Capital

thought perhaps we’d have a chat, see what’s knocking around out there?’
    ‘It’s good to have a plan,’ said Percy. ‘Absolutely. Very good.’ Then he paused. He was doing that thing of pretending to have answered Roger’s question, even though he knew perfectly well that he hadn’t.
    ‘So I was wondering if we might put something in the diary,’ said Roger, advancing over the parapet of his own desperation.
    ‘Quite so, quite so. Absolutely,’ said Percy. ‘Only – well, I hate to play this card. May I speak to you as an old pro?’
    ‘That’s why I’ve come to you.’
    ‘Experience teaches that there are some times when it’s best to let the market come to you. I know you’re a trader at heart, Roger’ – he knew nothing of the sort, not least because it was entirely untrue – ‘and I know you’re a go-and-get-’em type. Like to make your own weather. Create your own reality. A strength, a great strength. Really. In normal times. But – well, there’s a bit of a but knocking around at the moment. Not just the Pinker Lloyd thing but the market in general. Lehmans was a horrible shock. It’s pandemonium out there. People are wondering who’s next. They’re wondering what’s going to jump out of the cupboard and shout Boo! And this doth not for a hiring climate make. Nobody’s taking anybody new on. Nobody feels too sure about being kept on themselves. You follow me? Bad time to go looking for work – don’t want to seem desperate. Very off- putting . I tell my clients, it’s like sex. More desperate you are, more likely you are to have to pay for it! See my point? In your shoes, best course of action is not to act. Not just now. Let it shake down a bit. Dust settles. I tell my client, dust always settles – though it can take longer than you think. Best all round, eh?’
    ‘I thought that in this case—’ Roger managed.
    ‘That’s just it, though, Roger,’ said Percy. ‘This is the case. It’s all a question of timing. Long and short of it, speaking both as a pro in the field and as your old mucker, best to lie low for a bit. Trust me.’
    And that was that. Percy hadn’t so much given him the brush-off as picked him up bodily by his belt and collar and slammed him head first into a wall. This was made much, much worse by the fact that while Percy was an utterly obnoxious excuse for a human being, exceptionally vile and greed-crazed even by the standards of City headhunters, than which no form of life was generally agreed to be more low – he did know his field. If what he was saying, in effect, was that no one would touch Roger with the nozzle of a septic tank suction hose, then no one would touch Roger with the nozzle of a septic tank suction hose. He wouldn’t be wrong about that.
    This meant that Roger would be ill-advised to send out his CV and start touting for work. There was nothing for it except to make massive cuts in expenditure and try and make the cash in their current and savings accounts last as long as possible. Those balances stood at around £30,000 and Roger knew – was horrified to know it, but knew it nonetheless – that at current rates of expenditure the money wouldn’t last two months. Then they would be into his savings, the various assets wrapped in various tax-free devices over the years, and then into his pension fund. In the City, there was a term for this. It was called ‘being completely fucked’.
    So there was nothing for it except massive cutbacks in expenditure, starting right now. Action this day! Right now meant today, meant this very hour. Preferably this minute. Showdown with Arabella and then full-scale lockdown on expenditure. The thing was, though, that Roger felt that he didn’t want to do that; couldn’t face it. What he wanted to do, it turned out, was to log on to something called the White Shirt Specialists, which had a new offer where you could order three gorgeous white shirts for £400, a considerable saving from the normal price of nearer £500. Roger had been thinking about this saving, holding it back for a rainy day, and now here was the rainy day and Roger felt himself browsing a range of subtly different collar and sleeve and button and cuff designs, and also the question of monograms, which often struck him as vulgar but which in this case could be made delightfully understated, white on white. He found himself wondering if it were really true that the shirts could be made to fit perfectly with only