The honest truth

Howard Tish was a profiteer, which doesn't mean what I did was right.  The ‘son’ of Tish & Son, Rare Glass Dealers, Howard had inherited his father’s honorable and respected business, and turned it into a buy low/sell high emporium. He was a shark, who preyed on the desperate and the vulnerable. 

“A Daum Cameo and Enamel vase for one fifty,” he once boasted after a ‘home consultation’.  Or “A complete Depression glass tea set, they practically gave it away.” 

   

Despite his cupidity, I adored working there. Each morning, the moment when I illuminated the cabinets was, quite simply, joyful. Crystal goblets sparkled. Jewel coloured bowls in fluid shapes and hand painted vases were displayed like works of art. I dusted and replaced each delicate object, lingering in that final week over six rare Medici wine goblets, palest pastels rimmed in gold. 

Final week? Oh, yes. I was to be ‘let go’, Howard declared one Thursday afternoon, hovering anxiously while six American cruise ship passengers passed a rainy half hour in the shop. Online retail, he said, was the future. No more exorbitant rental, or sticky-fingered customers. No more time wasting tyre kickers.  He would pay a fortnight’s wages, but I would pack the stock and finish tomorrow.

I’m an honest person – perhaps every thief believes that. Was it vengeance, you may ask? Possibly. Compensation for seventeen years of faithful service?  A valid justification, some would say. In the gloom of that final June morning, I wrapped the eggshell blue Medici goblet and stowed the package in the recycling bin outside the back door for collection later that night.

One simple act of deceit continues to give me twofold delight, for my gain and Howard’s loss in equal measure.  He was a mean bastard, and that’s the honest truth.

Rosemary McBryde