How It All Began (22 page)

Rose said, “Actually, he’s not phoning from there. He says it’s a personal matter. He seemed to . . . to think you might be a bit reluctant.”

Mark had not thought—he knew. He knew all about the letter because he had read it in Delia’s office, and had anyway been present when Delia viewed the results of that day’s filming: “Say no more. We can’t use him. It was worth a try—but no.”

Delia might not be able to use Henry, but Mark reckoned that he could. Mark had his own fish to fry, in the form of a proposal to a rival concern for a film about the presiding figures of history: Macaulay, Carlyle, Trevelyan, Tawney, Namier et al. Working title—merrily—
The Dinosaurs
, though one would have to come up with something else if the project took off. Which was a bit of a long shot—this was an arcane subject for an increasingly philistine medium, but worth a stab. It would be amusing to work up, and the material could always come in handy for an article, or even, one day, a book. Mark saw this stint in the world of television as a flirtation. He had every intention of making his real career in academia, as soon as the opportunity arose to get going. No messing about with an assistant lectureship somewhere in the sticks; a proper job at a Russell group university, or nothing. It was a matter of biding his time, and keeping up his contacts with a few people who might help, in due course. A chair by the time he was forty, that was the idea. Vice-Chancellor somewhere, perhaps, eventually, if one could be bothered with the admin.

“. . . 
entirely
understand your feelings,” he said to Henry. “Between you and me, Delia is known to be a bit . . . well, inconsistent. Judgment not always spot-on. But the thing is, this might all work out for the best. There’s a scheme I’d rather like to run past you,
an idea I’ve got in which . . . well, in which, to be frank, you might play a rather crucial role. I wonder if I could come and see you?”

Henry grunted. He was feeling bruised, humiliated. One should never have let oneself in for this sort of treatment at the hands of some jumped-up young woman. And now here was the boy, who appeared to have defected, and was saying pleasingly critical things about Canning. What was all this about?

“We’ll have to see what my diary looks like,” he said. “Have a word with my secretary—she takes care of that.”

G
eorge Harrington made the six o’clock news—the tail end, admittedly, merely a coda, but there he was: “. . . investment banker George Harrington has been arrested in Bermuda, charged with insider trading.”

Marion heard it in her kitchen, distractedly chopping an onion for soup, her mind not on soup at all but on the bills, the bank, the bills. She heard it, subliminally, and then registered properly, and the knife fell from her hand.

Oh.

Insider trading?

Which is . . . ? I know—to do with shares, buying and selling. You’ve bought or sold when you have some insider information, so you’re cashing in, and that is illegal.

Arrested.

George Harrington is in prison, which means forget trying to find out where he is, in order to have a chat. You are not going to be having a chat, either now or in the foreseeable future. George Harrington has neatly removed himself, or been removed. At some point he will emerge, and there will be a court case, and either he’ll go back to prison for rather longer, or he won’t, but in any event I am not going to be able to seize his attention, so forget it. I shall have to discover how I go about trying to get what’s due to me, which will mean
endless letters, and probably a solicitor, and it will take forever. Which leaves me, right now, alarmingly overdrawn, and nothing coming in until some well-heeled and reliable client turns up.

How can a man
do
this to someone? To me. Easily, it seems—because George Harrington and his like do not operate as I do myself, and as do practically all those I have come across, in a nice do-unto-others-as-you-would-be-done-to-yourself way; his is a climate of
sauve qui peut
, and never mind anyone else. George Harrington will not be giving me a thought, if he ever did—except as someone who was useful.

Thank you, Uncle Henry, for George Harrington. That blessed lunch in Manchester, at which I should not have been.

Marion had not intended to tell Henry about Harrington. She was prompted to do so over Sunday lunch, a lunch that was the last thing she needed right now, but Henry had been insistent: “I need some company, my dear. And Corrie has promised oxtail stew.”

The prompt was Henry’s extended grievance, which lasted through the tomato soup (tinned) and well beyond the oxtail stew: “. . . dumped, frankly, and one is not accustomed to such treatment. I should never have got involved with those people—exposed myself to such behavior. And all because of that Manchester business.” With uncharacteristic candor, Henry had been explaining why the humiliation of the occasion had made him feel that he needed to restore his reputation. “If that lecture had gone as it should have gone, it would never have occurred to me to make myself available for
television
.”

He’s
complaining about Manchester, thought Marion. What about me? And so she had talked of Harrington, of the flat, of Harrington’s defection. Henry was shocked and, to his credit, sympathetic. “Outrageous. A man without a moral compass. Some kind of banker, you say? One has never dealt with such people, except of course for necessary services. You must take legal steps.”

“Yes,” said Marion wearily.

“The present Lord Chief Justice was a student of mine, briefly. I could have a word.”

Marion said she doubted that the problem was within the remit of the Lord Chief Justice. “I’ll get it sorted, Uncle Henry. Eventually. Somehow.”

“We are both the victims of circumstance,” said Henry. “I have the greatest mistrust of circumstance, whether in private life or public affairs. History is bedeviled by circumstance. Ah—here’s Corrie. Am I right in thinking it’s the rice pudding, Corrie? Excellent! Progress is forever skewed by circumstance—the unforeseen event, an untimely death, the unpredicted circumstance, and the course of history would be one of seamless advance. Without the Manchester circumstance you and I would be carefree.”

Insofar as I ever am, thought Marion crossly. Has Uncle Henry ever lived in the real world? “Just a tiny helping, thank you, Corrie. Delicious, but I’ve eaten so much already.”

“However, as it turns out, circumstance may also have thrown
up something useful. There’s this boy, what’s-his-name, Mark something—well, young man really, I suppose—worked for the Canning woman but seems to have left her, came here a couple of days ago, and I believe he may have made quite a promising suggestion.”

Mark had arrived in midmorning and at once set about establishing himself with Rose: “I’d
love
a coffee, how sweet of you, but only if Lord Peters is having one. This is such a lovely room—so atmospheric—I adored it last time I was here. Books do furnish a room, don’t they?”

No one had ever called Henry’s study lovely before. Gratified, Henry gave Mark a tour: the inscribed copies, the Gillray print, the bust of Walpole. Rose withdrew to make coffee, having got the measure of Mark. On the make, she thought. Heaven knows what he’s doing here, but no doubt we’ll find out.

In fact Mark was not entirely sure himself what he was doing here. His initial enthusiasm for the founding fathers of history project had already withered somewhat after he had floated the idea with the producer in question and failed to arouse any sort of response. Mark was
not a man to waste time on unprofitable ventures. He was already wondering if it was not the moment to chuck television and get back onto the academic ladder. He had thought of canceling his date with Henry, and then some instinct told him that it might be expedient to keep up the connection.

Once settled in Henry’s study, with Henry in full spate about his newly discovered—or rather, rediscovered—contempt for the popular medium of television, Mark considered Lansdale Gardens and perceived that Henry was not short of a bob or two. This was of academic interest only; Mark was not concerned with money for the sake of money, merely as the necessary prop for what you wanted to do, and that, in essence, was to make a name for yourself, probably in the university world.

Mark had, of course, an eerie affinity with Henry himself, and would have been offended to be told that. Like Henry, he recognized determined application to an area of scholarship as the route to distinction: make yourself the ultimate authority on something or other and you were away. It didn’t terribly matter what, but you needed to be sure there weren’t too many people in there already. He was thinking of taking over the Scottish Enlightenment entirely—flood the market with articles, then a book (beef up his thesis, so not too much extra work), elbow out the competition by hinting that all were superannuated hacks. This would take time, during which he needed an academic post, or funding in some other form.

Henry was satisfied to learn that Mark too was disillusioned: “Quite right to get out of that world. Amusing for a bit of youthful experience, I dare say, but no place for a serious-minded man. Now when I was your age I had of course my first Fellowship . . .”

More along these lines. Mark realized that Henry had entirely forgotten that there was an ostensible reason for the visit, and was quite happy to treat it as a social occasion with no particular purpose, which was just as well. No need for explanations. Henry was talking now about My Memoirs.

“I shall of course concentrate on the memoirs now that I have disposed of Ms. Canning.” Henry paused, and looked inquiringly at
Mark. “Did you say you had some project in mind—I’d rather forgotten, remind me . . .”

Oh dear. Mark regrouped, with smooth efficiency. “I’m fascinated, of course, with the prospect of the memoirs. I was wondering about doing a piece for one of the papers—a taster, as it were.”

Henry, of course, thought this an excellent idea. He warmed to the theme. He got out the typescript of My Memoirs. He explained the extent and range of the archival resources on which they were based—the shelves of files and boxes stuffed with papers. He led Mark over to the file cupboard, to view. He pulled out a file, at random—letters and other documents spilled to the ground. Mark gathered them up.

Henry tutted and shook his head. “One can never
find
anything, that’s the problem.”

“Really?” said Mark. Thoughtful. Very thoughtful. No, I can see you wouldn’t be able to. Interesting.

Over the next half an hour or so Mark assessed the potential. He displayed a constructive interest in Henry’s papers: “Of course with proper cataloguing . . . if you had a comprehensive index, then retrieval of any specific item would be simple . . . an orderly system could help your own approach to the memoirs.”

“Quite,” said Henry helplessly. “Quite so.”

“If I could assist in any way . . .” murmured Mark.

And thus was the arrangement born. Mark had done a quick investigation of the shelves and reckoned that he could get this stuff sorted within a few weeks, couple of months max, if he went hard at it. But he would not go hard at it. This would be an on-going process, a lengthy and time-consuming process which would fund Mark’s own, concurrent work. He could fiddle about with Henry’s papers, in a leisurely way, for part of his day, and get on with the Scottish Enlightenment during the rest.

He explained the complexity of the task to Henry: “A modern database requires meticulous presentation . . . fortunately I do have some experience . . . an archive of this importance can’t be dealt with in a hurry.”

Henry liked the idea of a database. He eyed the file cupboard, and
saw it transformed into a streamlined twenty-first-century research facility. He saw My Memoirs float forth from it, to critical acclaim and resounding sales.

It took Mark a while to get across the idea that he would need to be paid for his services. He murmured something about funding, a term with which Henry was not familiar. When the penny dropped, Henry brushed the matter aside as a mere technicality: “But of course, dear boy, of course. Whatever suits you. Sort something out with Rose.”

Mark saw at once that this would not be a good idea: “. . . far happier if you yourself could suggest an arrangement.” A sum was arrived at that was rather more than Mark had had in mind.

“Excellent!” said Henry. “Now when can you start?”

“Archivist!” Rose slammed the lid on the saucepan. The cat bolted from the room in protest. Charlotte kept silent; wisest not to risk comment.

“And will I get hold of two dozen box files, and will I clear the lobby so he can use it as his work center, and is it all right if I call you Rose, Mrs. Donovan? Please yourself. It’s Henry now, I note, no more Lord P. Got his feet properly under the table, he has.”

“Young?” ventured Charlotte.

Rose sniffed. “Thirty acting twenty-four. Boyish charm.” She wrenched open the oven, banged a dish of lasagne onto the hob. “
Gerry
 . . . 
supper
 . . .”

The cat returned, sheltering behind Gerry. Rose piled lasagne onto plates. “He needs surface space, and I’m stupid enough to remember that trestle table in the loft, so it’s ‘Oh, Rose, you’re brilliant, shall we go up and get it?’ And ‘The lobby’s a bit
dark
, Rose, would there be a table-lamp I could have?’ And he dumps his stuff in the cloakroom where I fall over it.”

“Who?” said Gerry.

“His lordship has employed an archivist.”

“Ah.” Gerry went no further, scenting a problem.

“Database! Since when does he need a database? Perfectly happy rooting about in the file cupboard.”

This is about territory, thought Charlotte. Her territory has been invaded. Is it Lansdale Gardens that is her territory, or his lordship in person?

“
My
files are in perfect order,” said Rose. “If he lays a finger on those there’ll be real trouble. The last ten years are immaculate.”

“I wish I could say the same,” said Charlotte, seeking to cause a diversion. “When I get home I plan a major search-and-destroy operation. Incidentally, to the garden gate and back without the crutches this morning!”