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The Professional*

Ruth Rendell

The girls had the best of it. Dressed in models from the Designer Room, they disposed themselves in one of the windows that fronted on to the High Street, one in a hammock from House and Garden, another in an armchair from Beautiful Interiors, holding best-sellers from the book department and pretending to read them. Small crowds gathered and stared at them, as if they were caged exotic animals.

The boys had seats inside, between Men's Leisurewear and Perfumery, facing the escalators. Anyone coming down the escalators was obliged to look straight at them. They sat surrounded by the materials of their craft, ten pairs of brushes each, thirty different kinds of polishes and creams and sprays, innumerable soft cloths, ali of different colours, all used just the once, then discarded. Customers had comfortable leather chairs to sit in and padded leather footrests for their feet. A big notice said: Let our professionals clean your shoes to an unrivalled high standard. £2.50.

It was a lot harder work than what the girls did. Nigel resented the girls, lounging about doing bugger all*, getting to wear the sort of kit they'd never afford in their wildest dreams. But Ross pointed out to him that the boys would do better out of it in the long run. After all, it was a load of rubbish ! Karen and Fiona thinking this was the first step to a modelling career. As if it was Paps (or even London), as if they were on the catwalk* instead of in a department store window in a city that had one of the highest rates of unemployment in the country.

Besides, he and Nigel were trained. They'd both had two weeksMntensive training. When he had been at his pitch at the

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