The View across the Valley

Alone for a moment, I looked across the valley from Denham Heights, out across the sprawling fields, the trees, the church on the hill, the cottages and the idyllic peacefulness of the scene and I felt truly happy.

My life was wonderful. 

I’d just collected my brand new white Mercedes sports tourer from the dealer and had filled up at the petrol station beside the viewing point at the top of the hill. I looked back to the car with my new bride in the passenger seat. I was blissfully in love, and we’d just come back from a fantastic honeymoon on Crete. On Monday morning promotion meant that I was going to take over the management of one of her father’s betting shops, which meant more prestige, more money and a golden future.

Which was when I noticed the tramp sitting on the wooden bench, who was also looking out across the Denham Valley.

Instantly my good mood vanished.  I looked closely at him, while he seemed oblivious to me. He appeared to be about mid-twenties, my own age, had a scruffy beard and unkept hair and slashed dirty jeans and an ancient teeshirt stretched across his bony frame.  He was hunched, looked seriously ill, sad and weary, shivering in the cold and blinking as if the light hurt his eyes. As if life had kicked him in the teeth too many times.

I bought him a sandwich at the petrol station, put it on the seat beside him, and he didn’t even look up. Then I went back to the car, and told Jackie how awful I felt.

“Life is so unfair,” I complained.  “Why should I have everything, when that poor guy is hunched up in the freezing cold and he hasn’t even got anywhere to sleep?”

“Don’t be stupid, John, you softie,” she clucked away.  “You can’t change the world, you’re not Mother Theresa! Leave him be. He’s one of life’s failures – probably an alcoholic or a druggie. I’m always telling you: don’t waste your sympathy on waifs and strays. If they’re in the gutter it’s their own fault.”

We drove home, a new house on the Franklin Estate we’d bought last month.  And while Jackie had a nap that afternoon, I suddenly had this awful attack of guilt. On impulse I grabbed one of our warmest blankets, jumped in the car, drove the cash point in town and back to Denham Heights to find him.

For a moment I thought he’d gone, but no, he was still there in the same place on the bench looking even more lonely and forlorn.  I walked up to him, put the £200 I’d collected into his lap, lay the blanket on top of his legs, gave him a quick squeeze on the shoulder.

He looked up at me in amazement.  “W-why?” he asked in astonishment.

“Because I’ve got too much luck,” I told him, walking away fast, so as not to embarrass him. “So I just wanted to share it out a bit.  I wish you all best, mate.”

I got away fast, still feeling guilty that he had so little when I had so much.

Monday morning came, and I soon got to grips with my new job.  It was a much bigger branch than the one I’d been working in up until Jackie’s father promoted me, and all the staff were nice and helpful – they seemed a friendly team.

The running of the shop was no problem, and I took to their system like a duck to water.  Just before lunch I had taken a turn on the counter and was face-to-face with a very old man in threadbare clothes, a grease-stained hat and a fag hanging out of the corner of his mouth.

“Sorry, Joey,” my chief counter clerk, Colin, said to him from behind me.  “I told you an hour ago. You know the rules.  No credit.”

Joey’s face fell.  “But I’ve got a dead cert for the three o’clock!”

“Sorry Joey, mate, we’ll always love you but you know the rules: No Reddies, no Flutters, no matter how dead the cert.”

“Oh I don’t know,” I interrupted, feeling sorry for the poor old man. I pictured his rotten seedy life, where a bet on the horses was most likely the high point of his week, perhaps his only pleasure. “Of course Colin, in principle you’re right, and maybe your last boss was a stickler for the rules.” I turned to Joey and smiled.  “But I’m the new manager, and our new rules are a hundred quid credit is no problem for valued customers like you.”

“Thanks, mate, you’re a star!” 

While Joey placed his bet, Colin’s smile was guarded, as if to say ‘You’ve dropped a bollock’. 

Trouble comes in threes, so they say.  Joey’s debt soon spiralled to 300 quid, and not only that, but word soon got around.  By the end of my first week we had some new customers – Joey’s friends, Bill and Fred, all of whom wanted credit, and I felt I had to give it to them.

And truth to tell, things weren’t going so well between me and Jackie.  We hadn’t been going out that long when we’d agreed to get married, and it seemed as if when we were alone we didn’t have that much in common, and there were lots of uncomfortable silences and unpleasant arguments.  What do they say?  Marry in haste, repent at leisure.

At the beginning of my fourth week, Jackie’s dad had called me into head office for a chat. 

“I’ve been hearing things about you,” Mr Grabbalot began as son as I sat down opposite him.  “You’re too soft, boy.  You know there’s a strict rule for most punters – no credit.  Takings are down at your branch and the word I’ve been hearing is that you’re a soft touch. You get a few deadlegs in one shop, the others all follow on, and when they’ve built up a wall of debt you never seen them again.  As you know our richer clients have accounts, which is fine because we can go after them legally if they get in too deep. But you can’t chase a debt from a bugger who hasn’t got a bean, you just have to write it off.  And unfortunately we’re running a business, not a charity.  Buck up, boy! I gave you this promotion against my better judgement, for the sake of little Jackie, but my faith in you has gotta be earned, understand?  Shape up or ship out!”

That afternoon when I went back to the shop there were even more disreputable customers – about ten of them by the look of it, mostly elderly, scruffy looking old men who were down on their luck.

In the evening I told Jackie what had happened, hoping for a bit of support.

“Well, John it’s your own fault,” she snapped.  “How many times have I told that you shouldn’t be such an idiot!  Honestly, I persuade Dad to give you promotion and you go and mess it up.  Don’t expect any sympathy from me!”

Six months later I was separated from Jackie and a divorce was pending.  Her dad had sacked me, and he had a nasty solicitor who was likely to screw me financially so as to get as much of my money for Jackie as he could. She’d certainly get the house and the car, and probably the shirt off my back. I wasn’t likely to get a job in the bookmaking game, not in this town, because Jackie’s dad had put the word out that I was unreliable.

I drove up to Denham Heights to get some peace and quiet and to think about what to do with my life.  I had wrecked my chances of a decent future, all my decisions were bad, and because of my weakness I had lost everything.

The magnificent view was as good as ever, especially now that it was almost evening, and the setting sun was spreading its dazzling redness like a wash of fire.  I sat on the empty bench.  After ten minutes an old man came and sat on the other end of it, staring silently out at the view, as I was.  

“My son Paul told me that he used to come here to look out over the valley,” he said, still staring at the view. 

When I turned to look at his face there was something familiar about it, but I couldn’t think where I’d seen him before.  Then I remembered.  Six months ago, the tramp who I’d helped, who’d been sitting in this very spot.  This man looked just as he would have looked if he’d been 30 years older, healthy and fit and with tidy hair.

“I think I may have met Paul,” I answered.  “How is he?”

“He died a month ago.” Tears trickled down his cheeks, his voice trembled, but he carried on.  “About a year after his mum died, so I’m all alone now. Poor Paul had a terrible life.  Suffered from depression, then he was into alcohol and drugs.  He never told us what he was doing, where he was living, we tried to find him but we never could,  had no idea where in the world he was, we never stopped worrying.  And then the hospital in town here, contacted me a month ago, and I went to be with him in his final days.”

“I’m so sorry.”

 Inadequate stupid words. 

“Do you know something?” he turned to look at me in the eye, and the likeness with the man I’d helped was quite startling.  “One thing he told me on his last day. He told me that a few months ago he met some stranger up here, and this rich guy gave him some food, 200 quid and a blanket, just like that, no questions asked.  He told me that it meant the world to him, because for a few days he could stay in a hostel, get some decent meals, even a few clothes.  He was never able to thank the bloke, but he said it touched him so deeply that he cried when he thought about it. And it wasn’t just the money, you see. He said it made him feel happier than he’d felt in years, because he was used to everyone looking down at him, despising him like he was rubbish.  Yet this bloke had made him realise that there were still decent people who cared.  That act of kindness by the stranger counted for more than anything else to him when he was almost at the end of his rope.”

I thought back to Jackie’s words, telling me I was an idiot to feel sorry for waifs and strays and how I had to man-up if I was going to amount to anything. How I was s wimp and drip and a failure to feel sorry for people in trouble, how I should ignore my conscience and look out for Number One. 

“But you don’t want to hear about my problems,” he went on, sniffing away his tears.  “I shouldn’t go depressing you like this. Trouble is I can’t stop thinking about my boy, how I should have done more to help him.”

“Look.” I leaned towards him, laying a hand on his arm and feeling a huge surge of affection for this old silver-haired man who looked so lost.  “Do you fancy a cup of tea or coffee from the petrol station?  Let’s make each other miserable. I can tell you about how I’ve lost my wife, my job and all my money. And you can tell me about Paul, all about his life before he had his troubles.”

“You don’t want to know, you’re just being polite.” He looked away.

“I do.  Please. I really do want to know.”

He looked back at me.  “A trouble shared is a trouble halved?”

“No.” My heart seemed to strain in my chest and I struggled with a sudden urge to cry.  “Just two bloody miserable people who are dead lonely and want to be friends.  How about that?”

He smiled for the first time. “Milk and two sugars for me.  And a bun if they’ve got one.”

As I fiddled about with the coffee machine in the petrol station, I thought about Jackie and her dad telling me what a drip I was to feel sorry for people in trouble, and how I had to forget my conscience if I was going to have a decent life and make lots of money. 

They were wrong. 

And I was right.

When I went back to the bench he had gone, and I felt desperately sad.

Then he appeared, smiling, jogging across to the bench.

“I just went back to the car to get these old photos of the family,” he explained. 

As I joined the old man I wondered why it had taken me so long to realise the truth.

Money, success, houses, cars, they come they go, and at the end of your life they fizzle out and disappear into nothingness.

But an act of kindness is never forgotten.