Francesca's Party (16 page)

‘Jeepers, that’s fast moving,’ Owen remarked as he demolished a succulent slice of meat.

‘I’m not saying anything to anyone until I see how it goes.’ Francesca sat down to eat her meal but she
wasn’t
very hungry. Now that she’d told Owen it felt real. She couldn’t back out.

‘Well, go for it, Ma, and the best of luck.’ Owen raised his glass of milk in toast.

‘Thanks,’ she murmured. She was having palpitations already at the thought of tomorrow.

She went to bed early and slept fitfully. She woke the next morning and lay snuggled in bed in the relaxed moments between waking and sleeping before suddenly realizing with a heavy lurching of her stomach that today was different. Today was the start of her life as a woman of independent means.

She was parked outside the redbrick office at five to nine. Across the road she could see Miss Carter sitting in a sporty red Honda Civic. She was surprised at Miss Carter’s choice of car. Still waters run deep, she thought, amused.

At precisely half a minute to nine Miss Carter got out of her car and crossed the road. Francesca got out of her own car.

‘Morning, Miss Carter,’ she said cheerfully.

‘Morning,’ Miss Carter reciprocated primly as she glanced at her watch and rapped smartly on the door. It was opened moments later by Edward.

‘Good morning, ladies,’ he greeted them politely. ‘Mrs Kirwan, if you would kindly bring me some coffee? Black, no sugar. Miss Carter, will you show Mrs Kirwan the kitchen area please?’ he instructed.

‘Certainly, Mr Allen.’ Miss Carter gave a tight little smile. ‘This way if you please.’ She led Francesca into a gloomy, brown-tiled kitchen with an old-fashioned gas cooker. Mustard-coloured presses lay along one wall and Miss Carter pointed to one and said, ‘China
and
coffee. Mr Allen likes his coffee in a china cup, as I do myself. I take my coffee at ten. You may have yours at ten-fifteen until ten-thirty when I’ll answer the phones for you. Lunch is from one until two. I’ll show you your desk when you’ve made Mr Allen’s coffee.’ The accountant clumped out of the kitchen in her serviceable brogues and tweed coat.

Francesca sighed as she took off her coat and filled the kettle. Scintillating conversation was not going to be the order of the day in Allen & Co.

She made her boss a cup of black coffee, knocked politely on his door and entered at his command. He didn’t look up as his long bony fingers flew over a calculator. She placed the coffee on the desk in front of him and left him to it. This place was as dead as a morgue, she reflected as she knocked on Miss Carter’s door. Miss Carter opened the door with a thin smile.

‘I have some letters for you to type and some bills for you to send out. You should start promptly as we have fallen behind a little and that is not the way Allen & Co. do business. Here is your tape.’ She handed Francesca a tiny cassette. ‘Your Dictaphone is on your desk. Follow me, please.’ She marched down the hallway to Francesca’s domain.

A desk with an electric typewriter and a phone was positioned at right angles to the window. The phone was an old-fashioned model and Francesca hid a smile as she remembered how worried she’d been that it was going to be a complicated switch system, when, in fact, it was extremely basic.

‘If you wish to put a call through to Mr Allen, push the first button. If you wish to put a call through to
me,
push the second one. Personal phone calls should be taken or made sparingly. Mr Allen is very strict about that.

‘The typewriter should be unplugged each evening and the photocopier also.’ She indicated a huge antique of a machine in the alcove beside the old-fashioned fireplace. Four hard dining chairs stood along the wall opposite the window and a coffee table held a few well-thumbed copies of
Business and Finance
.

‘This is your appointment book. We have two clients calling this afternoon. Any VAT or income tax returns you direct to me. Mr Allen deals with all other business—’

The phone rang. Francesca almost leaped out of her skin. ‘Answer it,’ instructed Miss Carter.

‘Hello, Allen and Co., how may I help you?’ Francesca said politely.

‘I’m after getting a threatening letter from those VAT people saying they’ll send the sheriff after me in twenty-one days,’ came a very irate voice down the line. ‘I want to speak to Miss Carter.’

‘Certainly, who may I say is calling?’ Francesca asked calmly, aware that she was under Miss Carter’s beady-eyed scrutiny.

‘Tell her it’s Francis Kelly.’

Francesca put her hand over the mouthpiece. ‘It’s a Mr Francis Kelly for you. Something about the sheriff calling in twenty-one days because of non-payment of VAT.’

Miss Carter flushed a deep red. ‘Tsk. Put it through immediately,’ she instructed coldly, much to Francesca’s relief. Miss Carter was hard going.

She sat at the desk and switched on the typewriter and ran her fingers over the keys experimentally. The golf ball clattered noisily. Obviously the receptionist/clerk typist was not deemed important enough for a computer. She slipped the cassette into the Dictaphone, inserted her ear plugs and pressed
play
. Miss Carter’s starched voice came tinnily into her ear. With a sigh, Francesca switched it off, inserted some headed paper into the typewriter, lined it up, restarted the tape and began to type slowly. She had just got to the last paragraph when she hit the wrong key and wrote assisyance instead of assistance. Groaning, she replaced the offending y with a t. Her next letter was more successful and it was ten-fifteen before she knew it and Miss Carter was standing at the door telling her that it was time for her break.

Francesca sat alone in the brown and mustard kitchen sipping her coffee. She must bring a book to work in future she decided, as chatty tea breaks were obviously not a feature of Allen & Co.

At ten-thirty precisely, Francesca was back at her desk. The phone rang several times. On one occasion she put a call through to Mr Allen which was meant for Miss Carter. On another she put one through to Miss Carter which should have been taken by Mr Allen. Miss Carter was quite snippy about it and Francesca had to resist the urge to tell her to get lost. She ploughed through her letters, pleased with her progress, and at twenty to one brought five completed letters in to Miss Carter to sign. The accountant’s office was even more chaotic than her boss’s, which surprised Francesca as she had assumed that Miss Carter would have a pristine
office
with a place for everything and everything in its place.

It was a relief to leave the building for an hour. The morning had gone quickly, she had to admit, but she had a tension headache that was getting worse. She hurried down to the seafront and slipped into Casa Pasta for a bowl of carbonara and a cup of coffee. It was strange not being her own boss, knowing that she couldn’t go home and flop in front of the TV for the afternoon or take Trixie for a walk on the pier.

Miss Carter was waiting for her when she got back, her eyes glittering with antagonism. ‘Mrs Kirwan, a word. We never send out Tipp-exed letters at Allen & Co. You’ll have to redo two please,’ she said triumphantly.

‘Oh, I see. Did you ever consider getting a computer for your clerk typist? It would be much less time-consuming in the long run,’ Francesca suggested.

‘Our previous employee was an excellent typist, she didn’t need one,’ Miss Carter said snootily as she plonked the offending letters in front of Francesca. Fortunately a client arrived and Miss Carter scuttled back into her own office to prepare for her meeting.

At three-fifteen Edward made an appearance. He presented Francesca with a tape and requested that the letters be ready for the evening post. Francesca’s heart sank. She’d have to work fast but carefully seeing as Tipp-ex was not permitted.

She had just completed the final, long and complex letter when she hit the wrong key accidentally
and
a line of x’s appeared on her lovely neat type-script.

‘Oh fuck, fuck, fuck,’ she muttered. Now she’d have to do that last page again and it was ten to five.

Miss Carter’s heavy tread sent Francesca’s heart plummeting. ‘It’s almost five p.m. Mr Allen likes us to be prompt about leaving.’

‘I’ve nearly finished this,’ Francesca said tightly.
Just go away and leave me alone
.

‘Well, don’t be long.’ She closed the door behind her and Francesca groaned. She finished the letter and picked up the rest of them for her boss’s signature.

He perused them slowly before signing them, then franked the envelopes and handed them back to her. ‘Thank you, Mrs Kirwan. I’ll see you in the morning,’ he said gruffly.

‘Goodnight, Mr Allen,’ Francesca said tiredly. She had a pounding headache and she was knackered. She couldn’t wait to get home.

She was dozing by the fire when Owen got home. ‘How did it go?’ he asked eagerly. Francesca made a face and regaled him with her day’s events as he made her a cup of cocoa.

‘Don’t stay there if you don’t like it,’ he advised.

‘I’ll see how it goes. It was only the first day. It would be good to get a bit of speed up in my typing. I should do a course, I suppose.’ She yawned.

‘You should do a computer course, Ma, you won’t really get anywhere without computer skills now,’ Owen said sagely.

‘I suppose you’re right. I’ll do something in the
spring.
I have to go to bed, Owen, I’m whacked. See you in the morning.’ She dragged herself upstairs, fell into bed and fell fast asleep. It was the first time she’d fallen straight asleep in months.

The following day was almost a replica of the previous one except that she got a chance to do some photocopying and filing. The day passed quickly enough but she found Miss Carter’s unfriendliness wearing and she saw little of Edward who remained ensconced in his office.

Her third day was a Friday and she was so looking forward to the weekend. It was a busy day, client wise. Miss Carter had two and Mr Allen three. The final client arrived at four and Edward asked her to bring coffee for both of them. She carefully made the coffee, poured milk into a china jug for the client and carried it into the office. She smiled at the elderly gentleman and then to her utter dismay caught her high heel in the cable of the computer and watched horrified as two cups of coffee, a milk jug and a bowl of sugar cubes described a graceful arc and landed all over Mr Allen’s desk, splattering him and a file of papers with liquid.

‘I’m
terribly
sorry!’ she exclaimed in horror as Edward moved with more speed than she would have thought him capable of, gasping as the hot coffee hit him.

‘How clumsy! Mop this mess up while I go upstairs and change,’ he rasped.

‘I’m so sorry, Mr Allen, Mr Walker,’ she stuttered. She dabbed ineffectually at the sodden mess on the desk.

‘Get a towel from the kitchen,’ Edward barked as he hurried out of the office.

‘Don’t fret, love,’ Mr Walker said reassuringly as he helped her put the coffee cups and sugar cubes back on the tray. ‘Get a towel and we’ll clear up this place in a jiffy.’ Francesca felt like bursting into tears. She was mortified. More to the point she was terribly afraid that she’d seriously scalded Edward. She got a towel and a cloth and mopped up as best she could but she could see that Mr Walker’s income tax form was sopping wet.

‘There’ll be plenty more where they came from,’ the old gentleman chuckled as she tried her best to dry it out. ‘Don’t worry your head about it.’

Edward reappeared. ‘You may go. We’ll forgo the coffee.’

Francesca departed the office thoroughly chastened. She felt like a ten-year-old. What a completely gauche and uncool thing to do. She sank into her chair and cursed Mark. It was all his fault that she was stuck here, she thought irrationally as she tried to concentrate on a stack of bills that had to be typed up.

Half an hour later she heard Edward show Mr Walker to the door. She tensed as she heard her boss knock on her door and walk into her office.

‘I suggest
flat
shoes in future. High heels are not suitable office attire,’ he said curtly and disappeared back into his office. Francesca felt thoroughly deflated.

The traffic was bumper to bumper going home and Trixie needed to be walked. Wearily she changed into jeans and running shoes and pulled on her
sheepskin
jacket. A walk around the houses was the most Trixie was getting tonight. She’d take her for a walk on the pier on Sunday.

The following morning she luxuriated in her lie-in. It was bliss. She made herself tea and toast and went back to bed with
Vanity Fair
. Millie called an hour later and Francesca couldn’t contain herself: she had to tell her of her experiences of the past three days.

‘God Almighty,’ giggled Millie. ‘I wish I’d been there. The pair of them sound like two right oddballs.’

‘They are, believe me. Miss Carter has the hots for Edward. She blushes if he looks at her.
He
can only think of his precious calculator. He never comes out of the office. And you should see the antique office equipment. The copier sounds as if it’s going to expire every time I copy something and the typewriter is out of the ark.’

‘Why don’t you give it up and get something better if you want to work?’

‘I’m not trained for anything, Millie. I’m too old.’

‘Rubbish,’ scoffed her sister. ‘You’re an intelligent woman, you shouldn’t be content vegetating in that place.’

‘Easy for you to say,’ Francesca retorted.

‘True,’ Millie conceded mildly. ‘Just don’t limit your opportunities.’

Francesca thought of her sister’s words as the following week dragged slowly by. On the Wednesday morning, Miss Carter presented her with a cassette. ‘Please have these letters completed by lunchtime. They’re quite detailed so take extra care,’ she instructed.

Francesca took the cassette and inserted it into her Dictaphone. She listened to the letters once before typing them, to get their gist. She pressed the
replay
button and heard a strange whirring sound. She nearly had a heart attack as she pressed
rewind
and heard an even worse noise. Frantically she opened the Dictaphone. She couldn’t believe her eyes as she saw the gobbled-up tape in ribbons.