The Past and Other Lies Read Online Free PDF Page B

of figures on the latest print-out from marketing and was only vaguely surprised to note that an interactive board game where players moved from one global trouble spot to another, settling disputes between warring nations through a combination of economic and diplomatic manoeuvres, and that had been extensively advertised on television in the run-up to Christmas, had failed to sell.
    What kid wanted to prevent wars?
    It was a relief she and Nick had never had children.
    The more traditional board games were past their use-by date in a modern toy department. Who wanted to play Ludo or Snakes and Ladders when you could play Surveillance: Spy on your neighbours!™ with a micro digital video camera and a listen-through-walls bugging device?
    ‘There’s a phone call for you. Mr Gaspari.’
    It was Gloria Clements, her PA, making a rare visit onto the sales floor.
    Gloria was younger than Jennifer but had somehow notched up fifteen years’ service at Gossup’s. Her mother, Alfreda, a huge woman with an alarming bust, was one of an army of West Indian, Fijian and Turkish cleaning women who descended on the store at closing time, and on the rare occasions when her mother made it up to the toy department before Gloria had left for the evening, Gloria would scoop up her bag and sweep tight-lipped out of the office.
    Gloria didn’t have children either. In fact, oddly, no one in the toy department had children.
    Or maybe it wasn’t odd. Maybe it made perfect sense.
    Jennifer looked up from the sales print-out and regarded Gloria thoughtfully. A telephone call from Mr Gaspari? Mr Gaspari was on the board of directors and as far as she could recall he had never, in nine years, rung her. It seemed surprising he even knew who she was. Could it be the Ring Me!™ thing? Surely that hadn’t made it all the way up to the boardroom, had it?
    Gloria returned her gaze expressionlessly.
    ‘And did you ask what it was concerning?’ Jennifer prompted.
    ‘No. I didn’t ask.’
    Gloria, Jennifer felt reasonably certain, disliked her. It was possible to attribute this dislike to what is conveniently excused as a clash of personalities, but it would be more accurate to put it down to the incident with Gloria’s fiance, Adam Finch, four years ago.
    ‘Well,’ Jennifer said slowly and calmly, ‘why don’t you go and ask him, and if it’s important I’ll call him straight back and if it’s not, take a message.’
    She turned away and studied the first aisle of girls’ toys. The single biggest seller in the pre-school section was My First Phone™, a plush mobile phone with nursery-rhyme ring-tones that middle-management parents picked out for the offspring they had just deposited at long daycare. For the pre-teens there was a Britney Spears version called Ring Me!™ in Barbie-pink fun-fur that imparted such profound messages as ‘ I rilly wanna see you tonight! ’ and ‘ Can I go out with you? ’ and ‘ I miss you so much! ’ in a pre-recorded preppy American voice. After less than a month on the shelves, the toy department sales team had been so driven to the point of insanity by the continual playing of Ring Me!™ by excited eight-year-olds that they had removed the batteries and put the product on the top shelf out of reach. Naturally, sales had been affected and comments had been made at the monthly executive meeting upstairs. The phones had been returned to the lower shelves and the sales team had been given booklets on stress management.
    Gloria hadn’t moved.
    ‘I need Saturday off,’ she stated flatly and Jennifer perused her sales print-out in a leisurely fashion and waited for more.
    ‘It’s a fitting for the dress,’ said Gloria finally. ‘She can only do me Saturday morning. I have to go down to Camberwell.’
    So that was it. The wedding. Jennifer squinted more closely at the figures. She chewed her lip to indicate that she might be listening and she might be about to approve this somewhat tardy request. On