Low life
Undone by chivalry
Jeremy Clarke
Afew columns ago I wrote about Mrs Wilberforce, my son's music teacher. In the column I said one or two things about her I deeply regretted. They weren't falsehoods exactly. But their correspondence with an actual state of affairs wasn't exact. Between filing my copy and publication day I worried myself sick about what her reaction would be when she read it. I imagined that she would probably be quite upset by my more or less calling her a slapper, and possibly feel a little betrayed as well. Unfortunately there was no hope at all she'd forget to buy The Spectator that week. Mrs Wilberforce is a big fan of mine. Since finding out I was a contributor, she hasn't missed an issue.
On publication day I happened to be in town quite early. I'd been up all the night before, and I was in that peculiar, detached, melancholic state of mind I always fall into after an all-night party, where I'm not quite sure whether I'm drunk still or just very tired. In the chemist's, though, I had a brilliant idea. Being unable to drive, Mrs Wilberforce rarely leaves the parish. I figured that, if I went to the newsagent and bought up every copy of the magazine on sale there, she wouldn't be able to buy her copy as usual, and therefore wouldn't get to read the column.
So I went to the newsagent's and made for the intellectual section of the magazine display. There were five copies. That's £12 worth. A small price indeed to pay for Mrs Wilberforce's ignorance and my peace of mind. I was just about to take them over to the counter to pay, when I remembered I hadn't brought my wallet. I only had 50 pence on me. So I decided to steal them. Normally I try to keep those of the Ten Commandments I'm not too scared to commit anyway. I'm not like the explorer Richard Burton, who, when asked by a young curate after supper whether it was true he had once killed a man, replied, 'Sir! I have committed every sin in the Decalogue!'
And I try particularly hard to keep the one about not stealing. I used to shoplift when I was younger of course — didn't everyone? But today I feel that no matter how low I sink in the general conduct of my life, at least I can hold my head up and say 'But at least I don't steal'. It's just about the only principle I have left these days. But it's one I cherish, because it gives me an edge over all the outwardly respectable people I know who steal and call it business. And now even that's been compromised.
Anyway, I got caught. I'd shoved The Spectators inside a copy of the Guardian and queued to pay. My hope was that the manager would see which paper I was holding, assume that I was a scholar and a gentleman, and simply ring it up on the till. But no. He had one of those price-reading laser-gun things. I hadn't reckoned on that. I had to hand him my newspaper so he could flash the pink light at the bar code. And as he took it from me he became immediately suspicious about the heavier weight of my Guardian and opened it out. I was undone.
Normally the manager is so polite, too. I go in there perhaps twice a week, and while we're not on first-name terms, he knows my face and says hello and makes a point of thanking me more times than I thank him. The instant he saw those Spectators nestling in the bosom of a Guardian, however, the expression of humble geniality froze on his face. 'What are these doing in here?' he demanded, showing the evidence to the rest of the queue as well as to myself.
Really I ought to have said that I was stealing them. But I'm sorry to say, I compounded my sin of petty theft with the far graver ones of cowardice and mendacity. `No idea,' I said lamely. The manager stepped back and pointed to the door. 'Get out!' he roared. 'We don't like shoplifters in here!'
I didn't argue. I got out, grateful he hadn't tried to have me arrested. Spectator Columnist Stole Spectators would have made an intriguing headline in the local paper, but on the whole I was glad I wasn't going to read it. And I needn't have worried about Mrs Wilberforce's reaction in any case, as it turned out. She said she loved it, and that I'd got her down to a T, and that she was going to open a bottle of her home-made elderflower wine to celebrate. Any excuse.
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