Dying for Millions (3 page)

‘For my students,' I said. ‘I'm responsible for placing them in organisations like yours where they can get some idea of the world of work.'

‘For how long are we talking about?'

I was slightly puzzled: I'd have expected this conversation to take place in his office. ‘Usually a week, occasionally two or three weeks. Some placements prefer to use them on a range of jobs: others prefer shadowing – following you around all day, about your daily round.'

He gave an exaggerated shudder. ‘You mean, they follow you
everywhere
?'

‘Apart from the loo, yes. Not just set-piece meetings – all the behind-closed-door politicking as well.'

He wrinkled a straight, rather elegant nose. ‘There's a lot of confidential stuff in a place like this. After all the problems other airports have had with demonstrators, we wouldn't want to take any chances.' He turned slightly – we were about to move at last.

‘Are you involved in live animal transportation, then?' I asked, gathering up my bag and preparing to follow wherever he led.

‘Not now. The management saw the way things were going and pulled out before the publicity started. There's plenty of other lucrative contracts without actively looking for trouble.' He led the way, limping slightly on his left leg. I hoped it wasn't just the cut of his suit that gave him such broad shoulders.

I followed him to a door. He tapped numbers into a keyboard, shielded so that only the most determinedly curious could have worked out the code, then held the door open for me.

‘You know, of course, that we don't handle large numbers of passengers here. We're almost exclusively freight with some short-haul private passenger flights. STOLs – short take off and landing. You see the Dash Sevens over there? That sort of thing. There are training flights, too. And over there is the helipad.'

I nodded; I would have to check out all the details later so I could use the right lingo – and, more importantly, understand should he use it. ‘You mean, like the airport in Docklands?' I said brightly.

He stopped by another door, again secretively tapping in a code before ushering me through.

‘We're less busy than they are. Like I said, it's mostly freight. The container base is over there.' He pointed through triple-glazed windows. ‘Customs and Excise. Engineering. Control tower.'

‘You're quite a small concern.' I hoped I didn't sound disparaging.

‘But very efficient. We have to be, there are so few of us. Most of the clerical work is now computerised and as soon as a plane is logged through Air Traffic Control it triggers a print-out in the accounts office. Which is where your students could be most useful.' He gave a bark of laughter. ‘Symbiosis – isn't that what they call it? You want us to give them experience; we'd want to get some work out of them.'

I hesitated: work experience placements weren't intended to turn students into unpaid labourers. ‘What sort of work?'

‘Quite responsible. The sort that might lead to paid work later – temporary relief when staff are off sick or on training. We're very forward-looking in our training policies. Investors in People.'

I smiled. ‘It's on your letter heading.'

‘Right! Some of it's essential – propellers are lethal things. We don't want people walking into them. And planes come expensive. Apart from that, we try to ensure everyone has their skills up-dated as often as possible. Not just those skills which would immediately benefit the company, either. Languages. Fitness. And we have regular team-building weekends at outdoor activity centres.'

The tone of his voice suggested he was particularly proud of something which I've always considered anathema. Imagine it – a weekend being swung from the end of a wet rope by a boss you couldn't swear at …

‘So how could our students help? In the short term, that is?'

For answer he took me out of his office, back into the corridor: another code-controlled door, this time into an office. From the windows you could see an immense aircraft sitting on the runway, disgorging containers. There was, I suppose, some background noise from the trucks and the plane itself, but nothing outrageous enough to disturb two women who were tapping at computer keyboards like creatures possessed. Their area was sectioned off by sound-screens, forming a self-contained enclave.

‘This is where the usual secretarial stuff is done.' He stopped by the section nearest the door. ‘Morning, Sal – how's Kieran?'

‘Still teething. Especially at three in the morning.'

‘Ron doing his share?'

‘When he remembers.'

‘Make sure he does!'

I wasn't sure how to take that little exchange. It seemed genuine, but I'm always suspicious of public displays designed to show what a brilliant, caring employer you are. I smiled sympathetically at Sal, who smiled back without any hint of irony. Perhaps he
was
simply a good manager.

‘Tell me,' Winfield began, ‘how flexible your students would be in their working hours.'

‘They'd normally do the same as everyone else – nine till five.'

‘Ah. That limits us slightly. You see, we're at our busiest between the hours of nine and twelve.' He paused for effect. ‘In the evening.'

‘Is that why it's so quiet now? I'd expected to be yelling over the sound of incoming or outgoing aircraft.'

‘That's right.' He guided me to a window. ‘See, it's mostly training flights during the day. I suppose you don't fly yourself?' His voice changed; I had an enthusiast on my hands.

I watched a smallish aircraft bounce to an awkward halt. If it were me, I'd want to loop and dive; but then, I reminded myself sourly, I wouldn't be able to. ‘I get vertigo,' I said.

‘So do I, on the ground. But never up there. I've even done parachute jumps! You should learn. Think about it!' When he smiled his face was transformed.

I reflected briefly on the use flying would be to a woman from semi-detached Harborne with a job that consumed lunch-times and weekends like a gull gobbled fish. But I did feel a nasty yearning. And if Andy was learning to fly a helicopter, why shouldn't I? No. For him flying made absolute sense. For me?

‘One day, maybe,' I said, non-committally. Then I found myself smiling back and adding, ‘Actually, I should love to.' What I had to do was direct the conversation back to education and the needs of my students – tactfully for preference. ‘When did you learn? Were you an air cadet or something?'

‘Fire Service, actually. That's how I got involved in training.'

‘That sounds an unusual career path!'

He laughed. ‘I was responsible for health and safety. And as I said, an airport is a dangerous place – you should see it at night when we're busy with all the Parcel Force traffic. Planes and lorries. Someone had to take responsibility for all the casual staff we've got out there and when I hurt my hip – oh, I fell through a roof – the company offered to take me on. Good of them. New General Manager – very enlightened. Anyway, since I started, there have only been a couple of incidents, neither of them serious. Whereas before, we were beginning to have trouble getting insurance.'

‘You must be doing a good job.'

‘We all work hard here. Which brings me back to your students.' He'd taken the hint. ‘They'd have to have a serious capacity for hard work. I don't want anyone farting round thinking all they have to do is make tea and do their nails. Real work is what I'm talking.' Take it or leave it, his voice said: then that smile.

‘And not nine till five? That would eliminate some of our Asian students – the girls, especially. Their fathers bring them in at five to nine, collect them at four-thirty.'

‘What about the others? You must have other students?'

‘Plenty.' My tone conveyed more conviction than I felt. How many students would want to work those hours?

‘I think there might be a way round this,' he said slowly. ‘What about – the same day a week, for several weeks? We could train them up to do something worthwhile, and it would free one of our staff to undertake a period of training. Then, as I said, there'd be the possibility of doing relief or holiday work, but that would almost certainly involve several evenings a week.'

I back-tracked. ‘A lot of students do evening work at McDonald's, or delivering pizzas. I'm sure we'll find you someone good.'

‘I don't want anyone who
isn't
good!' His smile again, eventually, softened his words. ‘Oh, and we need two written references – Department of Transport regulations.' He shot a look at his watch. ‘Twelve already. You'll join me for a bite in the canteen?'

I looked at mine in turn. ‘I wish I could. But I'm teaching at one-fifteen.'

‘Come on. It's only fifteen minutes back to the city centre. Well, twenty.'

His smile became very engaging indeed. I shouldn't offend a potential placement; it would have been churlish to refuse. ‘I promised I'd talk to a student – can I make a phone call to put her off?'

‘There's a phone in my office.'

It turned out Mark had played cricket before he hurt his hip, and was still a keen Warwickshire supporter. So we gossiped cricket for as long as it took us to eat salad and rolls, and drink rather weak decaffeinated coffee in what he referred to as the Mess. I was the only woman among short-haired men in smart shirts with impressive shoulder flashes; braided caps were much in evidence.

‘I'm sorry,' I said at last, ‘but I really must dash. I've got an A-level class.'

‘Tell you what,' he said, ‘you really ought to see what it's like at night. Come over next week. Let's see – I think I'm rostered for Tuesday. Come over about nine. We'll have a drink first, then I'll show you round.'

I must have been off my head: trailing round in the cold – and almost certainly the rain – of a February night wasn't my usual idea of a good time. But I heard myself agreeing. And, come to think of it, I found myself looking forward to it.

RIVERS
,
ANDREW MICHAEL
.
Passed away in his sleep, 14 February. Reunited with his dear wife Freya. Private funeral. No flowers
.

I'd been leafing idly through the courtesy
Evening Mail
at the Chinese takeaway. In the kitchen, someone added garlic to a pan; two middle-aged men were condoling with each other on West Bromwich Albion's recent bad performance.

– Passed away in his sleep—

‘Two frie' ri'e; chicken and bean sprou'; beef with green pepper?'

No! No, not Andy. Someone else. Andrew Rivers was a common enough name. This Andrew Rivers
couldn't
be my cousin Andy. I'd know the moment he died, without having to read about it in a evening paper. I'd
know
.

‘Don't use their heads, see. All those lofted balls …'

– dear wife Freya—

I forced myself to look at the TV on the corner of the counter, but they'd turned the sound down. The decor, then: I tried to concentrate on the tasselled lanterns and what seemed to be a shrine next to the till.

But my eyes wouldn't focus, and when I closed the paper firmly my hands opened it again.
Andrew Robert Rivers
…

‘Szechuan chicken and plai' ri'e?'

It didn't make sense.

‘Szechuan chicken and plai' ri'e?'

‘Isn't that yours, love?' someone asked.

Embarrassed, I got to my feet, left the paper on the formica table, and collected my food.

I rarely drank spirits before a meal, but this time I left the containers on the hob to keep warm while I sank a large slug of Jameson's. The sensible thing was to phone Andy, just to make sure everything was all right, but the logical part of my brain was outraged. Of course everything was all right!

But it wasn't. OK, Andy Rivers was not an unusual name – but Freya certainly was. In fact, I only knew one other, the teenage daughter of a friend. Andy had married his Freya when he was eighteen and into serious mistakes. She'd been a wispy girl, limp and pallid in the high-waisted, floating dresses already going out of vogue, and doing nothing in particular. I'd tried to love her, for Andy's sake, but was relieved when after a couple of years she drifted off with a colleague of Andy's further up the success ladder and into proportionately heavier drugs. She died of some bizarre drug cocktail before she reached her twenty-fifth birthday. Andy was by then deep into another relationship, but Freya's death had shocked him into giving up even coffee. For a while, at least.

The whiskey did little more than fuddle my thinking, so I emptied the rest of the glass down the sink and put the bottle away. To stop myself thinking about the notice, I watched the news while I ate. As soon as it was over, however, I was into worry-mode again. Clearly Andy was alive and well – the whole nation would have heard Michael Buerk breaking the news otherwise – but I was still uneasy. I reached for my ‘Do Tomorrow' pad: Phone the
Evening Mail
and check the provenance of the death notice.

And then I phoned Andy anyway. To ask after Ruth, naturally.

‘Bloody virus,' she whispered. ‘All those years teaching – you'd have thought my throat would be made of leather.'

Her voice stopped abruptly.

‘She's supposed to be Trappist for the next week,' said Andy, trying not to sound anxious but failing to sound amused. ‘So she won't be coming over to Dublin for the gig there. That's for definite.'

‘What about the Music Centre?' Surely nothing would stop her missing that.

‘Yeah. A bit of a milestone, isn't it?'

‘I can't imagine it without her. Couldn't she come along to the party and gesture? It's about all most of us can do after that level of decibels.'