The Heart of the Dales (2 page)

‘Well, whatever,' said David dismissively, ‘he's not here and no doubt at this very moment he's lying on the beach in Sorrento.'

‘But what about all his files and folders, his cabinets and cupboards, all these pictures and posters, papers and boxes?' Mrs Savage asked. ‘They can't remain here.'

‘Don't worry, Mrs Savage,' I said, ‘we'll move his things for him.'

David gave a hollow laugh. ‘
We
most certainly will not!' he cried, emphasising the first word. ‘I do not intend moving them. I've got quite enough of my own stuff without lugging all Sidney's rubbish down two flights of stairs. Not with my bad back, I'm not.'

‘Well, this is most unsatisfactory,' said Mrs Savage. ‘It is imperative that this room is cleared today for –'

‘Mr Reid and the Social Services team to move in on
Monday,' interrupted David. ‘Yes, Mrs Savage, so you keep saying.' Then he added mischievously, ‘Perhaps you could arrange for someone to pack Mr Clamp's stuff? What about Derek from the Post Room?'

‘Certainly not!' she snapped. ‘I am far too busy to arrange anything of the sort. I have a major conference for Dr Gore to organise, quite apart from all my other urgent administrative duties within the department.'

‘My, my, what a busy bee you are, Mrs Savage,' observed David.

She ignored the sarcasm. ‘And, in any case,' she continued, ‘it is the inspectors' responsibility to move their own files and materials and to clear their desks.' She glanced at the only area of the room that was empty of everything apart from the cleared desk. ‘It's a pity that all the inspectors aren't as efficient and well organised as Dr Mullarkey. I notice that she has moved everything of hers.'

‘We can't all be as efficient and well organised as the inspector for Science and Technology,' said David.

‘More's the pity,' she muttered.

‘Mrs Savage –' began David in a voice threatening to brim over with fury.

‘Don't worry, Mrs Savage,' I interrupted, ‘the room will be cleared by the end of the day.'

‘I sincerely hope so,' she said, her mouth drawn together.

‘Is there anything else, Mrs Savage?' asked David. ‘It's just that we are rather busy at the moment and we do wish to make a start moving into our new offices downstairs.' He peered over his glasses. ‘We certainly wouldn't want Mr Reid and the Social Services team to be inconvenienced, now, would we?'

Mrs Savage gave him a look like the sweep of a scythe and made a loud clucking noise with her tongue. ‘I shall be having words with Dr Gore,' she threatened.

‘Please do that,' Mrs Savage,' said David. ‘In fact, perhaps
he
might like to give us a hand moving.'

The Personal Assistant of the Chief Education Officer departed angrily in a whiff of Chanel Number 5.

‘In all my years in education,' said David, removing his spectacles, ‘I have never, never met such a pettifogging, tactless, infuriating and interfering person as Mrs Savage. Who does she think she is, swanning over here, speaking to us like an infants head teacher telling off some naughty children? It's a pity she hasn't anything better to do with her time. ‘I have a major conference for Dr Gore to organise,' she says. Who does she think she's kidding? When was the last time the CEO held a conference?'

‘She just likes to appear important,' I said. ‘You shouldn't let her wind you up so much. You'll give yourself a coronary getting so angry.'

‘Gervase,' said David, ‘if the woman had, like any normal person given the job of organising an office move, enquired in a pleasant and good-humoured way how things were going, I wouldn't have got all wound up. Goodness knows how such a tactless, talentless and tyrannical person like Mrs Savage has managed to get the position she has, and how in heaven's name Dr Gore puts up with her is beyond belief.'

‘She does have some abilities,' I said. ‘She's quite efficient in her own way. It's just her manner.'

‘The only ability that virago is blessed with,' said David, ‘is to appear very busy whilst actually avoiding work of any kind. “Major conference for Dr Gore”, my foot! And what are all these urgent administrative duties within the department? She delegates everything she's given. I don't recall seeing Mrs Savage in her tight skirt and high heels ever risk breaking her nails taking so much as a pile of files from her office to one of the committee rooms. I've a good mind –'

David's diatribe was interrupted by the appearance at the door of Julie, the inspectors' secretary. ‘Has she gone?' she asked in hushed voice.

‘She has,' I told her.

‘Thank goodness for that,' she sighed. ‘I just couldn't face she of the joyless countenance and the viper's tongue this morning. Mrs Savage has that wonderful effect of brightening up the room by leaving it.'

David grunted, shook his head and muttered something inaudible. He was obviously still simmering.

‘What did she want at half past ten on a Friday morning?' Julie asked.

‘To see if we'd cleared the office,' I told her.

‘Well, what's it got to do with her?' asked Julie.

‘She's been put in charge of the move,' I told her, ‘and she was checking up.'

‘As you well know, Julie,' said David, ‘everything in the Education Department has to do with the meddlesome Brenda. She has her long red-nailed fingers in every pie. Well, if she thinks that pestering me will make me vacate this office any quicker, she's got another thing coming. I shall move out in my own good time. And there's no way I'm shifting all Sidney's stuff downstairs.'

‘Don't worry about that,' said Julie. ‘I'll sort it out later.'

‘You can't possibly do all that on your own,' said David.

‘We'll do it together, Julie,' I said, ‘when I've finished moving my own things.'

‘OK,' she said smiling. ‘Now, who's for a cup of coffee?'

‘I'll have a large strong sweet mug of caffeinated coffee, please,' I said. ‘I have an idea that it's going to be a long long day.'

‘I could do with a double brandy after that encounter,' David remarked. He picked up a large cardboard box full of files. ‘I'll dispense with the coffee, thank you, Julie, and make a start re-homing this little lot downstairs. I want to pick a spot well away from Sidney. When he's in the office, I never get anything done.'

‘I'll get the coffee and then I'll give you a hand,' Julie told me.

‘And, despite what I told the wicked witch of County Hall,' said David, ‘I suppose I shall reluctantly have to help you move all Sidney's stuff or I'll never hear the last of it.' He shook his head like a terrier. ‘Not that I wish to agree with Mrs Savage, but it is damned inconvenient for Sidney to be away just now. Typical, of course. That man could fall into a mound of steaming manure and emerge smelling of roses.'

‘I'll put the kettle on,' said Julie, laughing, and headed for the door.

If the man in the street were to describe what he imagined a school inspectors' secretary might look like, I guess he would picture a small, serious-minded and quietly efficient woman with grey hair scraped into a neat little bun at the back of her head. She would be dressed soberly with sensible flat-heeled shoes and a few bits of plain jewellery. She would be deferential, inconspicuous and innocuous. Well, Julie could not have been more different. She wore ridiculously short skirts, tight-fitting jumpers and outrageously high heels, and had thick bubbly dyed-blonde hair. Heads turned whenever this young woman with the hourglass figure and swinging hips sashayed down the marbled corridors of County Hall.

Everyone in the inspectors' office loved Julie and relied heavily upon her. She had the qualities of many a Yorkshire lass; she was funny, excessively talkative, outspoken and bighearted but also possessed the sterling qualities of the really good secretary. Julie was industrious, highly organised and entirely loyal. She was also very discreet when it came to anything within the inspectors' office but she had a useful network of contacts within County Hall who supplied her with all the latest gossip, which was relayed to us at regular intervals.

That morning, Julie was wearing a body-hugging turtleneck jumper of shocking pink, a black pelmet of a skirt, treacherously high red leather stiletto shoes and a pair of large pendulous silver earrings. It was not the sort of outfit best suited for someone who would be spending the day moving everything down two flights of stairs from one office to another.

A few minutes later she arrived back with two steaming mugs, which she set down on Dr Mullarkey's desk, the only one with an area left uncovered.

‘So how was your holiday?' I asked, reaching for the coffee.

‘Never again!' she exclaimed, perching on the edge of the desk, crossing her long legs and throwing her head back like a model posing for a photograph.

‘Not too good then?' I hazarded.

She uncrossed her legs and sat up straight. ‘I went camping in France with my boyfriend and his mum and dad. For the last three years we've been on holiday with Paul's parents, and I should know better by now. Well, this is definitely the last time I'm going with them. After that disastrous time in Spain three years ago when Paul fell asleep in the sun and woke up like a lobster with an attitude problem and a face full of blisters the size of balloons, we decided to stay in England the next year and go to Skegness in his auntie's caravan. I think I told you it rained for the full two weeks except for the one fine day when Paul broke his ankle jumping off the sea wall. I spent most days at the hospital and most nights wide awake listening to Paul's father snoring like a hippopotamus with sinus trouble.'

‘Yes, I remember you regaling me with the Skegness saga. So what happened in France?'

‘It was worse,' she said. ‘We were squashed in two leaking tents near a stagnant, mosquito-infested lake, the showers packed up, Paul's mum moaned about the food the entire time, and his dad got into an argument with the site manager when he told him that the French were pretty quick to surrender to the Nazis in the last war and if it wasn't for the British Army bailing them out, he'd be wearing great jackboots and speaking German.'

‘Oh dear,' I said, smiling.

‘Then Paul got food poisoning from a plateful of prawns, the car broke down just as we were driving onto the ferry and all the French lorry drivers we held up behind us hurled abuse at us. When we did finally manage to get across the Channel, the Customs men found and confiscated the extra bottles of duty free that Paul's mother had hidden under her coat, and she never stopped whingeing all the way back to Yorkshire.'

‘Yes, it was certainly eventful,' I said.

‘Never again,' sighed Julie, shaking her blonde curls. She took a sip of coffee. ‘Have you been to France?'

‘I went to Paris with the school when I was fifteen and I can't say it was a great success,' I told her, remembering the miserable time I had had in a dark and spartan hostel on the
outskirts of the city, sleeping in a dormitory colder than death, on a bunk bed as hard as nails. ‘It came as quite a shock,' I told Julie, ‘that all the French I had been learning for years and years at school was completely incomprehensible to the Parisians. People just laughed when I opened my mouth.'

‘Well, it'll be the last time I go to France, I can tell you,' said Julie.

‘Oh, I shall go again one day,' I said. ‘Of course, it helps having a wife who can speak the language. Christine spent a year there as part of her French course at college so I won't make a fool of myself the next time. I'll let her do all the talking. When the baby gets older, we intend to go camping in Brittany.'

‘So where did you go for your holidays this summer then?' Julie asked.

‘We stayed in Yorkshire,' I told her, recalling the wonderful two weeks Christine and our baby son Richard had spent in a guesthouse in Robin Hood's Bay on the east coast.

The weather had been gloriously bright and rain-free, and we had enjoyed many a happy hour sitting on the beach in the sunshine making sand castles – I claimed I had to get in practice for when Richard was older – collecting shells, searching for crabs in the rock pools, walking along the cliff top with the baby strapped to my back, and exploring the little snickleways between the cottages in the village. Each evening, when the baby was safely tucked up in his cot, Christine and I would sit in the guesthouse's conservatory that overlooked the great sweep of the bay. What a scene it was: the looming cliffs rising from a placid sea turned pinkand gold by the setting sun, the jutting outcrops of dark purple rocks reaching out like gnarled fingers. I had been so happy.

Tricky Dicky, as we called him, had not lived up to his nickname; he had been far from demanding. In fact, he had not been an ounce of trouble, feeding happily, sleeping soundly and crying rarely. He was such a contented child that we really couldn't believe our good fortune in having such a model baby.

‘So was it good?' asked Julie.

‘It was super,' I told her. ‘We had a great time.'

‘Well,' she said, stretching, ‘I'm glad somebody did. You had better finish your coffee. We have work to do.'

By the end of the afternoon, the small cramped room that had been my place of work for four years was clear of everything. David, Julie and I had made journey after journey up and down the narrow stairs, struggling with boxes full of reports and guidelines, balancing armfuls of files and folders, carting books and journals. The worst stuff to carry down was, of course, everything that belonged to Sidney. By five o'clock, all that remained in the office was the furniture that was not coming with us – the four heavy oak desks with their brass-handled drawers, the ancient wooden swivel chairs, and the now-empty grey metal filing cabinets and dark heavy bookcases.