Chapter 38

He had taken his anonymity for granted in a large, four-star hotel but the first person he saw as he turned away from checking in at the reception desk was Alice. And Alice saw him.

“George!!”

“Alice!!” His heart sank. “How lovely! What are you doing here?”

“We arrived yesterday. What a co-incidence! Are you on holiday?” George noticed that the other part of ‘we’ was a strikingly good looking and well muscled man, somewhat younger than Alice, who was standing behind and to one side of her, smiling in the way of someone witnessing a reunion between old friends and waiting patiently to be introduced. Alice saw his glance. “George, this is Adam. Adam, George was the HR guy at the bank. He’s the one who sorted out all that harassment business and got me the money. I told you about him.”

Adam stepped forward with his hand extended. “Good to meet you George, Alice has told me all about you.”

“Are you on your own, George? We can’t have that. Look, come and have a beer. How great to find you here. This must entitle us both to life membership of the small world club, eh?”

Reluctantly, George followed Alice across the vast, marble-tiled foyer towards a bar next to the floor to ceiling windows, overlooking gardens and a swimming pool. The sunlight outside was so bright it made him squint and he put his sunglasses back on. “I’ve only just got here, Alice. I really ought to take my bag to my room and I could do with a shower.”

Alice glanced at his overnight bag. “Either you are travelling very light or you don’t plan to stay long, George. What would you like? Beer?” Then to the hovering waitress, “Three beers please. Well, how about this eh? Adam, I probably owe George my sanity. I’d have either gone mad… in fact, I think I was getting quite paranoid... if George hadn’t decided to give evidence for me instead of that bastard Brian. It was George who encouraged me to quit and go to a tribunal. Without him I don’t know what I’d have done; probably killed myself or murdered bloody Brian or both. I never knew someone could make me feel so worthless and so angry until I joined his department. You stopped us from killing each other, George. I owe you.”

“Well, Alice, I’m glad you’ve moved on. You weren’t Brian’s first victim, you know. I’d been trying to get him to change his ways for a couple of years. It wasn’t just him. It was a whole culture around the male, macho thing. I’ve forgotten how many times I told the board that we had to do something before we ended up with a huge court bill. Mind you, I was a bit surprised at the amount of the award. Did you know your case is still used as a case study to frighten employers into action to stop bullying? Mentioning the best part of a million quid concentrates the minds of even the most sexist and blinkered boss. With your background, I don’t have to ask if you’ve invested it wisely, do I?”

“Of course I have. But it’s not about money is it? It’s about freedom. You set me free, George, and I hope the cash helped you, too, especially as you had to leave the bank. I don’t suppose they offered you a big leaving bonus, did they?”

“Hardly. But then there was the Susanna business too. I think I’d have had to leave anyway. I needed a fresh start. Do you know about Susanna?”

“Lots of people knew that something was going on between you. Is she with you?”

“Oh. You don’t know then. She was killed by a hit and run driver last month, while she was staying with her mother in Swindon.”

“Oh, George. I’m so sorry.” She turned to Adam. “Susanna was George’s secretary. She was a lovely girl. I suppose you’ve come on holiday to try to get over it? Good idea, George. It’ll take your mind off things.”

George sensed their embarrassment at finding he was alone and presumably grieving. There was a risk that he would want to talk to them about it, to cling to them, follow them about and darken their holiday with his shadow. Single and miserable people could not be welcome holiday companions. In fact he was so desperate for companionship that, for a moment, he considered suggesting they should meet up later, but he knew it would be miserable so he had to reassure them.

“Well. I’d better go and find my room and unpack, especially as I’m only staying a couple of days. Better make the most of it. Good to see you looking so well and nice to meet you, Adam. Enjoy your holiday. Just one thing, the bank doesn’t know I got part of your payout and to be honest, I’m not sure it’s strictly legit. There could be questions of collusion or maybe even perjury or fraud. You… we might have to return the money and I’ve said it all before but it bears repeating: I’d rather not raise the question so… well, best not to talk about it, at least not in London. Only the two of us…” he glanced at Adam, “three of us know anything about it and it’d be better to keep it that way. Sleeping dogs and all that.”

“Of course, of course. And it’s great to see you. You will give me a ring, won’t you? And we must have lunch or dinner together if you have time while you’re here.”

“Yes, we must,” said George but he noticed that Alice had not suggested a date to meet or told him their room number. And he did not tell them his.

If you or I had seen George half an our later, showered and naked, staring out of his window at the sunbathers exhibiting themselves around the pool below, we should probably have concluded that he was indulging in mild voyeurism. But we would have been wrong. The swimming pool had triggered thoughts of his first Boy Scout summer camp. He was, in his mind, in a field at the foot of the Sussex Downs. Several memories stood out clearly. He remembered the much-loved, dedicated and tireless Scoutmaster universally known to boys, colleagues and parents as ‘Skipper’ or ‘Skip’ for short. He remembered sacking-screened latrines, foul-smelling with some archaic chemical disinfectant. He remembered the whispered debate about what the Scottish, Assistant Scout Master wore under his kilt that was resolved for those boys positioned facing him across the camp-fire circle when they all sat cross-legged on the grass. Those boys had spent the rest of the duration of the camp trying unsuccessfully to convince their peers what they had seen. He never found the truth and the question remained, as it does for almost everybody else, one of life’s mysteries. He remembered wandering on mist-shrouded downs like a lost Hobbit. He remembered the electric fence that confined the cows to their part of the field and the unforgettable smell of dried cowpats used as fuel for the fire. He remembered the delicious, home–made lemon squash that was doled out at the rate of a single glass for each boy every morning. He remembered a swimming pool. The pool was a mile or so away and reaching it meant crossing the cows’ field and following a lane into the outskirts of the nearest village. It may not have been a true swimming pool. There never seemed to be anybody else there and, faintly green with algae and surrounded by colonnaded buildings like a Roman bath, it had had a sort of farmyard atmosphere. Years later, he realised that the almost daily visits to the pool probably had more to do with ablution than with diversion. About the same time he had made the mental connection between the daily dose of lemon squash and the latrines.

They had been warned sternly about the electric fence running above the knee-high grass of the field. It was a single wire strung through the insulated eyelets of steel stakes driven into the soft ground. The cows had long since learned that it was best left alone but, boys being boys, it held huge interest for George and his companions. For a dare, first one boy, braver or more stupid than the rest, briefly grasped and released the wire. Nothing happened. Another followed suit. Nothing happened. Yet another pressed his backside against the wire and the conspiratorial chuckles of his companions were silenced by a scream that was clearly audible at the camp a quarter of a mile away. That boy ate his dinner standing up while Skip explained that the electric current was sent around the fence in pulses a few seconds apart – not in a continuous stream. In those days of innocence, being fed laxative-laced lemon squash, shown what a Scotsman wears under his kilt, bathed in cold, green water in a pool so unlike the one he was staring at from his hotel window and subjected to painful electric shocks had all seemed – and were - perfectly normal experiences for a twelve year old boy. Happy days.