‘Now that I look at it, I can see it,’ said Alix. ‘Clearly the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.’
Rob, passing, said, ‘Who’s Bobby McCartney?’
Peter pretended not to hear. Michael took his lead from Peter. Alix said, ‘Agh, he’s a pain in the neck, that’s who he is.’ She went back to her desk.
Peter said, ‘We won’t be using it, not yet at any rate.’
Alix turned in her chair. ‘Too right we will. There’s been half a dozen of these robberies, and we have him red-handed.’
Peter snorted and said, ‘I think not. He hasn’t been arrested, charged, anything.’
‘He has a gun in his hand!’
‘Do you know if it’s a real gun? Or was he messing around with his... his baby nephew or something and it’s a toy—’
‘The shop has just been robbed, we know that, he’s just dropped half the proceeds!’
‘Do we know that? Was he not maybe bending down to pick up the money and gun the real robber dropped?’
‘Ah, for fuck sake, Peter, you know what it is.’
‘Of course I know what it is. But until he’s convicted in court we can’t run it.’
‘Right. Sure. You’re just scared of his dad.’
‘Who’s his dad?’ Rob asked again, ‘Apart from a pain in the neck.’
Peter sighed.
Michael said, ‘He used to be in the UVF years ago. Now he owns half the bars in town, and he sits on the local council. He likes to get his own way. He doesn’t like us.’
‘Janine?’ Peter called. The advertising manager popped her head out of her office. She looked mid-forties, with died raven hair and a top that emphasized her cleavage. Rob suspected she was older than she looked. ‘Tell me – you think we should run a pic of Bobby McCartney’s son caught red-handed robbing a Mace?’
‘Of course you should. If you want to be out of a job. He’ll make a few calls and half our advertising will disappear. That’s the truth of it.’
Peter raised an eyebrow at Alix. ‘Plus he’ll tie us up in injunctions we can’t afford.’
Alix fixed him with a stern and steady look. ‘Only if he finds out about it in advance.’
‘What’re you insinuating?’
‘I’m not insinuating anything. I’m saying that you get a lot of stories out of him and he’ll be expecting something in return.’
‘You take that back.’
‘Well, the proof will be in the pudding.’
‘It gets out,’ said Janine, ‘he makes those calls, then we’re sunk.’
‘We’re sunk already,’ said Michael, ‘just ask yer man.’
He nodded at Rob. They looked at him expectantly. Rob deflected by saying, ‘On the Guardian we—’
Michael immediately mimicked, ‘On the Guardian—’
‘It’s where I work,’ Rob said. ‘You asked my advice.’
‘I’m only saying,’ said Michael, hurt that Rob had taken it thick.
‘What would you do on the big paper in the big smoke? You’d run it, wouldn’t you?’
‘Yes, we would. It’s a great news story and a brilliant photograph. And you have to stand up to bullies like... what’s his name...?’
‘McCartney...’
‘McCartney. Otherwise you’d never print anything. Big or small, you’re first and foremost a newspaper.’
‘See,’ said Alix.
Janine pointed a finger at Rob. ‘It easy for you to say, run it, but you don’t have to slog around after ads when they’ve all been warned off.’
‘Exactly,’ said Peter, ‘and you don’t have to live here. We do. McCartney’s hoods knocking seven shades of shite out of you’ll soon change your mind. Different if he’s charged and tried and convicted, then he can’t complain.’
‘I’m not saying it’s easy. The Guardian’s a powerful beast, it can stand up for itself. I know this is different. But sometimes you just have to... do it.’
‘Sometimes you just have to mind your own business,’ said Pete, ‘or concentrate on what is your own business, like time and motion and closing us down.’
Rob put his hands up and said, ‘You asked’ before walking between them back into his office.
He wasn’t angry, or even mildly upset. It was none of his business. They could bicker away, for all he cared. He’d be out of there as soon as Gerry returned. He also knew how frustrating local-paper journalism could be. Daily papers, nationals, you wrote your story, you made sure you got it right, and then you really didn’t care how it affected who you wrote about because the chances were they would never cross your path again; there was a splendid anonymity to it. But with local papers, as soon as you walked out your front door you were liable to bump into who you were just writing about, from puritan to pimp to pedo. You learned to deal with it. The best and only defence was the truth of your story. That was universal.
He spent another hour in the office. The door was open still, and the argument did not go away, but it became more about who had the right to spike the story, and therefore in essence a power struggle over who would eventually run the paper. Peter was the de facto deputy editor, but it seemed he’d never actually been appointed to the position or paid for it, which in effect made him just the senior reporter. Alix was also a senior reporter, but with only a tenth of Peter’s experience. But she had youth on her side and he guessed that one step up her ladder of ambition would be to climb into Billy’s biscuit-crumb-strewn chair. He guessed she would prove to be a dynamic and invigorating editor, which was exactly what the paper needed; but it was also a job for life, a job that aged you, that fatted out your arse; she should be out there seeing the world. Peter was dour and traditional and presumed he would get the job purely because he was next in line and that was the way it had always worked. He was more the ‘job for life, don’t care about the rest of the world’ kind of guy. He would be a good, solid editor and wouldn’t change a damn thing about the paper. Michael, an odd mix of cockiness and gauche inexperience, would still have to do the bun run, no matter who was in charge. Rob laughed to himself. Why was he even thinking about this? The paper was dying on its feet, and he was on one of the next flights home.
They were still going at it when Gerry arrived twenty minutes later; they covered themselves and the vacancy by switching back to their debate on the photo. Alix put it under his nose and he agreed that it was a great picture and Janine shouted from her office that if it was that good they should frame it and put it on the wall, not make her life difficult by sticking it on the front of the paper; Peter warned them again about what Bobby McCartney was capable of and Alix said they should print it huge and worry about next week next week. Gerry called for order, drew himself up and announced: ‘At this point in time, there may not be a next week.’ They looked shocked at that. He nodded at Peter and said, ‘We’ve got how long?’
‘We need to be at the plant at six.’
‘Okay, then – put two front pages together, one with, one without, and I’ll let you know. Now where’s...’ He looked about him and spotted Rob in the editor’s chair. ‘Ah... do you want to...?’ He indicated his own office.
Rob got up and followed him in. As he passed Michael’s desk, Michael began to hum the death march.
*
Gerry’s office was like the antidote to Billy’s, but he said the only reason it was paper free was because he was never bloody there. ‘Does that need to change, Rob? What are your thoughts about our wee paper which hasn’t missed a week in a hundred years? Hitler couldn’t stop us, the Ulster Workers’ Council couldn’t stop us and an INLA bomb couldn’t stop us. What do you say?’
‘I say you’re losing money hand over fist.’
‘Tell me something I don’t know.’
‘Your advertising woman is skimming off 20 per cent.’
‘Fuck off!’
‘You’d need to bring in a forensic accountant but, first look, that’s about it.’
Gerry had moved in behind his desk and
put his feet up, but now he moved them off and clasped his hands and leaned forward. ‘Janine?’ he said. ‘Janine’s been with us for years.’
‘And she’s probably been at it for years. She wouldn’t by any chance do your accounting?’
‘How did you...?’
Rob raised an eyebrow.
Gerry sighed. ‘She had some training when she was younger, and she’s cheap.’
‘No, Gerry, she’s expensive.’
Gerry nodded sadly. ‘She used to be my... and sometimes is still my... I wouldn’t have thought in a million years that... You’re sure?’
‘Like I say, get an expert in. But pretty much any idiot with an abacus could see it.’
‘Okay. All right. So Janine’s a bad ’un.’
‘And the least of your worries.’
Gerry sighed. He got up and began to pace.
‘I’m not an expert in advertising, Gerry, but when you dip in and out of recession, advertisers get choosy about where they spend their money – the paper’s old and boring and clogged up with all kinds of shit people don’t have the time to wade through these days, there’s hardly any colour, doesn’t look like it has ever known a designer and it’s not in the least bit surprising circulation’s in the shitter. It’s not a good paper, Gerry. It’s a bad paper.’
‘I paid you £1500 to tell me it’s a bad paper?’
‘I tried to tell you that you were wasting your money.’
‘You should have tried harder. But never mind that now – can she be saved?’
‘If you throw enough money at it, of course you can prop anything up with cash, but the way papers are going, it would be good money after bad. And why would you want to?’
Gerry sighed again. He stopped by the glass panel that looked out over editorial. He shook his head. ‘I don’t have money to throw at it. What can I do without money? There’ll be something down the back of my chairs, but not much. If I had some – what would I do with it? Where do I start?’
‘Well – look, you’re a local paper, but I think you need to make it more of a community paper, you need to get people involved, find out what they care about and then fight their causes, champion them. The radio, TV, they’re not interested in what happens around the corner, most of what happens in a town like this is too small for them, but people still want to know, they just don’t want to have to wade through seven shades of shite to find it. You have to make sure you’re the first place they turn to if they want to find something out, that means proper news stories – at the minute every word anyone ever said in the history of the world seems to make it into print here. It’s crap. Cut it. People won’t wait a week for news, they need it regular, rolling, you need Facebook, Twitter, a proper website instead of one that looks like it’s too much trouble. People want something they can’t find elsewhere. The Express is a family-owned newspaper and has been for generations, that means that even with the best will in the world it just rolls along year after year and it never changes because this is the way it’s always been done – but I guarantee you everyone in this building knows exactly what the problems are but they’re either too scared to speak up or they’re just happy with their nice easy life.’
Gerry was still looking out at his staff as they added the finishing touches to that week’s paper.
Rob came up beside him and saw the grim look on his face. ‘I know, it’s not easy to hear,’ he said. ‘What it all boils down to? This paper needs its arse kicked. Hard. And repeatedly.’
Gerry shook his head. ‘What I said about finding money down the back of my chairs? Well, I’ve been there, and I’ve spent it. You see Alix?’ He nodded across at her, phone under her chin, talking earnestly to someone. ‘Later today, maybe tomorrow, she’s going to get a call from her friendly neighbourhood bank manager telling her that the cheque I wrote her at the funeral has bounced. I knew it then, and I still wrote it. Gave her a bloody bonus because I knew.’
Rob was staring at him. And then his hand went to his jacket pocket, and he pulled out the cheque Gerry had given him for his consultancy. ‘You mean...?’
Gerry nodded. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m a des-perate man.’
‘Desperate?’ Rob repeated. ‘You’re not desperate. You’re a fucking wanker.’
He tore the cheque in half, and then again, before throwing the pieces in Gerry’s face and stalking out of his office. He stomped through editorial, not stopping even when Alix said hi to him and asked how it was going; he went through the swing door, with enough violence for the rest of them also to look up. As he pulled the main door Gerry came hurrying out of his office, flustered, pulling his jacket on and answered their confused expressions with: ‘He wanted to sack the lot of you! I stood up for you! Keep at it!’
Rob continued on out.
*
In retrospect it was inevitable and predictable that Gerry would find him in the bar, it being just a few yards from the office and them both being the sort to enjoy a drink in times of stress or no stress. It was half hidden up a largely abandoned covered shopping arcade; from the chalkboard outside and posters within, he understood it was home to indie bands and cool teenagers with bumfluff beards by night, but in daylight it was mostly empty, with a solitary barman who asked him warily if he was in for something to eat and then looked relieved when he said no. He was just ordering a whiskey, straight, when Gerry came in and said, ‘Make that two. And I’ll get those.’
Rob said, ‘Are you going to write a cheque for them?’
‘Hey, if you’d didn’t want me to find you, you wouldn’t have come in here.’
‘I chose the first bar I came to because I was in desperate need of a drink to kill the pain of being fucked over.’
‘I didn’t... Well...’ Gerry sighed. He paid for the drinks and told the barman to keep the change.
‘There is no change,’ the barman said.
‘Was I to know that?’ Gerry gave him a helpless shrug, and before Rob could lift his glass he picked both of them up and moved them to a table further down.
Rob just looked at him.
Gerry took a seat and said, ‘Well?’
Rob sighed. Then he joined him.
Gerry gave him a long look and said, ‘Well, Rob Cullen. Rob Cullen of the Guardian. It’s got a nice ring to it. Cullen of the Guardian, eh?’
‘What do you want, Gerry?’
‘What do you want, Rob?’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Really, Cullen of the Guardian, who, as it turns out, probably isn’t actually in that much of a hurry to get home?’
‘Christ, get to the point.’
‘You know, I’m not just a pretty face.’ He raised an eyebrow.
Rob studied him, hard, and then knocked back his whiskey. He put the glass down hard and said, ‘It’s none of your fucking business.’
‘Well, it could be.’
‘What the fuck is that—?’
Gerry had a hand on his arm. ‘Rob – Rob. Hear me out. Okay?’
Rob looked at him some more. Then kind of grunted.
‘I’m a businessman, and generally a pretty good one, Rob, it’s not my fault the property market has gone to shite. But if I want something, I know how to get it, and if I have an idea that something isn’t quite right, and that might help me to get an advantage over someone or some rival or some other business, then I can’t help but take it. It’s the nature of me. So, Cullen of the Guardian, how is the Guardian treating you these days?’ He let it sit there, but Rob said nothing. Instead he indicated to the barman for another drink. Gerry held up two fingers. ‘So, Rob? Anything to say, anything to say about the fact that you’re on gardening leave?’
‘No, nothing.’
‘I hoked and I poked, but really I didn’t get much beyond the top soil. Gardening leave and you’re not expected back any time soon. Do you want to tell me about it?’
‘No, I fucking don’t.’
Gerry held his hands up. ‘Ok
ay, all right, that’s your prerogative. But I imagine – phone tapping, that’s all the rage? Or insider dealing?’ He wasn’t fazed at all by Rob’s lack of reaction to his prodding. In fact, he smiled. He said, ‘And you know what? I don’t care, because whatever problem they have with you is to my advantage.’
Rob sighed. ‘How do you work that out?’
The drinks arrived. Rob paid for them. Gerry nodded his thanks and took a sip.
‘It’s like this, Rob,’ Gerry said. ‘We’re both in a bit of a bind right now. And maybe it might do you some good to be away from there for a while, just until it’s sorted, maybe it would suit you to be back here where people don’t give a shit about all that phone-tapping malarkey—’
‘I told you I—!’
‘Okay, all right. Just saying. But my paper, the Express, I know it’s a bit rubbish. But it has been around for a hundred years, it hasn’t missed a week, it’s in a big mostly prosperous town and there’s no competition. And it is all I have left. Sure I can close it down, walk away and still be able to afford a Jet Ski, but that’s not in my nature. My nature is to stay and fight, and I can do that, I really can, but I can’t do it without an editor.’ He took another sip from his glass. ‘So what do you think?’
Rob laughed. ‘So that’s the grand plan?’
‘It is grand. So what do you say?’
‘Me? Back here... doing...? I don’t think so.’
‘Rob – you told me yourself, you’re management now, but I’ve seen how you operate, and the guys told me all about your little speech, so I know that inside there, beyond that corporate bullshit there’s a good old-fashioned journalist champing at the bit to get out. I know it. And I know if Billy trained you, you must be good, and I’m thinking a man like you wouldn’t take well to being put out to grass, even if it’s only temporary. And that’s what I’m offering you – temporary. Come back here for a few weeks, get us sorted out, and then go back if you want to. Come back here, Rob, save a newspaper, save the Express, these jobs. Think of it as a challenge. A well paid challenge, and if that business of the cheques is worrying you, don’t let it, that was a blip, it happens in business. If you want, I’ll pay you in cash. C’mon, what’s the downside?’
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