The angry wrestler appeared in our inquiries section spitting blood. He looked like Conan the Barbarian overdosed on Angel Dust.
“Where is the sniveling little shit,” he growled at me. “I want to speak to him. Now.”
Some of the cheques had been given to people even bigger and a lot nastier than our friendly wrestler. McFier had caused him a whole world of trouble.
“Take a seat please Mr. James, I`ll tell him you are here.”
When I told McFier that ‘Mister Angry’ had requested an audience he went white as a sheet.
“Tell him I’m not here,” he ordered.
“You want me to tell lies for you. I am not sure my conscience will permit me to do that.” I was enjoying his discomfort immensely.
“Look the man is a maniac when he’s angry. I am not going to see him and that is final.You will tell him that I am out with customers and not expected back today or you will spend the rest of your time here filing paperwork all day. Do you understand?”
“Perfectly.I hear and obey master. I will tell him exactly what you told me to.”
When I returned to the interview room Mr.James had not taken a seat as I had suggested. He was pacing round the room like a wounded tiger with a bad attitude.
“Well where is he?” he demanded and his demeanor was quite threatening. The man towered over me and I could see he was barely in control of his temper.
“Sorry Mr.James but the sniveling shit you referred to earlier has instructed me to tell you that he is out with customers and is not expected to be back today.”
“The yellow livered bastard, I’m gonna kill him” he growled and head butted the wall leaving a most impressive dent in the plasterwork but causing no visible damage to his forehead whatsoever. I decided I didn’t want to be the next victim of his anger. I needed to deflect his rage before he head butted me.
“ If I might give you some information you may find useful Mr. James, you may be interested to know that Mr. McFier drives a Jaguar, license plate number… The Jaguar is his pride and joy – used to belong to a minor member of the Royal family according to the logbook. He parks the car in a private parking space on the third floor of the multi storey car park on Smith Street. As far as I know they don’t have cameras on the third floor, only at the entrance and exit.”
For the first time that morning he smiled. “Thanks, I owe you one.”
“Pleasure Mr. James.” I was just relieved to get rid of him.
So it was that Mr. McFier, having left the branch via the service exit disguised as a Tibetan monk, discovered his Jaguar pride and joy had been defaced by vandals. The words ‘shithead bastard’ had been written large on the bonnet in paint stripper. Even after the car was resprayed you could still make out the words in certain light.
At least I didn’t get snotted by an irate Neanderthal.
Soon afterwards Village and I both got our wish – I was transferred to another area altogether. I was off to a branch in Wakefield with a promotion to office supervisor. This was one of the bigger branches in the network, about 45 staff, and it was run an absolutely Dickensian manner by an over -manager and three branch managers. Or to be more accurate, four two-faced bastards. The office politics was unbearable. Each of the managers seemed hell bent on scoring points off the others, so it didn’t make for a pleasant atmosphere.
