Oxford Blood (15 page)

Jemima considered. The lights were changing.

'I could give you a cup of coffee, but then what would you do with your horse?'

'You know,' began the rider, 'you look rather like—'

The light was green and Jemima shot forward. What with Cass and Mourant and Midnight, none of whom had proved themselves to be particularly rewarding companions during the night hours, she began to wish that she had rather a different nature. Why not, for example, take off into the bracken with a handsome and unknown young cavalier and forget the cares of the world, or at least the cares represented by the foregoing three names for the length of one morning's idyll? Why not?

'Because
I
wouldn't have enjoyed it at all,' said Jemima sternly to herself as she laid out her solitary picnic in the bracken, car abandoned, some time later. 'That's why. What a perfectly ridiculous idea anyway. As it is, I'm already covered in bracken, so think what it would have been like
...'
Jemima drank her coffee and did think, just for a moment, what it would have been like.

Whether she was right or wrong about the anonymous cavalier would never be known, but she was still brushing fronds off her track suit when she entered Megalithic House. What was more, she was by now rather late, having encountered heavy traffic on her way from Richmond Park. The various traffic blocks gave Jemima plenty of time to ponder on a number of things, including whether there was a special God who deliberately sent down heavy traffic when you were late already and not for a reason that everyone in the world would consider a good one.

Cherry, looking remarkably appealing in a pink cotton boiler-suit, many top buttons left untouched and a tight belt to clinch her figure at the waist, gazed speculatively at Jemima as she entered.

'Messages first or a cup of coffee? You've just been having coffee? In Richmond Park? I knew it had to be something perfectly ordinary like that. Ah well, here goes. Cy of course. Three times, and I dare say Miss Lewis fended off some other of his reckless enquiries after your whereabouts before they reached me. Cass telephoned. Twice. Sounded agitated, if not as agitated as our Chairman. Says he missed you at home. And Saffron. Last but not least. First, he's out of hospital, back in his college. Second, the engagement weekend at Saffron Ivy has been fixed: bank holiday weekend at the end of May.'

'Anything else?'

'Oh yes. A man telephoned. Nice voice. Wondered if you drove a white Mercedes sports car. He thought he might have seen you in Richmond Park this morning.'

'What a weird enquiry!' said Jemima in her most innocent tone.

'That's what I thought. So I told him you drove an old black Ford and were anyway away filming in Manchester.'

Cy Fredericks accepted with surprising equanimity Jemima's proffered explanation of a game of squash, and then a traffic delay driving from the squash club. It was the word club which seemed to soothe him.

'The Squash Club!' he cried. 'Most exciting! Jemima, you must take me there sometime. Can one eat there late as well as early?' Luckily Miss Lewis entered before Jemima had time to sort out a suitable reply.

As to Cy's keen enquiries about the progress of the
Golden Kids
programme, Jemima was able to stop them at source by her double revelation of Tiggie Jones' engagement and her own invitation to Saffron Ivy.

'We'll be
shooting
there?' asked Cy in a specially reverent tone which he reserved for any conjunction of Megalith cameras and the more gracious aspects of English life.

'No, no, all shooting in Oxford.' Jemima knew it was the moment to stand firm. 'I've got the whole thing lined up.' She took a chance. 'You didn't read my memo. We centre round the Commem Balls at the end of June. St Lucy's is having a big Commem this year - it's their turn - and Rochester is having an ordinary Ball, which I'm assured won't really be ordinary at all. We feature Saffron with Tiggie Jones, the future Lady Saffron, on his arm or anyway somewhere respectable like an arm, then the whole lot of them: the Golden Kids at play. Just what you wanted. Then we move to St Lucy's which is on the river: plenty of punting. Remember how keen you were on punting.'

Cy Fredericks looked uneasy but Jemima thought it was more in reference to the unread (and as a matter of fact as yet unwritten) memo than at the prospect of Megalith cameras going punting. Which should actually have worried him more.

'Tiggie Jones to wed,' he said at last. 'I shall never understand you English girls. Never.' Jemima thought it diplomatic not to probe further into that statement. Nor did Cy Fredericks seem in any mood to amplify it. It was his kind of obituary on the future Lady Saffron.

The ten days or so before the Saffron Ivy weekend were spent by Jemima both at Megalith and Oxford in a frenzy of official activity as the
Golden Kids
programme suddenly became a reality - a hideous reality said Guthrie Carlyle in one of his daring
sotto voce
remarks at a planning meeting, and 'that bloody programme' was heard on more lips than just Jemima's. All sorts of questions had to be answered rather quickly, ranging from the practical to the theoretical.

For example, was Spike Thompson (Jemima's favourite cameraman and many other people's favourite man) available? It was generally agreed that Spike would display an unrivalled mastery over the shadows on the long grass and Laura Ashley dresses and doomed youth and fingers trailing out of punts and ancient stone walls and all that sort of thing. He would also deal expertly with pop music, heavy metal, rock music, and sundry other concomitants of the modern world which Jemima, if not Cy, was well aware went with a successful Commem Ball. Spike could also be relied upon not to raise his camera - nor for that matter his eyebrows - at some of the more lethal habits of doomed youth, the exotic cigarettes to be puffed, the exotic white substances to be sniffed. In short Spike Thompson was, so far as Megalith was concerned, Thoroughly Modern Cameraman.

'Champagne yes, if it's around, the rest of it no,' observed Guthrie Carlyle wisely. 'You can't drink and drug. At any rate not on a Megalith programme.'

As for Spike's expenses: 'Even Spike can't do much with a lot of students' snack bars,' suggested some optimist. For Spike Thompson's expenses while on location were legendary; so that people sometimes swapped anecdotes about such trips at eventide in the Blue Flag, as Henry V predicted that the men who outlived Agincourt would recall St Crispin's Day.

'I'm not sure we'll be moving exclusively in the snack bar set. The programme
is
called
Golden Kids.'

'But not
Golden Cameramen,'
retorted the optimist wittily. Jemima exchanged glances with Cherry. It was in both their minds that introducing Spike to La Lycee - and how could it be avoided? - was rather like showing an Alsatian into a butcher's shop.

As to the theoretical side, it became increasingly obvious that there were two programmes here. One was the programme beloved of Cy Fredericks - the
Golden Kids mean Big Bucks
programme which was undeniably the type of programme he had successfully pre-sold in those parts of the world - the more luxurious parts - which he had recently visited. The other was the kind of socially investigative programme beloved of Jemima Shore and Guthrie Carlyle in which the lifestyle of the Golden Kids would be contrasted with that of the vast majority of the undergraduates eating in Hall, living off grants or, rather, struggling with inadequate grants, finding even coffee an expensive luxury and never touching a drop of champagne from one end of term to the other.

'This is where Kerry Barber is important,' explained Jemima. 'He's our link. For one thing, he's not only boycotting St Lucy's Commem Ball but leading a protest outside it, a protest against the price of the tickets, that is. He thinks the money should go to the Third World and is prepared to say so to camera. He's also going to provide us with some undergraduates of the same way of thinking. We've got permission to film at St Lucy's as well as Rochester, so the Barber protest should be quite an effective contrast.'

'Jem, my gem,' began Cy Fredericks warmly, 'you're doing wonders here as you always do. Rounded, human
and
humanitarian: I can see already how this programme is shaping. All the same, our motto here at Megalith has always been hard-
nosed
not
hard-grained
reporting.' He paused, giving everyone at the meeting including himself just time to wonder exactly what the difference if any between these two terms might be, before he rushed on: 'What I'm saying, and I think - Miss Lewis, is this right? - I
think
I'm quoting from my address to NIFTA last fall - the essence of interesting controversy on the screen is equality of protest.'

Miss Lewis' silence being taken as assent, Cy beamed even more warmly, particularly at this last statement gained a great deal of muttered encouragement from all those present, delighted to have such an unexceptional sentiment with which to agree.

'So, my gem, please no uncouth types in blue jeans given our air time for their causes
...'

'I'm afraid I can't guarantee the elimination of jeans from the programme altogether,' interrupted Jemima sweetly, allowing her gaze to roam the room before resting briefly on her own designer-jean-clad thigh. 'But I should tell you that the principal protestor at St Lucy's on the night of the Commem will be Jack Iverstone, who is of course Saffron's cousin. Is that what you meant by equality of protest?'

Everyone agreed afterwards that it was a noted victory for the cause of the good in the perpetual - and not unenjoyable - war waged between Cy and Jemima on the content of her programmes. But as a matter of fact the victory, if it was such, had been engineered by Fanny Iverstone. In the course of her various expeditions to Oxford, Jemima had found no difficulty at all in securing the agreement of assorted undergraduates to appear on the programme promoting assorted views. But although the views were varied, the declared motive for agreeing to appear was generally the same:

'I thought I might go into television after I've gone down,' confided the innocent. The more sophisticated eyed Jemima keenly and asked details of graduate training schemes at Megalith. It all came to the same thing: most people at Oxford, like Kerry Barber, were perfectly prepared to share what they imagined to be Jemima's forum of the air.

Nevertheless Fanny's approach took Jemima by surprise.

Perhaps it should not have done. After all Fanny was an indefatigable organizer. Saffron was really quite right to compare his cousin to Mrs Thatcher - except that the latter had actually been at Oxford as an undergraduate whereas Fanny, as she had cheerfully admitted on their first meeting, had had no education at all. The thought occurred to Jemima as they sat in the dark plate-glass window of Bunns, Oxford's most fashionable cafe. Fanny was drinking an extraordinarily expensive cappuccino while Jemima toyed with an orange juice (equally expensive). In view of Fanny's forceful character, it was tragic that foolish Daphne Iverstone had taken no interest in her education. With education, Fanny might have gone far. Correction: Fanny would - somehow - go far; of that Jemima felt sure. The question was, in what direction?

Jemima certainly could not imagine her married to her cousin Saffron, although she would have made an excellent Marchioness of the old-fashioned school; but the pair of them would have driven each other to desperation. Jemima only hoped that the dominating streak Fanny had inherited from her father - at present concealed under the softness of girlhood - would not lead her in the same political direction as Andrew Iverstone.

It was Andrew Iverstone who constituted the problem for Jack, confided Fanny. That and his political ambitions.

'Can you imagine what it's like for him, being the son of Old Rabblerouse? For Jack who won't allow any violent emotion whatsoever to surface? Quite apart from being ambitious to save the world and all that sort of thing. So it's twice as important for Jack to make his name as for anyone else. You must feature him on your programme. Doing his thing. This protest with that rather dishy tutor who eats nuts, in his shorts and sandals. Just so everyone can see he doesn't agree with Daddy. Please, Jemima.'

'What about you, Fanny?' asked Jemima curiously. 'Do you mind being the daughter of Old Rabblerouse, as you kindly term him?'

'It's different for girls, isn't it?' Fanny gave her confident upper-class laugh which was possibly more charming now while she was still young than it would be when she got older. 'I'll change my name when I get married. For me, frankly, it's much worse being Mummy's daughter. All that ghastly debutante stuff and the match-making! I ask you. In this day and age. Quite a relief when the Prince of Wales finally got married, I can tell you. If only the other two would follow suit. Prince Andrew, as you may suppose, is Daddy's ultimate idea of what a hereditary leader figure should be.'

'I gather she even had cousin Saffron in mind.' Jemima spoke carelessly.