Dougal turned sideways in his chair and gazed out of the window at the railway bridge; he was now a man of vision with a deformed shoulder. ‘The world of Industry,’ said Dougal, ‘throbs with human life. It will be my job to take the pulse of the people and plumb the industrial depths of Peckham.’
Mr Druce said: ‘Exactly. You have to bridge the gap and hold out a helping hand. Our absenteeism,’ he said, ‘is a problem.’
They must be bored with their jobs,’ said Dougal in a split second of absent-mindedness.
‘I wouldn’t say bored,’ said Mr Druce. ‘Not bored. Meadows Meade are building up a sound reputation with regard to their worker-staff. We have a training scheme, a recreation scheme, and a bonus scheme. We haven’t yet got a pension scheme, or a marriage scheme, or a burial scheme, but these will come. Comparatively speaking we are a small concern, I admit, but we are expanding.’
‘I shall have to do research,’ Dougal mused, ‘into their inner lives. Research into the real Peckham. It will be necessary to discover the spiritual well-spring, the glorious history of the place, before I am able to offer some impetus.’
Mr Druce betrayed a little emotion. ‘But no lectures on Art,’ he said, pulling himself together. ‘We’ve tried them. They didn’t quite come off. The workers, the staff, don’t like coming back to the building after working hours. Too many outside attractions. Our aim is to be one happy family.’
‘Industry is by now,’ declared Dougal, ‘a great tradition. Is that not so? The staff must be made conscious of that tradition.’
‘A great tradition,’ said Mr Druce. ‘That is so, Mr Douglas. I wish you luck, and I want you to meet Mr Weedin while you’re here.’ He pressed a button on his desk and, speaking into an instrument, summoned Mr Weedin.
‘Mr Weedin,’ he said to Dougal, ‘is not an Arts man. But he knows his job inside out. Wonderful people, Personnel staff. If you don’t tread on his toes you’ll be all right with Personnel. Then of course there’s Welfare. You’ll have some dealings with Welfare, bound to do. But we feel you must find your own level and the job is what you make it – Come in, Mr Weedin, and meet Mr Douglas, M.A., who has just joined us. Mr Douglas has come from Edinburgh to take charge of human research.’
If you look inexperienced or young and go shopping for food in the by-streets of Peckham it is as different from shopping in the main streets as it is from shopping in Kensington or the West End. In the little shops in the Peckham by-streets, the other customers take a deep interest in what you are buying. They concern themselves lest you are cheated. Sometimes they ask you questions of a civil nature, such as: Where do you work? Is it a good position? Where are you stopping? What rent do they take off you? And according to your answer they may comment that the money you get is good or the rent you have to pay is wicked, as the case may be. Dougal, who had gone to a small grocer on a Saturday morning, and asked for a piece of cheese, was aware of a young woman with a pram, a middle-aged woman, and an old man accumulating behind him. The grocer came to weigh the cheese.
‘Don’t you give him that,’ said the young woman; ‘it’s sweating.’
‘Don’t let him give you that, son,’ said the old man. The grocer removed the piece of cheese from the scales and took up another.
‘You don’t want as much as all that,’ said the older woman. ‘Is it just for yourself?’
‘Only for me,’ Dougal said.
‘Then you want to ask for two ounces,’ she said. ‘Give him two ounces,’ she said. ‘You just come from Ireland, son?’
‘No, Scotland,’ said Dougal.
‘Thought he was Irish from his voice,’ commented the old man.
‘Me too,’ said the younger woman. ‘Irish sounds a bit like Scotch like, to hear it.’
The older woman said, ‘You want to learn some experience son. Where you stopping?’
‘I’ve got temporary lodgings in Brixton. I’m looking for a place round here.’
The grocer forgot his grievances and pointed a finger at Dougal.
‘You want to go to a lady up on the Rye, name of Frierne. She’s got nice rooms; just suit you. All gentlemen. No ladies, she won’t have.’
‘Who’s she?’ said the young woman. ‘Don’t know her.’
‘Don’t know Miss Frierne?’ said the old man.
The older woman said, ‘She’s lived up there all her life. Her father left her the house. Big furniture removers they used to be.’
‘Give me the address,’ said Dougal. ‘and I’ll be much obliged.’
‘I think she charges,’ said the older woman. ‘You got a good position, son?’
Dougal leaned on the counter so that his high shoulder heaved higher still. He turned his lean face to answer. ‘I’ve just started at Meadows, Meade & Grindley.’
‘I know them,’ said the younger woman. ‘A nice firm. The girl Waghorn works there.’
‘Miss Frierne’s rooms go as high as thirty, thirty-five shillings,’ remarked the older woman to the grocer.
‘Inclusive heat and light,’ said the grocer.
‘Excuse me,’ said the older woman. ‘She had meters put in the rooms, that I do know. You can’t do inclusive these days.’
The grocer looked away from the woman with dosed eyes and opened them again to address Dougal.
‘If Miss Frierne has a vacancy you’ll be a lucky chap,’ he said. ‘Mention my name.’
‘What department you in?’ said the old man to Dougal.
‘The Office,’ said Dougal.
‘The Office don’t get paid much,’ said the man.
‘That depends,’ the grocer said.
‘Good prospects?’ said the older woman to Dougal.
‘Yes, fine,’ Dougal said.
‘Let him go up Miss Frierne’s,’ said the old man.
‘Just out of National Service?’ said the older woman.
‘No, they didn’t pass me.’
‘That would be his deformity,’ commented the old man, pointing at Dougal’s shoulder.
Dougal nodded and patted his shoulder.
‘You was lucky,’ said the younger woman and laughed a good deal.
‘Could I speak to Miss Fergusson?’ Dougal said. The voice at the other end of the line said, ‘Hold on. I’ll see if she’s in.
Dougal stood in Miss Frierne’s wood-panelled entrance hail, holding on and looking around him.
At last she came. ‘Jinny.’ Dougal said. ‘Oh, it’s you.’
‘I’ve found a room in Peckham. I can come over and see you if you like. How -‘Listen, I’ve left some milk boiling on the stove. I’ll ring you back.’
‘Jinny, are you feeling all right? Maria Cheeseman wants me to write her autobiography.’
‘It will be boiling over. I’ll ring you back.’
‘You don’t know the number.’
But she had rung off.
Dougal left fourpence on the telephone table and went up to his new room at the very top of Miss Frierne’s house.
He sat down among his belongings, which were partly in and partly out of his zipper bag. There was a handsome brass bedstead with a tall railed head along which was gathered a muslin curtain. It was the type of bed which was becoming fashionable again, but Miss Frierne did not know this. It was the only item of furniture in the room for which she had apologized; she had explained it was only temporary and would soon be replaced by a new single divan. Dougal detected in this little speech a good intention, repeated to each newcomer, which never came off. He assured her that he liked the brass bed with its railings and knobs. Could he remove, perhaps, the curtain? Miss Frierne said, no, it needed the bit of curtain, and before long would be replaced by a single divan. But no, Dougal said, I like the bed. Miss Frierne smiled to herself that she had found such an obliging tenant. ‘Really, I do like it,’ Dougal said, ‘more than anything else in the room.’