Trustee from the Toolroom by Neville Shute

 

Trustee from the Toolroom by Neville Shute

published 1950

 

 

sailor with a model - though not quite the right kind

Always trust the word of Clothes in Books commentators.

I would never have read this book without them – I have enjoyed some Neville Shute, but the descriptions of this one sound rather off-putting.

The matter arose in the comments on this post

Heyho for Smugglers’ Rest

But I believed in the blogfriends and here we are. Also – nobody’s fault but mine – I kept hearing it in my head as ‘Trustie from the Toolroom’ – a well-behaved prisoner in a rehab workshop facility in jail.

Well it’s not that.

It tells the story of an ordinary man, living a quiet life in London, getting involved in adventures and a treasure hunt, for a reason you would never guess. His sister and brother-in-law die at sea while going on an extended voyage: Keith and his wife Katie are left with the daughter, Janice, whom they were looking after when the sailors departed.

John, the dead relation, turns out to have left no money at all, a mystery. But then Keith realizes that he must have converted all his money into valuable precious stones, and hidden them on his boat – which then sank near a remote island in the Pacific. Keith made the box for the jewels (helpfully wrapped in asbestos btw), knows where it was on the boat, and decides he must go and find the wreck and rescue the valuables. Otherwise – and I hope you are sitting down for this shocking jeopardy - Janice will have to go to a council (ie state) school. Horror of horrors. This is what I found off-putting in the descriptions of the book, and readers, such as Susanna who first mentioned it, felt the same.

However, can’t help thinking this: the dead man, John, is highly educated, posh family, and supposed to be wonderful in every way, much superior to Keith: John is the product of the best life has to offer.

When it becomes apparent that he and his wife and the boat aren’t going to make it, there is this conversation as they worry about their daughter:

‘John, they haven’t any money.’

‘She’ll have money,’ he replied. ‘It’s all left in trust to Keith for her, until she’s twenty-five. She’ll get as good an education as anyone can get, and after that she’ll have a good lump sum. Don’t you remember how we made our wills?’

‘But, John, she won’t have anything! We’ve got it all here!’

He stared at her in the half light. ‘I never thought of that.’

Callous though it sounds, I found it hilarious that Mr Clever Clogs had made this basic stupid mistake. He broke the law in a very substantial way, hiding his money and then smuggling it out of the country, because he didn’t think the law should apply to him, and he really really messed up because he couldn’t think two steps ahead… Perhaps a council school would have taught him better, including some morals.

The book is quite excruciatingly snobbish in this way, and also with the constant comparisons of Keith with others – he’s a quiet man who missed out on life and has only a very small house, and an ordinary wife, who works in a shop. Shute is of course setting him up as a man who has great capabilities and is a good person who achieves what he sets out to do – but there is no implication that he is NOT ultimately inferior to richer and more class-driven types.

But that is my only complaint.

off the coast of Tahiti

It turns out that Keith is an engineer, and very good at making working miniature models. He makes his lowly living by inventing these items and writing about them for a magazine, Miniature Mechanic, where he has a large and very enthusiastic following. (His latest serial, which they are all trying to make, is a Congreve Clock, a very complex item which you will have to look up).  He sets out to reach the other end of the world - Tahiti - and everywhere he goes, he meets men like himself who love making models. They all know him – he is a legend. So they help him, and in a relay of model-makers he travels round the world to try to reach the wreck.

Among his fans there are some very wealthy people, and so this fairy-tale gets even more dramatic. One of the rich men has a flighty red-headed daughter, ‘dressed for shore and picking up a broad-brimmed sun hat with a gaudy ribbon’, but not otherwise many opportunities for women’s clothes.

Honestly, Trustee is absolutely splendid. Keith has scarcely been out of the country, scarcely flown before, and has no idea of the right clothes to wear, and no money. The final part of his voyage (when his superfans are desperately trying to find him) takes him to a rickety boat with a rickety, illiterate sailor and no communications. Jack Donelly is a wonderful character.

There is also a trip to Seattle in Washington State – a place I know well – and a diversion into the lumber industry.

picture copied from the boring sailing entry

I have said before

How boring is sailing? (answer: very)

- and I could have done without paras like this:

He bent his heaviest warp on to the sea anchor, made the other end fast around both pairs of stern mooring bitts, and put the drogue overboard, taking a turn of the warp round one of the bitts as he paid out to ease the strain. The warp strained like a bowstring as the drogue sank in and took hold of the water…

 

But some boat stuff was fun: ‘The warm wind blew softly through the cabin, scented with frangipani and salt water’… and the two men are hanging around on deck in not many clothes. (I hope you are impressed that I found a picture to match this, and at least they are not peeing over the side as described in the book)

They eat cornmeal fritters every day. I loved this conversation when Donelly is fishing:

‘What are you using for bait?’ he asked conversationally.

‘Maggots,’ said Mr Donelly.

Keith sat down on the deck beside him, watching the line. ‘Where did you get them from?’

‘Out the cornmeal sack. There’s just a few in there. Don’t make any difference.’

Keith swallowed spasmodically.

By the end of the voyage: 'The remains of the cornmeal in the sack was now a festering mass of maggots…Keith persuaded Jack to let him drop it overboard, which Jack did with regret.'

Donelly has an unexpected romance, as Keith finds out when he returns to the boat with supplies - they are like two fratboys sharing a dormroom:

‘I’ll just take them down’ said Keith

Jack did not move his big frame from the companion. ‘Don’t go down just yet,’ he said in a low tone, but distinctly. ‘Wait while she gets her dress on.’

Keith stared at him in horror. ‘Wait while who gets her dress on?’

Occasionally we check in with life in Ealing, where Janice goes to school and parties, and Katie goes to work:

 

Shute, among the manly adventures he does so well, always has an unusual (for a male writer of the time) gentle touch with the lives of women, and an understanding: here he totally gets childcare problems, where can Janice go after school before Katie finishes?

(This helps balance out the odd remark in the book, ‘of its time’ which we wouldn’t be happy with now)

The book is hilarious, and exciting, and very charming, and I am very grateful to Susanna who I think was the first to mention it.

 Tattooed man with bird, W. Silk of Paddington, Sydney, 24 … | Flickr

Expedition vessel as seen from shore of Tahiti in Papeete,… | Flickr

The Vintage  1959 fashion shot

Picture from the 'sailing is boring' post – more appropriate for this one:

Aboard the Carefree Isles in the Bahamas | Local call number… | Flickr

Hello, Sailors! | This Mary had a mild fit of the vapours at… | Flickr  

Schoolgirls from a girls' annual