The Sleeping Partner Read Free Page A

started with a capital of £100. It had all come so quickly, perhaps too quickly. And perhaps my credit wasn’t as good as it had been twelve months ago in places where it mattered. Maybe success had to be slow to be solid and enduring; even success in marriage and in love.
    It was a twenty-five-minute drive to Letherton. The firm of Granville and Company was still very much a one-man affair, and in my brighter moments I sometimes speculated how long it would go on if I took ill or was knocked down by a taxi.
    There was really nobody at all able or willing to take authority even for a short time, and this had been the chief cause of the mess up in February, when the details of the move into the new factory had completely swamped me, and the production had had to be left to Read and Dawson, who for some inexplicable reason hated each other’s guts and got in each other’s way at every opportunity. Harwell had reacted violently — unreasonably to my view – to two late deliveries; and no doubt I’d been tactless too. Anyway it had finished our association, and the outcome had been that the factory’s production was truncated and being forced into commercial channels that I wasn’t interested in.
    As usual this morning there was a pile of letters on my desk and I’d dictated a couple of replies when Frank Dawson came in. I’d forgotten about his telephone call last night and I didn’t feel very much more patient now than I’d done then. I half expected him to pitch straight in about being cut off so sharply, but instead he said: ‘I brought you this, Mike. It should rejoice your soul. Exhibit D; the fourth in two weeks.’
    It was a bit of work done by a new hand and ruined by having had a 5/16 screw used in place of a quarter inch. Bill Read, the works manager, was trying to improve production by switching some of the workers about, and this, Frank maintained, was the outcome. I pacified him as best I could, half concerned and half no longer caring; and presently, getting precious little response from me, he dried up and stood pushing back his black hair and staring out at my car waiting patiently at the front door in the rain.
    I said: ‘Anything else, Frank?’
    â€˜Yes. When you’ve time. I’ve made a final selection from the IDA drawings, but I want your approval before I go ahead. There are one or two I’m not sure about.’
    I sighed. Like most of my other attempts to shift decisions on to other people, this one didn’t look as if it was going to be a great success. ‘Where are the plans? All right I’ll come and look in a few minutes. I must do a bit of phoning first. Is Mrs Curtis in the laboratory?’
    â€˜Yes. Do you want to see her?’
    â€˜No … I’ll see her when I come out to you.’
    He hesitated at the door, thin-featured, bright-eyed, moody. ‘There’s one other thing. I’ve a basket of strawberries for Lynn. Home grown. They’re particularly good this year.’
    â€˜Oh, thanks,’ I said awkwardly. ‘I – you have them with you?’
    â€˜Yes. I’ll shove them in the back of your car.’
    â€˜Thank you, Frank. That’s very nice of you. You must – look in and see us sometime.’
    â€˜You’re a bit distant now. Twelve miles is twelve times as far as it was in the old days.’
    When he’d gone I sat for a minute. I lit a cigarette. Then I put it out, angry that my fingers fumbled the job. I pressed the switch of the intercom thing and told them to get me the manager of the Pall Mall branch of the National Provincial Bank. While I was waiting I fiddled with the piece of damaged equipment.
    â€˜The manager is on the line now, Mr Granville.’
    I said: ‘Good morning. My name is Granville. My wife, Mrs Lindsey Granville, still banks with you, I think. Until early this year we lived at 5, Grosvenor Lane, off Clarges