Lane-Hinkton said, ‘But she hasn’t a down on you, Martin, because of your possible unwillingness to give us insider glimpses. She understands that you possibly don’t wish to spy – to turn informant. Perhaps you consider that kind of thing contemptible. Regardless, she would like you to sit in along with myself when she sees Lawford. This will be what’s known in our splendidly astute bureaucracy as a “Preparatory Parameters Survey (U)” the U standing not for Upper Class as usual in terms like “non-U”, meaning prole, but for “Unminuted”.
‘The natty convention is that the two main, official figures – here, Geraldine Fallows and Lawford Chote – confer directly, armchair to armchair, or across a desk. But, so as to establish the meeting’s informality and casual nature, two other people should be present, each linked to one of these chief participants, though having no designated connection with the topic or topics discussed; in this case, you, Martin, and myself. You’re an academic, not an administrator, more interested in Pinter than in policy; and I am only a sort of Premier League office boy and gofer at Universities Finance Centre. The essential nobodies – that’s us. But we are both allowed to join discussions – are not mere clerkly background, on call with appropriate stats and bottled water. In fact we are required to join in. However, the meeting or meetings has, have, no executive power because of our non-executive role in it, them. By contributing we invalidate. Think of the crazy, impregnable logic in Joseph Heller’s famous novel, Catch 22. The rules and conventions for these “unminuted” sessionss are not quite up to that mad standard, but let’s say they form a Catch Twenty-One-And-A-Half. The reasoning Byzantine but almost flawless. A meeting of this sort might not get known about except to those involved. But even if it does, never mind, because such get-togethers can be passed off as simply idle chin-wagging with no binding outcomes, full of sound and hooey, signifying nothing much.
‘Geraldine is especially agitated by the closing Jurbb thought, Mart.’ Neddy spoke at his accustomed slow pace and Martin tried to guess which side of the mouth the talk was coming from. Mart thought that if he could get another hearing of a multi-syllabled word like ‘agitated’ he might be able to diagnose the left or right source. It wasn’t vital to know, but would help Mart keep Neddy’s jolly type of face in his mind, bringing some lightness to a fairly clunking conversation so far.
‘Did you say “agitated”, Neddy?’ he asked
‘Yes, agitated.’
Mart found he could visualize this word laid out like a patient etherized upon a table and, looking hard at it, as a surgeon might, felt it was most probably from Neddy’s lips angled for ouput from the left. This verdict was instinct only. Mart realized that. He couldn’t have pointed to any evidence, but he would have bet a bundle it was left. It came to him as a kind of revelation.
‘Charisma, Mart,’ Neddy said. ‘The sort of pay-off for the review, a conclusive thumbs up.’
‘Charisma is mentioned, at the end, yes.’
‘What especially troubles Geraldine and probably persuaded her to decide on a personal trip to Sedge and Lawford, is the yoking together of Sedge and Chote’s charismas, or should it be charismae?’
‘Yoking?’
‘I have the final sentence in front of me, Mart. “Although Sedge and Lawford Chote are perilously short of cash they still have charisma.”’
‘Yes, that’s the last line.’
‘I think you’ll see why this would disturb Geraldine. Perhaps, in fact, it’s already troubled you.’
‘In which respect, Ned?’
‘You don’t see it?’
‘See what?’
‘The identification charisma-wise of Sedge and Chote.’
‘Identification?’
‘The marriage – the assumption as Geraldine sees it, and as I’m inclined to see it myself, I admit … yes, the assumption seems to be that they are interdependent for charisma – if one of them has it then the other must, too. Now, Mart, Sedge obviously does have charisma. It is a university 100 years old which, although by comparison with Oxbridge or the Sorbonne might seem trivial, is not trivial for provincial, red-brick and breeze-block places.
‘And Sedge has alumni in distinguished posts right across the main professions, in business and the creative arts. True, Charter Mill has an international goalkeeper among its most successful former students, who’s probably earning more than any Sedge graduate – and three times more than the Charter Mill principal’s and senior academics’ combined salaries. But we are not talking loot here, are we, Mart? We are not talking goalkeepers. We are talking intellectual renown earned over the decades. We are talking genuine charisma. The danger, as Geraldine views it, and I don’t disagree, is that Lawford, being of the awkwardly indomitable, egomaniac kind we know him to be, will decide that if Sedge has charisma, the principal running Sedge at present, i.e., Lawf, must also have charisma. Geraldine fears, and I share this apprehension, she fears that Chote, on reading O.T.O. Jurbb, will deduce that all he has to do is carry on as ever in his job because the way he conducts this has brought him charisma and will continue doing so after a few local difficulties about money and debt have been dealt with and forgotten, just as the inept cymbals interlude will be. He’s not going to kowtow to accountants and their talk of black holes in the Sedge account books. His view is that charisma will cancel all those piddling anxieties.’
‘“Tax not the royal saint with vain expense”,’ Mart said.
‘“High-heaven rejects the lore/Of nicely calculated less or more”,’ Neddy replied. ‘But there’s another aspect to it.’
‘I did wonder.’
‘It could be that some harsh things will be said at this meeting and some harsh decisions confirmed. Although Geraldine can be very understanding and sweet-tempered, clearly she isn’t coming on a crisis trip from London by train just to dispense understanding and sweet-temper. It’s true she sees my expenses sheets, of course, so is aware of our pleasant, refreshing snack at The Lock Gate, and might feel it worth a visit. She wanted to know if it was up to snuff – can’t believe any eatery outside London is a goer – and I naturally referred to the black-pudding hash. But I don’t think this, on its own, accounts for her determination to travel. For all I know, Mart, she isn’t into black-pudding hash. She didn’t indicate one way or t’other.
‘In any case, she’ll probably want to lunch in the Sedge staff dining room. She’s heard of the lavish upgrading and might feel a duty to look at it and the deluxe carpeted approach. No, the black-pudding hash is probably not a motivator. She has a well-defined, serious purpose. This is why I spoke of possible harshness arising. The meeting will begin, most likely, in a very civilised, even amiable, style. In fact, Geraldine would see this as essential. It ties in, Mart, with another reason for wanting you present. If matters reach an abusive, end-of-the-fucking-road, ultimatum stage, Ger will require someone present who can report to the rest of the Sedge staff that Lawford was given every consideration and kindness from the outset but would offer no concessions, no decent response; behaved, in fact, as if he were in a morality play representing the quality of pig-headedness. She wants head-to-head contact but not with a pig.
‘This is where you’ll be invaluable, Mart. Colleagues know that you and Lawford are friends, and if you have to admit he behaved in a negative, blatantly uncooperative style they will accept this as almost certainly a fair and honest judgement. Geraldine or myself might be suspected of bias. She has to keep in mind that even when the Sedge situation has finally settled she will still need workable relations with Sedge and all of Britain’s universities, never mind what shape Sedge emerges in after these troubles. She will not want to be regarded as a bureaucratic bully. Such a reputation would spread far and fast. It might appear that having kicked her way through what is known as the glass ceiling, hindering women from reaching a major job, she’d developed the kicking habit and had given some toecap to Lawford when he was down – though Lawford would never have admitted he was down, of course. D
own is not his habitat.’
‘You spoke of an ultimatum, Neddy,’ Martin said.
‘Oh, yes, there could be an ultimatum.’
‘Of what nature?’
‘Geraldine is sure to bring documents already part prepared, in case. She wouldn’t necessarily produce them. She probably wouldn’t want to produce them. She’d prefer another route. But that route might not be open. It would be a matter of judgement at the time.’
‘Documents for what?’
‘We’re talking aide memoires.’
‘Are we?’
‘This is one of the things about Geraldine – preparedness: she’s famed for it. Geraldine could have mentored Lord Baden-Powell, founder of the scout movement with its motto, “Be prepared”,’ Neddy replied. ‘I’ve had her a few times as you’d expect and she makes all the arrangements – no possibility of discovery and interruption; champagne, vintage brut from an ice box; cork double-thumbed out by her in one explosive, decisive move and jetting off to some safe corner of the room or car or garden shed; the wine poured at exactly the right angle into the flutes, preserving the liveliness, but with no wasteful and messy bubbling over the sides and perhaps chillingly on to her body; biting only in areas normally hidden by garments; the cork recovered afterwards by Ger and disposed of in a public waste bin with the bottle and any of its paper-bag shreds so as to leave no evidence of a high-jinks, multi-cum occasion.’
‘Preparedness to do with the ultimatum?’ Martin replied.
‘The documents ready for close interrogation if utilized. Not for signature yet, obviously. No signed agreements can come out of a Preparatory Parameters Survey (U), because the meeting has no power or acknowledged status: might not even be known about generally. It is irrevocably (U). The procedure she’d be hoping for is discussion involving all four parties – herself, Chote, you, me; verbal agreement on the required major points; agreement, also, on the date of a formal, officially diaried meeting; signatures, then; minutes then. No invitation for us this time because our presence in an apparently policy-making session would disqualify its proceedings and render the signatures worthless.’
‘Agreement on what, Ned?’
‘The terms would have been set out in the aide memoire I mentioned, but need not be referred to, let alone shown, if the parties at the (U) settle everything by conversation and handshakes. The pattern for this would be each of us shakes hands with the other three, although, technically, the handshakes you and I provide would add up to bugger-all, especially as one of the handshakes would be between you and me, who have utterly no rank, and so whose handshake rates as bugger-all squared. The handshake between Lawford and Geraldine would also amount to bugger-all at that stage since the meeting had no standing because you and I were there, Mart.
‘However, the Lawford–Geraldine handshake will – if it happens – be of a promissory kind, resting on the honour of the two. She’d be entirely willing to accept this commitment from Chote, although unbacked by paperwork at that juncture. I’ve heard Geraldine call him by all kinds of abusive, filthy and blasphemous terms, but I have also heard her pronounce him straight – straight in the sense of undevious and trustworthy, not anything to do with sexuality.’
‘But what would she and he be shaking hands about, Neddy? What would the aide memoire, if ever brought forward, aid them to remember?’ Mart replied.
‘I don’t think this sounds anti-woman, but to treat a handshake as something more or less sacred we would normally take as being between males, I believe, wouldn’t you say so, Mart? But for Geraldine, who has kicked her way through the glass ceiling, this, in a heartening way, seems to free up her hands as well as her feet so she can get in on the shake procedure, as if it were absolutely normal for females. But she certainly remains all woman, Mart. I can assure you she won’t black mark you for seeming to be very much of Chote’s inner gang. Are you keen on brut champagne at all? I can’t recall what we sipped at The Lock Gate.’
‘You ought to keep an aide memoire, Neddy.’
‘And the biting, although forceful, is nicely controlled to draw no blood; perhaps more a suck with tooth backing rather than an authentic bite,’ Lane-Hinkton said. ‘The redness soon fades but, obviously, for a day or two you have to be careful when undressing at home or with someone else. This is only standard decent manners.’
TWENTY-FIVE
1987
‘Thank you, thank you, thank you!’ Victor Tane yelled. He waved graciously to the crowd of spectators lining the pavement. It was the kind of wave he’d seen performed by a Caesar to the masses in a film on TV lately, probably Ben-Hur. The imperiousness of it didn’t quite fit in with all the thank yous. Caesars wouldn’t lavish gratitude on their subjects. But Tane wasn’t a Caesar and thought he’d better go half-and-half: part grand and aloof, part affable and populist.
Although skinny, he had a big, refined voice, the sort of voice you might hear if the colonel himself were commanding a Coldstream guard of honour for some visiting head of state. A jazz band banged brassily away fairly near in the procession but Victor could be heard above it. He was standing on the back of a slow-moving, open lorry. ‘Thank you for supporting our charities,’ he shouted. Students in a range of comic costumes and masks – Bo-Peep, Red Riding Hood, Cruella de Vil, Micky Mouse, Oliver Hardy with a padded stomach, small moustache, braces, black bowler – they moved among the bystanders with collecting boxes. ‘Give, give, give!’ Tane bellowed. ‘It’s Bounty Week.’
‘Yes, folk, be generous. Dig deep,’ Bernard Optor shouted. He had a big voice, too, and was built for it. He’d have had plenty of practice, cursing referees or his defensive backs for mistakes that left him exposed. He was alongside Tane, wearing the usual kit when in goal for his club or country: navy woollen bobble hat, polo-necked green sweater, brown woollen mittens, navy shorts, football boots. Behind him, reduced size imitation goal posts with netting had been rigged up on the lorry. His bulk would have made it more or less impossible to get a ball past him into that net.
Tane himself had on a yellow-and-black striped football shirt. Ursula said it made him look like a tall wasp. He wore also a blue ski hat, black shorts and red-and-white trainers. He was a good deal over six feet in height, slight and gawky, bordering on the wispy. He’d known he wasn’t at his best in sports gear, or any gear involving shorts, but Optor had phoned a while ago to say he’d thought of a way to help Tane and Charter Mill, and Victor had agreed to his scheme. His scheme required shorts.
Tane’s acceptance of the plan was in some sense posthumous kow-towing to his mother, her orders unspoken and, in fact, non-existent, of course, but envisaged as very true to her character, if only she’d been alive: ‘Victor, cherish, heed and obey this glorious goalkeeper.’ From his days as an undergraduate at Charter, Optor apparently remembered the traditional Bounty Week, when the two universities put on a combined carnival parade through the city centre to raise money for a handful of charities. Optor had said, ‘We’ll do a footy theme for one of the lorries, eh, Principal? But I suppose I can call you Victor now, or even Vic, after so many years and since we’re buddies, but it does feel cheeky.’ Optor explained the ins and outs of the project and said he’d ‘pop over’ from Spain to take part.
He’d told Tane his agent, Loriner Vone, was vastly enthusiastic about it. Vone had said that such a pure, unmaterialistic labour of love carefully publicized was worth its weight in pounds sterling or the equivalent in pesetas, i.e., numerically a lot more. He didn’t think he’d ever come across a smarter PR gambit. Not just the local media would be interested but national, too – the great Bernard Optor journeying back to his alma mater on a good, utterly selfless mission; loyalty of a magnificently high order. Vone considered this was the kind of generous gesture guaranteed to help improve the general reputation and image of professional soccer. It would consolidate the link with the game’s fans, help build a fine relationship with them, almost certainly pushing up attendances. In particular, this example of t
he ‘sweeter’ and ‘more wholesome’ aspect of players’ behaviour off the pitch might encourage more women to support the game. The extra following for Optor and his club would, naturally, be reflected in fatter transfer fees if he moved in the future. Although Optor played for a Spanish team the favourable impact of his Bounty Week contribution would certainly reach the media there as well as throughout the UK and pile more value on to Bernie.
Charter Mill would not be called on to pay any of the costs for Optor’s travel, accommodation and other expenses, Optor told Tane. Vone had explained to Bernie that such outlay could be set against tax because the benevolent, spontaneous gesture by him in supporting Charter Mill would be very germane, if not essential, to developing his celebrity profile as not just a soccer star but a citizen who cared in a positive, practical, deep style about the community. He wasn’t someone who simply stood between the sticks blocking or fisting out balls. He shone with responsibility in the widest of contexts. Loriner had said this could be deftly yet sensitively utilized.
Bernie told Tane that Loriner Vone believed the ‘community concept’ was an infallible switch-on for the media, national and local, and the kind of coverage Optor would get was sure to be a plus, both for himself and ‘the education place in question’. And for the charities. People in Whitehall would be impressed by Optor’s obvious splendidly strong bond with the past ‘education place in question’ because it proved that this ‘education place in question’ was brilliant. Optor had said he might be able to bring one or two other famous footballers with him to boost the lorry’s cast.