Martin Harbottle's Appreciation of Time (33 page)

You should see it, Martin. You should be here. (Or better, you should be there.) It would appear that Sauron Flesh Harrower has become some kind of online king – complete with his own online harem. And back in the real world, on this freezing train in the freezing night, crawling through the suburbs near Slough, he’s loving it. He’s sitting there in his pin-stripe suit, collar undone, middle-aged spread spilling out around the edges, staring at the screen on his lap with a permanent grin, fingers typing frenetically.

And, well, good luck to him, I guess. Whatever gets you through the day. Part of me wishes I could see the conversation he’s having with these women, and part of me is rather glad I can’t. I’m sure you can imagine what’s going on.

Anyway. I’ve got my own weirdness to deal with. Because it’s been a mixed day.

I called Beth’s mum’s house this morning. I didn’t speak to Beth. Her mum answered the phone, said she was in the shower but she could fetch her if I wanted? I said not to bother, not yet… but I wouldn’t mind a word with Sylvie.

So she put the little one on the phone. My daughter. My baby daughter. My one-year-old baby daughter Sylvie. One today.

Did I not mention that before? It’s her birthday, Martin. She’s been around for exactly one year. What a year it’s been. When I think back to this time last year, when I cast my mind back to how things were exactly 12 months ago… in the delivery suite, staring at my wife, my amazing wife who’d just done this most amazing thing; staring at my daughter, my amazing daughter, so whole, so complete, so wholly, completely perfect, so total in her total potential… when I think of what I was thinking one year ago today, I…

Actually, you know what? I’m not going to think about that. I don’t want to think about that. I don’t want to write to you about that. I don’t want to lose it in front of Sauron Flesh Harrower, of all people.

So anyway. Today is Sylvie’s birthday. And I talked to her on the phone. She said ‘Dadda’, with only a little prompting from her grandma. She said ‘Want Dadda’ with a little more. She said ‘Wubb you, Dadda’ with no prompting at all. And then she started crying. And then as my mother-in-law came back on the phone to reassure me that she was fine and that my card and my present had arrived on time, I hung up, because I didn’t want her to hear me crying – and besides, I was nearing work and I didn’t want the news crews and the protestors to have the satisfaction of seeing me walk past without my head held high and a defiant look in my eye. Entering the building in tears, right now, could send out the wrong message.

That’s how my day started. And then it got worse. (That was the good bit, Martin. That was the good bit of the ‘mixed’ bit. It was all downhill from then on in.)

I got a tip today. A proper tip. My first good new story in ages. Phoned in, to my mobile (my home mobile, not my work mobile, not the one the police could confiscate at any time, not the one they’re no doubt monitoring daily). From an impeccable source. An impeccable source who’s also a criminal, but still. He’s a useful guy to know – given his connections. He works for a firm providing ‘security’ in south-east London, and although I don’t hear from him often and he doesn’t come cheap, when I do it’s usually worth it.

Today it was worth it. He had a doozy. A belter. He had proper hold-the-front-page stuff. A girl he knew – or rather, and to be strictly accurate, the daughter of someone for whom he provides security – was in hospital. She’d refused an offer. She refused all offers. She didn’t want a place on any reality show or a footballer boyfriend to strut around town with. She didn’t even want a recording contract in any factory-assembled girl band or a modelling contract with one of the lads mags. And the people whose offers she refused aren’t used to having their offers refused. They don’t appreciate ingratitude like that. And that’s how she had her accident.

And now, what she wanted was to talk to a journalist. Specifically, a journalist on the scandal-hit and scandalous
Sunday Globe
. She had a story to tell.

Do you want to know why she was being offered Premiership boyfriends and modelling contracts and TV spots and hit singles? Can you guess? Can you, Martin? Can you guess which recently victorious, eminently newsworthy microphone-botherer she might have crossed? Whose offers she might have refused?

Bingo. Give that man a cuddly toy.

Here’s what happened. She met our high-moralled and ever-eager singing friend in a nightclub a month or so ago – just about the time he was revelling in his victory over the worst excesses of the gutter press, in fact – and they’d hooked up a few times since. So far, so what? Well… it was then he’d asked her if she ever experimented. You know, with other girls? With threesomes, foursomes, moresomes? Did she party?

She said she wasn’t averse to the idea. He said he knew just the place, just the girls.

The place was one of his old haunts near the Elephant and Castle. Somewhere so ludicrously low-rent that discretion (or intimidation) was never going to be a problem. Somewhere dealing exclusively with East European girls. Somewhere dealing exclusively with East European girls of a certain ‘innocent’ appearance. ‘Hungary Hearts’, that’s what they call themselves. Hungary Hearts. I mean, really.

Our girl took one look at these kids and said she was having none of it. Even his assurances that he’d seen the paperwork and they were all on or around the age of consent failed to convince her. She split. She walked away. And soon after, she was made an offer.

So: lying in a hospital bed with her neck in a brace and her left cheek fractured and three of her ribs broken (a drunk driver – can you believe it, Martin? A drunk driver who was never caught, with no witnesses), she told her daddy she wanted to speak to a journalist. And Daddy said he knew someone who might know someone. And that’s how I got the call.

And when I got the call, I swear my heart stopped for a second. ‘Gotcha!’ I thought. Gotcha! And I burst out laughing – hysterically, gloriously, uncontrollably, the first laughter that’s been heard in that newsroom for months. And then I ran – literally, ran – to the acting news ed, pushed him into his office, waved my phone at him and told him everything.

And did he laugh too? Did he punch the air? Did he shout ‘Gotcha!’? No. He put his head in his hands and he said ‘Oh Jesus’. And then he said he’d have to run the whole thing past the managing editor.

Fair enough, thought I, and it’s only Wednesday after all, we’ve plenty of time. But there’s not going to be any doubt about the bottom line. Nailing the man who nailed us? Discrediting every bit of evidence he gave? Gotcha! And so when he called me over later that afternoon, I’d already drawn up the girl’s contracts, I’d already loaded up my Dictaphone, I’d already started mentally composing the first three paras – the ones that would go on the front page, under the headline, under my byline.

‘Your contact,’ he said. ‘What sort of security exactly does he provide?’

And so I told him it was best he didn’t know.

He shook his head. ‘We can’t run it,’ he said. ‘Not if you’re getting the tip off anyone with any kind of record. Not if there’s even a hint of anything dodgy about any of the people involved. What about the girl’s dad? What does he do? And the girl herself? She got any kind of history with the police?’

I couldn’t believe it. ‘But the facts,’ I stammered. ‘The facts are the facts! He did it! She says he did it! She’s prepared to sign stuff. And what about her face! That’s how scared he is of her. He did it! That’s the facts!’

He shook his head again and he couldn’t meet my eyes. ‘We can’t use tips off anyone dodgy,’ he said. ‘Not right now. Especially not where he’s concerned. No matter what. Sorry. Really sorry.’ And he walked away, leaving me in his office, Goebbels’ old office. And I’ve never felt more like picking up a chair and hurling it at anyone in my life.

But you know what? I’m not even angry any more. Sitting on this useless train, late home again, on my daughter’s first birthday, more sober than I’d like to be, watching a middle-aged businessman with thinning hair act out the part of a rampant warrior king being fed delicacies by a harem of barely dressed women, I’m not even especially angry. I just can’t help thinking… it’s over.

It’s over, isn’t it, Martin? When we can annihilate the one person who started all this trouble, when we can obliterate him for ever with one golden story… and we bottle out of running it. When the
Globe
bottles it – it’s over.

And, like my parents used to say when they wanted me to feel really bad, especially bad: I’m not angry; I’m disappointed. I’m not angry, Martin. I’m disappointed.

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
22.50 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, March 24. Amount of my day wasted: five minutes. Fellow sufferers: No regulars (Saturday).

Dear Martin

Well, there we go. Another edition to the presses. And it’s a budget special, of course. A budget special because in these high-stakes economic times, it’s the budget that really matters to people. Ooh, it’s a budget special, all right! It’s got analysis – pages of it! It’s got explanations – for every eventuality! It’s got case studies for every possible permutation of reader possible. It’s got everything you need, budget-wise.

Of course, what it’s not got is the showbiz scoop of the decade, but there you go. What can I say? I’m too tired to complain. You’ll just have to amuse yourself for the rest of the delay this letter represents, Martin. Why not pretend you’re Sauron Flesh Harrower? I’m sure there are worse ways to pass the time.

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
23.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, March 31. Amount of my day wasted: four minutes. Fellow sufferers: No regulars (Sat again).

What up, Martin? How you doin’?

I hope you’re doin’ good. I hope you’re doing real good. And also, that you’re well. I hope you’re doing real good and doing real well also.

I could be worse. I’m friends with Train Girl again, at any rate. Did I tell you that? She wasn’t too put out that I blew her out the other week. She said she’s prepared to forgive me. She said she understands the pressure I’ve been under. So that’s nice. That’s nice she understands.

Anyway! We’re not here to talk about Train Girl! Why do we keep talking about her?

There was a new email last night. From Beth, to Karen (who is she? I really need to find out just who Karen is!). It was a short one. It went like this:

Why hasn’t he called yet, Kazza? He spoke to Sylvie on her birthday, Mum told me, but he hasn’t spoken to me. I keep wanting to call him, but Mum says I should wait for him to call me. She says he needs time. But why hasn’t he called me? How can I say sorry properly if he doesn’t call me?

I think I should call my wife soon. Really soon. I’ll call her really soon and we’ll sort it out. Tomorrow, maybe.

Au revoir
!

Dan

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
23.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, March 31.

Dear Dan

I’m sorry to hear of your latest delays. The 20.20 from Paddington to Oxford on March 21 was held up by a suspected sighting of a nesting owl in a signal box near the Hayes and Harlington area. Closer inspection revealed the bird to be merely a pigeon-deterrent placed on the signal by Network Rail, and which they had failed to log correctly, hence our ignorance of its existence and the subsequent confusion.

On another matter, as I believe I’ve mentioned before, Sauron Flesh Harrower would appear to be a player of MMORPGs, or Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games, a pursuit both misunderstood and, if I may say so, rather prejudiced against. Your constant sniping against the genre does you no favours. And your insults against him personally even less so. What do you really know about him, Dan? Don’t be so quick to judge. For all you know, he may be a perfectly nice fellow. Avuncular, even.

Best

Martin

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Re:
22.20 Premier Westward Railways train from London Paddington to Oxford, April 3. Amount of my day wasted: 19 minutes. Fellow sufferer: Overkeen Estate Agent.

Martin: another tip came in today. Has it made the news yet? I haven’t seen a telly since lunchtime, since we walked out, since we all went to the pub. I couldn’t face an
Evening Standard
in case they had it too. Has it made the news? Has the latest news on our newspaper made the evening news?

A tip came in to Harry the Dog. From his friend at another paper. Asking for a comment. A comment on the rumour that they were shutting us down. A comment on the rumour that the Big Cheese, the Man Himself, the Old Boy Who Owns the Paper, was flying in tonight. A comment on the fact that when he was presented with the rumour he failed to comment one way or the other. A comment on his failure to deny.

What did Harry the Dog do? He told his friend to get lost. And then he told the rest of us about the rumour, about the imminent arrival of the
Grand Fromage
. And then a delegation went upstairs. And then they came back down again, having also failed to get a denial. And then our phones all started ringing – landline, work mobile, home mobile – and every one had someone on the end wanting a comment on the rumour they were shutting us down or a comment on the failure of anyone to deny the rumour they were shutting us down.