Off the Record (31 page)

‘Well, I’m very pleased to have it, of course. You do realize that I could go ahead and develop it myself ?’

‘That’s the chance I took,’ said Ferguson earnestly. ‘The Professor’s machine is a wonderful achievement, there’s no two ways about it, but it’s a pig of a thing to operate. Take the ribbons, for instance. They’re so awkward to use they’d drive any customer up the wall. In the new version the ribbons are encased in a holder and are easy to handle. The old ones won’t work on the new machine, but that’s not a problem. We’ll simply make new ones. What d’you say, Lewis? Let me complete Carrington’s work.’

‘I must say I’m tempted,’ admitted Lewis.

Ferguson brightened visibly. ‘You won’t regret it.’ He spread his hands out encouragingly. ‘We can talk about the finer points of ownership afterwards. The great thing is to have a working machine up and running. If you’re still interested in a merger, it’s something I’d like to do.’

Lewis ran his finger thoughtfully round the top of his glass. ‘It makes sense to proceed, I must say. Quite apart from the huge technical advance, Otterbourne’s has taken such a battering that we do need a new product. What about your mother, though? What’s her opinion? After all, she owns the company.’

‘My mother’s happy to let me have my head,’ said Ferguson. ‘She doesn’t want to be bothered with business. You can take it I’m speaking for her. There won’t be any trouble.’

Lewis picked up his whisky and drank it reflectively. ‘Let’s do it,’ he said eventually.

‘Excellent,’ said Ferguson happily, boxing his papers together. ‘I’ll go ahead and you should hear from me very shortly. I’ve just taken the lease on a new recording studio. It’s in Bridle Lane, Soho. Why don’t we meet up there? Under the circumstances, with Carrington and all, it’s perhaps inappropriate to give a party, but we should mark the event in some way. I know my mother’s interested and she really should be there. Why don’t you bring Mrs Lewis? I’ll provide cocktails and so on.’

‘I’ll look forward to it,’ said Lewis with a very satisfied smile. ‘And I’ll look forward to hearing from you soon.’

Molly sipped her cocktail and looked round Hector Ferguson’s new studio. It seemed odd, in a way, that the whole evening should be focused on the two modest wooden boxes sitting on the table. Those wooden boxes were, she knew,
It
. The new machine, the Big Advance, the Great Step Forward, as Steve had enthusiastically described it. Ever since he had agreed to Dunbar’s producing the new machine a couple of weeks ago, Steve had been like a different person. He had, he said, something genuinely to look forward to. Otterbourne’s would merge with Dunbar’s and they would have an unbeatable product.

The worry that had clouded him, the worry that had plagued him ever since he received that telegram about his uncle, had vanished. Quite simply, Steve was fun to be with once more.

His arm encircled her waist. ‘Shall we dance?’ he said, his mouth close to her ear. The gramophone – a Dunbar’s gramophone naturally – was playing a foot-tapping American song,
Do It Again!
‘Or shall I take on Mrs Dunbar?’

‘Dance with Mrs Dunbar if you must dance,’ she said with a giggle.

‘Beast,’ he said softly. ‘She creaks when she moves. I think she needs oiling.’

‘I think she wears corsets. Mrs Dunbar,’ she called, turning, ‘my husband was wondering if you would care to dance.’

‘Molly!’ said Steve in apprehension, then moulded his features into a smile as Mrs Dunbar bore down on them.

‘That’s very kind of you, I’m sure,’ said Mrs Dunbar, ‘but later, perhaps?’ Steve’s sigh of relief was so heartfelt it tickled Molly’s ear. She gave him a warning nudge with her elbow. He grinned and slipped away to refresh his glass.

‘What do you think of Hector’s new studio?’ asked Mrs Dunbar. ‘He’s been so busy up in Scotland that he hasn’t been able to spend much time here, but he assures me it will become a centre for this new music he’s so fond of.’

Molly knew all about Hector Ferguson’s ideas for his studio. He had treated her to an account of his plans whilst mixing her a White Lady. He had spoken at some length. The new studio was, in fact, nothing more than an empty room in Soho, with a cloakroom and two box rooms. According to Ferguson, it was ideally placed to lure the hottest jazz musicians from the clubs. They would clamour, he said, to be recorded. They were, apparently, standing in what would be the dynamic heart of jazz.

The odd thing was that she had heard Hector Ferguson on the subject of jazz before and he had overwhelmed her with his enthusiasm. On this occasion, in his new studio with his new recording machine, when he had every reason to be on top of the world, he sounded flat and uninterested. He had said the words, yes, but there was no passion behind them. She shot a glance to where he was standing, back against the wall, smoking a cigarette. He was staring at Major Haldean. He’s
nervous
, she thought with sudden insight, looking at the way he pulled on his cigarette. The man’s alive with nerves.

With an effort, she dragged her attention back to Mrs Dunbar. What had she been talking about? Oh yes. ‘Mr Ferguson’s ideas sound very interesting,’ she said, adding politely, ‘I do like the decorations.’ Mrs Dunbar, she knew, had been the force behind the Chinese lanterns, roses and wreaths of glossy green leaves that adorned the newly painted white walls.

‘It makes it more of an occasion,’ said Mrs Dunbar in a satisfied way. ‘I wanted Hector to hire a couple of waiters, but he said he didn’t want anyone to know about this new machine until he and your husband were ready to demonstrate it to the Press. Hector says that the publicity will have to be handled very carefully, with Mr Carrington being . . .’

Molly felt as if a hand had gripped her heart. She knew her face betrayed her. She saw Mrs Dunbar’s expression change and heard her voice falter.

Gerry!
she thought bleakly. Damn Gerry. Despite everything, she couldn’t get him out of her mind. Life should be good but not an hour passed that she didn’t think of Gerry. And it was so unfair to Steve. He deserved better. She had tried – really tried – to forget Gerry, to give the man she was actually married to the wholehearted attention he deserved. Steve couldn’t ever really appreciate how mixed her feelings were. One feeling she had isolated was anger, that burning resentment of betrayed trust. She had
believed
in Gerry. Once before, when he had been accused of murder – the murder of this woman’s husband, she reminded herself – she had clung passionately to the belief he was innocent and rejoiced when he was free. Steve had tried to warn her, but she hadn’t wanted to listen. ‘I’m sorry,’ she managed to say. ‘Please, do carry on.’

‘The circumstances are so difficult, aren’t they?’ said Mrs Dunbar lamely. ‘What does your husband think, my dear?’ she added with an attempt at brightness.

Molly felt as if she’d reached some firm ground in the shifting sand of her emotions. ‘Steve? He hasn’t really talked about it,’ she said, looking across the room to where Steve, his thick fair hair streaked with red light from the Chinese lanterns, had strolled across to Major Haldean.

Mrs Dunbar glanced about her conspiratorially. ‘I was so grateful to your husband, Mrs Lewis,’ she said in hushed tones. ‘I know he was instrumental in freeing Hector from that awful suspicion. I have never felt so desperate in all my life as that terrible night Hector was arrested. When he was freed, it was as if I’d come to life again. I can never thank your husband enough for what he did.’ She reached out and held Molly’s arm confidingly. ‘I know you have endured a great deal, my dear, but you have a lot to be grateful for.’

And that, presumably, was Mrs Dunbar’s tactfully clumsy way of referring to Dad. No one would ever forget what her father had done. How could they, when he had made such a parade of his virtues? She suddenly remembered when she was very small and Dad was very big, a sunlit memory of Dad in the garden. He’d thrown her up in the air with a shout of laughter. Her mother’s voice:
Charles, don’t drop her!
Molly, helpless with joy, trusted Daddy would catch her and he had. She’d always trusted him until the ghastly truth had poisoned all her memories. That was when the anger had begun. When she had first found out what her father had really been like.

‘It’ll be much better when Mr Carrington is convicted,’ said Mrs Dunbar with brutal sympathy. ‘We can forget all about it then.’

Molly suddenly couldn’t take any more of Mrs Dunbar. ‘Yes, yes, I’m sure we shall,’ she lied, backing away. ‘Excuse me, I want a word with Steve.’

But Steve, to her dismay, was also talking about Gerry. ‘The whole family always had some sort of mental kink, I’m afraid,’ he was saying to Major Haldean. ‘It’s a real pity when you consider how brilliant the Professor was. And Gerry too.’

She saw Major Haldean frown warningly as she approached. Irrationally, she resented the fact that he didn’t want to talk about Gerry in front of her. For heaven’s sake, what did she want?
I want it all to be different
, a voice deep inside whispered. She was like a child crying for a broken doll, she thought in disgust. She didn’t just want the doll to be mended; she wanted it never to have broken at all. She wanted Dad to be good and Gerry to be innocent and it was stupid and she was a gullible fool to have trusted them. Even now, there was a traitorous spark of hope.
Fool!

‘I’m looking forward to seeing this machine put through its paces,’ said Major Haldean. He welcomed her into their little group with a smile. ‘When Ferguson invited me, I jumped at the chance.’

‘Why doesn’t he show it to us?’ asked Molly fretfully. Once Ferguson had played the wretched machine, they could all go home and she could stop pretending not to mind so very much.

‘Let’s chivvy him on,’ said Steve. He raised his voice and called across the room. ‘Ferguson! When are you going to demonstrate our new machine? We’re all waiting.’

Ferguson threw his cigarette to the floor and crushed it out with his foot. Molly saw him consciously take a deep breath and straighten himself up. ‘I’ll do it now,’ he said, walking to the table.

The two varnished wooden boxes on the table were approximately eighteen inches high and two feet long, connected to each other by a wire. The front of the second box was faced with fretwork bands covering a thin mesh. Beside them was the Dunbar’s gramophone.

Ferguson lifted the needle from the record player and the room fell silent. ‘First of all, thank you all for coming,’ said Ferguson. ‘I hope you all enjoyed the music.’

Beside her, she was suddenly aware that Major Haldean was standing very still. He was concentrating on Ferguson. She clenched her fists involuntarily. The pools of light from the lanterns shadowed his face and coloured his shirt red against his black jacket. Black and red: the colours of a pantomime devil. But he was so
intent.
This wasn’t a pantomime . . .

Haldean was on edge about Ferguson and something was badly wrong. He was waiting with so much pent-up stillness she was irresistibly reminded of a hungry cat beside a fishpond. Waiting for the kill.

Ferguson cleared his throat. ‘The quality of sound from this gramophone is about as good as can be achieved with any model currently on sale. It simply doesn’t measure up to the wireless, does it?’

His carelessness was assumed, she was certain of it.

He patted the larger of the two boxes. ‘However, this is the new machine. The second box takes the place of the horn. In my opinion the sound is even better that the wireless. I’ll play it and you’ll be able to hear for yourselves the radical difference.’

‘I hope there
is
a difference after all the trouble you’ve been to, Hector,’ said Mrs Dunbar with a grating laugh. She sounded on edge. She’d sensed that indefinable threat of danger in the atmosphere too. ‘It looks very much like an ordinary gramophone to me.’

‘Not when you look inside,’ said Ferguson. He lifted up the lid. ‘You’ll see the difference between this and a gramophone or phonograph. There’s no turntable or cylinder but only these two spindles on which the ribbons are placed.’ He picked up a small round Bakelite case from the table and drew out a coil of flat wire on to his hand. ‘I recorded this earlier,’ he said, fixing the case and wire on to the spindles.

Molly suddenly realized just how nervous Ferguson was. His hand, as he reached out to press the button on the machine, trembled. Beside her, Major Haldean drew his breath in.

The sound of a jazz piano, played with considerable flair, filled the room.

Molly felt it was a complete anti-climax. She had expected . . .
What?
Something else. Ferguson was really keyed-up, but all that was actually happening was a group of people listening to a piano. She shook her head in irritation and tried to concentrate on the sound. It really was very life-like.

Even though she wasn’t in a receptive mood, Molly could appreciate the clarity of the reproduction. Dad would have loved it, she thought involuntarily and winced. Dad would have loved Gerry’s machine. That was a nasty little refinement of irony. There was admiration in the faces round her. She tried very hard to mirror that emotion.

‘It’s astonishing,’ said Jack Haldean with what seemed like genuine admiration. He was a very good actor, thought Molly. His attention was still fixed on Ferguson. ‘The piano could be in the same room. What is it?
The Alligator Hop
?’

Ferguson ran his tongue over his dry lips. ‘That’s right. The original’s by King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band. It’s one of my favourites. But what do you think of the sound? It’s easily as good as the wireless, isn’t it?’

‘Easily,’ said Steve enthusiastically. Molly relaxed, hearing the cheerful lilt in his voice. ‘By jingo, it’s remarkable. If we can get the price right, we’ll make a fortune. Have you thought about potential customers?’

‘There’s films, of course,’ said Ferguson, still with that odd nervousness, ‘but I’ll leave that side of it to you, Lewis. I want to concentrate on music.’ His voice was clipped and Molly could see the muscles in his throat contract as he swallowed. ‘It’s easy to record and it’s easy to play. Not only that, but we can have music at length. We’re not limited by the three minutes you get on a record. You could have whole concerts recorded, an entire opera, say, or a symphony, or an entire evening of jazz.’ He pushed back a strand of ginger hair and Molly knew he was searching for something to say. ‘There could be a very decent profit from the sale of the ribbons.’