IN BETWEEN my monthly bouts of answering Helpline queries for Sinclair users I crack the whip over a team of programmers, sales and production staff based in Oxfordshire.

We've been at it for five years and more, and in the autumn of last year our activities at last came to the attention of another team of specialists, based in the flatlands of Cambridge, who apart from building the odd computer, occasionally experimented with watches, televisions, calculators, not to mention a mobile bath-tub.

The Cambridge lot, having discovered the hard way that designing fun products is not a comfortable way to make a living, put a new version of their staggeringly successful computer on the market. They chose to do so in Spain, for reasons which make a lot of sense to bank managers, creditors and men in dark suits, but which don't make much sense to you and me.

My Oxfordshire team watched the happening with interest, and we even got hold of one of the devices to give it a good going over. It had a few extra knobs and whistles but was nothing earth-shattering. We could easily work on it if - and when - it arrived in the UK.

And then came the phone call...

Ring-ring... ring-ring.

"Hello Oxford, this is Cambridge. Look, this is awfully important and secret but can you come and see us?" Ho-hum, I think, what are they after? " Sorry, terribly hush-hush old bean. Thing is, we know you're a bright lot, and this idea we've gobs going to be just right for you. We've done all the really hard work, we just need you to do the easy bit. You'll make lots of money too." I've been in the business long enough to know that when somebody is offering to do the hard bit and offering me money into the bargain, then something fishy is going on. When they start telling me how awfully clever we are etc I get nervous as well. Usually it means they think we're a bit slow on the uptake. Usually it means that we do the hard bit while they do the easy bit. Usually it's them, who gets the money too.

"Well, I'm not sure," I reply decisively. "Tell you what, old chap, we'll send an official car to fetch you."

Next day, my heart thumping in anticipation, I stow my sandwiches and thermos flask in the C5's dear little boot, don plastic mac, goggles and ear-muffs and climb aboard.

Three days later I arrive, tired but triumphant. The journey powered by the C5's surging motor and my own tireless legs has been smooth and uneventful save for an interesting encounter with a landlady in Bicester, who misunderstood my reference to joysticks. The C5 draws to a rest outside the shed at the bottom of Uncle Clive's garden. A burly commissionaire steps smartly forward.

I gaze around the estate. In the distance the dim outline of a mansion shimmers in the mist. Closer at hand I note that the cabbages are beginning to show and that the late potatoes are being lifted.

I step into the hallowed sanctum of the famous shed. Here the balding genius creates his wonder products with a loyal team of workaholics, assorted men of vision and a cat named Biggles - towering intellects every one of them. I am careful to put the padlock back on the latch as I tug the door shut.

"Good afternoon, Sinclair. Ringing for you. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Sorry can you hold. 256 ringing for you. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Putting you through now. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Yes and the same to you. Good afternoon, Sinclair. No, not in your ear, in the EAR socket at the back. Good afternoon, Sinclair."

The receptionist, all legs and hairdo, talks to a pencil. She is wearing earmuffs and filing her nails. She mouths at me. I gesture incomprehension. She mouths again. I blow her a kiss. Her response is frosty.

"You're through. Good afternoon, Sinclair. One moment please. What do you want? Good afternoon, Sinclair. Ringing for you. WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

"What would you have done if I'd told the world?" I ask.

"We'd have said that you were off your rocker. They'd have believed us. We're pretty reliable, you know."

I infer from the volume that this last is addressed to me. She looks displeased. I explain my business.

"Good afternoon, Sinclair. Go ahead. Hello. Here's another of those dozies to see you. This one's deaf. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Can I help you. No there isn't a left-hand drive version. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Ringing for you. HE'S COMING. SIT DOWN. Good afternoon, Sinclair. Yes, we haven't."

I look for a chair. The hairdo gestures at a line of bath-tubs against one wall. I perch on one nervously.

An inner door thumps open. Cambridge looms into view, striding briskly. He leads the way into an ante-room. A table, two chairs, proper ones this time. One wall is lined with Sinclair products like a Woolworth clearance sale. We sit down.

"Right, can you sign this, then I can talk to you," says Cambridge. He waves a piece of paper at me.

"Why?"

"Sorry, I can't tell you until you've signed."

"Can't tell me what?"

"I can't tell you why I want you to sign."

"What have you got to tell me?"

"I can't say."

"Have you got anything to tell me?"

"Perhaps."

"So," I say, thinking slowly, "it might be that I sign your bit of paper and then you say to me that you haven't got anything to say after all."

"Yes, it could be," says Cambridge cheerfully. "But there again," he says, leaning forward, "it's a pretty safe bet, isn't it, that I've got something to tell you? You wouldn't be brought all this way for nothing by a company like ours, would you? We're pretty reliable, you know."

I try very hard to look persuaded by this particular piece of intelligence because I don't want to hurt his feelings.

He looks like I've hurt his feelings. "Well look, just between you and me, old boy, fact is I have got something to tell you, so you can go ahead and sign."

I raise my eyebrows and scan his piece of paper. It reads:

Cambridge might have something to say to Oxfordshire and if he did then Oxfordshire mustn't tell anyone else unless that someone else already knows about it. If that someone else doesn't already know then Oxfordshire must pay lots of money to Cambridge and say sorry. In any case Cambridge might not have anything to say after all.

I read the agreement twice, trying to look as though I understand it. "Go on," prompts Cambridge, "I really am going to tell you something."

I sign. He grins. "We're going to sell the new Spanish computer in the UK."

"When? How much? What are you going to call it?"

"I can't tell you."

"When can you tell me?"

"I can't tell you."

I sit back and fold my arms. Cambridge leans forward again.

"Why don't you ask me a question I can# answer?" he suggests helpfully.

I begin to piece the story together. The new computer is just very much based on the Spanish machine that we've already seen, without the keypad. Nothing revolutionary but progress nonetheless.

"Right-ho," says Cambridge, "If you extend one of your games specially to run on the new machines we'll advertise it on a piece of paper we're giving out with the computer. What's more we'll give you a Spanish machine to work with."

"What about the money you talked about on the phone?"

"You'll make that from selling your new game. All you've got to do is write the new program."

"Is that the easy bit you talked about?"

"That's right," he says, "you've got it. And we do the hard bit with the advertising and so on."

"Have you any idea?" I ask, leaning across the table belligerently, "have you any idea how difficult it is to write a good game?"

"Yes, absolutely. Jolly difficult I'm sure. But you chaps are awfully bright and clever. Not like us lot. We're not nearly as clever as you so we get to do the hard bit, like the advertising."

I can see that we're not going to agree so I try a new tack.

"Suppose you don't bring out the machine. What then?"

"It's not likely, is it? I mean we have to earn our living. Anyway, we wouldn't bother with all this if we weren't going to. After all, we're pretty reliable, you know."

The conversation is beginning to take on a familiar ring.

"OK, I'll think about it. Can I have a machine to play within the meantime?"

"No can do. You've got to sign to say you're going to do something for us before I can let you have it. Made your mind up?"

"Yes," I say, "I'm going to go away and think about it."

"Right-ho," he says.

We move back to the reception area. Cambridge takes the padlock and shoves the shed door open. The autumn sunlight makes us both squint as he escorts me to the official car. The commissionaire has kindly refilled my thermos.

I climb aboard. "Tell me," I ask Cambridge thoughtfully, "what would you have done if I hadn't signed your piece of paper and then told the world that you'd got something you wanted to tell me?"

"Ahha," he says, "we thought of that one. We'd have said that you were off your rocker. They'd have believed us. We're pretty reliable, you know."

I press the starter button on the C5. The motor coughs, whirrs and, after a short pause, comes to life.

Sinclair User
April 1986