Chapter 1: Lunch

I was sitting in my office at Saleware. The sign on the door said "Marketing Director". I was feeling surprisingly fit after the previous evening. That's the worst of customer hospitality events, I think. You always end up drinking more than you should — just in the interests of keeping the customers happy. And of course as the host you've got to hang on until the bitter end. I could only have had about three hours sleep.

Still, one good thing - I was amazed that I didn't have the least sign of a hang over.

Everything seemed really great. In fact I felt really sharp and...

It was then that my brain ran into a brick wall as the alcohol finally caught up with me.

Five minutes later I was sitting at my desk with my head in my hands and a glass of seltzer fizzing noisily in front of me, courtesy of my secretary. I wasn't in the best of moods when she put her head around the door five minutes later and pointed at the phone. "Can you pick this up," she said, with a grin "I didn't think you want me to ring through - all things considered."

I nodded, grateful for the consideration, and picked up the receiver. It sounded like a thousand angry snakes were hissing down the wires. I winced and moved the receiver away from my ear as the voice at the other end boomed out. "Morning," it said. "Clegg here. We spoke last night. Thought you did a good job on the event. Wondered if you might be interested in a proposition."

The good thing about Clegg's staccato delivery was at least I didn't have to cope with following long sentences. He didn't wait for an answer.

"Good, good. Thought you'd like some lunch. I'll be at my club, The Crescent. Come over about 1 o'clock. See you then."

The clunk of the receiver heralded blissful silence.

I'd only met Clegg for the first time the previous evening. His company had installed our software earlier on in the year. I ran the marketing for SaleWare — it's the UK end of a US software company specialising in systems for distribution businesses, merchants, wholesalers, that sort of thing. Anyway we like to do profiles of our customers when the systems have been in and running for a while. Clegg's company hadn't been keen so I'd invited him along to a party we were having to launch the new version. I hadn't really expected him to come but he'd been there large as life and, if the squeals of some of the girls we had on hand to ease the evening along were anything to go by, twice as willing.

He managed to avoid any discussion of a profile and then I got drawn into a debate on the merits of some particularly abstruse new feature with one of our more tiresome clients. I took a vodka or two to numb the conversation. I guess that started the down-hill road to my current condition.

I climbed out of the taxi as it stopped in the middle of a Georgian terrace of houses ranged in an elegant curve. A very small sign on a brass plate on some railings said "The Crescent". Some steps led down to a basement entrance.

The woman standing at the desk just inside the doorway peered over her spectacles as I arrived. "I don't believe you're a member," she said, suspiciously. I really wasn't in the mood for complicated power games, though looking at her in her well fitting, sharply tailored suit and crisp blouse I might have been encouraged to other activities when in my normal state of health.

"Mr Clegg," I replied. "I'm a guest of Mr Frederick Clegg."

The woman's look changed instantly to one of ingratiating pleasantness. "Of course," she said. "Do come this way. I'll show you through myself." She ushered me across the dining room. It was a rather more modern setting than I'd have expected for Clegg — I'd have thought deep padded seats and tapestries on the wall were more his style; this was all bare wood and steel. We arrived at the door to a private room and she knocked. I heard Clegg's voice boom out, "Come!"

The woman opened the door and showed me in. "Your guest, Mr Clegg," she said quietly.

"Excellent," Clegg smiled getting up and extending his had to me. "Thank you, Hermione, give us a few minutes and then we'll order."

"Of course," she said, smiling as she left the room.

Clegg watched the door close. "Snooty bitch," he said. Hope she didn't give you too hard a time."

"Well, no," I started but Clegg cut in.

"Good, good. Now let me get to the point. You've done a good job for SaleWare. I'd like you to come and do the same for me."

"That's certainly coming to the point Mr Clegg," I replied, startled by his bluntness.

"That's me," said Clegg. "Don't believe in wasting time. My business, distribution and selling. World's changing. Too many suppliers, too much competition, too few customers. People tell me I need some of this marketing stuff. Maybe they're right. You seem like the man to do it. Talked to some people that know you. They seem to agree. So what do you think?"

"Well, Mr Clegg apart from the fact that I don't know you, I don't know your company, I don't know your products or your customers and I have a perfectly good job at the moment; I can't think of a single reason to say no."