Sitting in the bar, some other things struck him – things that didn’t come up in the data, but which weren’t actually that surprising. For instance, people were generally taller here than they were in pubs in South London – for reasons not fully understood, the positive correlation between income and height had been maintained, even though poorer people now ate more than rich people. Being around tall people was never something James had to worry about, but more troubling was the fact that everyone was good-looking. It wasn’t like being in East London – you didn’t have to study people closely in order to work out whether they were attractive or not, and what the strategy behind their choice of personal disfigurement was. Everyone was just good-looking – it was as simple as that. The men had thick arms and well-structured faces and could only really be described as handsome, while the women had long, sternly combed hair, nimble features and clever mouths. And what with being so tall and good-looking and wealthy, they were also unusually loud.
‘What are you getting so grumpy about? It’s not so bad in here,’ said Felix.
‘It’s not really my kind of place,’ said James. ‘It’s far too noisy.’
‘The key thing is to judge people by your value system, rather than to judge yourself by theirs.’
‘Well, okay. I don’t really like the people here.’
‘You’ve got to learn to enjoy London,’ said Felix. ‘And it’s largely because it’s brimming with appalling people that it’s so enjoyable. The half-witted celebrities, the venal politicians, the pretentious artists, the oikish footballers – all paid for by the cretinous bankers. Imagine how impoverished the city would be without its monsters. Anyway, let’s go. I promise you’ll enjoy it more than the nightclub.’
They left the bar, and joined the thickening stream of Chelsea fans walking conspicuously towards the stadium. It was, James noted with satisfaction, a stupendously poor piece of town planning. Or rather, and this cheered him all the more, there hadn’t been any planning. It was a welcome reminder of why cities needed long-sighted, over-officious professionals like him, why everything would be so much better if only it looked like it did in his masterplan poster. There were railway lines here, but no mainline station to service the stadium. The pavements weren’t wide enough, there were coaches stuck in traffic, insufficient parking spaces and unlicensed stalls selling scarves and football shirts. And through all of this marched forty thousand men.
Even if Felix had promised him that they would be watching the match exclusively with people on very high incomes, they still had to get there along with everyone else. They had to wait in lines, to squeeze through ticket gates, walk up stairwells and get given directions by men in their sixties who were supplementing their state pensions. All of this gave James the opportunity to have a good look at the football fans. Rich, well-educated people now went to football, he knew that, but what was more surprising was that working-class people still went as well. Almost certainly, these were the affluent working classes, who had travelled here from across southern England. This was the socio-demographic group who decided general election results and drove saloon cars, and who were deeply suspicious of government but wildly susceptible to Felix’s advertising campaigns.
‘I know, I know. It’s not what you were expecting,’ said Felix. ‘But we’ll enjoy the private box all the more for having to go through this.’
James had been brought up to fear all crowds, but there was, he soon realised, no need to be worried. They weren’t in the least bit violent and even though they supported the same team, they didn’t have enough sense of common purpose to act as a mob. It was no more than a dense concentration of moderately unpleasant men. They had drunk just enough alcohol to raise their voices without embarrassment and to swear a great deal, but not enough to sing songs or get into fights. Instead, most of them were eating hot dogs and playing with their mobile phones.
But the higher Felix and James climbed, the fewer of these people there were, the fewer there was of anyone. On the upper floor of the stadium were the executive suites, and a pleasing sense of well-managed calm, as if they were in a conference centre in an unspecified northern European city. They walked past a row of identical wood finish doors, each with a name plaque belonging to companies that James knew he ought to have heard of.
‘Everyone thinks that London is the world centre for capitalism,’ said Felix. ‘But, in truth it actually functions more like a tribal gift economy. It’s composed of business people giving things to other business people. And the trick is to give them enough that they then give you something back which turns out to be of greater value – like a contract or profile in a newspaper. And the wider and more generous the giving, the better chance that you’ll hit upon someone who will one day repay you.’