own expense.
Employees also had to provide for themselves the clothes they wore to work, though Ballantynes had strict rules governing those as well. William discovered that many people spent almost all of their meagre wages on either the food they bought to supplement the basic fare they were given, or on items of clothing. Since the slightest infraction of the many rules they lived under earned a fine, some people ended up paying over as much as half of what they earned back to the firm. The whole system seemed designed to ensure that their lives were not their own.
Every second Wednesday evening, a staff social was held in the basement restaurant where they ate their meals. It was an opportunity for everybody to gather together informally; the shop girls and departmental buyers and assistants, the people who worked in the offices on the top floor, the floorwalkers, the people who did the window displays and also the stockboys. At all other times, especially during the working day, a definite hierarchy operated. The buyers considered themselves above everybody else, as did their assistants, and the office people thought the same of everyone except the buyers. William observed that even the shopgirls differentiated themselves from one another according to the department they worked for. Those in Ladies Fashions imagined themselves at the pinnacle of all the salespeople, while for some reason that William couldn’t fathom, anyone who worked on the housewares counter was at the very bottom. Beneath them all, the lowliest of the low, languished the stockboys as they were universally called, even though Frank, who drove the lorry, was in his fifties.
It was Taylor, the young man who’d helped William get his job, who introduced him to his first social. The tables had been put aside and everyone was dressed in their best. The men wore lounge suits, and the women and girls wore elaborate dresses. Since nobody really spoke to the stockboys, even on these occasions, Taylor kept up a running commentary in a low voice, so that William would know who was who.
The evening began with people volunteering some sort of entertainment. A young woman played a popular tune badly on the piano, and when she finished turned to the applauding crowd and inclined her head graciously, as if their acclaim was her rightful due and they were at the Albert Hall.
‘That’s Miss Worth from Perfumery,’ Taylor said. ‘If you take a delivery to ‘er department she won’t speak to you directly, but tells ‘er girls anything she wants to say instead, even if you’re standin’ right in front of ‘er.’
A man in his late thirties with a thin and serious face stood up next to recite a poem.
‘Mister Cook from Gentleman’s Hosiery,’ Taylor said. ‘Does the same thing every time.’
The poem was Tennyson’s The Charge of the Light Brigade , and was rendered with much gesticulation and overly dramatic emphasis. Mister Cook’s voice swelled and thundered to give the impression of galloping horses and booming canons, but was so overdone and with such seriousness that William wasn’t sure if it was meant to be parody.
Canon to right of them,
Canon to left of them,
Canon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d:
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
At the end, the man was red-faced from the effort and the emotion of it all. He looked down at the floor and absorbed the rapturous cheers and applause, mainly from the young men in his department.
A very large woman, who wore lace gloves and too much glittering jewellery, sang excruciatingly out of tune. Another man did a tap dance. Mrs Ferris did palm reading with much oohing and aahing and melodramatic pronouncements of tall dark strangers, unexpected surprises, long trips abroad and other banalities, though she herself had a different
Employees also had to provide for themselves the clothes they wore to work, though Ballantynes had strict rules governing those as well. William discovered that many people spent almost all of their meagre wages on either the food they bought to supplement the basic fare they were given, or on items of clothing. Since the slightest infraction of the many rules they lived under earned a fine, some people ended up paying over as much as half of what they earned back to the firm. The whole system seemed designed to ensure that their lives were not their own.
Every second Wednesday evening, a staff social was held in the basement restaurant where they ate their meals. It was an opportunity for everybody to gather together informally; the shop girls and departmental buyers and assistants, the people who worked in the offices on the top floor, the floorwalkers, the people who did the window displays and also the stockboys. At all other times, especially during the working day, a definite hierarchy operated. The buyers considered themselves above everybody else, as did their assistants, and the office people thought the same of everyone except the buyers. William observed that even the shopgirls differentiated themselves from one another according to the department they worked for. Those in Ladies Fashions imagined themselves at the pinnacle of all the salespeople, while for some reason that William couldn’t fathom, anyone who worked on the housewares counter was at the very bottom. Beneath them all, the lowliest of the low, languished the stockboys as they were universally called, even though Frank, who drove the lorry, was in his fifties.
It was Taylor, the young man who’d helped William get his job, who introduced him to his first social. The tables had been put aside and everyone was dressed in their best. The men wore lounge suits, and the women and girls wore elaborate dresses. Since nobody really spoke to the stockboys, even on these occasions, Taylor kept up a running commentary in a low voice, so that William would know who was who.
The evening began with people volunteering some sort of entertainment. A young woman played a popular tune badly on the piano, and when she finished turned to the applauding crowd and inclined her head graciously, as if their acclaim was her rightful due and they were at the Albert Hall.
‘That’s Miss Worth from Perfumery,’ Taylor said. ‘If you take a delivery to ‘er department she won’t speak to you directly, but tells ‘er girls anything she wants to say instead, even if you’re standin’ right in front of ‘er.’
A man in his late thirties with a thin and serious face stood up next to recite a poem.
‘Mister Cook from Gentleman’s Hosiery,’ Taylor said. ‘Does the same thing every time.’
The poem was Tennyson’s The Charge of the Light Brigade , and was rendered with much gesticulation and overly dramatic emphasis. Mister Cook’s voice swelled and thundered to give the impression of galloping horses and booming canons, but was so overdone and with such seriousness that William wasn’t sure if it was meant to be parody.
Canon to right of them,
Canon to left of them,
Canon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d:
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
At the end, the man was red-faced from the effort and the emotion of it all. He looked down at the floor and absorbed the rapturous cheers and applause, mainly from the young men in his department.
A very large woman, who wore lace gloves and too much glittering jewellery, sang excruciatingly out of tune. Another man did a tap dance. Mrs Ferris did palm reading with much oohing and aahing and melodramatic pronouncements of tall dark strangers, unexpected surprises, long trips abroad and other banalities, though she herself had a different
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