Shuttlecock

[23]

Today I did it. I went to see Quinn. To have it out with him. I said: ‘Sir, I want to know what’s going on.’

Now it’s true I rarely go to see Quinn without his first summoning me. And yet today, when I had taken the initiative myself, when I had asked over the office intercom (what daring!) for permission to see him as soon as possible — ‘about a special matter’ — and he had replied, ‘Very well, in ten minutes,’ he was not in the least taken aback. When he buzzed for me and I entered, the work on his desk was pushed to one side, he was sitting with his hands clasped neatly before him (carnation in buttonhole), as if in some way he had long prepared for this visit of mine (perhaps, after all, it really was he who summoned me). As if he knew this was a big moment.

‘Well, Prentis, what can I do for you?’

Naturally, all this readiness threw me off my guard. I sat down at his bidding. I had rehearsed my opening in advance. It spilled out like some self-conscious statement made in court:

‘Sir, I must speak to you about something that’s been on my mind — concerning the department — for some time. What I have to say, if you’ll permit me, is merely a considered observation — nothing more — which I feel obliged to make by my position here in the office. It’s quite possible that I may be intruding into matters which shouldn’t concern me and which have a perfectly satisfactory official explanation. In which case, sir, I’d be grateful — I’d quite understand — if you’ll tell me when I’m venturing too far.’

Even as I spoke I thought: What studied, what ingratiating servility. Out with it! Accuse him face to face: You’ve been stealing office files.

‘Good heavens, Prentis, what an introduction. You’d better go on.’

The eyes expressed curiosity, but not alarm.

I thought: It’s not too late to change tack; to avoid wrecking my promotion prospects; to avoid Quinn’s wrath. I could hastily invent some other story which wouldn’t launch me into trouble.

He looked at me as I paused. But, strangely enough, it wasn’t fear of Quinn which made me hesitate at this point. Somehow I knew I could bear his worst retribution. It was a recurrence of the opposite thing, the thing I had experienced before. What if in the face of my veiled accusations this inscrutable, imperious man should crumble? What if the consequence of my words should be to expose him, to jeopardize his own long and almost completed career, and that I should sit in power over him. Would I be able to bear that?

‘Sir, I can’t help having noticed — for some months now — that certain files in this office have been missing from their normal places. Not having had the use of these files has hampered work on a number of cases I’ve handled — which, if I may say so, have at the same time, even in terms of the available data, been disjointed and confusing. I know that documents and whole files can, in the normal course of things, be removed for reference — er — at a level higher than my own. But such items are usually returned after a short period and, in any case, a proper record is kept of their use. The files I am speaking of, sir — I believe’ (don’t cringe!) ‘I have alluded to them in conversations with you before — have never returned. If you wish, sir — I had made a list — ’

Nothing ruffled the plump face. A mistake! A catastrophic error of judgement! The eyes looked straight at me. He put a hand to one cheek, propping his elbow on the armrest of his leather chair, and gently rubbed his mouth with the knuckle of his little finger.

‘Let me get this clear, Prentis. What you are saying now isn’t just some passing misunderstanding. Is that right? What you are voicing is a strong, long-harboured suspicion?’

‘I —’

‘Well, is it?’

‘Yes sir.’

‘I see. And what would you say if I were to say to you that this suspicion of yours is none of your business?’

‘I — er — would have to accept your word on the matter, sir.’

‘Yes, yes. But would it stop your suspicion?’

‘No sir.’

‘Would it in fact prevent you from taking steps of your own to follow up your suspicion?’

‘I — er — No sir.’

‘In other words, you think that something in this office demands investigation and if necessary you yourself, on your own initiative, would carry out that investigation?’

But now he didn’t allow me time to answer.

‘Ironic, Prentis, isn’t it? We are the ones who investigate others. That we should have to investigate ourselves.’

He smiled sourly. It was the first hint of some possible confession. I felt afraid.

‘Tell me, Prentis. Missing files, mixed-up files … Been going on for some months you say. So what’s kept you quiet up to now? Is there something else, perhaps, you haven’t yet mentioned?’

The eyes sharpened, as if my thoughts were on view.

‘Perhaps, sir … But I’d rather clear up the general issue first.’

‘You’d rather clear up the general issue first. Hmmh. You see, if I were a suspicious man — like you, Prentis — and if, let’s suppose for the sake of argument, something really is “going on” — I might be saying to myself now that what you call this “considered observation” isn’t really a considered observation at all but some sort of disguised allegation. And I’d be saying to myself that a man like Prentis wouldn’t just come out with an allegation by itself like that. He’d back it up with a little bit of homework of his own. I’ve been watching you, Prentis. You’re suspicious, all right, and crafty — and’ (his face seemed to draw suddenly closer) ‘just a little bit desperate. So — I’d better find out what information he’s got up his sleeve before either I make some stupid denial or incriminate myself. It’s lucky for you, Prentis, I’m not a suspicious man.’

‘Sir, I — ’

‘No, no, it’s all right. You’re a responsible junior, acting according to his conscience.’

He took off his glasses and began to rub them diligently with a handkerchief. When people take off their glasses it gives them a vulnerable appearance; but at this moment it was as though Quinn was indicating he was prepared to fight without artificial protection.

‘You know I’ll be leaving this job in three and a half months.’

‘Yes sir.’

‘It won’t be me who’s sitting here then. Three and a half months.’

He held up his glasses to the light, squinted at them, huffed, and began rubbing again.

‘Tell me something else, Prentis. Allow me to ask some questions just for the moment. You’ll have your turn for yours to be answered, but let me clear up mine first. The others — Fletcher, Clarke, O’Brien — have they noticed any of these things you’ve mentioned?’

‘I don’t know, sir. They may have done, but never spoken about it.’

‘But nonetheless, it’s you and not one of them who’s come forward with this suspicion. Why do you think that is?’

‘I don’t know, sir. I am — the most senior of them. And — with respect sir — there have been previous occasions, talking with you — ’

‘Could it just be that they are simple, trusting souls who want a quiet life and ask no questions?’

He finished polishing his glasses and replaced them over his nose.

‘How long have you been in this department, Prentis?’

‘Eight years.’

‘Do you think it’s a good job?’

‘I can’t complain, sir.’ (Liar. You’re a persecuted little drudge.) ‘The conditions, the — ’

‘No, no, no. I mean the function we perform here. Do you think it’s a good one?’

‘I don’t know it’s something you can judge like that. Basically, we provide information.’

‘But do you think it’s a good thing to provide information?’

He got up and moved towards the window, turning his back towards me.

‘Have you had moments in your life, Prentis, when you’ve found yourself asking the simple question: Is it better to know things or not to know them? Wouldn’t we sometimes be happier not knowing them? Know what I mean?’

For a moment I thought: He’s stalling. He’s not going to tell me anything. I will have to resort to other methods. Break into his office at night and crack his safe. Silence the security guard with a stiletto.…

‘I think so, sir.’

‘And what’s your answer been?’

‘I don’t know. Circumstances usually decide that for you. It can be — a torment not knowing things.’

‘Ah yes. Quite so. You suffer either way.’

He turned round, away from the window. For some reason his face seemed pinker and pudgier than I’d ever known it.

‘Do you know what I think of this job, Prentis?’

‘No sir.’

‘It’s — uncomfortable. That chair —’ he pointed to the big black leather chair which, though unoccupied, seemed to have a masterful, sinister quality of its own — ‘is uncomfortable. Try it. All this information we sit on, Prentis. Do you know how I sometimes imagine this place? A big cupboard for the collected skeletons of half the metropolitan population. And I’m the one with the key. Oh, I don’t mean the things we have to let out for quite specific reasons. But just think for a moment of all those innocent, unwitting people whose peace of mind might be shattered by some little titbit we have here. It’s an odd thing, Prentis, looking at other people’s lives and seeing the dangers that they’re unaware of. Like — looking at a fly and wondering: shall I swot it?’

As it happened — as though expressly to provide Quinn with his image — a fly had flown into the room through the opened window only minutes before, and after buzzing several times round the desk settled on the rim of a cup of coffee which Quinn had only half drunk. Yet, oddly enough, he did not brush it away.

‘There was a time when I didn’t like this job, Prentis. All this accumulated evil, constantly sifting through it. You have to admit it gets you down. It sticks to your hands, so to speak. Doesn’t it?’

‘Er, yes sir.’

‘I used to tell myself that the solution was simply to curb one’s imagination. You’ve heard me tell you to do just that enough times, haven’t you? But you can no more curb the imagination than you can stop the truth being what it is. Do you follow me, Prentis?’

‘I’m not sure, sir.’

‘Never mind. Then I started to think that precisely because I had access to all this evil, I was in a position to do real good. I thought, perhaps one can wipe out certain harms simply by erasing the record of those harms. With me? But I’m not sure, now, if you can do that. I’m not sure at all.’

He moved across the room and perched himself on the edge of his desk. There was something almost comical about this casual posture in a man like Quinn. His lame leg swung and knocked against the panelling of the desk with an oddly solid thump.

‘What do you think, Prentis? Is it right?’

Once more, he did not wait for my reply. He twisted round and pressed the intercom on his desk.

‘Miss Reynolds — be a dear and bring in another two cups of coffee.’

He turned back and took a deep breath. ‘I seem to have said enough, don’t I? No, I’m not trying to duck your questions. I’ll answer them. But I don’t know if this is the right time or place.’ He picked up a diary from the desk. ‘You want to know — everything, don’t you? Would you care to come and see me, one evening after work — at my home?’

Two years ago, if Quinn had invited me to his home, I would have gone, uneasily, regarding it as an office duty. Now I was not sure whether I was walking into some strange friendship — or a trap.

‘You look alarmed, Prentis. Yes, I know. Nobody knows much about me outside the office. The office persona and all that.’ He smiled sourly again. ‘You probably know more about any number of people in our records than you do about me. But I do have a home, and a home life of sorts.’

He had a pen poised over the diary.

‘What day would you like? You can get to Richmond?’

‘Richmond?’

‘Richmond, yes.’

‘Wednesday?’ I don’t know why I said that day.

‘Wednesday. Fine. Shall we say about eight? Ah — Miss Reynolds.’

Miss Reynolds (a frosty-faced spinster of some years, renowned in the office as ‘The Iron Lady’, and the perfect partner to Quinn) entered with a tray with coffee and biscuits. She put it down on Quinn’s desk and removed the dirty cup — from which the fly buzzed upwards. She brushed at it with her hand, then left the room.

Quinn, like the avuncular figure in the biscuit commercial in which I sometimes mentally cast him, poured, stirred, asked, ‘Milk? Sugar?’ and proffered cup and saucer. It was because, I found myself thinking again, he had none of the outward attributes of power — height, sternness of feature or manner — and because, in some way, power really did not suit him at all, that his actual power so impressed — and maddened me.

‘You look baffled, Prentis. As you say, it can be a torment not knowing things.’

I had confronted this formidable man who now was offering me coffee and Lincoln Creams. It did not seem such a daring act.

Quinn sipped his coffee. Through the glass panel I caught a brief glimpse of the office — Eric, Vic and O’Brien hunched at their desks like guinea-pigs in some controlled experiment.

The fly circled in towards the desk and settled on the plate of biscuits. We looked at it closely for some seconds and then, as if agreed on something, at each other.

‘Tell me, Prentis — forgive me for not asking for so long — how is your father?’