‘Morag the Moaner,’ Diana said. ‘Can’t wait.’
‘Even if she knew what you thought of her, my guess is she wouldn’t care,’ he said.
‘True. What’s the take online? Are the defections a rumour that’s trending, or are we in danger of putting the denial in front of the horse?’
Jonathan adjusted his wire rims. ‘Fuck online,’ he said. ‘Said it before and I’ll say it as many times as it needs to be said. We’re news media, not bloody Facebook.’ So maybe not so much like Steve Jobs after all.
Diana pretended this was the first time she’d had the pleasure of being subjected to this particular rant. Or the first time she had trolled him into it. ‘Well, Jonathan, it seems to me that our presence out there is looking a little bit thin, compared to the rest of the news media these days. Just saying.’ He wasn’t the one who had to deal with the callers, she was. ‘We’re missing out on large audiences if we can’t connect with people online in any meaningful way.’
‘Twitter this and blogging that,’ Jonathan fumed and pounded the desk. ‘You know, I’m sick of hearing about it. Ten years from now no one will even remember what it was, much less why we cared.’
‘Maybe so,’ Diana said. ‘Or maybe ten years from now we’ll be looking at the scorch marks on our arses and wondering how the hell we ended up getting ripped a new one by teenagers and their vlogs. Everyone who’s anyone is out there, you know, J,’ she continued. ‘All the main editors, give or take a broadsheet. Every last head journalist, and don’t get me started on the columnists. They’re getting their content out minutes after news breaks. I know it’s not your favourite topic, but news is happening all over social media, and we’re missing out.’
Jonathan’s face scrunched up. It was a look Diana knew too well, and if she wasn’t pulling such good ratings, she knew he would be screaming his head off at her for even questioning his decisions. ‘Fuck’s sake, D,’ he said. He stabbed the pile of papers with his pencil. ‘Nothing of value, and I mean nothing, ever came from the Internet. Not when it comes to news.’
‘Would you have said the same thing about Huffington Post? Slate? People are breaking news online, we should be right there with them,’ she said coolly. Yes, winding Jonathan up was one of the subtler perks of her job.
Diana watched him gurning and chewing his cheek, trying to find a way to put words into sentences without throttling her. Finally he spoke. ‘When you say breaking news, what you mean is mean spreading libel and pictures of cats. We should be leaving that sort of nonsense to the New Politician and their ilk,’ he said. ‘I will not let the station stoop to clickbait. It’s undignified.’
Jonathan stood up, well into his flow now, and punched the air. ‘No, what the world needs more of now is quality analysis, not dodgy opinions and worse grammar. This is what we made our name on.’ He jabbed a finger in her direction. Diana smirked behind her hand. ‘The in depth debate. The whole conversation, not the sound bites. Real content. You don’t get that in 140 characters or less.’
Or fewer, Diana thought. Jonathan’s features sank together like a handful of dried currants dropped into a steamed pudding. She knew the look well. It meant he was about to shout at someone, or break something. She was enjoying this, but it probably wasn’t good for his blood pressure to keep it going. Not to mention the rest of the staff, who would bear the brunt of his temper. ‘Sooo, today’s headlines. What else are you looking at?’
Jonathan, panting and overheated from his screed, scanned the rest of the printouts. ‘Scotland Liberal Unionist Party sent through a release, looks like a good one,’ he said and sat down again.
‘Scotland Liberal Unionist Party?’ Diana asked. ‘Some anti-independence thing? Never heard of it.’
‘Not just anti-independence, but anti-devolution as well,’ Jonathan said. ‘They claim to be resurrecting the spirit of a party that existed until 1912 and then was merged in to the Conservatives.’
‘1912, huh? Well, that’s sure to grab the imagination of young voters.’ Though given the hipster aesthetic, perhaps they weren’t far wrong.
His face unclenched slightly. ‘You know, I like this. Protest voting is still hot. Even people who voted for the current government are starting to turn their opinions. We should get on top of this before anyone else gets the story.’
Diana shrugged. ‘What, more English votes for English parliament stuff?’ she said. ‘We’ve done that topic to death.’
Jonathan shook his head. ‘Beyond that. Returning Parliament to the pre-1999 settlements, they say. Capitalising on the mood post-referendum. Not broken big yet. My hunch is it’s going to explode this week. There’s a tip that those lottery winners are giving a big chunk away for the party to fund a run on the European Parliament.’
‘Not how I would have chosen to spend it,’ Diana said. The couple had been all over the papers a few days before: good-looking, riches-to-rags-to-riches story. Wife had a bit of a past, nothing serious, just tittle-tattle. Husband was some City prat who’d lost his job in the recession. Seemed a bit odd for them to turn round and hand it all away. But if news had taught her anything it was that the one predictable thing about people was their unpredictability. ‘What’s their angle?’
‘Blah blah Scottish heritage stuff, taking the fight to Brussels, et cetera. Who knows? Maybe they like the lottery spotlight so much they decided to stay in it for a while.’
‘I guess.’ Diana frowned. Plenty of celebs had made their careers on less, but still . . . They had seemed smarter than that to her. Then again, most lottery winners never went public about their wins at all, so maybe publicity seeking was on the cards all along.
A runner came into the room and put a cup of tea and plate of biscuits by Jonathan’s elbow. She had a coffee as well for Diana. Diana noted that the producer neither acknowledged nor thanked the girl. Diana recalled that she might have been named Kerry. Or possibly Kirsty. Even after several months of the girl working there, they had never been introduced. She would have asked Jonathan but he made a point of not knowing the name of anyone less important than him. Which, in his mind, amounted to very nearly everyone.
‘Do we know who the party’s MEP candidates are going to be? Anyone credible? Or is it a load of brigadiers in fake family tartans and frothing racists?’
‘No candidates announced as yet, it’s an announcement of an announcement,’ he said.
An announcement of an announcement? What was that when it was at home? She looked over the press release. ‘Sounds a bit suspect,’ Diana said. ‘Are you sure this isn’t a practical joke?’
‘Looks legit enough.’ Jonathan sniffed his tea and slammed the mug on the desk. ‘This is stewed. You squeezed the bag, didn’t you? What, are you trying to poison me?’ he snarled at the runner. She flinched and mumbled an apology. He turned back to Diana, a false smile on his face. ‘Anyway, they’re over in Molesey so easy for us to get out there, or do a phone link. Then we can get a call-in after, get people to talk about how they would spend lottery money if they had it, or something.’
‘Fine, we’ll do that,’ Diana nodded. ‘So . . . any plans for the weekend?’ she asked.
Jonathan’s head shot up. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
Diana smiled innocently. ‘Just making conversation, Jonathan. You know, talking to people. It’s kind of what you pay me to do.’
He pursed his lips. ‘Usual things,’ he said.
‘Ah.’ She’d noticed he was careful not to reveal anything about his private life. Now that she thought about it, Diana didn’t even know where he lived. Not that she fancied hanging out. It just seemed odd, somehow. You usually knew personal things about the people you worked with even if you didn’t like them or see them socially. But Jonathan gave every impression of not even existing outside of the station. There was a rumour going round that he had a new squeeze, but from what she could tell, he was the same
as he always was: a sour, middle-aged hack with a chip on his shoulder the size of Essex.
Diana turned back to her own notes. ‘What about that missing geologist?’
‘The Schofield case?’ Jonathan said. ‘Has there been anything new on that?’
‘No, but it’s a month now since he disappeared. I thought we could get the family down the line for a fresh appeal, ask if anyone saw anything. . .’
‘Forget it,’ Jonathan said. ‘The guy’s probably dead. And the story definitely is.’
Diana frowned. Most news stories didn’t affect her either way, but for some reason this one had stuck in her head. Mild mannered geologist Damian Schofield disappears, a few days later police find an unconvincing suicide note at the house saying he was going to Scotland to end it all in the hills he loved. His wife said it wasn’t even his handwriting. No leads, no sightings, no body.
Police seemed convinced it was a suicide, end of story. And in any other circumstances it would be news that came and went. An eminent professor’s tragic death, one family’s tragedy, and that was all.
Diana had a feeling there was more to the story than anyone was saying. Schofield had been scheduled to appear before a Select Committee on energy policy a week after he disappeared. The details of his testimony had not been released widely but rumour had it he was going to imply, if not outright state, that the official numbers on oil and fracking in Scotland had been misrepresented. Or possibly, as some conspiracy theory websites speculated, he was going to say they were altogether wrong. If that was the case, could that have been a reason for him to disappear? For him to commit suicide? Or worse – for someone to kill him, as some Internet sites suggested had happened? Already a few blogs were referring to him as the new Dr David Kelly. Maybe the committee timing was only coincidence. And maybe, Diana thought, it wasn’t.
If it had been a suicide, why wasn’t he on any camera footage, why was there no train ticket to Scotland if he was going there, why were his hiking boots still in the cupboard according to his wife, why were there no witnesses? Sure, people went missing all the time. The story might have happened exactly the way the police assumed it had. It was equally possible it happened some other way. Maybe he had disappeared on purpose, or had a tragic accident. But something about the story didn’t make sense to her, didn’t add up.
She thought about the image the family released after he had disappeared. The grainy old photo of a man in a corduroy jacket standing on a mountain path. It reminded her of a holiday by Loch Lomond with her father when she was small. Somewhere there was a family missing him, a daughter who might never know what became of her father, a wife who could only sit and wait. What must it be like to know someone for decades then, without warning, they’re gone? This was about more than one man – it was a story about grief. Diana would have killed to nab the first solo interview with his wife but the family had stuck to communicating anything they wanted to say through lawyers and press releases.
‘I hear you,’ Diana said. ‘But someone must know something. A neighbour, maybe? Did anyone ever interview his co-workers?’
The runner was still there, hopping from foot to foot, holding the mug of rejected tea. ‘Um, can I like, go make a new one?’ she asked. Jonathan waved his hand in the air and she darted out the door.
Diana watched the girl bolt like a frightened kitten. Jonathan had that effect on people. It never seemed to occur to him that the high turnover in station staff was probably as much a result of his general attitude as the pressure of the work itself. Only being on the public side of the microphone earned her any leeway with him, she knew. And it was an advantage she didn’t mind pressing when she could. ‘Come on, let’s be on the right side of the story for once,’ she said. ‘It beats regurgitating tabloid pap twelve hours after everyone’s already sick to death of it.’
‘That case is police business, not ours,’ Jonathan said. ‘When the body turns up we’ll be there. Till then no one cares.’
‘Whatever happened to, “if it bleeds, it leads”?’ Diana said.
Jonathan puffed out his cheeks. ‘We got nothing new here, D. Come on.’
‘Or what about, “if they’re dead, we’re live”?’ Diana said.
He scoffed. ‘Live where? At the family’s house? Don’t you think they’ve been through enough already?’
‘I suppose,’ Diana said. She had seen it many times before, but it never failed to surprise her. It all seemed to happen so quickly. How the news could go from full saturation over someone’s disappearance, to . . . nothing, no interest. Overnight.
‘Christ, D,’ Jonathan said. ‘You’re still cutting your teeth. These kinds of stories can be highly emotive. Remember the News of the World fiasco? You can’t chase every mystery down the rabbit hole. We’re living in a post-Leveson world, let’s not forget that. Get it wrong and we’re the baddies.’ he said. ‘My hunch – my experience – says leave it. We’ll be first out when they find him. I promise.’
Diana didn’t agree, but she knew Jonathan wouldn’t budge. How was raising a largely forgotten unsolved mystery that might benefit from having its profile raised the same thing as phone hacking? But that seemed to be the stock answer to anything he didn’t want to do: Leveson. Libel. Meanwhile they were getting their arses toasted in the ratings. Her show did well enough, but the drop-off in numbers for the presenters on after her was shocking, and she had a feeling she could only hold on to her success for so long before listeners would start going elsewhere. ‘Got it.’
Jonathan stood up. ‘So it’s cabinet and headlines before the break, traffic and weather, live to Molesey for Scotland donation and call-in. We’re on in ten. Throw that coffee down your neck and get in the tank,’ he said.
: 13 :
Erykah slipped out the French doors in a coat and wellie boots. She wanted a walk along the towpath before anyone turned up at the house. She needed time to think, away from Rab and his sullen looks, away from her phone and the radio and the television news.
The clouds that had brought sleet overnight were just starting to lift. The river was swollen with rain from an earlier snow, and even at the ebb of the tide patterns and eddies swirled on the surface like ripples in satin.
Even without the alarm set for early morning outings, Erykah’s eyes still snapped open at half five every morning, her legs still kicked the blankets away with pent-up energy. In the bath just that morning she had looked down at her hands and seen the peeling skin on her palms starting to soften and come away from the callouses that had been a constant feature for so long.
What was she going to do?
Since her anniversary, every day had been worse than the last. If she tried to stop and put the events of the last ten days in order in her mind, she simply couldn’t. It was like being back at Grayson’s trial. Something was happening, and while she had no control over it, she couldn’t simply opt out of being involved, either.
She needed something to hold on to. Not her husband – Rab had proved himself more of an anchor than a lifejacket. In less than an hour, the money she thought they had won would be gone too. She had lost her precious anonymity, the security of blending in to Molesey life, just another middle class wife, thanks to the papers. The club was gone. And Nicole . . .
A clutch of women from the boat club jogged in the opposite direction, warming up before their water outing, their trainers crunching the gravel. Probably one of their last before they went away on training camp, she guessed. Erykah raised one hand in greeting. The group brushed past without a word or a look – save for Nicole, at the back, whose green eyes met hers for a painful fraction of a second before she turned her head and ran on.
The syncopated rhythm of their feet on the path grew fainter and disappeared. So that was it, then. She searched her feelings and found a distinct lack of surprise. Hadn’t she only ever been passing for one of them anyway? Accepted into the fold conditi
onal on her husband’s job, or her usefulness in a boat? Now she was just another topic of conversation to them, gossip fodder until something better came along. A familiar tension rose up in her neck. The way these people regarded anyone who was not the same as them. The way they talked about London, like it was a sack full of rubbish to be held at arm’s length, not the city they profited from and were connected to.
At some point over the years she had stopped counting the number of times women in Molesey would catch themselves in the middle of a conversation about politics, about what was in the papers, and reassure her that of course, when they talked about immigrants or inner-city people or black people or whatever else, they didn’t mean her. And then, still later, at some other point, they stopped apologising altogether.
‘Fuck it,’ she said. Maybe what she should be doing instead is making the most of the situation. Use them before they use you. She had been the only one holding things together when the press first came to their house, Rab had been a wreck. She had managed to deal with Seminole Billy and Buster and – apart from Rab’s broken finger – without getting them into any more trouble. Maybe she could come out on top.
Erykah turned on the path and rounded back towards the house. The reporters and photographers were right on time. There were also about twice as many as she had expected and the crowd spilled over the edges of the garden and into the street. ‘Arse,’ she murmured. She felt a chill that had only something to do with the cold weather.
The last time the media had come to the house was to get the obligatory shots of the celebrating couple. This time she sensed a hungrier, meaner edge to the crowd. Erykah went in through the back door and upstairs to change her clothes.
The Turning Tide Page 14