“Sure.”
She took hold of his arm. He noticed she was wearing a ring with a diamond the size of the ruddy Koh-i-Noor. “You will make sure he gets it? It’s really important. Desperately important.”
“I understand. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get on. This is our busiest time of day. We’re all on deadlines here.”
Her face crumpled. “I’m sorry. Please just make sure he gets it. Please.”
Don nodded.
She waited, her eyes not leaving his face, perhaps trying to reassure herself that he had meant what he said. Then, with a final glance around the office, as if to check that O’Hare really wasn’t there, she took her daughter’s hand. “I’m—I’m sorry to have bothered you.”
Looking somehow smaller than she had when she’d walked in, she made her way slowly toward the doors, as if she had no idea where she was going. The few people gathered around the sub’s desk watched her leave.
“Congo,” said Cheryl, after a beat.
“We need to get page four off stone.” Don stared fixedly at the desk. “Let’s go with the dancing priest.”
It was almost three weeks later that someone thought to clear the subeditor’s desk. Among the old galley proofs and dark blue carbon sheets, there was a shabby folder.
“Who’s B?” Dora, the temporary secretary, opened it. “Is this something for Bentinck? Didn’t he leave two months ago?”
Cheryl, who was arguing about travel expenses on the phone, shrugged without turning but cupped her hand over the mouthpiece. “If you can’t see who it belongs to, send it to the library. That’s where I put everything that doesn’t seem to belong to anyone. Then Don can’t yell at you.” She thought for a moment. “Well, he can. But not for misfiling.”
The folder landed on the trolley destined for the archive, with the old editions of the newspaper, Who’s Who, and Hansard, in the bowels of the building.
It would not reappear for almost forty years.
Part 3
Chapter 16
SEPTEMBER 2003
Ellie Haworth emerges from the underground station and half walks, half runs along the street, dodging pedestrians, blind to the gaudy shop windows offering unmissable autumn bargains, deaf to the cacophonous queue of traffic, her gaze still on the little screen of her mobile phone. She clashes elbows with a suited man who tuts loudly, sidestepping around her, and she mutters an apology without looking up.
She comes to a brief halt outside the pub, stands still for a moment, and then punches a number into the phone.
“I’m just about to go into a meeting,” Nicky says.
“Very quickly. ‘Later.’ With an x. What on earth does that mean?” She has to shout to be heard over the engine of an idling bus.
“What?”
“I mean at the end of a text message. ‘Later x.’ Does it mean someone is going to call later today? This week? Never?”
Bob, who runs the little coffee wagon opposite her office building, is packing up, ready to move on to his next pitch at the shopping mall. She has overslept, having lain awake until the small hours, and now realizes with a sick lurch that this means she is even later than she had feared. But the thought of going into conference without a coffee is too much. She taps him on the shoulder, her phone still pressed to her ear, and arranges her face into an expression she might call “hopeful.”
Bob spins around, and registers that it is Ellie. When he realizes what she wants, he taps his watch.
“What did he say?” says Nicky.
“ ‘Later.’ With an x.”
She mouths a please to Bob. She wedges her phone in the crook of her neck and lifts both hands in a gesture of prayer.
“ ‘Later x’ ?” echoes Nicky.
Shaking his head resignedly, Bob pulls the cover off his coffee machine and with an ostentatious air of martyrdom begins to make her an Americano, just as she likes it.
“Nicky?”
“Oh, Lord. I don’t know what it means. It could mean anything. ‘Later’ when he remembers who you are. ‘Later’ when his wife lets him out of the cellar.”
“Funny.”
“Well, it’s meaningless. It’s one of those things men say so that they’re not committed to anything.”
“But he’s—”
“I don’t know, Ellie. You know him better than I do. Look, I’m really sorry, but I’ve got to go. They’re waiting for me. I’ll call you tonight, okay?”
“Do you think a big X means more than a little x?” Ellie begins, but the phone has gone dead.
She stares at it for a moment, then shoves the phone into her pocket, grabs the coffee, hands a fistful of change to Bob, and with a hurried “Thank you thank you Bob you’re a lifesaver,” turns and runs across the road toward her office.
It has never even occurred to her to tell Nicky the rest of the message. Sorry couldn’t make it last night. Things tricky at home. Later x.
The Nation is being packed up, box by box, for transfer to its new glass-fronted home on a gleaming, reclaimed quay to the east of the City. The office, week by week, has been thinning: where once there were towers of press releases, files, and archived cuttings, now empty desks, unexpected shiny lengths of laminated surface, are exposed to the harsh glare of the strip lighting. Souvenirs of past stories have been unearthed, like prizes from an archaeologist’s dig, flags from royal jubilees, dented metal helmets from distant wars, and framed certificates for long-forgotten awards. Banks of cables lie exposed; carpet tiles have been dislodged and great holes opened in the ceilings, prompting histrionic visits from health and safety experts and endless visitors with clipboards. Advertising, Classified, and Sport have already moved to Compass Quay. The Saturday magazine, Business, and Personal Finance are preparing to transfer in the next weeks. Features, Ellie Haworth’s department, will follow along with News, moving in a carefully choreographed sleight of hand so that while Saturday’s newspaper will emanate from the old Turner Street offices, Monday’s will spring, as if by magic, from the new address.
The building, home to the newspaper for almost a hundred years, is no longer fit-for-purpose, in that unlovely phrase. According to the management, it does not reflect the dynamic, streamlined nature of modern newsgathering. It has too many places to hide, the hacks observe bad-temperedly as they are prised from their positions, like limpets clinging stubbornly to a holed hull.