When My Friend Harry was a pink-cheeked stripling on the Chatham Observer he soon discovered that his job-description as ‘journalistic pupil" was by no means comprehensive. There was dusting, for instance.
First job in the morning was dusting the editor’s desk and it was no good giving the thing a good blow and nipping back to the reporters’ room. It had to be done properly with a damp duster, for Bernard Archer Brooks, the editor, could spot a speck of dust on his desk from the saloon bar of the King’s Arms across the road -- and frequently did.
Then there was the errand-running on behalf of Mr. A. J. Radford-Satturley, the freelance photographer who lived in the suburbs. He was a slothful man who liked his bed, among other things, and it was Harry’s privilege to indulge him by hastening to his house bright and early, picking up an envelope of prints and hastening back. Sad to say, there were days when Harry, too, was a little slothful and those were the days when the editor arrived to find a dusty desk and no envelope of photographs.
Let us not talk about those days ...
However, all this has little to do with that ‘cutting spill’ mentioned above. Good background stuff, though. Puts you in the picture.
It was on a Thursday night that the editor put his head round the door while Harry was proof-reading and gave him his usual greeting. “Hey, you,” he barked. “I want you."
Proof-reading? Certainly, all part of the job. Proof-reading every Thursday night until the paper went to bed at 5 a.m. Then the 3-mile walk home and up in good time for the police court at 10 a.m. Busy little body, Harry was.
When Bernard Archer Brooks said he wanted Harry, the lad thought it would be the usual request for another cup of tea. That was all part of the job, too. When people wanted cups of tea on Thursday nights, Harry had to disappear into the gloomy book-binding department with a kettle and teapot, find the tiny gas ring and brew up. When thirsts had all been quenched, and that was rarely before there’d been another couple of brew-ups, all he had to do was empty the teapot and wash it up together with all the crockery.
So, it was no willing little lad who followed the Old Man out of the galley-slaves’ department on the command: “Hey, you. I want you." But it was not tea.
"Go down and get me a cutting spill," he ordered. “Quick.”
Now, Harry was about to ask what a cutting spill was, but ignorance was unforgivable thereabouts. You were supposed to know everything by instinct, especially late on a Thursday night.
So, Harry faded smartish and set out for the cutting spill.
“Mac," he said to an elderly reporter of 30 or so, “what do you suppose a cutting spill is?"
“Cutting spill? Cutting spill?" he ruminated. “Heaven knows. Ask ‘em out there.”
So, Harry asked the machine room overseer. “Never heard of it," he said. “Who wants one?”
“The Old Man," Harry told him.
“Then let him look for the bloody thing himself," he snapped unhelpfully.
Harry went to the stereo room. They had never heard of it.
He asked Frank, the Linotype operator, if, in his wide experience, he had ever come across a cutting spill. Frank was normally a genial soul but subject to piles, and on those unhappy occasions, his geniality left him. Unwisely, Harry did not inquire as to the state of his health before approaching him with the query. Frank was rude. Profanely rude. But Harry’s vocabulary was broadened.
There was nothing for it. He went back to the editor.
“I am very sorry, sir," he apologised, “but I do not know what a cutting spill is."
He put down his bottle of Bass. “Nor do I," he said, “and I would like to know who the hell cares.”
“I am very sorry, sir," spluttered Harry, pressing on regardless, “but you asked me to get you one.”
“I did?”
“Yes, sir. You called me from the readers’ room and told me to get one."
Understanding and Incredulity struggled for supremacy on the editor’s purpling face. “You blithering fool," he shouted. “I told you to get a cutting spill."
They were plainly getting nowhere and tempers were fraying and Harry knew who would suffer most from that.
“Yes, sir," he ventured, “but I still don’t know what a cutting spill is and nobody knows in the works, either."
“You are," snarled the editor, “heading for trouble." He reached up and dragged something down from a wall. “This is what I want. A cutting spill. A cutting spill. A cutting spill."
So, Harry darted out and got one in 30 seconds.
Know what it was? A double-crown contents bill.
But the Old Man came from Durham and you know how funny they talk up there, don’t you?
Comments