“Funny you should mention the M6,” Gerald replied. “I was three hours—three whole hours out of my life—getting between Junctions Four and Five the other day. And you know what caused it all? Changing the light bulb in one of those street-lamp things. Pathetic, I call it, absolutely bloody pathetic.”
“Tell me all about the M6,” Gerald’s friend said savagely. “I’m sure it’s incredibly relevant to my getting the sack.”
“You have not got the sack,” Gerald said. “How many times have I got to tell you? You’ve been moved sideways, that’s all. It happens to everyone. I got moved sideways last year, and it’s been the making of me.”
“Gerald,” said his friend, “how long have we known each other?”
Gerald’s friend thought for a moment. “Good question that,” he said. He put down his fork and began to count on his fingers. “Let me think. Seventy-three, was it? Seventeen years. My God, how time flies!”
“I’ve known you for seventeen years?”
“Looks like it.”
“Why?”
Gerald frowned. “What do you mean?” he said.
“Why?” said his friend angrily. “I mean, what has been the point? Seventeen years we’ve been meeting regularly, sending each other postcards from Santorini, inviting each other to parties, having lunch; you’d think it would count for something. You’d think it would go some way towards creating some sort of mutual understanding. And now you sit there, drinking a glass of wine which I paid for, and tell me that getting transferred from Current Affairs to Sport is a sideways move.”
“Well it is,” said Gerald. He had grown so used to this sort of thing that he took no notice whatsoever. “More people watch sport than current affairs, it’s a known fact. Call it promotion.”
“Will you be able to get me seats for Wimbledon, do you think?”
“What’s Wimbledon?” asked his friend.
Gerald frowned. He didn’t mind Danny trying to be amusing, but blasphemy was another matter. “Doesn’t matter if it’s behind a pillar or anything like that,” he said. “It’s the being there that really counts.”
Danny Bennet ignored him. “Anything but Sport,” he said, “I could have taken in my stride. “Songs of Praise.” “Bob’s Full House.” “Antiques Roadshow.” Take any shape but this and my firm nerves shall never tremble. Sport, no. At Sport I draw the line.”
“You never did like games much,” Gerald reflected, as he cornered a radish in the folds of his lettuce-leaf. “Remember the lengths you used to go to just to get off games at school? You just never had any moral fibre, I guess. It’s been a problem with you all through life. If only they’d made you play rugger at school, we’d be having less of these theatricals now, I bet.”
“Have you ever tried killing yourself, Gerald? You’d enjoy it.”
“If I were in your shoes,” Gerald continued, “I’d be over the moon. Plenty of open air. Good clean fun. What the viewer really wants, too; I mean, quite frankly, who gives a toss about politics anyway? Come to think of it, maybe you could do something about the way they always put the cricket highlights on at about half past three in the morning. I’m not as young as I was, I need my eight hours. And it’s all very well saying tape it, but I can never set the timer right. I always seem to end up with half an hour of some cult movie in German, which is no use at all when I come in from a hard day at the office. My mother can do it, of course, but then she understands machines. She tapes the Australian soaps, which I call a perverse use of advanced technology.”
“Isn’t it time,” Danny said, “that you were getting back?”
Gerald glanced at his watch and swore. “You’re right,” he said, “doesn’t time fly? Look, I hate to rush off when you’re having a life crisis like this, but the dollar’s been very iffy all week and God knows what it’ll get up to if I’m not there to hold its hand. You must come to dinner. Amanda’s finally worked out a way of doing crême brulée in the microwave, you’ll love it. Thanks for the drink.” He scooped up the remaining contents of his plate in his fingers, jammed the mixture into his mouth, and departed.
With Gerald mercifully out of the way, Danny was able to enjoy his misery properly. He savoured it. He rolled it round his palate. He experienced its unique bouquet. It is not every day that a living legend gets put out with the empty bottles and the discarded packaging; in fact, it would make a marvellous fly-on-the-wall documentary. For someone else.
Perhaps, Danny said to himself, I am taking it rather too hard. Perhaps they were right, and I was getting a bit set in my ways in current affairs. Perhaps it will be an exciting challenge producing televised snooker in Warrington. Perhaps the world is just a flat plate spinning on a stick balanced on the nose of the Great Conjuror, and my fortunes are so insignificant as to be unworthy of consideration. Perhaps I should pack it all in and go work for the satellite people.
