Dear Simon and the (hopefully understanding and forgiving) collective,
It has been nearly 10 years now since my crime and apart from the odd pub recollection to close friends I have kept it all but secret due to my guilt and self-reproach.
I'd recently left university and started out on my fledgling career, in a stroke of good luck I managed to land myself a job in the marketing department of a well known manufacturing firm. As you can imagine I was as keen as a very potent mustard to establish myself and part of this campaign of self promotion was offering my services to the Marketing Director to do all those menial tasks that my other colleagues shunned viewing them as "demeaning" or "below them".
One of these tasks was do some in the field research, and I jumped at the chance to get some time out of the office. As a lowly marketing Exec I had no company car, so I was delighted when it was suggested that I borrow one of the senior sales manager’s cars that he had recently been given.
The large and burly Sales Manager somewhat begrudgingly handed over the keys to his pride and joy, instructing me sternly that he wanted to leave on time as it was Friday and he wanted to get back to his family. I re-assured him that I'd be back in plenty of time and then practically ran to the car park.
Once behind the wheel of a brand new luxury Audi estate I sped off into the countryside to find my fray; in this case some parents of employees at the company who had been asked to trial new machines. My task was simple, find their houses, and conduct a research interview on the new products!
After a couple of successful interviews my third household was proving quite hard to find (this was the days before Sat Nav) so I tried to call the interviewee on what was then a brick of a mobile phone. Needless to say the reception was terrible and after a very disjointed phone conversation I managed to get some rough directions.
What I thought the lady had said was "drive down the small country lane, pass through a ford, and the house is just ahead on the right" So after a few more minutes of driving I found the right lane and drove down until I reached the ford.
Now my understanding of these road features is that they are very shallow stretches of water that breach a roadway and are completely safe for cars to pass through. What lay before the bonnet of my shiny estate however could only be described as a raging torrent of water about 30 feet wide.
It looked fairly substantial to me and had obviously swelled due to heavy rain the night before, but as the water was slightly muddy I assumed that its depth was probably minimal and being the keen, and rather stupid, marketing exec I was, I left all my concerns of uncertainty and doom at the water’s edge and drove head on into the swell.
5 feet in and all seemed fine… At 10 feet the water did appear to be deepening, possibly a bit more than I had expected... by 15 feet the ground beneath the car suddenly gave way and I entered a rather deep and scary section of the river.
Water was now flowing freely over the previously shiny bonnet and I could see it lapping at the windows either side of the car…. Panic washed over me like the river over the car! Panic thoughts flew threw my head… Was this the end of my career? How would I get out? Would I need a tractor or would a Sea King helicopter be required? Worse still how was I going to explain away the loss of the company car?
Somehow the engine continued running and I decided my only hope was to “gun it” in reverse and keep my fingers crossed. I kept the revs high and closed my eyes as the sinking feeling in my heart told me this was not an ideal scenario.
After an initial bit of wheel spinning the car lurched backwards and apart from a rather ugly grating noise from below my feet I was edging back to safety. Through sheer luck and pure brilliance on behalf of the car I managed to reverse out of the river (note I have given up calling it a Ford now) and was elated as I stepped out of the car.
My feelings of jubilation were short lived. The car was now making a noticeably louder diesel tapping noise and when I looked under the car there was a trail of disaster in the guise of tree branches, strands of river weed and a huge piece of plastic now hanging down from the engine bay.
Yes, in my haste to remove myself and the car from the raging torrent that now flowed innocently in front of me, I had managed to rip off the engine cover from beneath the car.
I couldn’t leave all these clues to my awful deed and so I reached underneath and yanked away the branches, weeds and the engine cover placing it in the boot. I then retraced my steps back up the lane, finding the house that I had initially past.
Having conducted the interview with a lot of haste and very little attention, I finally started the return journey. Guilt washed over me as I realised that I was now also running late despite my promise to the Sales Manager.
So I stopped off at an off license to buy some wine as a gift to say sorry for returning the car late and damaged. Just as I got back in the car I saw a large commercial bin in front of me and a plot leapt into my head – I could ditch the engine bay cover now sat in the boot, quickly polish up the car and then return the keys with the wine and make a run for it.
Putting on my best face of innocence I returned to the office well after my 5pm deadline, ran to the desk of the sales manager, handed over the keys along with a sorry story and the bottle of wine. He ignored the wine and simply grabbed his jacket and keys and left for the evening… But hey, I was off scott free… or was I?
After a full weekend of guilt the horror of Monday morning arrived. All seemed fine until at 10am a call came through to my desk from the Sales Manager.
I answered the phone and after a very brief exchange of niceties over the weekend he asked if I had any problems with his car when I had taken it out on Friday as he had noticed it making an awful noise and had taken it into the garage on Saturday where they had told him he needed a new engine cover etc etc …
I mustered up all my acting skills and somehow managed to blurt out that it seemed fine when I had it and suggested it must have happened over the weekend.. to which he angrily responded “It must have been my damned wife, she borrowed it Saturday morning”.
Father Simon I'd like to seek forgiveness, not only from the company who's property I damaged, The Sales Manager who I blatantly lied too, but most of all to the Sales Managers Wife… I'm not sure how much trouble I landed her in, but I have always pictured in my mind that it was minimal due to it being a company car.
My guilt is absolute and I can only ask that the team find it in their hearts to forgive – there is a 10 year old bottle of wine in it for you all!
Thanks
Mike