The Outer Rim

Then there is the old joke.

A chap is sorting out the personal effects and papers of a recently deceased relative. Amongst the old books, reams of documents and the usual collected items of someone who has lived a long and active life he comes across a receipt from a garment repair shop. It is dated more than 10 years ago. Intrigued he reads through the handwritten note and it relates to a very smart and bespoke tailored casual jacket that he remembered admiring in his own younger days. The note recorded the need for a minor repair to the stitching which had become a bit worn. As a beneficiary in the estate he fancies his chance to inherit the classic piece of clothing. To his knowledge the business is still in the same location in the High Street and so a couple of days later he pays a visit with the receipt. The proprietor of many decades standing recognises his own scrawling script on the faded ticket. In answer to the anxious enquiry as to whether the jacket is still on the premises after such a long time the shopkeeper shouts through to the back work room to that effect. An equally old and frail voice comes out of the gloomy space "Tell the man it will be ready a week on wednesday".

I had this tall story in mind upon my return just this week to Osbourne Street, Hull.

It is a non-descript street just off the busy city centre, built up with a hostel for the homeless, two storey modern flats, a large Age Concern drop in centre and the Model Dwellings, built in 1862 as a means of  "improving the conditions of the labouring classes".

However, about fifteen years ago the streetscene was quite different. In the position now occupied by the town-house type flats there used to be a pair of shops with traditional ornate wooden porticos around large plate glass windows. Even further back in time there would have been many more similar shops serving a densely populated urban population but somehow only these had survived the inevitable process of inner-city decay and renewal.

The left hand side premises was occupied and traded from by Mr Eric Suffill as a bicycle repair shop.

I found myself easing open the door with one hand to the cacophonous sound of a bell whilst trying to negotiate a way through clutching a pair of bike wheels in the other.

It was my first visit to the renowned Eric's place. In the folklore of the city cycling fraternity he was a legend. Granted, his rather aloof and strange demeanour to customers would not have endeared him to anyone but his reputation for straightening up a mangled set of alloy wheels was unrivalled.

The shop had very little actual stock on display and indeed casual passers by may not even have realised the type of business conducted from it. In all, there was a small selection of second hand bikes, miscellaneous bike frames, some basic accessories of tyres, inner tubes and puncture repair kits and tied up with string a few personally assembled lightweight racing wheels. The latter were highly sought after and prized in that when sheathed in a gossamer tubular tyre a few seconds could be shaved off a personal best in a road time trial.

The former looked like a pile of old junk but many a cyclist would stand and drool at the quality of the frame lug work, the glossy enamelling and the magic names of Bianchi, Coppi, Mercian and Curly Hetchins. These were truly classic marques, timeless and rare.

Eric shuffled in from the workshop at the back of the ground floor in his brown, almost greengrocer-like coat. He resembled a rather shifty black marketeer on first impression. I explained that I had lost a recent encounter with a large pothole in the road and displayed the warped and distorted rims of what had been, up until that unfortunate incident, my most expensive set of wheels. He spun them on their axles in turn to verify my claim. The gyroscopic effect under rotation had almost broken my wrists but his battle hardened tendons were more than a match for the laws of physics. "They'll be ready in a couple of weeks. Ring ahead first to check" were the only words spoken in our meeting.

I am not really sure what transpired in my life to prevent me from checking on Eric's progress with the rebuilding of the wheels but I seem to have changed job, moved out of the area, got married, had a family and eventually returned to Hull in what seemed like a few minutes but was in fact a period of 10 years.

I had thought about the wheels a lot in that decade. The aforementioned life events had meant that my cycling had taken a bit of a sabbatical and so I was not desperate to reclaim the items. It was only in a quiet moment in a particular working day in the central city area that I decided to call in at the shop. Perhaps I should, as Eric had asked, rung ahead first because as I approached Osbourne Street the premises looked closed.

It was only upon standing in front of the shop door that I saw the official looking notice stating that Suffill Cycles was in Receivership and any claims on the company were to be made to the appointed Commercial Agents. I rang the number on the rather sun bleached typed sheet and after being passed around a few faceless voices I was put through to someone who knew something about the case.

They recounted that the business had actually been closed for at least 24 months and the pair of shops were shortly to be demolished for redevelopment as flats. I asked nervously about the stock and was told that everything had been sold at auction by the distressed estate. Apparently the required advertisement period for the bankruptcy in the local press had solicited a few to reclaim their property so as to avoid its inclusion in the disposal of assets. I had not been living in the distribution area of the Hull Daily Mail and was oblivious to the opportunity of re-acquiring my possessions.

My wheels would not be ready a week on wednesday as in the old joke rather someone else would be using them to gain that previously elusive two seconds from their best time over the ten mile distance up and down the by-pass.