authority. At once.’

‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ Colin snapped. ‘Can’t I just stay here and sulk? I’m sure you don’t need me down there. I don’t know how to run a factory. Dad does all that.’

‘It is required,’ Oscar said.

‘Balls.’ And now he’d sworn at the Devil. Just as well his mother couldn’t hear him, or she’d be really upset. Tell him he’d come to a bad end, most like. ‘Or are you going to tell me you’ll whatsit the contract if I don’t?’

Oscar hesitated. ‘It is required,’ it repeated awkwardly.

Or?’

‘Or there may be a downturn in morale and industrial relations, leading to a decline in productivity.’

Colin stood up. ‘I’ll risk it,’ he said. ‘I think I’ll go out for a breath of fresh air.’

Oscar sniffed. ‘There is air in the building,’ it pointed out.

Colin walked past it onto the landing, then sprinted down the stairs as fast as he could go. At reception, Rosie called out, ‘That Oscar’s looking for you,’ but he ignored her and bundled out into the street.

Outside, he paused. Just getting out of there made him feel a lot better, but it was hardly a plan of action. He looked up and down the street, open to suggestions. Sod this, he thought, I’ll — He’d what? He knew what he wanted to do: he wanted to go to 70 St Mary Axe, see Cassie Clay and demand that she explained the contract, in language that he could understand, so he’d know exactly what kind of hold the bastards had over him. If he knew that, he could at least start working on an escape plan. That was what he’d like to do, but he had an unpleasant feeling it might not be possible. The railway station was closed until further notice, he didn’t have a car yet - come on, he told himself, there’s got to be a way to do a simple thing like get up to London. Buses? Taxi?

Colin had a bad feeling about those two options. Somehow, he had an idea that if he went and stood at the bus stop, he’d be there a very long time. He remembered the cup of tea. Even so: there had to be a way, even if he was right and there was an exceptionally powerful supernatural force bent on making him stay put. So what if they could sabotage public transport? He could — hire a car. Yes, of course. Then he’d set off in the opposite direction, make for Kingston or Basingstoke, and then double back and outsmart them that way. Maybe it wouldn’t work, but he wouldn’t mind trying. It’d be (he grinned sadly) something to do.

Hire a car … He remembered. There was a hire-car place own on the Richmond road, only a few hundred yards away. Into his mind flitted an image of Steve McQueen on a motorbike. Of course, in the film Mr McQueen had been trying to get home, and here he was, desperate to break out of it.

The hire-car place was on the left-hand side, just past Halfords—

Apparently not. It had been there; he’d seen it only the other day, a large glass-fronted building on a corner. Instead, he found two small buildings, a florist’s and a mobile-phone shop, and, on the opposite side of the road, a photos-while-you-wait place which he could’ve sworn he’d last seen down the other end of the road, three doors up from Laura Ashley.

This, Colin told himself, is silly.

He stood on the corner, wondering what to do next; and while his mind was wandering, a taxi pulled up next to him. Its yellow light was on, and the driver was looking at him.

Oh well, Colin thought. He went over, and the driver said, ‘Where to?’

‘Can you take to me 70 St Mary Axe?’ he asked.

‘Hop in.’

There’d be roadworks, of course; or a burst water main, or a tailback, traffic diverted via Orpington, Salford and the Great Barrier Reef. Humour, as Oscar would say. Colin got in nevertheless. It’d be interesting to see just how far he managed to go before they turned him back. He snuggled into the seat, stretched out his legs and closed his eyes. He was wasting his time, but at least it was out of the office and away from Oscar and the demons, for a little while.

‘Seventy St Mary Axe,’ the driver called out.

Colin’s eyes snapped open, and he leaned forward. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

“Course I’m bloody sure. I do this for a living, you know.’

Colin jumped out, handed over money, waved away the change. Just as the driver pulled away, Colin caught sight of the man’s eyes; they were strangely red, as though he was a photo of himself taken indoors with a flash.

‘Bugger me,’ Colin said aloud, as he stared at the old-fashioned brass plate and the revolving door. ‘I made it.’ He smiled out of pure exuberant joy. ‘Eat your heart out, Steve,’ he added, and barged into the door, which whirled him round a couple of times like a rogue centrifuge and spat him out in the front office of JWW.

‘You,’ said a voice.

His eyes opened wide. Couldn’t be—

‘Fam?’

‘Colin.’ She was sitting behind the front desk, staring at him. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I came to see—’ Fuck that, he thought. ‘What about you? What’re jou—?’

She looked at him with a mixture of misery and contempt. ‘I work here,’ she said.

‘Here?’

‘Yes, here.’ Fam looked round to see if anybody was watching, and lowered her voice. ‘It was the only job I could find, after your Dad fired me. Really, Colin, I didn’t think you’d be so bloody petty.’

Colin opened his mouth and closed it again, like a whale catching krill.

‘He told me, you know, straight out, like it was my fault. You dump my son, he said, you can bloody well get another job. My Mum said I should take you to the tribunal, but I told her, I don’t want anything to do with any of them ever again.’

‘My Dad said that?’

‘Yes, he did.’ Fam scowled at him so fiercely that he winced. ‘So I told him I never wanted the stupid job and he could go to hell.’

‘And what did he say to that?’

‘He just laughed. Thought it was dead funny. So I went home und looked through the ads in the paper, and this place was the only one that’d even give me an interview. Took me on straight away, which just shows. Some people aren’t complete bastards.’

Colin put a hand on the desk to stop himself falling over.

Didn’t make sense, his brain was screaming at him. First, all the unseen bloody forces are trying to keep me from finding her, and now they’re practically throwing her at me, except that she hates me, because my stupid Dad — Hold it right there. His father, who’d fired her. Go to hell, she’d told him.

And why not?

‘Listen,’ he said, and the urgency in his voice cut her off in mid-protest. ‘It’s really, really complicated and bizarre and hard to explain, but I promise faithfully that I’ll try, okay? But first I’ve got to see one of the people who work here, Cassie Clay. It shouldn’t take—’

‘Cassie Clay,’ Fam interrupted venomously. ‘Her. The one you were slobbering all over in the office that day, back at your place.’

‘I wasn’t bloody slobbering,’ Colin hissed. ‘Look, I’m not the tiniest bit interested in the stupid cow, except that I desperately need to ask her something about a really ghastly, horrible mess we’re in at work; and just maybe she might be able to tell me how I can get out of it, and if I can I’m going to leave Hollingshead’s and probably the country, and—’ Just a fraction of a second’s hesitation; but he was right up on top of the wave, so why not carry on and see where it took him? ‘And if I do that,’ he heard himself say, ‘I haven’t got a clue what I’ll do or where I’ll go, and you probably think I’ve gone barking mad but I genuinely mean this: if it turns out I can go, will you please, please come with me?’

There was a moment’s dead silence. ‘You what?’

‘I love you,’ Colin said. ‘You’re my one true love, you’re the only reason my life could possibly be worth living, and will you bloody well come with me or not?’

Maybe, if a trapdoor in the ceiling had opened and swamped Fam in runny custard, she might have been marginally more astonished. Too close to call, really. ‘I—’

‘Well? I hate to hurry you, but I’ve got to see this dratted Clay woman.’

‘I don’t know,’ she said.

‘Damn.’ Colin breathed out hard through his nose. ‘All right, tell you what. I’ll go and see Cassie Clay, and while I’m in there you can be thinking it over. Then, soon as I’m done, you can tell me what you’ve decided. All right?’