No it wasn’t, the night manager’s name was Bellew; Christopher Bellew. While I was enthusing about The Night Manager series on TV I was bursting to tell and I can’t resist any longer. I was the night manager at the White Hart Hotel in Braintree, Essex, in July 1974 while I was on a summer break from Durham University.
I came on duty at 10.00 pm and had an assistant, the real manager’s dog, a German Shepherd. I ran the hotel bar until the last resident was ready to turn in. I quickly learnt not to drink myself. If a drink was offered I’d pour a little Guinness into the bottom of a pint glass, top up with water and gratefully pocket the money.
Then I patrolled the hotel with a machine that looked like the thing bus conductors used to have. At various points around the hotel there were keys which I put in the machine and it clocked when and where I had been. Next it was time for a bit of cleaning. I wasn’t overly fond of cleaning the bogs and there were some remarks about this.
The telephone switchboard was almost beyond me but guests did sometimes want to place calls during the night. It had plugs that I never really mastered. When I worked at Czarnikow they had the same system and I hope the operators were impressed that I had at least a passing knowledge of what they were doing. This is what it looked like.
Then I would pop into the walk-in chiller to fix myself a snack. I had to refuse the dog admission because of his indiscriminatory snacking habit. Then, if everything was quiet, I’d put two chairs across the night entrance and grab a bit of kip until it was time to do a round with my time clock recorder again.
Officially I went off duty at 7.00 am but Trust House Forte were experimenting with an innovation: breakfast only to be served in bedrooms. I almost doubled my pay by delivering trays and picked up some tips as well. In those days job titles were nothing like as grand as they are these days, so Mr Lewis calls me the Night Porter, but I know that I was The Night Manager. He was wrong about something else too. My subsequent jobs in the City seldom, if ever, carried as much responsibility as being The Night Manager in Braintree.
Tom Hiddleston makes the job look more glam. I will explain the significance of this post’s title tomorrow. This video isn’t a clue but it is about love.
Marvellous anecdote, Christopher.
What he has failed to add is that when he turned up for work the first day in his tweed jacket and tie, and talking fast, the receptionist thought he was a guest asking to speak to the Night Porter and said she would go and find him. Christopher was left saying anxiously, “No, I AM the Night Porter”.
I was rather jealous of the job because I was working as a waitress in the local transport cafe at the same time and the tips weren’t nearly so good.