“What if they were both talking on the phone?”
“Excuse me. Mr. Halliday?”
“It’s too weak. I want a picture that tells a story. Dirty hands time, remember? Look, you’d better throw maintenance out of his space if he’s not using it.”
“They’ll strike, like last time. All the terminals went down.”
“Fine. Your choice, Tony. Five hundred pounds or the terminals.”
“I’ll ask someone from the picture desk to pop up and—”
“Don’t bother. Just send the guy to Middlesborough.”
“Mr. Halliday? Are you Mr. Vernon Halliday?”
“Who are you?”
The talking group came to a halt, and a thin, balding man in a black suit whose jacket was tightly but toned pushed his way forward and tapped Vernon on the elbow with an envelope, which he put into Vernon’s hands. Then the man planted his feet well apart and read in a declamatory monotone from a sheet of paper that he held in front of him with two hands. “By the power of the above-headed court in the Principal Registry invested in me, I make known to you, Vernon Theobald Halliday, the order of said court as follows: that Vernon Theobald Halliday, of thirteen, The Rooks, London NW1 and editor of the Judge newspaper, shall not publish, nor cause to have published, nor distribute or disseminate by electronic or any other means, nor describe in print, or cause such descriptions of the proscribed matter hereafter to be referred to as the material, to be printed, nor describe the nature and terms of this order; the aforesaid material being …”
The thin man fumbled the page turn, and the editor, his secretary, the home editor, the deputy foreign editor, and the managing director inclined toward the tipstaff, waiting.
“… all photographic reproductions, or versions of such reproductions whether engraved, drawn, painted, or produced by any other means, of the likeness of Mr. John Julian Garmony of number one, Carlton Gardens …”
“Garmony!”
Everyone began talking at once, and the final rhetorical flourishes of the thin man in the suit two sizes too small were lost. Vernon set off toward his office. These were blanket provisions. But they had nothing on Garmony, nothing at all. He reached his office, kicked the door shut behind him, and dialed.
“George. These photographs are of Garmony.”
“I’m saying nothing until you get here.”
“He’s already served an injunction.”
“I told you they were hot. I think your public-interest arguments will be irresistible.”
As soon as Vernon hung up, his private line rang. It was Clive Linley. Vernon hadn’t seen him since the funeral.
“I need to talk to you about something.”
“Clive, this isn’t really the best moment for me.”
“No, quite. I need to see you. It’s important. What about after work tonight?”
There was a heaviness in his old friend’s tone that made Vernon reluctant to put him off. All the same, he tried halfheartedly.
“It’s rather a hectic day …”
“It won’t take long. It’s important, really important.”
“Well, look, I’m seeing George Lane tonight. I suppose I could call in on my way.”
“Vernon, I’m very grateful to you.”
He had a few seconds after the call to wonder about Clive’s manner. So pressing in a lugubrious way, and rather formal. Clearly something terrible had happened, and he began to feel embarrassed by his ungenerous response. Clive had been a true friend when Vernon’s second marriage came apart, and he had encouraged him to go for the editorship when everybody else thought he was wasting his time. Four years ago, when Vernon was laid up with a rare viral infection of the spine, Clive had visited almost every day, bringing books, music, videos, and champagne. And in 1987, when Vernon was out of a job for several months, Clive had lent him ten thousand pounds. Two years later, Vernon discovered by accident that Clive had borrowed the money from his bank. And now, in his friend’s moment of need, Vernon was behaving like a swine.
When he tried to call back there was no reply. He was about to dial again when the managing director came in with the newspaper’s lawyer.
“You’ve got something on Garmony you didn’t tell us about.”
“Absolutely not, Tony. Obviously, something’s floating around and he’s panicked. Someone should check if he’s served on any of the others.”
The lawyer said, “We have. He hasn’t.”
Tony was looking distrustful. “And you know nothing?”
“Not a thing. Bolt from the blue.”
There were more suspicious questions of this sort and more denials from Vernon.
As they were leaving, Tony said, “You won’t do anything without us, now, will you, Vernon?”
“You know me,” he said, and winked. As soon as the two had gone he reached for the phone. He was just beginning on Clive’s number when he heard a commotion in the outer office. His door was kicked open and a woman came running in, followed by Jean, who rolled her eyes heavenward for the editor’s benefit. The woman stood in front of his desk, weeping. In her hand was a crumpled letter. It was the dyslexic sub. It was hard to make sense of everything she was saying, but Vernon could discern one repeated line.
“You said you’d stand by me. You promised!”
He could not know it then, but the moment before she entered his room was the last occasion he would be alone until he left the building at nine-thirty that evening.
iii
Molly used to say that what she loved most about Clive’s house was that he had lived in it so long. In 1970, when most of his contemporaries were still in rented rooms and several years away from buying their first damp basement flats, Clive inherited from a rich and childless uncle a gigantic stuccoed villa with a purpose-built two-story artist’s studio on the third and fourth floors whose vast arched windows faced north over a mess of pitched roofs. In keeping with the times and his youth—he was twenty-one—he had the outside painted purple and filled the inside with his friends, mostly musicians. Certain celebrities passed through. John Lennon and Yoko Ono spent a week there. Jimi Hendrix stayed a night, and was the likely cause of a fire that destroyed the banisters. As the decade progressed, the house calmed down. Friends still stayed over, but only for a night or two, and no one slept on the floor. The stucco was restored to cream, Vernon was a lodger for a year, Molly stayed for a summer, a grand piano was carried up to the studio, bookshelves were built, oriental rugs were laid over worn-out carpets, and various pieces of Victorian furniture were carried in. Apart from a few old mattresses, very little was ever carried out, and this must have been what Molly liked, for the house was a history of an adult life, of changing tastes, fading passions, and growing wealth. The earliest Woolworth’s cutlery was still in the same kitchen drawer as the antique silver set. Oil paintings by English and Danish impressionists hung in proximity to faded posters advertising Clive’s early triumphs or famous rock concerts—the Beatles at Shea Stadium, Bob Dylan on the Isle of Wight, the Rolling Stones at Altamont. Some of the posters were worth more than the paintings.
By the early eighties this was the home of a youngish, wealthy composer—by then he had written the music for Dave Spieler’s hit movie, Christmas on the Moon—and a certain dignity (so Clive considered in his better moments) seemed to fall from the gloomy high ceilings onto the huge lumpy sofas and all the stuff, not quite junk, not quite antique, that had been bought in Lots Road. The impression of seriousness was furthered when an energetic housekeeper started to keep order. The not-quite-junk was dusted or polished and began to look antique. The last of the lodgers departed and the silence in the house was workmanlike. Over several years Clive seemed to race through two childless marriages relatively unscathed. The three women he had known closely lived abroad. The one he was with now, Susie Marcellan, was in New York, and when she came over it was never for very long. The years and all the successes had narrowed his life to its higher purpose; he was becoming not q
uite zealous, but cagey, about his privacy. Profile writers and photographers were never invited in these days, and the time had long passed when Clive snatched hours between friends or lovers or parties to write a sudden daring opening, or even a complete song. The open house was no more.
But Vernon still took pleasure in his visits, for he had done a lot of his own growing up here and had only fond memories of girlfriends, hilarious evenings with various drugs, and working through the nights in a small bedroom at the rear of the house. Back in the days of typewriters and carbon copies. Even now, as he left his taxi and mounted the steps to the front door, he experienced again, though only vestigially, a sensation he never had these days, of genuine anticipation, the feeling that anything might happen.
When Clive opened the door, Vernon saw no immediate signs of distress or crisis. The two friends embraced in the hall.
“There’s champagne in the fridge.”
Clive fetched the bottle and two glasses, and Vernon followed him up the stairs. The house had a closeted atmosphere, and he guessed that Clive had not been out for a day or two. A half-open door revealed the bedroom to be in a mess. Clive sometimes asked the housekeeper not to come in when he was working hard. The state of the studio confirmed the impression. Manuscript paper covered the floor; dirty plates, cups, and wineglasses were strewn around the piano and the keyboard and MIDI computer on which Clive sometimes worked out his orchestrations. The air felt close and damp, as though it had been breathed many times. “Sorry about the mess.”
Together they cleared books and papers off the armchairs, then sat with their champagne and small talk. Clive told Vernon about his encounter with Garmony at Molly’s funeral.
“The foreign secretary actually said ’fuck off’?” Vernon asked. “We could have used that in the paper.”
“Quite. I’m trying to keep out of everyone’s way.”
Since they were on Garmony, Vernon gave an account of his two conversations that morning with George Lane. It was just the kind of story to appeal to Clive, but he showed no curiosity about the photographs and the injunction and seemed to be only half listening. He was on his feet as soon as the story was over. He refilled their glasses. The silence that announced the change of subject was heavy. Clive set down his glass and went to the far end of the studio, then paced back, gently massaging the palm of his left hand.
“I’ve been thinking about Molly,” he said at last. “The way she died, the speed of it, her helplessness, how she wouldn’t have wanted it that way. Stuff we’ve talked about before.”
He paused. Vernon drank and waited.
“Well, the thing is this. I’ve had my own little scare lately …” He raised his voice to forestall Vernon’s concern. “Probably nothing. You know, the sort of thing that gives you the sweats at night and by daylight seems like stupidity. That’s not what I want to talk about. It’s almost certainly nothing, but there’s nothing lost by what I’m going to ask you. Just supposing I did get ill in a major way, like Molly, and I started to go downhill and make terrible mistakes—you know, errors of judgment, not knowing the names of things or who I was, that kind of thing. I’d like to know there was someone who’d help me to finish it … I mean, help me to die. Especially if I got to the point where I couldn’t make the decision for myself, or act on it. So what I’m saying is this. I’m asking you, as my oldest friend, to help me if it ever got to the point where you could see that it was the right thing. Just as we might have helped Molly if we’d been able …”
Clive trailed away, a little disconcerted by Vernon, who stared at him with his glass raised, as though frozen in the act of drinking. Clive cleared his throat noisily.
“It’s an odd thing to ask, I know. It’s also illegal in this country, and I wouldn’t want you to put yourself on the wrong side of the law, assuming, of course, you were to say yes. But there are ways, and there are places, and if it came to it, I’d want you to get me there on a plane. It’s a heavy responsibility, something I could only ask of a close friend like yourself. All I can say is that I’m not in a state of panic or anything. I have given it a lot of thought.”
Then, because Vernon still sat in silence, staring, he added with some embarrassment, “Well, there it is.”
Vernon set down his glass and scratched his head, and then stood.
“You don’t want to talk about this scare you’ve had?”
“Absolutely not.”
Vernon glanced at his watch. He was late for George. He said, “Well, look, it’s quite a thing you’re asking me. It needs some thought.”
Clive nodded. Vernon moved toward the door and led the way down the stairs. In the hallway they embraced again. Clive opened the door, and Vernon stepped out into the night.
“I’ll need to think about it.”
“Quite so. Thanks for coming.”
Both men accepted that the nature of the request, its intimacy and self-conscious reflection on their friendship, had created, for the moment, an uncomfortable emotional proximity, which was best dealt with by their parting without another word, Vernon walking quickly up the street in search of a taxi and Clive going back up the stairs to his piano.
iv
Lane himself opened the door of his Holland Park mansion.
“You’re late.”
Vernon, who assumed that George was trying on the part of press lord summoning his editor, declined to apologize or even reply and followed his host across a bright hallway into the living room. Fortunately, there was nothing here to remind Vernon of Molly. The room was furnished in what he had once heard her describe as the Buckingham Palace style: thick mustard-yellow carpets, big dusty-pink sofas and armchairs with raised patterns of vines and scrolls, brown oil paintings of racehorses at grass and reproduction Fragonards of bucolic ladies on swings in immense gilt frames, and the whole opulent emptiness overlit by lacquered brass lamps. George reached the massive brecciated marble surround of the coal-effect gas fire and turned.
“You’ll take a glass of port?”
Vernon realized that he had had nothing to eat since a cheese and lettuce sandwich at lunchtime. Why else would George’s pretentious construction have made him feel so irritable? And what was George doing wearing a silk dressing gown over his day clothes? The man was simply preposterous. “Thanks. I will.”
They sat almost twenty feet apart, with the hissing fireplace between them. Had he been alone for half a minute, Vernon thought, he might have crawled over to the fender and knocked the right side of his head on it. Even in company now, he did not feel right.
“I’ve seen the circulation figures,” George said gravely. “Not good.”
“The rate of decline is slowing,” was Vernon’s automatic response, his mantra.
“But it’s still a decline.”
“These things take time to turn around.” Vernon tasted his port and protected himself with the recollection that George owned a mere one and a half percent of the Judge and knew nothing about the business. It was also useful to remember that his fortune, his publishing “empire,” was rooted in an energetic exploitation of the weak-headed: hidden numerical codes in the Bible foretold the future, the Incas hailed from outer space, the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant, the Second Coming, the Third Eye, the Seventh Seal, Hitler was alive and well in Peru. It was not easy to be lectured by George on the ways of the world.
“It seems to me,” he was saying, “that what you need now is one big story, something that’ll catch fire, something your opponents will have to run with just to keep up.”
What was needed for the circulation to stop going down was for the circulation to go up. But Vernon kept a neutral expression, for he knew that George was working his way around to the photographs.
Vernon tried to speed him up. “We’ve got a good story on Friday about a pair of Siamese twins in local government …”
“Pah!”
It worked. George was suddenly on his feet.
“That’s not a story, Vernon.
That’s tittle-tattle. I’ll show you a story. I’ll show you why Julian Garmony is running round the Inns of Court with his thumb up his arse! Come with me.”
They went back down the hall, past the kitchen, and along a narrower corridor that ended in a door, which George opened with a Yale key. Part of the complicated arrangement of his marriage had been that Molly kept herself, her guests, and her stuff separate in a wing of the house. She was spared the sight of her old friends stifling their amusement at George’s pomposity, and he escaped the tidal waves of Molly’s disorder engulfing the rooms of the house used for entertaining. Vernon had visited Molly’s apartment many times, but he had always used the external entrance. Now, as George pushed the door open, Vernon tensed. He felt unprepared. He would have preferred to look at the photographs in George’s part of the house.
In the semidarkness, during the seconds it took George to fumble for the light switch, Vernon experienced for the first time the proper impact of Molly’s death—the plain fact of her absence. The recognition was brought on by familiar smells that he had already started to forget—her perfume, her cigarettes, the dried flowers she kept in the bedroom, coffee beans, the bakery warmth of laundered clothes. He had talked about her at length, and he had thought of her too, but only in snatches during his crowded working days, or while drifting into sleep, and until now he had never really missed her in his heart, or felt the insult of knowing he would never see or hear her again. She was his friend, perhaps the best he had ever had, and she had gone. He could easily have made a fool of himself in front of George, whose outline was blurring even now. This particular kind of desolation, a painful constriction right behind his face, above the roof of his mouth, he hadn’t known since childhood, since prep school. Homesick for Molly. He concealed a gasp of self-pity behind a loud adult cough.
The place was exactly as she had left it the day she finally consented to move to a bedroom in the main house, to be imprisoned and nursed by George. As they passed the bathroom, Vernon glimpsed a skirt of hers he remembered, draped over the towel rail, and a towel and a bra lying on the floor. Over a quarter of a century ago she and Vernon had made a household for almost a year, in a tiny rooftop flat on the rue de Seine. There were always damp towels on the floor then, and cataracts of her underwear tumbling from the drawers she never closed, a big ironing board that was never folded away, and in the one overfilled wardrobe dresses, crushed and shouldering sideways like commuters on the mÉtro. Magazines, makeup, bank statements, bead necklaces, flowers, knickers, ashtrays, invitations, tampons, LPs, airplane tickets, high-heeled shoes—not a single surface was left uncovered by something of Molly’s, so that when Vernon was meant to be working at home, he took to writing in a cafÉ along the street. And yet each morning she arose fresh from the shell of this girly squalor, like a Botticelli Venus, to present herself, not naked, of course, but sleekly groomed, at the offices of Paris Vogue.