Victoria Line, Central Line by Maeve Binchy Read Free Book Online Page B

up.

KING’S CROSS
    Eve looked around the office with a practical eye. There was a shabby and rather hastily put together steel shelving system for books and brochures. There were boxes of paper still on the floor. There was a dead plant on the window, and another plant with a Good Luck in Your New Job label dying slowly beside it. The venetian blind was black – there was so much clutter on the window ledge it looked like a major undertaking to try and free the blind. One of the telephones was actually hidden under a pile of literature on the desk. In the corner was a small, cheap and rather nasty-looking table . . . which would be Eve’s if she were to take the job.
    And that’s what she was doing now, as she sat in the unappealing room . . . deciding if she would take the job of secretary to Sara Gray. Sara had rushed off to find somebody who knew about holidays and luncheon vouchers and overtime. She had never had a secretary before and had never thought of enquiringabout these details before she interviewed Eve. She had pushed the hair out of her eyes and gone galloping off to personnel, which would undoubtedly think her very foolish. Eve sat calmly in the room waiting and deliberating, by the time Sara had bounded back with the information, Eve had already decided to take on Sara Gray. She looked like being the most challenging so far.
    Sara heaved a great sigh of relief when she heard that Eve would stay and work with her. She had big kind brown eyes, the kind of eyes you often see shown close up in a movie or a television play to illustrate that someone is a trusting, vulnerable character and therefore likely to be hurt. She looked vague and bewildered, and snowed-under. She sounded as if she needed a personal manager rather than a secretary – and this is where Sara Gray had hit very lucky because that’s what Eve was.
    From the outset she was extraordinarily respectful to Sara. She never referred to her as anything but Miss Gray, she called her Miss Gray to her face despite a dozen expostulations from Sara.
    ‘This is a friendly office,’ Sara cried. ‘I can’t stand you not calling me by my name. It makes me look so snooty. We’re all friends here.’
    Eve had replied firmly that it was not a friendly office. It was a very cut-throat company indeed. Eve had asked Sara how many of the women secretaries called their male bosses by their first names. Saracouldn’t work it out. Eve could. None of them. Sara agreed reluctantly that this might be so. Eve pressed home her point. Even the managers and assistant managers on Sara’s level were not going to escape, they all called Sara by her first name because she was a woman, but she felt the need to call many of them Mr. After two days Sara decided that Eve must be heavily into Women’s Lib.
    ‘There’s no need to fight any battles on my behalf, Eve,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Look at how far I’ve got, and I’m a woman. Nobody held me back just because I’m a downtrodden put-upon female. Did they? I’ve done very well here, and I get recognition for all I do.’
    ‘Oh no, Miss Gray, you are quite wrong,’ said Eve. ‘You do not get recognition. You are the assistant promotions manager. Everyone knows that you are far better and brighter and work much harder than Mr Edwards. You should be the promotions manager not the assistant.’
    Sara looked upset. ‘I thought I could say I’d done rather well,’ she said.
    ‘Only what you deserve, Miss Gray,’ said Eve who seemed to have acquired a thorough familiarity with the huge travel agency and its tour operations in two days. ‘You should have Mr Edwards’ job. We all know that. You
must
have it. It’s only fair.’
    Sara looked at her, embarrassed.
    ‘Gosh Eve, it’s awfully nice of you, and don’t thinkI don’t appreciate it. You’re amazingly loyal. But you really don’t know the score here.’
    ‘With great respect, Miss Gray, I think it’s you who doesn’t know the score,’ said Eve