This story was written many years ago. I am not really happy with it but you don’t throw stories away. Someone that I once knew worked in a factory that the Duke visited. He told me that the walls were only repainted on the side that the Duke would see.
TOMORROW.
Even being second choice was an honour. Fendpak Industries Penrose plant was to be visited by no lesser person than the Duke of Edinborough. Our new Queen wouldn’t be coming, she’d be off doing something else and probably wasn’t very interested in factories anyway. Actually, it had been planned that the Duke would visit Harrison and Gottlieb’s further up the road but their fire a few nights earlier had brought a sudden change of plans and a panic at Fendpak.
An amazing amount of organising was necessary to stage manage this simple visit.It was all rather reminiscent of the elaborate false facades shown to Catherine of Russia on her journeys through that land. The Duke’s route was carefully worked out and timed. Everything that would meet his eye was repainted, polished, rendered scrupulously clean. The rest of the factory, though, was left in its usual tatty state. The new paint stopped at the corners. The pieces of equipment that had tended to lie around, because no-one could ever decide what to do with them, were now carted off to some remote corner. There was an issue of brand new overalls.
A great deal of bad feeling had been caused. Machine operators, naturally enough, felt that they should be operating their usual machines when the Duke passed by. If they were on the route then, by the luck of the draw, they should meet the Duke: maybe exchange a few words. That was not how it was working out. Suddenly it became obvious who wielded power in the firm. Several, who were in with the bosses, managed to get themselves shifted to prominent positions which meant, correspondingly, that others were shifted away. The biggest cause for anger was the fact that two bods from the group’s head office had suddenly appeared and were being given a crash course in lathe operation.
Such upsets even extended to the cafetaria. The Duke and his retinue were to take morning tea in the boardroom with the local management. If the cafeteria staff thought their moment of glory had come they were wrong. The important job of serving the duke with tea and tasty sandwiches could, it seemed, only be done by someone with real finesse: someone like the Branch Manager’s wife and her sister. These two had been provided with unlimited funds with which to buy suitably fetching uniforms.
As with everything else , the morning tea had a rehearsal . This took place on the afternoon before the big day. The cafetaria staff, and anyone else that they could rope in, played the part of the big-wigs. Bill, who ran the cafeteria, played the Duke as was his right. Since, for once, there seemed to be plenty of money to throw around, quite a reasonable spread had been assembled which would explain why volunteers were not too hard to find. At least they’d get this much out of the visit.
Basically, the rehearsal was for the two ring-ins and the normal staff was not inclined to give them much assistance. For some reason the two ladies had decided that this should be a full dress rehearsal, hairdo, make-up, the lot. More than a few present thought that the effect was perhaps a little overdone. Waitresses should be unabtrusive. These two wouldn’t look too much out of place at the reservoir end of Karangahape Road or the top end of Cuba Street.
The rehearsal looked set to be a farce. Their ladyships showed every sign of being flustered right from the start. Bill wondered how they would manage when it came to the real thing. Not too well possibly. He hoped that they would make complete fools of themselves although he knew, at the same time, that any blame would fall on him, unfair though that was. But then the whole thing was grossly unfair anyway. Rosie and Janice should have had the job. Good girls, both of them. Thoroughly reliable.
Bill, as the Duke, was served first and by the Branch Manager’s wife, Esme, who had every intention of keeping the Duke to herself on the morrow. She bobbed in a practise curtsey and as she did she had the distinct impression that an overstressed seam had parted. For a moment, she was totally disconcerted but then reassured herself that it was impossible for anyone else to have noticed anything. She managed to ask’The Duke’ whether he preferred tea or coffee.
“Tea please.”
“With milk sir?”
“Yes with milk.”
Downstairs in the cafetaria, tea, coffee , sugar, and the necessary hot water came out of one of those serve-yourself machines and the teaspoons lived in a pint preserving jar beside the machine along with a two litre plastic container of milk as a temporary resident. It was after all a workshop caff. Here it was fine pottery, tea and coffee pots, milk jugs, sugar bowls with the novelty of sugar lumps and tongs. Everything hired.
Esme poured the ‘Dukes’ tea and slowly added the milk.
“Say when sir.”
“When.” The ‘Duke’ placed two sugar lumps in his cup and began to stir them in with his index finger as though that was a most natural thing to do. He had long seen that certain vital things were missing. And while he stirred he plied Esme with questions. The sort of inconsequential small-talk that he assumed the real Duke would use and have become skilled at. His continued stirring was paining his finger but it was paining Esme even more. The movement of his hand held her in hypnotic fascination. Her answers were a mumbled incoherence so that Bill relented somewhat.
“I’ll bet you won’t forget the teaspoons tomorrow. And you’d better hit the firm up for some stronger knickers.”