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speech around the second reference to a welcome being extended to Commander Badger and his officers. As Sir Rollo’s voice rose and fell, Dagwood studied Sir Rollo’s private secretary who was sitting immediately behind him. She had a notebook on her lap and glasses on her nose. Occasionally she made a note in her book and then reaffixed her eyes upon the small of Sir Rollo’s back Dagwood noted the contours of the figure underneath the short grey bolero coat and silk blouse and just as he was deciding that behind the spectacles and beneath the notebook there might be more than met the innocent eye, the girl turned her head. Dagwood half-smiled. The girl looked at him. Dagwood’s half-smile faded. Her look had plainly said: ‘The bus leaves at noon - be under it.’
    Dagwood turned his attention to the boardroom. It was a long gloomy chamber, a mausoleum in honour of the men who had ruled Harvey McNichol & Drummond’s and of the ships they had built; the room was lined with portraits, all very large, very dark and, at the time they were painted, very expensive. Each picture was fitted with a tiny light above it but none of the lights were switched on and Dagwood could not make out more than the pale blurs of the faces in the sombre backgrounds. By straining his eyes he could just read the small gilt plaques on two of the nearest pictures: ‘Harvey McNichol 1813-1865’ and ‘George Drummond, 1841-1902.’ Glass cabinets were placed on tables along the room containing examples of the ships the firm had built. Dagwood could see a clipper, an early paddle steamer with a tall brass funnel, a dreadnought, a First World War monitor, a destroyer of the ‘30s, a ‘River Class’ submarine, and a range of passenger ships. Dagwood felt a sudden sympathy with the firm; they had a long and famous tradition of ship-building. They had a right to be proud of themselves. It was just that the faces Dagwood could see representing the firm now seemed somehow unworthy; Dagwood had the suspicion that none of them would have satisfied ‘Harvey McNichol, 1813-1865’ nor ‘George Drummond, 1841-1902.’
    Dagwood came to as Sir Rollo was winding up his address. ‘ . . . every endeavour therefore must, and will, be made to make this job an undertaking worthy of Harvey McNichol and Drummond’s craftsmen! ‘
    There was a simultaneous expulsion of breath, all round the conference room. The Bodger, Dagwood and Ollie were the only people oblivious of the atmosphere. Harvey McNichol & Drummond men sat back in their chairs; they had been given their instructions. Mr Tybalt and his team braced themselves. They too, had received the signal. Mr Tybalt compressed his lips and thrust out his jaw.
    There followed a weary discussion on contracts, penalty clauses, delivery dates, costing, overtime bans, and union negotiations. It was all double Dutch to The Bodger. He attempted to follow the arguments but they were mostly beyond him. He could see that Mr Tybalt was obviously battling strenuously on their behalf but felt powerless to help him; it was like watching a man fight a lion behind a sheet of thick glass. It was not until the conference passed to the lists of defects to be made good that the ship’s officers sat up in their chairs and felt that at last they could begin to make a real contribution.
    But even here they were superfluous. The refit was to cost what sounded to The Bodger a fantastic sum of money but the defect lists covering the work were dealt with in about forty minutes. Mr Day read out the defect numbers and Harvey McNichol & Drummond men nodded or shook their heads to signify whether or not they would undertake the work. The Bodger was reminded of a high-speed auction, where the proceedings were unintelligible to all save the cognoscenti. Whenever the Harvey McNichol & Drummond men shook their heads, Mr Day and Mr Tybalt exchanged glances of complicity. The reading of the defect list was obviously only a formality; like the