‘Caitlin knows everything,’ said Rupert. ‘She doesn’t miss a trick, and she might easily have seen Sally Maples or Harold.’

‘They’ve never been to the house,’ said Declan. ‘I suppose one of the moles could have turned countermole.’

‘More than their life’s wurf,’ said Freddie, shaking his head. ‘If they shopped us, they automatically shop themselves. Georgie is the only one it might have been, and he was far too upset when Tony broke the news yesterday. I expect Tony’s got the thumbscrew on him now, getting the rest of Venturer’s secrets out of him.’

‘What about Maud?’ said Rupert. ‘She’s always hanging around with Monica.’

‘When did my wife ever take the slightest interest in the franchise? She doesn’t know a thing,’ said Declan bitterly.

‘Valerie’s got a soft spot for James Vereker,’ suggested Rupert.

Freddie sighed. ‘Valerie’s like Maud, simply not interested.’

‘Much as I’d like to suspect the Bishop and Professor Graystock,’ said Rupert, ‘they’re far too motivated by greed and self-interest to shop us, and the same goes for Marti.’

‘Not if Tony made it worth their while,’ said Declan. ‘I wouldn’t rule them out.’

‘Well, Basil’s in the clear,’ went on Rupert, ‘and I honestly think Wesley and Henry are too thick, or in Wesley’s case too spaced out to remember anyone’s names anyway. But I suppose they’re possibilities.’

‘Everyone’s a possibility,’ said Declan bleakly, ‘and finally there’s Cameron. She’s my choice. I’ve had my doubts about her all along.’

‘Balls,’ said Rupert irritably. ‘She’s far too obsessed with us winning the franchise and, since she came back from Ireland, with making movies with you.’

‘And frankly,’ said Freddie, ‘she’s far too smitten by our Rupe.’

When Declan said nothing, Rupert protested: ‘Cameron’s got a lot of faults, but she’s basically honest. That’s why she so loathed carrying on with Tony and Corinium while she was sleeping with me.’

‘I’ve always suspected she was treacherous,’ said Declan. ‘How do we know she hasn’t been spying for Tony from the very beginning?’

‘Don’t let’s get Le Carré-ed away,’ said Rupert. ‘We’ll just have to keep an eye on her.’

‘We’ll have to keep an eye on everyone,’ said Declan grimly.

In an atmosphere of sniping and growing suspicion, Venturer carried on preparations for the IBA interview. There were secret communications with Georgie, Billy, Harold and Sally, arranging that they would join Venturer if and when the franchise was won — it no longer seemed a certainty — but there was no way they could be present at the IBA meeting on 29th November. Night after night without them, therefore, Hardy Bissett fired endless questions at the rest of the consortium, until they were word perfect, and answered almost without thinking. Then he accused them of being too glib.

One evening Charles Fairburn, desperately trying to hide his anxiety about being fired, turned up dressed as Lady Gosling in a grey wig, half-moon spectacles, and hundreds of shawls, and proceeded to lay everyone in the aisles by answering questions in a high soprano until Hardy sharply slapped him down.

But the questions rolled on: ‘How d’you hope to promote interest in scientific matters in your schedule? What is your attitude to training schemes? How will you ensure equal opportunity for women in your company?’

‘By screwing every one of them,’ answered Rupert.

‘Don’t be bloody flip,’ yelled Hardy. ‘You can be funny, but never flip, and, with a female chairman, never never be funny about women.’

Rupert was bored and fed up. Why the fuck couldn’t they tell the truth, that they just wanted to make good programmes and a lot of money, and dispense with all this flannel? He was relieved when Cameron and Declan set off to Ireland for a final week’s shooting. He needed some space and time to think. He spent most of the week they were away in London on political work and keeping the rattled Venturer backers happy. Outside his office the last of the plane leaves were drifting down, reminding him unbearably of Taggie. He still had the thirty leaves she and the children had given him. They hadn’t brought him much bloody happiness. He steeled himself not to ring her up, or drop round. He was truly terrified how much he wanted to.


45


When Rupert didn’t take advantage of Cameron’s week away to ring her, Taggie wanted only to retreat into her turret room in utter despair. But, alas, Monica had asked her to do the food for the first night party for The Merry Widow next Saturday, and when she wasn’t cooking and freezing in both senses of the word (now the cold weather had set in, The Priory was absolutely arctic) Taggie was calming down or boosting the morale of an increasingly demanding and nervous Maud. Corinium were showing highlights of the first night and Maud was counting on Declan getting back from Ireland in time. She couldn’t face such an ordeal alone.

In addition the press were on the prowl for a story. Both Venturer and Corinium consortiums were turning out in force and dinner jackets for the first night. The newly sacked Charles Fairburn was playing Monica’s lover, Declan’s exquisite wife was making her stage comeback, and her leading man was the handsome Bas who was on opposing sides to his loathed brother Tony. With Declan due back from Ireland, with Rupert Campbell-Black’s live-in lover, who was also Tony’s ex, it was clear that there were endless possibilities for fireworks. ‘Cotchester’, wrote Nigel Dempster slyly, ‘are celebrating Guy Fawkes Day ten days late this year.’

The Merry Widow dress rehearsal on Friday afternoon was disastrous. The presence of the television crew on a dry run threw the entire cast. Tempers flared, lights dimmed too early, lines were fluffed or forgotten. The television director decided to put two cameras in the dress circle and in the two boxes on either side of the stage, so they wouldn’t have to take out any stall seats. The technicians stood around yawning, one sound man even fell asleep and snored loudly throughout the second act. James Vereker (Cotchester’s dusty answer to Humphrey Burton, according to Charles Fairburn) would be presenting the programme.

‘Just as well we bombed early,’ said Barton Sinclair, The Merry Widow’s director, but he seemed far from happy.

Over in County Galway Cameron and Declan were at the end of their last day’s filming. Declan, in a dark-blue fisherman’s jersey and jeans, his thick black hair lifting in the gentle west wind, was speaking to camera.

‘Hallow this spot,’ he began softly. ‘Here once stood the proud white Georgian house which belonged to Lady Gregory. Here for the last thirty years of his life, Yeats spent every summer and most of his winters. That’s a long time to put up with not the easiest of house guests —’ Declan smiled briefly — ‘even bearing in mind the number of servants large houses employed in those days. Here in this tranquil, ordered household, Yeats’s genius was able to blossom on and on like a rose right into the winter of his days. “I doubt,” said Yeats, “if I’d have done much with my life, but for Lady Gregory’s firmness and care.”’

‘Cut!’ shouted Cameron. ‘That was excellent. We’ll now do close-ups of the copper beech on which he carved his initials, and then straight down to the lake for the last shot. We’d better hurry. The sun’ll set in three-quarters of an hour.’

Twenty minutes later Declan was standing on the shore of the lake with a huge blood-red sun sinking gradually behind the coloured trees and casting a warm glow on his face.

‘While Yeats stayed at Coole Park,’ said Declan, bending down and picking up a pebble and sending it spinning across the still water, ‘he wrote his poetry in a room looking towards this lake, a time lovingly remembered in his poem “The Wild Swans at Coole”.’ He began to quote softly:


The trees are in their autumn beauty,

The woodland paths are dry,

Under the October twilight the water

Mirrors a still sky. .

Oh, that husky, heartbreakingly sexy voice, thought Cameron, feeling the hairs lifting yet again on the back of her neck. She could go to the stake for Declan at times like this. They’d been so lucky with the weather too. Enough leaves still hung from the trees to pretend it was October, but one hard frost would have stripped them in a day.

The crew, going out to get plastered at an end-of-shoot party, tried to persuade Declan and Cameron to join them, but because they were both tired and faced a late night at The Merry Widow tomorrow, they opted for a quiet dinner at the hotel. Afterwards they sat alone in the bar. Apple logs cracked merrily in the grate, giving off a sweet cider smell. Occasionally the flames flared, lighting up Declan’s face, as he sat immersed in the Galway Post, his whisky hardly touched.

Cameron was happy to watch him, memorizing every tiny black bristle of stubble, every deeply trenched line on the battered, craggy Western hero face. Without seeing the rushes, she knew they had made a great programme. Schemes were afoot for other programmes, but this first would always be the most exciting. Exploring and luxuriating in each other’s talent, she had learnt so much from him already. Despite the fact that all the crew were at times victims of his almost feudal caprice, he certainly inspired devotion. He allowed no insubordination. Only that morning he’d roared at the sound man for giving the hung-over PA a Bloody Mary for breakfast. He was irascible, with an extremely short fuse, and got so wrapped up in the work that he frequently upset people, but he was so mortified afterwards and so ready to apologize, that they always forgave him, not least because he had more charm than anyone Cameron had ever met.