Diana Simonson travelled by train to Birmingham with Tony Simpson, the thin angular man from Factory News, as her companion. She took both her notebook and a camera, because New Proletariat’s union chapel recognised her as a photo-journalist. The paper had no money to pay photographers as well as reporters, but considered itself bound by National Union of Journalists demarcation lines, and so carried few pictures. Smithson explained that he was chaperoning her because she needed an introduction. She did not object, because he paid for both their tickets, explaining that he could charge them as travel expenses.
‘The committee members are a bit wary.’ He sat next to her, perhaps a little more close than she might have expected, as the train headed north-west through green and pleasant pastureland. But Diana did not move away away, because he was telling her about confidential matters, and she sensed that he might also entertain a hidden agenda. It had been a long time, and she had watched one man in her life destroy himself. She needed someone with certainty.
‘They suffer from paranoia.’ Smithson laughed sharply. ‘They spend most of their time scanning prospective recruits for factional tendencies, or trying to find out whether they’re police spies.’
Diana nodded intelligently. The whole of the radical left seemed riven with factional tendencies, buzzword for would-be messiahs. Every potential agitator wanted a power base, a following. The police also loved infiltrating – it gave them a chance to sit around in jeans doing nothing very much but listening and provoking, looking for reds under beds.
‘They’re thrilled that you’re taking an interest.’
‘Really?’ She felt Tony touch the back of her hand, but did not pull away. He was making a point, and the contact added emphasis.
‘You’ll find Doug the most intelligent, he’s the committee’s chairman, he’s pretty energetic.’ This time Tony’s touch was more of a caress, and Diana dimpled. There might be time, after talking to the committee, for a little informality, and she would not refuse it. ‘Can you give him a bit of a spread?’
Diana thought for a moment. ‘How many can he bring out?’
Smithson hesitated. ‘A couple of plants.’
‘Will it spread?’
‘Possibly.’
But she knew from his hesitation that he was uncertain.
‘What about the picket?’
He looked away. ‘They’ll come down by coach.’
‘A coachload?’
Smithson did not reply. Diana knew that she might be in need, but she was also intelligent, and she began to wonder whether she had embarked on a wild goose chase.
A small delegation met them at Birmingham’s New Street station: three bulky men in heavy peajackets and jeans. Diana smiled at them shyly, and the central man held out a large meaty paw. He looked tough, thickset and bulldog-jawed, the epitome of a new proletariat. Diana congratulated herself on having dressed in keeping. She had brushed her red hair back into some semblance of order, and topped it with a big black beret, jauntily pitched to one side, very Rosa Luxemburg, teamed with a man’s navy peajacket and jeans with big turnups, and heavy Doc Martens. She was ready to storm barricades.
‘I’m Doug. Welcome t’Brum, comrade.’ He pausds for a moment, to nod to Smithson, before looking back at her. ‘Comrade Smithson tells me you’re going t’put us on t’map.’
Diana fumbled for her notebook. ‘I’ll try.’ She stood with her ballpoint poised, hoping her shorthand would prove adequate to the occasion.
Doug shook his head. ‘We’ll go into session when we get back to t’works. The committee’s elected me spokesman, but I like t’know that I’m carrying t’workforce with me.’ He seemed suddenly to remember his two companions. ‘Meet Joe, Comrade Horton, and Ed, Comrade Sageley. T’committee appointed us reception sub-committee. We’ve got a car outside.’
Diana shook hands with Doug’s companions, though she judged them no more than side-kicks, and they trooped out of the station to an elderly Renault Espace people carrier. Doug took the wheel, and gestured to Diana to sit beside him, Smithson and his two companions sat behind them.
‘We’ve closed t’main works, and one of t’specialist shops.’ Doug spoke as he wove the Renault through the Birmingham traffic heading north. ‘We’re hoping t’get rest of group out tomorrow, so all’s shut by weekend.’
‘Will they stay out?’
‘We ‘ope they will.’
‘What about management?’
Doug laughed abruptly. ‘They’re queueing up t’leave t’sinking ship.’
‘Are they doing anything to help relocate your people?’
He swore as a white van with an Asian driver cut in on them. ‘Bloody Pakis.’ Then he frowned, either remembering her question or feeling that he had said something unproletarian. ‘They don’t know t’meaning of t’word. Underwood and Smith, t’big white chiefs, are snotty-nosed bastards. Moss is a yid. What do you expect?’
Diana bridled. ‘I’m a yid too.’
The man at the wheel looked at her sideways. His look was contemptuous. ‘Well, then, you’ll know.’
The Renault drove on past factories, some new, some in varying states of disrepair, until it slowed in front of a wide gate. A handful of men stood grouped around two large banners. One read in black on white: ‘We want a future’. The other in red on black: ‘Don’t throw us away.’
The Renault drove past them slowly, and the pickets stared at Diana. Their stares made her feel uncomfortable. The Renault stopped in front of a single story redbrick building.
‘Here’s t’canteen.’ Doug motioned her to stay in her seat. ‘Wait while I go tell t’committee.’
Diana wondered whether he also planned to expand on her ethnic origins.
He returned a couple of minutes later. ‘Right, come on in. No pictures. They’ll think you’re Special Branch.’
A group of men clustered around a canteen table scattered with beer mugs, bottles and ashtrays. They stared at Diana suspiciously as Doug rattled off introductions. He looked round. ‘Right, I propose myself as spokesman.’
The group nodded collectively, and Doug drew some crumpled sheets of paper from inside his peajacket. He had obviously prepared a speech. Diana began to scribble busily. It was really more rant than speech, couched in a language dense with socialist dialectic, referring frequently to ‘oppressive capitalist forces’ and ‘the workers’ collective struggle’. She had heard it before, and had little doubt she will hear it again. But he seemed rather short of hard facts. However she wrote busily, until he came to an end.
Then she sat back, and tapped her ballpoint against her teeth. ‘Can you tell me exactly how much support you’ve mobilised?’
A couple of the men at the table scowed, shifting uneasily on their chairs.
Doug’s eyes narrowed. ‘Why?’
‘Well, it would help me assess the scale of your protest in relation to labour issues at a national level.’ Diana knew the language, she had been to enough workplace meetings.
‘We’re the spark that’s going to light the blaze.’
‘Will it be a big blaze?’ His remark about ‘yids’ still rankled in her mind. She had heard the word used amongst managers, in the capitalist camp. It was not something she expected at a comradely level.
‘We’ve lit the fuse.’
The canteen was silent. Smithson, seated next to her, leaned over, his mouth close to her ear. ‘They probably don’t want to talk hard numbers because they think they’ll be rounded up.’
Now it was Diana’s turn to look bad-tempered. ‘That doesn’t make sense. The bigger they were, the stronger they were.’
Doug scowled. He plainly expected a rather more admiring audience. ‘You’re not being very supportive.’
She bridled again. ‘You don’t seem very pro-active.’
The committee chairman muttered something under his breath, and Diana imagined he was referring to her ethnic origins, but this time it did not bother her. This was not the frontline, and she faced no barricades. This was just a group of men with ideas bigger than their abilities. She wanted out, because she judged that she was wasting New Proletariat’s time, even if Smithson had paid for her ticket, and to be back in London, where she knew where she was, in her own cosy little revolutionary world.
The meeting broke up with a certain stiffness of manner. Two of the committee did not even bother to bid her farewell, but sloped off to the canteen counter to buy themselves drinks. Nobody offered Diana a beer.
Doug delegated one of his underlings to take her back to New Street, and both the driver and Smithson were silent.
Smithson fumbled uncomfortably at the station ticket barrier, and held out her ticket. ‘I’ve got to go back and talk to them.’ He made no attempt to stand close to Diana, and the warmth was gone from his body language.
‘He wasn’t much of a revolutionary.’
Smithson shrugged. ‘Are any of us?’ His voice was hard, inflexible, all his charming gone. ‘Don’t we all want a reward? Aren’t we all on the make?’
His words hit Diana like a blow in the face. She felt tears well up in her eyes, and pushed her ticket into the barrier, to put as much distance as she could between them. Men could be real bastards.
Shosanah Haris flew into London by Concorde on Thursday morning. She was a big woman, dark and lustrous, a real New York princess. Well, more of a New York queen, really, with beautifully styled hair, clothes carefully chosen to offset a glowing tan, and a great deal of gold jewellery dangling around her. Levon met her at Heathrow, she would not have brooked anything less.
‘Hi, baby!’ She enveloped him in a cloud of expensive scent, and looked around for gifts. Levon always brought something nice as a greeting, she counted their reunions in jewellery boxes. He held up a package and her hand stretched out like a predatory claw. ‘Whassat, baby?’
Levon took a step backwards. He liked playing with her. He was beaming, because the Dreamstone bid for Wide Horizons was now on its home run, and his private jet would be flying them all down to Harry’s place in France on the Friday evening. It would make a nice change for Shosanah, because she never travelled far from Fifth Avenue. He has sometimes flown her across to LA, because she liked mixing with film people, and sometimes down to Miami, but she has limited horizons. They have been married a couple of years, and she has been once to Europe, to take in fashion shows in Paris and Milan. She complained that the locals spoke in strange tongues.
Shosanah snatched at his package and began to unwrap it, scattering paper and tissue around her in a small blizzard. The paper covered a box, with an inscription in Arabic, and she frownd, but she was in much too much of a hurry to ask for a translation. She opened the box quickly, taking care not to damage her carefully manicured fingernails, and screamed with excitement as she stared at the contents.
‘Why, Levon, baby, it’s the most beautiful thing.’ She lifted a bracelet from the box carefully. It was large, and heavy, a series of huge interlinking gold loops, each as thick as a man’s thumb, and it glittered most expensively in the neon light. Her fingers stroked the metal and she smiled at Levon, but she seemed undecided as to where she should focus her attention. Gold was gold, and men cropped up all over the place. She fastened the bracelet around her right wrist and held it up for Levon to admire. ‘Ain’t that something?’
Levon folded her into a big bearhug. For a moment Shosanah hesitated, because she had spent a fortune on having her hair styled early that very morning. But then she yielded, embracing him theatrically. ‘You’ve bought my heart again, honey, you know just how to win me.’
Levon beamed. He had certain plans, centred on buying up some attractive real estate on the New Jersey coastline, and counted on old Hymie Berger, Shosanah’s father, making a contribution. ‘For you, rose of my heart, I have to search the world for the best, the very best.’
Shosanah beamed back at him, kissing him again with big queenly kisses. ‘Hey, baby, you’re just so romantic. Let’s get to some place where we can celebrate this thing.’
Levon glances over her shoulder and saw his chauffeur hold up his hand, two fingers extended. It meant that he had loaded all her baggage. He kissed his wife tenderly. ‘You only brought two bags?’ Shosanah usually travelled with truckloads.
‘Huh?’ She thought for a moment. She was a woman who preferred thinking about one thing at a time, generally by way of adornment, and his question distracted her. ‘Yep, I got five things, Louise will unpack them tonight.’
‘Five? Louise?’ Levon shrank a little into himself. He feared Louise, Shosanah’s lady’s maid, a little. She was French, and could sometimes be almost as sharp-tongued as her mistress.
‘She’s flying in economy with the other three, I told her to take a cab ride to the hotel. She can handle all that stuff there.’ Shosanah looked around her impatiently. ‘Let’s get outta here, I just can’t abide airports. I gotta get to a shower, towel myself off, and be just right for you, baby.’ She kissed Levon again, but this time a little less floridly.
Levon followed her to the Mercedes, counting mentally. Two Haris, two Chapmans, Harry’s daughter, husband, two kids, and now Louise, plus everyone’s baggage. The Learjet was going to be full flying south.
Harry Chapman was lazily exploring some new investment opportunities as Levon welcomes Shosanah. An electronics group based in Singapore wanted some backing, and he thought he might well celebrate breaking up Wide Horizons by flying out for a week to take a closer look. A trip to the Far East would keep Doreen out of harm’s way, and provide a better guide to her long-term potential. Some Bolivians had also been on line, with a big mining project. But Harry preferred to leave the Americas exclusively to Levon.
Charlie Miller was looking after Bea’s shop, because Bea had gone off to meet an Italian woman who wanted to sell her a couple of chandeliers, and planned to spend the afternoon tidying them up, if need be, or else complete some restoration work for a customer. He had time on his hands as morning stretched into afternoon. A couple of women browsed round the shop, and one bought an emerald ring for £350, so he was not wasting his time. The telephone rang a couple of times: somebody trying to sell space in the local paper, and a second caller who hung up, after barring identification. He was bored, and wondered what would happen if he closed early and popped across to the winebar for a glass of something white. Perhaps he could chat someone up. Pru, one of Bea’s partners, had brought in a big brass bed overnight, complete with a mattress, and set it up in the storeroom behind the shop. He had inspected it, and the bed had sent his mind flying. Bonking would be so much more fun than boredom. But he stayed where he was, because he was on duty, and the winebar was too close to the shop for comfort.
The bell on the shop door rang as he drowsed, and he looked up, and was straight on his feet. Emma Carnes was standing in the doorway, now in a smart pale blue silk suit that made her glacier eyes look really quite human. She smiles slightly, and she was holding a briefcase. Charlie supposed he would have to listen to poetry. He wondered, just for a moment, because he really was very bored, whether Emma might not be open to temptation.
‘Come in, come in.’ He made beckoning gestures, filling his voice with welcome. ‘Let me sell you a chandelier, or several.’
Emma closed the door behind her, before looking at him again. ‘Is business so bad?’
Charlie nodded wryly. ‘They prefer dealing with Bea.’
She began to wander towards the back of the shop, inspecting a small Edwardian table, then some china. ‘Time must weigh heavy.’
He followed her, polite shopkeeper, but also social acquaintance and fellow writer. ‘You promised to read me some of your poetry.’
‘I did.’ Emma held up her briefcase. The shop had a small sofa at the back, and she sat on it gingerly. ‘I suppose you’ll have to stop listening when customers come in.’
Charlie glanced at his watch. He was supposed to keep the shop open for another half an hour yet, but he saw no point. No more money would come through the door. ‘I’ll close for the day.’ He locked the street door, and returned. But the sofa was visible from a certain angle through the shop window, and he hesitated. The storeroom had a couple of comfortable chairs as well as the brass bed. But he was uncertain.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘I don’t want people banging on the door.’
Emma got to her feet and tried the storeroom door. ‘What’s in here?’
Charlie watched her as she pushed the door open, and saw her smile faintly.
‘Is this where you seduce customers?’
It was an invitation. Charlie stepped past her to switch on the storeroom light, and brushed against her, and heard a sound as her briefcase dropped to the floor, and she was staring at him, her blue eyes burning now, and he put his hands on her arms, drawing her against him, and kissed her, and Emma’s mouth was open under his.
Their progression after that seemed to occur in a blur. He drew his hands lightly down the front of her suit, parting her jacket, and Feeltthe outline of her small breasts under her blouse and her bra, and then she was undressing, and they were both undressing, and they were naked, and he was lying on top of her on the bed, penetrating her, and she had engulfed him, and they moved together to share their pleasure.
However the best things in life are all too often much too brief, and they were all too quickly done. Charlie was spent, but had enjoyed a good preliminary run-in, and decided that he needed to explore this icy woman further. He remained on her, gathering his energy for a fresh onslaught, and caressed the nape of her neck as he kissed her. But Emma lifted her arm to glance at her watch over his shoulder, and pushed him away a little impatiently.
‘I must get back to the office.’
Charlie rolled away from her. She was already picking up her clothing from the floor, examining her suit jacket and skirt, presumably for traces of their encounter. She grunted in satisfaction and began to dress. Charlie pulled up his trousers.
‘That was good.’
Emma surveyed herself in a mirror, patting her hair into place. ‘I might drop by again.’
‘You could ring.’
‘I did.’
‘And hung up?’
She nodded.
‘I’ll try and talk Bea into giving my own day each week.’
Now she was ready to go. She picked up her briefcase. ‘I might come back and read you some of my poetry.’
Charlie beamed. Men are nothing if not masculine when they are completed. ‘You could write me a description.’
Emma smiled, but did not reply. She was a busy solicitor, and she had just found herself a handy restroom.
Sylvia rang the Manor House on Friday morning. She judged it a good time, because she imagined Harry would be travelling back to Tithing St. Mary on Friday evening or Saturday morning, and his wife would still be bleeding when he arrived home.
Anne was in her bedroom, in the middle of packing for France, when Anthony told her she had a caller. She took the cordless telephone a little peremptorily, for she was in the middle of tieing up loose ends. France was already safely in the bag: she had spoken to Madame Cauchois, the nice woman who looked after the house in Saint-Adolphe, several days since, and knew that all would be ready for them to arrive that evening. Marcel would meet them with a minibus at Nice airport, and Madame Cauchois had promised a typical provencal menu for their arrival, with something of a surprise to follow. Anne thought they might then have an easy day on Saturday, for the men to relax, and with dinner at the Negresco in Nice, and a trip after that to the casino at Monte Carlo, and another easy day on Sunday. She was not overjoyed at the thought of having to accomodate Shosanah’s maid into the bargain. But she accepted the burden for Levon’s sake. Shosanah was a brassy woman, and more than a bit of a pain, but she imagined a busy social programme would float everything along pretty smoothly, and she was prepared to go a long way to make Levon happy. He was such a very nice man, and so good for Harry.
‘Yes?’ She made her voice brisk.
‘Mrs. Chapman, I have been your husband’s mistress for some years, but he has replaced me with a teenager.’ Sylvia spoke smoothly and seamlessly. She wanted to drive a knife home, and twist it slowly.
Anne’s hand tightens on the telephone. She had once been pestered by an anonymous caller, some man using a phone box in the village. The police had traced the call back, and told her to keep him talking, if he returned. Anthony had called them on her mobile, and they had found him. ‘Who are you? What do you want?’
‘I feel sorry for you, Mrs. Chapman. She is so young, and she is now living in your Canary Wharf flat. Can you imagine their pleasure? Do you think she will stay there?’
The words were too much. Anne cut the call off in a sudden reflex reaction, and stood staring blindly at the suitcase in front of her. She had planned to travel light, because she knew Delia would overkill, and she kept a decent wardrobe at Saint-Adolphe, so that she could hide there, when the need arose. She had hidden a couple of times, when Harry had been difficult. Her thoughts spun round and round in her mind like some demonic CD. She felt tears of anger, and misery, and fear welling up. Tears of humiliation. She wanted to break down and weep, but Anthony was still standing next to her. She realised that she was still gripping the cordless phone in her hands, as though holding on to the past, to a moment before this eruption into her calm and well-planned existence, and she wanted to crush the phone out of existence, out of ever having been.
She heard a voice, close to her, and realised that Anthony was speaking.
‘Are you all right, ma’am?’
Anne was silent for a moment, and then nodded. ‘Yes, I’m all right.’
‘Some bad news, ma’am?’ His voice was carefully insistent, the voice of a good servant showing signs of concern.
‘I said I’m all right.’ She snapped the words out sharply.
He nodded, and moves silently away.
She stared down at the suitcase, and saw nothing. A woman had come into the Manor House, to invade her privacy and make a mess of her life, and she was powerless. Dirt can be scrubbed, stains can be laundered out of existence. But poison corrupts most completely. She wondered what she could do now. The thought of divorce skimmed through her mind, circling on itself. Of course Delia would be totally opposed, because she wanted money out of her father to move out of London, and she would have to change her lifestyle. Divorcees were bad news in smart dinner table terms, and her friends would all cool on her – she had seen it happen to others. But it might be an exit. She might move to France. The thought tugged at her mind, because she was still an attractive woman, and she would be very comfortable, if she hit Harry for a generous settlement.
She sensed a movement at her elbow, and turned. Anthony stood holding a silver tray with a half-filled crystal whisky glass. She smiled wearily as she reached to take it. ‘Anthony, you’re a blessing.’
She felt a little guilty as she swallowed the scotch in a single gulp, the liquor burning her throat. Something about not drinking before sundown. Yet people drank freely before, during, and after boozy lunches. She realised that he has not moved, and she replaced the now empty glass, shaking her head.
‘No, Anthony, I’m fine. It’s all come and gone.’
She watches him move away, and knew that it had not gone at all. Her head was prey to a dull burning pain, some kind of a migraine. But she must get on, and get ready, because she was waiting for Delia and the boys, and they would expect her to be what she always was, concerned and deftly efficient. She had no time to sit down and weep, no time to let go. Her mind circled, spinning round and round, and she felt herself burn up with fury. Fury with the woman for breaking into her life without invitation. Fury with Harry. But the woman caused greater pain. She knew Levon chased skirts, but it was not a vice she associated with Harry. She had once or twice suspected the presence of a visitor at Canary Wharf – there was a large walk-in wardrobe that he always kept locked. He claimed it contained confidential documents, secret papers. She had suspected that it might hold secret silks. But he had never embarrassed her, and she always judged it weekday compensation for being cooped up in London. Something occasional. She had lived with it, because it stayed non-invasive.
Now a voice had wiped her nose in it, with no hope for escape. She knew that she would have to confront Harry, because she would not be able to keep the call a secret. She would speak to him before they left, and to hell with the consequences. But the thought stopped her short. Delia would be there, with her husband, and the boys, and she would be meeting Levon and Shosanah. She might speak to him icily, and demand an explanation, an apology. But she could not disrupt the weekend. Her mind returned to the call in cold, bleak anger. The woman had used the word ‘teenager’, and implied that she was living at Canary Wharf. Anne closed the door of her bedroom, and locked it, and sat on the edge of her bed, Harry’s bed, and buried her head in her hands. The woman wanted to make her think Harry planned to replace her. Anne knew the corollary. Somebody more fecund. She knew Harry often dreamed of fathering a son, regarding Delia’s boys as another man’s bloodline. She had wanted no more children herself, for she had given him a daughter, and the pain of childbirth had nearly broken her. Harry could provide no guarantee that her next child would be a boy. But now she faced the one thing she had always feared, to be thrown on a scrapheap, with a lifetime of work, of standing behind him, and helping him grow and develop, all thrown away, just because he wanted to plant his seed in another garden.
She heard a car crunch on the gravel, and realised that Delia must have arrived. She stood up, and took a deep breath, and walked across the bedroom to the master bathroom. A puffy, mottled face stared back at her, and she almost burst into tears. Then she reached for a flannel and turned on the cold tap. Dramas often affect us at the most inconvenient times, but she had a multitude of things still to do. She would sleep in a spare room, and perhaps she would have time to cry later.