"David Moody - Straight to You" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moody David)

I knew was right and to criticise others when I agreed with their morals and actions? I decided there and
then (as I did nearly every day at the same time) that a change of career was the only sensible solution to
my problems.



Five o'clock seemed to take an eternity to arrive. I spent three long hours alone in my office, ploughing
through mundane paperwork and occasionally speaking to customers on the telephone. The heat made
the time drag even more and I noticed from my records that it was on this date last year that we had fired
up the boilers and switched on the office heating. Today I sat next to an open window with my tie
hanging loosely around my neck and my shirtsleeves rolled up.
A knock at the door disturbed the quiet and Robert, my assistant manager, poked his bald, sweaty
head into the room.
'All right if we all shoot off?' he asked. 'Everything's finished.'
I nodded.
'I'm just about to pack up myself,' I said and I was about to ask him a question when his head
disappeared again. The heavy clunking of feet followed as the staff collected their bags, newspapers and
redundant overcoats and climbed down the stairs to leave the building.
I gathered up my papers from the desk and shoved them into my briefcase, determined to catch up
with more work at home later. As I leant across and closed the window, I looked down onto the busy
street below and watched as people strolled through the early-evening gloom of October with their
jackets hung casually over their shoulders and their shirt collars open.
I slammed the window down and locked it shut. Keen to leave the branch quickly and be on my way
home, I picked up my jacket and case and went out into the main office. Robert had just let the last of
the rest of the staff out of the building and I waited for him to return. It was company regulations that
no-one was ever left on the premises on their own to lock up at night and a strict, almost regimental
check of the building needed to be made before we could leave.
A discarded newspaper lay on a nearby desk and I picked it up. The paper was one of the national
tabloids and, as I expected, carried little in the way of any real news. As is the norm for such papers, the
first hint of unexpected sunshine meant full, front-page pictures of crowded beaches and of children in
park paddling pools. The predictable headline yelled. 'What a Scorcher!' in inimitable Fleet Street style
and another footnote at the bottom of the page continued the theme, saying, '…and there's more to
come!' Try as I might, I could find nothing inside the paper to explain the heat or to even give the slightest
idea of how long the conditions might last or how hot it could get.
Robert returned from the front door with his round face glowing red and covered with a layer of
sticky sweat. 'This is too much for me,' he wheezed.
'I know what you mean,' I said. 'I don't know what we'll do if it gets any warmer.'
 As I spoke and tried to make polite conversation, Robert walked past me and collected his briefcase.
Although I was sure that he was not trying to be deliberately rude or obstinate, I could tell that he had no
interest in anything I had to say and that he just wanted to get away as quickly as possible. I hoped that it
was the branch he was so eager to escape from and not me - the constant whispers and glances from my
staff were beginning to make me paranoid.
I followed Robert as he made the required checks around the building and switched off the
computers. As we left the building I breathed a cool and relaxing sigh of relief and looked forward to a
quiet evening at home. With a little luck, I thought, I would wake up in the morning and find that the office
had burnt down and that it was a typically grey, cold and miserable October day outside.
Somehow, I didn't think thatwould be the case.