The Shift of Numbers (3 page)

*

It was official:
after 2 weeks the strike was over. The share price had dropped to a new record low of
79p
, but in Bill
’
s eyes things could only get better. Over the last 2 weeks all of his
27
staff members had arrived every morning, co
vered their faces with a fresh coat of orange paint
and climbed back into their holes. It was agreed in the long and difficult negotiations that the workers new hourly rate would increase to 4.98 pounds per hour with a new overtime rate of 5.23 pounds per hour. The foreman was particularly clever in his inclusion of an overtime rate as he knew there were no carrots in the field at the moment and the workers would be called upon to work extra to rectify the problem. Bill
’
s current problem was that he needed to grow a large amount of carrots in a very short amount of time otherwise he would be dangerously close to going bankrupt. In the spirit of goodwill that had descended upon the farm he had decided to push all his current worries to the back of his mind and take the workers to the local pub to celebrate the end of the strike.

The local pub had a slight
ly
damp smell to it and was constructed to look like an affable non-descript version of every other public house in the land
. The
builders had succeeded admirably and were awarded a contract by the brewery to build 14 other pubs in the country, all absolutely identical, apart from the name.

The workers were
enjoying the drinks Bill had b
ought for them in the lounge while Bill, who had more pressing problems to think about, sat at a table on his own in the bar. Nursing a large brandy
,
Bill stared into the empty ashtray in front of him and considered his lack of carrots and wh
at that spelled for the future: n
o wife, no farm, no money, no job, no prospects.

“I know who you are,” c
ame a voice from the gloom. The face attached to the voice bel
onged to a middle-
aged man with very red cheeks and overgrown eyebrows.

“I would appreciate being left alone
,
please
,
” Bill responded curtly.

“I know all about your problem.” The face came a bit closer and the owner of the face sat down opposite Bill.

“What’s it got to do with you?”

“Well,” cough
,
“I know you need a lot of carrots and quick.”

“Well
,
friend,” said Bill leaning forward and loo
king as menacing as he could, “m
ost people around here know that. What’s it to you?”

“I have a solut…” cough
,
“…ion”

“A w
hat?”

“A solution
.
”

Puzzled, Bill looked on.
“How could you have a solution? What’ya mean by that
,
squire?”

“I’m a scientist. I have a…” extended bout of coughing
,
“… a batch of super growing formula, especially for carrots.”

“You mean like a fertili
s
er?”

“A bit like fertili
s
er, only better. It will re
duce the growing time of your
average carrot by a half.”

“Really? Seems a bit far-
fetched to me, does that.”

“I can assure you that, excuse m
e,” the Scientist noisily cleared
his throat while Bill looked on wit
h interest, “t
he formula
(
or fertili
s
er
, as you put it)
works perfectly well.”

“Well, how much would it cost me?” said Bill sceptically with a glint in his eye.

“I know your situation and it wouldn’t cost you any money as such. The share price as it stands is very low. All you would have to do is give me
50
thousand shares. Either from the half million you own or buy them for me.

Bill looked on bemused then pulled out a pen from his top pocket, writing something on the back of a beer mat. “So you want me to giv
e you nearly 40 thousand pounds
for a fertili
s
er that may or may
not work. Thanks, but no thanks,
” Bill laughed.

“No
,
no, perhaps I…” coughs repeatedly
,
“…didn’t explain it right. You keep hold of the shares until you see how well the formula works then you give them to me. You give me nothing up front.”

“Oh
, I see. That
seems a bit to
o good to
be true. What’s to stop me from keeping the fertili
s
er and not giving you the shares after I’ve grown me carrots?”

“I will go to the press and tell them you have been using my formula.”

“What dif
ference will that make to me?” s
aid Bill, puzzled again.

“While the formula does work
, and I can assure you of that, i
t’s not exactly been tested properly.”

After 2 hours of further debate
,
the
Scientist
held out a sca
r
red hand, which strangely had no fingernails. Bill spat in his palm and with a handshake the deal was struck. Bill settled back in his chair and winked at Gordon’s boss who had just entered the bar.

“Drink
, Bill?” h
e shouted, wiggling his hand in the air.

A thumb in the air replied. “And one for my new friend
.
”

*

If anyone had looked to the west on his or her walk home from the pub that evening, they would have seen a figure silhouetted in the moonlight. The shadowy figure seemed to be digging a small hole in Bill
’
s garden. Occasionally
,
a glint from what looked like gold bounce
d playfully off
the figure
’
s hand.

*

“Would you believe it?” exclaimed Richard for the 100
th
time that day. The recipient of
Richard’s
astonishment was his bored looking fiancé
e
. “I can see properly again. I told you that the carrots would work, didn’t I?”

“Yes
,
you did
,
Richard,” replied his fiancé
e
without looking up from the television guide
.

“What do you want for dinner? I
’ve just got this new cookbook,
” Richard effused.

“I thought we could eat out for a change
.
”

“We can’t go out. Nowhere caters for my dietary requirements.”

“So we
’
re never going to eat out again?” came an exasperated response.

*

As Gordon waited for the bus he became acutely aware of the endless stream of cars going in the direction he wanted to go. It was a quarter to 3 in the afternoon and he was on his way to the job centre. He was the only person at the bus stop, the only person it seemed without his own means of transport. He pas
sed
the time by staring up the road past a distant hedgerow, expectantly waiting to see the top of a red double-decker bus. As he waited,
it suddenly struck him the shee
r amount of money
that was speeding past his eyes: each car, from the clapped-
out old banger to the luxury sports car
,
was worth something. On average he figured each car must be worth a few 1000
pounds
, not to mention the money spent on fuel. Every few sec
onds, a different model sped
its way past him, some with air-conditioning, others with furry dice.

As he waited, growing colder and con
sider
ably later, he wondered what the odds were that 1 of these cars would stop and offer him a lift.
In all his years of waiting
at bus stops it had never happene
d, so the odds must be quite low
. He then thought about all the money that went into building these cars and the money individuals spent on them. Then there were the roads themselves, snaking all over the country with no real plan, connecting up everyone, haphazardly avoiding hills and water, like veins. Every evening
,
human cargo pumped out from tire
d cities to their homes on ever-
narrowing roads.  He wondered what would happen if all the vast amounts of money that went into building roads, cars and obtaining fuel were directed into public transport. What a magnificent system it would be
, he thought. I
t would be nothing like this. Houses wouldn’t need to be on streets as there would be no need for parking; all the existing
residential
roads could be turned into lawns where children could play. Just clusters of houses all within a couple of minutes
’
walk from a public transport station. Trams, trains, high-speed can
al boats, underground super-
speed trains or even more futuristically
,
he thought, capsules. Instead of trains, you get into your own capsule, tell it w
h
ere you want to go and
,
whoosh, at high speed
,
you travel underground through a vast network of tunnels to your des
ired location. As he pondered
this
,
the screech of overworked brakes and a big red object filled his daydreaming eyes.

On the bus
,
overhearing the mundane conversations of his fellow passengers
,
Gordon considered the gulf between the thoughts in his head and the reality of his situation, on the w
ay to the job centre. He sighed.
I’ve hated every job I have ever done, he thought
, in a none-too-
brief melancholic haze. 

*

Mary worked
at the job centre
. She had
worked there for
5 years. She liked her job and felt like she wa
s providing a valuable service to the local co
mmunity. Her job mainly consisted
of checking up on
the people she was trying to
get j
obs for. To get any money off
t
he government her ‘clients’ had
to prove that t
hey were looking for work and we
re making an effort. To quantify the effort of looki
ng for a job, the ‘clients’ had to show that they had
actively applied for at leas
t 3 jobs a week or no money would
be forthcomi
ng. All of Mary’s ‘clients’ had
to meet up with her on a weekly basis to pro
ve themselves worthy of their 55
pounds a week payment from the government.

Gordon had been seeing Mary for the last 2 weeks and he found it to be a s
oul-crushing task. After
their
allotted 15 minutes of
Mary
asking him to justify what he had been doing for the last week, Gor
don felt sucked dry of any self-
worth. He was considering this under the cold glare of the office lighting
,
when the electronic bell sounded. That meant it was his turn next. Looking round to see if anyone else was next in line and
realising with dismay
that
there wasn’t, he walked
slowly over to Mary’s desk. She watched over the top of her glasses as Gordon sat down opposite her. He looked across the desk at Mary’s lined and wrinkled face
, hidden behind oversized thick-
rimmed glasses with that bit of string attached so she could hang them around her neck. Because of a trick of the bright office lights her glasses seemed to reflect Gordon’s face back at him, only he had an extended forehead and a giant chin. He thought about all the lines on her face as she hacked away noisil
y at the keyboard with nicotine-
stained fingers. It seemed she had a wrinkle for every ‘client’ she had made feel small and worthl
ess, the
opposite of laughter lines.

“Hello
, Gordon. H
ow has your week bee
n?” she said with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. T
his was her 17
th
‘client’ of the day. Gordon blinked out of his thoughts and replied, looking at his watch under the table.