In the meantime, Bernard has gone up to Arthur’s, there in the shadow of Gurney Castle where the cobbled streets meet the ancient castle walls, and all is grey, grey, grey, except for Arthur’s yellow waistcoat when he comes outside to arrange his wares. Bernard dresses in leather, and other mirk, as befits today’s dustbin young. It’s their elders who bounce about on lively polished toes in bright, soft wools and won’t be defeated. Bernard had brought with him the leather bucket recently appropriated by Flora; his purpose was to flog it to Arthur.
In order to enter the shop Bernard had to pass through Arthur’s outside wares – today including a rather pleasant but battered games table: a japan box with broken drawers and an over-varnished pig bench with a cracked basin and ewer upon it. Arthur would put such bargains out of doors, hoping to get rid of them quickly, before their sorry state finally defeated him, and he sent them off to the restorers, spending more on them than he was ever likely to get back.
A certain Sandra Radlett came out of the shop as Bernard went in. She was twenty-two or so, with a clear skin and wide-apart blank blue eyes: like a doll, Bernard thought. He wondered what she was on that had made her pupils enlarge. (The young notice things like this.) He supposed sex could do it. Arthur pecked Sandra Radlett on the cheek, patted her on the bottom and said:
‘Now don’t get serious. We’re in this for laughs.’ She tittered obligingly, nervous of Bernard, and left. Sandra worked in the bank, and took a late lunch on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Jane no longer lived above the shop, of course, but Arthur was a man of habit.
Arthur did not seem pleased to see Bernard. He knew trouble when he saw it.
‘Why aren’t you up at Avon Farmers?’
‘I’m on nights.’
‘That’s promotion! Time and a half! Congratulations.’
‘It’s okay if you’ve got no principles,’ said Bernard, and Arthur thought he was joking, but Bernard was serious, and taller than Arthur, what’s more. ‘Trouble is, I have.’
‘Cheap food for the millions,’ said Arthur. ‘That’s what this country wants, that’s what this country gets. Down there at Avon Farmers you’re doing your bit for Britain.’ And he laughed.
But Bernard just went on staring, so Arthur stooped and took the leather bucket. ‘Funny old bucket,’ he said.
‘Georgian, I reckon,’ said Bernard.
‘George the Sixth, yes.’
‘Leather. Not many of these about.’
‘They’re all over the place,’ said Arthur. ‘Common as mud.’
‘Twenty quid to you,’ said Bernard.
‘You’re joking. Couldn’t raise a tenner on it. It’s been about. I’ve seen it somewhere.’
‘Couldn’t have,’ said Bernard. ‘Turned up on the dump. If you’re not interested, I’ll take it somewhere else.’
‘You’re going too fast,’ said Arthur. ‘That’s for when I say twelve and you come down to eighteen, and neither of us will say fifteen. You’re losing your cool. But you have an instinct. Tell you what, we’ll make it fifteen, and when you’re finished at Avon Farmers I’ll take you on as my assistant.’
‘Finished? Is there something you know I don’t know?’
‘All good things come to an end,’ said Arthur. ‘Even Avon Farmers.’
‘What are you talking about?’ asked Bernard. ‘Nerve poison?’
Arthur sighed pointedly and handed over three five-pound notes for the bucket and Bernard said:
‘And another eighteen. That’s what Mrs Harris owes Flora and never paid.’
‘Why should I pay Natalie Harris’ debts?’ Arthur was afraid of the answer but couldn’t help asking.
‘Because you bought her house for sixty thousand and a couple of months on you’re selling at one hundred and twenty, and that’s sixty thousand clear profit and I reckon you can afford it.’
Arthur paid up.
‘I worry about you, boy,’ he said. ‘Good thing there’s no Mafia round here or you’d end up head first in a drainage dyke.’
Ah, the heart of the country!