When I was in college, Alfred (name changed), who managed the administrative office there, was among the most disliked people around. He was the chap we had to meet on most routine matters and his unsmiling, stern demeanour was hardly encouraging.
Now, most students who entered the office did so to find a way out of something or to atone for their sins such as inadequate attendance or a delay in the payment of fees, having misappropriated the parent’s grant of funds for an outing to the cinema.
Even before you said what you had come to say, his head, with that neatly cut crop of hair and a clean-shaven face with a sneer affixed on it, would shake in an emphatic ‘No’. He would look down at some other work he was doing and ignore you then, his manner that of an inspector dealing with a juvenile driver.
If you persisted, as most did, he would eye you with one of his trademark looks that was calculated to induce discomfort, if not downright fear. “Ask the Principal,” he would say, as he turned away from you in final rejection of the pathetic piece of human flesh standing in front which was, well, the end of the story.
It was in my final year that I had a particularly bad run-in with Mr Sneer and was needlessly hauled in front of the Principal to explain myself. A couple of days later, on a Friday evening, a college friend, Anil, and I cycled upto Rumali’s, that venerable restaurant on Church Street, now alas a distant memory, for dinner. We sat down at a table and were talking animatedly when the waiter showed up and asked us in a courteous tone what we’d like.
I looked up and saw Alfred. For a few seconds, there were three startled faces staring at each other, before he forced a weak smile to appear (the muscles must have creaked from years of disuse). He dutifully took the order down, confirmed it in a neutral tone and then attended to someone else, with us watching his every move.
When he entered the kitchen though, Anil and I went into whispering overdrive, our dominant thought centred around just how we could use this opportunity to create a level playing field. We decided to leave a generous tip, but do it in a most discreet way.
After dinner, he wordlessly took the bill folder away and, as he pocketed the tip, I saw the hint of a smile. He looked back to nod in assent, suggesting that we were on a strong wicket with him from then on. We decided to keep the little incident to ourselves and away from the troops to sustain the advantage.
About a week later, I strode in to the college office confidently and, as Alfred looked up with an enquiring glance, made the usual pitch. His cold eyes bore into me, as he shook his head emphatically, the sneer intact. I would be better off, the scorn implied, speaking to the clock on the wall.
His confidence suggested that I had no negotiation leeway at all and all that effort had been wasted. Even worse, I had lost a fortune on a princely tip.
Published 30 August 2015, 18:37 IST