The Greening
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© Margaret Coles 2013
This book is a work of fiction. The use of actual events or locales, and persons living or deceased, is strictly for artistic/literary reasons only.
The moral rights of the author have been asserted.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any mechanical, photographic or electronic process, or in the form of a phonographic recording; nor may it be stored in a retrieval system, transmitted or otherwise be copied for public or private use, other than for ‘fair use’ as brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews, without prior written permission of the publisher.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-78180-113-0 in print
ISBN 978-178180-132-1 in Mobipocket format
ISBN 978-1-78180-133-8 in ePub format
To my sister, Christina Myfanwy
By chance, I encountered the lost lady.
At that time I still believed in chance.
A candle burned, and by the light of the flame I embarked
upon the soul’s solitary adventure.
CONTENTS
“What do you want me to do? Trip her up at the airport? Lace her tea with arsenic? Stab her with a poisoned umbrella?” The newsroom fell silent as the other reporters waited to hear who would win this round in my ongoing battle with the News Editor.
“You’re bloody useless, Meredith,” said Milo, bringing his face uncomfortably close to mine. I could smell the whisky on his breath. “Joanna Useless Meredith, not a bloody clue.”
My interviewee had pulled out with barely any notice, sending a message to say she had to leave urgently for South-East Asia. The interview with Ismene Vale, a distinguished anthropologist and environmentalist, had been scheduled for a two-page spread to be published the following day. The Editor would be furious.
Ismene Vale’s secretary had been very mysterious about her sudden departure. I sensed a story, something beyond her views on the state of the environment, but had no way of following it up.
“How the hell can I interview someone who’s in a plane heading for South-East Asia and nobody will say where?” I demanded.
“You’re as good as your last story, Meredith. Remember that. Get onto this,” said Milo, throwing some sheets of news agency copy onto my desk. “Simon will brief you. And for Christ’s sake don’t bugger this one up.”
Seething, I grabbed the copy. I cursed Ismene Vale for letting me down. My frustration was intensified by my disappointment.
She was my childhood heroine. Her books about her travels among the world’s forgotten and dispossessed had opened my mind and inspired my choice of career.
I quickly read the copy, which bore the Reuters dateline. It was background material rather than a news story. The subject was research into medicine to counteract depression. There was a lot of detail, describing the development of various drugs and their side-effects. It was not clear what I was expected to do with the material. I walked across to the news desk. Simon, the Deputy News Editor, was on the phone. He finished his call and said, “Take a seat, Jo. I need to talk you through this.” Simon was a tall, sturdy Scot with an introverted, bookish manner. He had an air of self-containment and rarely said more than was necessary.
“This is big,” said Simon. “International Pharmaceuticals has suppressed an internal report showing a link between one of their antidepressants and incidents of suicide. Their research director is going to blow the whistle. You’re meeting him at 9:30.” Simon gave me a full briefing on the interview I was to do and said, “You’d better get going. We don’t want to keep him waiting.”
I hurried from the building into the autumn drizzle and hailed a taxi. The day was chilly and the sky overcast. Twenty minutes later I arrived at the address Simon had given me, a 1930s mansion block in South Kensington. I pressed the intercom buzzer for Flat 11 and waited. There was no response. I pressed the buzzer again. Again, there was no response. After a few more minutes I pressed it again. I glanced at my watch. It was 9:35. I began to feel uneasy. I walked to the rear of the block and found another entrance, but that, too, was operated by an entryphone system.
I returned to the front of the block. Despite the need for discretion, I decided to press the buzzer for the concierge. The front door of the block swung open. I walked in and approached the reception desk. The concierge, a smartly uniformed man of about fifty, said, “Good morning, madam. Can I help you?”
“I’m visiting number 11,” I replied, “but I can’t get a response.”
“The gentleman who occupies number 11 is out of town,” said the concierge.
“I don’t think so. He’s expecting me. Would you ring him, please?”
“He’s away, madam.”
“Please, would you try? He is expecting me.”
“The gentleman is away, madam. The apartment has been empty for the past three weeks.”
I was becoming irritated. “Look, just try the number, would you?” I said.
“There’s no point, madam. The apartment is empty.”
“Are you being deliberately obstructive?” I asked, my temper rising. “Just try the number.”
“I’m sorry, madam – ” he began.
“OK, I’ll check for myself,” I said, walking towards the staircase. The concierge came swiftly across the lobby and blocked my path. “You mustn’t do that, madam,” he said. “I can’t help you and I really must ask you to leave.”
What could I do? I turned and left. The door swung to behind me. I felt desperate. There was a telephone box on the corner. I ran to it and rang the news desk. Simon answered. I told him what had happened. It was obvious that the concierge had been told to put me off. We needed to find out who owned the apartment and track down the whistleblower. Simon said, “Hold on. Let me brief Milo.”
A moment later I heard Milo’s voice. “What the hell are you playing at?”
“It’s not my fault,” I replied.
“It never is your bloody fault, is it? No doubt he got away while you were arsing around.”
“I was not arsing around – ” I began.
“Oh just bugger off,” said Milo, slamming down the phone. His manner told me that I was off the story and had better stay out of his way until he cooled down.
Everything I had worked for, everything I thought I had achieved, my hope of a future and a successful career in Fleet Street
seemed to be fragmenting around me. This would be the end. All the tension and worry of the past several months, as work had become increasingly demanding and difficult, coalesced in one moment of despair. I started to cry, leaning on the stand that supported the telephone receiver.
I heard the door open and a woman’s voice ask, “Are you all right, dear?” I could not speak but nodded in assent. “Are you sure?” she asked. I could not respond. I pushed past her and gulped in the fresh air. A taxi was approaching. I hailed it and climbed in. I directed the driver to the offices of the
Correspondent
in the Docklands area of east London.
The world outside the cab window flashed by, full of people going about their lives as if it mattered. I felt I belonged nowhere. What was I doing with my life? The only thing that made any sense was my ability to do my job well and I could no longer count on that. The ground was crumbling away beneath me.
The Editor would be angry and Milo would put the blame on me. He would lay into me publicly and I would have to fight back. My self-respect, and perhaps pride, would allow me no less. I was used to fighting my corner. It had been my way since childhood. People thought I didn’t mind. But I did mind. I found it frightening and debilitating and I had to summon up my courage every time.
My work was good, I knew that, but lately I always seemed to fail. The idealism with which I had arrived in Fleet Street ten years earlier, at the start of the 1980s, had dwindled away. In a hostile environment, my independent streak had deepened. I had grown a protective shell. If I was not as confident as I appeared to be, well, in my world appearances counted for a lot. But who was I? I no longer knew. And soon I would be out of a job. How would I pay my mortgage and the rest of my bills?
Then I remembered. I had to buy Patrick’s birthday gift. He had specified a particular political biography – a nineteenth-century life of Disraeli – and I was determined not to disappoint him. I had tracked down a copy in an antiquarian bookshop in the Charing Cross Road and the bookseller had put it aside for me. He had
assured me that it was in good condition. I hoped it would be good enough. I wanted to see Patrick’s smile of satisfaction and approval and not the little frown that sometimes creased the skin between his eyebrows, making him look suddenly stern, as when a cloud passes in front of the sun.
We were travelling alongside the River Thames, heading east. The leaves on the trees had turned a golden brown. The sky was still overcast. I asked the driver to change course and take me to the Charing Cross Road. The door of the shop swung to behind me, cutting off the blistering sound of car wheels on wet tarmac. I stepped into a sanctuary. Rows of tall, narrow bookshelves created a maze of pathways, inviting exploration. The shelves were crammed, as though the books they contained had jostled and fought for space. Silence hung heavy, the sounds of the street deadened and the outside world removed to a place far distant.
I suddenly felt exhausted and I sat down on a stool used for filling shelves. I was in a silent, right-angled world with nothing to distract me, nothing but my thoughts. I felt completely alone. Nobody in my world knew where I was and, in a sense, neither did I. Who was I? Where was I going? They were questions I could not answer. My life had no purpose and no meaning. I feared the future. I was too sad to cry, too sad to know how sad I felt.
This place was unfamiliar territory. Bookshops I knew and frequented, browsing contentedly when time allowed among the new titles – the acclaimed biography, the recommended first novel – shiny volumes that enticed the eye.
This place was different. The books here were elusive: they did not clamour for attention; they needed to be sought out. In a place such as this, you never knew what you might find. It was the difference between being offered a selection made by someone else and discovering treasures that, I thought fancifully, had found their own way there, this destination being part of each one’s particular journey. How strange it is that randomness can suggest an organizing mind when order and regulation may not. And where no one has chosen for us, what extraordinary choices might we make for ourselves?