How It All Began

  When the program was over, Henry poured himself another glass of claret, and reflected. Television programs are watched by millions of people—even programs about history. Books about history are read by thousands—or not even that, in many cases. Television is of course for the masses, but a program of this kind is for the more discerning elements of the masses. Henry has seen other such programs, in which other loquacious younger academics held forth; he had watched with a certain detachment—populist stuff, not to be taken seriously.

  On the other hand . . . Could one be wrong about this? Long ago, Henry had himself appeared on television. But that was back when it was acceptable for an academic simply to address the camera, at length. A kind of filmed lecture. He seemed to remember that portraits of Walpole and George II had been shown at some point, but there had been no nonsense about striding around the landscape, or people in fancy dress. Once that kind of program was defunct, Henry had dismissed the medium, insofar as serious discussion of history was concerned. Now, he found himself reconsidering. Is it not an obligation on the scholar to transmit to the widest possible audience? To enlighten as many as possible, to invite even the uninformed to consider the past, to listen to history? The more Henry thought, the more he revised his former contempt for this medium. Books and articles can address the few; a privileged number have access to the lecture and the seminar. But in a democratic society something further is required, and television has supplied this need; one had been misguided not to have realized this before, not to have made oneself available.

  Well, it was not too late. By no means. Indeed, thought Henry, the fact that he was not some young sprog in jeans and a sweater could be a positive asset. Age would lend gravitas, authority. He would not be doing the scrambling around hillsides and sprinting up ramparts, but ramparts were a dead duck by the eighteenth century, anyway; no—a wander round Blenheim, maybe, and a stroll through the grounds of Rousham, talking about the picturesque. And then of course a session in the Soane Museum, discussing the Hogarths. One would have to try to veto those dramatized sequences that were apparently de rigueur—all too easy to imagine the kind of vulgarities that would be dreamed up when it came to dramatizing a bit of Hogarth or Gillray. No, the style would be elegant, restrained, purposeful—the object, to inform and entertain. Back to Reithian principles, in fact, which seemed so often forgotten in the present climate of broadcasting. One had of course known Reith quite well, way back.

  When Rose arrived the next morning Henry was busy making notes. “Ah, Rose. Something for you to type up later—some memoranda about a new project. I’m planning to make a television series—half a dozen one-hour programs, I envisage, on aspects of the eighteenth century. One has vastly underestimated television, I’ve come to realize. Time to put that right, eh?”

  She hadn’t seen him in such a good mood for a while. She tried to assume an expression of polite enthusiasm. He hasn’t got a clue, she thought. Well, nor have I, but I’ve a pretty good idea that you don’t just decide to make a TV series and bingo! you’re off. Even if you’re his lordship.

  “I must admit that this is not a world in which I have many contacts,” said Henry. “None, indeed. One has not paid much attention to broadcasting lately. But it’s presumably just a question of having a word with some key people. Oh—and Rose, I’ve been trying to get hold of my niece but there’s always that maddening voice saying she’s not available. Could you persist, and ask her if she’ll come to lunch on Saturday?”

  Marion was finding the Harrington project a shot in the arm. The agreed budget was generous, she had a free hand, on the whole, within a general brief of “traditional, nothing too recherché but a few interesting surprises would not go amiss.” In other words, do what you like, but don’t frighten the horses. The flat was spacious, flooded with light from high windows, plenty of room for a dining-room as well as a lavish kitchen, two en suite bedrooms, huge sitting-room. The ultimate place for a picky foreign financier or diplomat.

  She wandered around amid the dust and rubble—the plumbing and electrics were going in, to her specification, and some supervision was needed. She was having to spend quite a lot of time here. Clipboard in hand, she made notes about possible color combinations, thumbed through sheafs of Farrow & Ball, broke off to have a word with the electrician. Her mobile rang and she glanced at the screen: Uncle Henry, yet again—he would have to wait.

  As would Jeremy. A missed call from him also. The Jeremy situation was a problem—though in many ways a self-inflicted one, as Marion realized. Did she want to carry on with this affair, or not? No sooner had she decided that no, she really must pull out, she must explain that honestly things weren’t going anywhere, and didn’t he agree, than she would find herself susceptible once more to that charm, that absence of guile, that rather touching vulnerability. And they would be back in the little French bistro they so liked, and back in bed.

  Marion knew that she was pretty self-sufficient, and was proud of this. Her marriage had been troubled, and eventually a burden; it was a relief to have laid it to rest, a while ago now. She had never been looking for a repeat performance. Occasional passing relationships were quite fun, and she had never wanted children. Sooner or later, she would have to make the position clear to Jeremy, but sooner kept becoming later, and after all there was no harm in coasting along like this for a while, and the man was in such a stew about the tedious Stella and his money worries.

  Her own, she felt, were on hold for the moment, thanks to George Harrington, and the flat. He had made a payment up front for the first few weeks which would tide her over nicely, and he would be topping up on a regular basis. No other client of any significance had turned up—recession still biting away, it would seem—but she need not feel too bothered about this just yet.

  The electrician was offering a mug of tea. He and the plumber had established squatters’ rights, where essentials were concerned. Both were Poles—brothers—and had come into Marion’s life when she realized that their quotes far undercut the firm with which she had previously worked. Both were amazingly quick to latch on to the latest requirements by way of uplighters and wet rooms. Their English was minimal, and consisted mainly of trade terms: polyfilla, halogen light, power shower, double socket. Their seventeen-year-old nephew, raised and schooled in Ealing, acted as interpreter. “If you have any trouble with them,” he told Marion during the briefing visit, “just call me—here’s my mobile number.” She had asked him if he planned to go into the building trade himself. He had smiled; no, the idea was a career in the City, finance of some kind.

  She sat on a box of tiles in a shaft of sunlight, drinking the tea and enjoying a moment of relaxation. One scuttled too much, had been scuttling for years, catering for the whims of rich people. For Marion’s mother, who had never worked, a busy day meant a trip to the hairdresser and lunch with a friend. And Marion would not have wanted to live like that, but even so, a bit more pure leisure would not come amiss. That was the trouble with running your own business—there were no office hours, you never really knocked off. You found yourself going over accounts after supper; you spent weekends sourcing stuff. Oh, you did it because it was what you enjoyed doing, but you were seldom able to shed the whole thing, forget about it. A business has to be driven, serviced, and if you are the sole driver and server it has you in a stranglehold. And no business, no income; no home, no food on the table.

  So a moment in the sun with a mug of tea was to be relished. She would make no phone calls, no further notes, simply sit for a while and consider whether she could splurge on a new spring outfit, given this bit of money in the bank.

  And then her mobile rang. Uncle Henry’s Rose this time. Damn. She’d have to take the call. “Yes, Rose?”

  “Half a dozen programs, I think,” said Henry. “The overall title probably The Augustan Age—quite simple. But each of them homing in on a different aspect.”

  Marion took another—small—mouthful of Corrie’s cottage p
ie. “Yes, I see.” Except that I don’t. Uncle Henry as Simon Schama? I don’t think so.

  “One will use all the prime sites, of course. Or locations—isn’t that the term? Blenheim, Chatsworth, Dr. Johnson’s house. A fascinating prospect. I will allow you to take me to a good tailor for a new suit—one must dress the part.” He laughed indulgently.

  “The thing is,” said Marion, “I just wonder if . . .”

  “I see it as thematic rather than chronological. Though one will of course try to get across the momentum of the century. An entire program on industrial developments—much as one rather dislikes the north of this country. But the canals would make a nice setting—one could be filmed talking from a narrow boat.”

  “I’m just a bit doubtful as to how . . .”

  “So where you come in, my dear, is to sort out some key person I should be getting in touch with. I’m not particularly au fait with that world, and you have so many contacts all over the place, don’t you? You are always telling me about your prominent clients.”

  Marion stared across the table at him. Challenged, it would seem. Hoist with one’s own petard, is that it? Trust Uncle Henry to put you on the spot when it suits him.

  “Well . . . actually, I’m not at all sure that I . . .”

  “Someone well established in the BBC, or the other outfit—whatever it’s called.” He waved a deprecating hand. “One of those in charge of program making. I wondered initially about going straight to the top chap at the BBC, the . . . the . . .”

  “Director-General, I think.”

  “Quite. Find out who he is and put the proposal to him—but, on second thought, it makes more sense to deal with the people who’re going to actually do the program, don’t you think? So—who do you suggest?”

  “I don’t . . .” she began. But I do, she thought. I’ve known for the last two minutes that I do.

  Henry pounced on the hesitation.

  “Yes?”

  All right. It’s not going to come to anything, in any case, and all it means is that I look a bit of an idiot, unleashing Uncle Henry with this fantasy.

  “Well, there is someone I did some work for a couple of years ago who does BBC documentary programs, I understood.”

  “Ah. Senior figure?”

  “Very, I think.”

  “Excellent. What’s his name?”

  “Her.”

  “Oh. Really?” Henry had never quite got used to women in top positions, even after Mrs. Thatcher.

  “Delia Canning,” said Marion wearily. “I’ll look up her details and phone them through to Rose.”

  She had done up a Chelsea flat for Delia Canning; all cutting-edge sophistication, she remembered. Delia Canning will think Uncle Henry a figure out of the Ark. Sorry, Delia—but you’re a smooth operator and will get him off your back in a trice.

  “Good girl,” purred Henry. “I knew you’d come up with the answer. Let’s ring for Corrie—I think she’s made us one of her jam rolls.”

  Jeremy left Marion another text: “Hope uncle lunch not too trying. Tonight? Please, please.” There was a couple hovering around the new stained glass panels; their second visit, and he needed to chat them up a bit more, point out that Edwardian stained glass butterflies are the ultimate, you can hardly ever lay hands on them. Those panels had only come in a day or two ago, and were not yet priced; he slapped on another hundred quid as he crossed the warehouse to engage the couple.

  Marion was being a bit iffy these days which was really boring of her, just when he needed all the support he could get. Mind, he had never assumed that this was forever, but he must have someone, and now was not the time to be looking around for greener grass, with the solicitor and the bank on his back. There had often been someone, over the last few years—a necessity, with Stella the way she was—but most had been passing fancies, and he’d felt Marion to be a tad more serious—more than a tad, really. So he needed her, he must keep her onside, at least until . . . well, he had no idea until what, or when.

  The solicitor’s letters crashed through the door of his flat once a week. God, how he had come to dislike that flat; he had never planned on living there, it was just to be his London pad, convenient for the warehouse, convenient for—well, some personal independence. Instead of which it was apparently now his home—an abuse of the term. Home was the dear old Surrey farmhouse, with all its attractive things—Stella could do a place up nicely, you had to hand her that—and supper ready when he got in at night, and the girls all welcoming and amusing, and Stella affectionate and attentive and not in one of her states.

  The solicitor’s letters received cursory treatment. Jeremy would skim through the demands, then write a petulant and noncommittal response, the subtext of which was a further plea to Stella for direct contact: “Kindly convey to my wife . . .”

  And not only did the bank refuse to consider a further business loan but they were getting shirty about the payments on the previous one. Well, stuff them. Jeremy had been fending off banks for the last twenty years and he knew how to do it. So far, anyway. Something would turn up—he’d find some gem and make a killing, or at least a small stash. He’d sort the bank out, one way or another. Eventually, surely, Stella would see sense and sack that bloody man and life would get back to normal, or as normal as it had ever been—one had never wanted a bog standard, nine-to-five existence.

  Jeremy had never believed in planning life. It’s nerds who plan and structure—the sort of people who go for the sort of job interview that says: “Where do you see yourself in five years’ time?” And of course they see themselves as a few rungs up the ladder, smug. Boring, boring. Far more interesting to take what comes, make what you can of it, veer off course if that looks like a good idea. Way back, he’d gone to university, to please his parents, but was soon tearing his hair out at the tedium of lectures and seminars; as for exams—forget it. He dropped out, or rather, slid off, and eventually admitted to his parents that actually he was going great guns with a market stall in the small town near the university campus; soap and cosmetics and stuff that you bought cheap in bulk and then sold for twice as much—magic! A guy in a pub told him how to do it and after a couple of weeks he was hooked. But he got tired of that in time, and then the mirror gave him a better idea—the old mirror he picked out of a skip and sold to his landlady for a fiver.

  Skips did him proud for a couple of years. It’s amazing what you find. One person’s rubbish is exactly what someone else has been wanting. All that’s needed is the middle man—the man with the van, and the yard on the outskirts of town: Jeremy. His granny died—bless her—and left him ten grand, so there was the van sorted and the down payment on the yard. He called it Jeremy’s Place—big quirky painted sign alongside the main road, and an ad in the local paper every week. He teamed up with a guy who was good at restoring furniture—the table with a leg missing, the chest that just needed a coat of paint—and who could help heave the lengths of wood. They had timber by the ton—spewed out of one house by builders, snapped up from Jeremy by some more impecunious do-it-yourself home owner. He was a conduit—through him, those with too much subsidized those who did not have enough, and in the process provided Jeremy with some cash.

  He discovered that his own personality was an asset. People expect a junk yard to be run by some dubious character in a greasy T-shirt. Not by Jeremy, with his nice public school voice (Mummy and Daddy paid a wad for that) and his manners and his jokes and his helpfulness: “I’ll drop it over to you in the van—no problem.”

  And so it all began. Jeremy’s Place is a long while back—he outgrew it, saw possibilities that were far more enticing, more productive. And had learned by then that the golden rule is never to plan. Something will turn up—dear old Granny chose a most tactful moment to kick the bucket, Jeremy did that nifty deal with the people demolishing a hotel—one thing enables another, if you seize the moment.

  He’d had to get hi
mself better informed. Once you’re into the more fancy stuff you need to be able to talk it up, to know your Georgian from your Victorian. Actually, he’d come to enjoy that. Book work in the service of exams had been punitive; book work in the interests of commerce was at first stimulating and then rewarding in itself. He found that he liked to find out, to check, to look up; he acquired quite a library on furniture, ceramics, stained glass, metalwork. When something remarkable came his way he would recognize it.

  He did. From time to time there was a windfall—the lovely Spode piece in a box of rubbish, the murky old screen that when cleaned up turned out to be an early eighteenth-century treasure. He found out how to dispose of such things—where to get a decent price. Good fun—negotiating with the big boys, the pukka antique specialists, who thought they could take a novice for a ride, and then found they couldn’t.

  The pleasure of this game, for Jeremy, was its unpredictability. All right, you never knew from one month to the next what you’d be pulling in, but except for the occasional crisis period there had always been enough, and every now and then a positive surplus. In crisis periods you crossed your fingers, kept cool, and told Stella to stop fussing; in a surplus situation you moved Stella and the kids into a better house, bought a nice car, or took a business risk on Bickston Manor—and yes, that went off the rails but we all make mistakes.