Maximum Exposure: The Heartlands Series

by Harper, Jenny

  ‘Well, I feel sorry for her.’ Today Lizzie seemed inclined to be charitable. ‘She can’t even talk about it to anyone, not like Angus’s wife.’ She picked up the paper Daisy had thrown on the table and unfolded it, idly skimmed the contents, then swung her legs of the chair and sat bolt upright. ‘Have you read this, Daisy?’

  Daisy shook her head. ‘What is it? It was in my pocket.’

  Lizzie passed it across the table and watched as Daisy read the few lines.

  ‘Oh. My. God.’ Daisy’s ash-gray eyes widened in shock and one hand flew up to her mouth. ‘Ohmigod, ohmigod.’

  She stuck her right hand automatically into her pocket and found Tiny Ted. Her fingers stroked the soft fur on his little head. The action, familiar since babyhood, brought a measure of comfort, but the colour was still gone from her cheeks as she blurted out, ‘This is what Angus was reading when he collapsed, Lizzie. I’ve just remembered. I stuck it in my pocket. I wasn’t even thinking about it, I was checking on him.’

  Her eyes, the colour of the haze over the sea on a winter’s day, were still the size of dustbin lids. The smoky eye shadow had blurred, leaving a faint bruise of colour. ‘But this is what did it. This is what killed him.’

  Chapter Four

  Dear Angus

  You will be only too aware of the falling circulation of The Hailesbank Herald. We have been watching this and the increasingly poor quality of the content over the past year with considerable concern.

  Naturally, at the Board of the Havering Group, we are all concerned for your health. However, we view the situation as untenable and unless the circulation and advertising figures are back to their previous levels by the summer, we fear we will be forced to close the offices in Hailesbank and merge the paper with The East Stoneyford Echo, with obvious consequences for yourself and your staff.

  We await with interest.

  Yours as ever

  Etc.

  ‘Angus had a heart attack because of this!’ Daisy was incandescent. ‘How could they? They bloody killed him, the bastards.’ She crumpled the paper in her hands and slammed her fist on the table.

  ‘He was in line for a heart attack anyway, Daisy, you know that,’ reasoned Lizzie.

  ‘Six months! My God, Lizzie, they’ve given us six months. It was up to Angus to save us, and now he’s bloody well dead!’ Anger was still her foremost emotion but it had swung like a pendulum from the owners of the paper to her recently deceased boss. He’d deserted them in their hour of need. Daisy’s mouth, always an indicator of her mood, was twisting and working convulsively. ‘Never mind my pay rise, I might be out of a job. What am I going to do?’ Her mouth came to rest in a small sideways twist but the worried expression in her eyes betrayed her concern.

  For all her creativity, Lizzie had a practical bent. Now she deployed the same talent that she used to invent an intricate cloth design, and started to take Daisy through a process of basic logic.

  ‘Right.’ She dumped her wine glass on the table and pushed it delicately to one side. ‘One, you are under threat of closure. Two, you have no editor. Three, you have six months before a decision will be made.’ She ticked off the points on her fingers. ‘Yes?’

  Daisy nodded, concentrating, still curling her mouth to one side anxiously.

  ‘Let’s address them one by one. What do you have to do to avoid closure?’

  ‘Erm … improve our circulation and advertising I guess.’

  ‘By …?’

  ‘Getting more readers … writing more interesting features. Hoping there’s some grim news to cover.’

  ‘Steady.’

  Daisy managed a rueful smile. ‘I know, we’re like vultures. But it’s true, people love a gruesome murder or a horrific plane crash.’

  ‘OK, so maybe you can’t fix that but you could talk to the others about how to improve the features?’

  Daisy thought glumly about how Murdoch Darling might take to being asked to write better features. An old hack, he’d been with the paper for ever and was nearing retirement. She could just imagine his caustic response to such a request. The words ‘off’ and ‘fuck’ would probably be involved, maybe in a different order.

  ‘Two, you need a new editor.’

  ‘Yeah, like they’ll give us one when the paper’s going to fold anyway.’

  ‘You never know. What’ll happen if they don’t? Can you carry on without one?’

  Daisy shrugged. ‘I guess Murdoch might do it. Or Sharon.’

  ‘Right, so they’ll start to pull everything together, yes?’

  The only thing Murdoch could pull together was a thousand words and he seemed to find that rather tedious these days. Sharon was different. She’d enjoy more power, no question, but could she inspire them all to save the newspaper? Job risk or not, Daisy was fairly certain that she was not the only one who’d not take kindly to a Sharon Eddy with power.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said, her mouth slackening with doubt.

  ‘You’re not got to let this go without a fight, Daisy,’ Lizzie’s voice was encouraging, ‘Because three, you’ve got six months.’ She leaned back triumphantly. ‘And anything can happen in six months. Anything!’

  ‘I suppose.’ The slackness turned into another twist.

  Lizzie leaned forward again and took her hands. ‘It’s not going to happen, Daisy. You can save the paper.’

  Hope began a feeble flutter in Daisy’s chest, the tentative flap of a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis. Lizzie was right. Somehow, they would do it. After all, Hailesbank without the Herald was unthinkable. The information she held in her hand was devastating – but not fatal. She, Daisy, would rally the troops, fight the fires, lead the battle to avenge Angus MacMorrow’s death. No way was that shower at The East Stoneyford Echo going to steal their paper.

  Her hand stole into her pocket, felt Tiny Ted’s soft fur soothe her fingertips, and hardened her resolve. Tomorrow. She’d start on it all tomorrow.

  Ben Gillies, not three miles away, accepted a second helping of marmalade sponge and custard from his mother and wondered what a spell at home might do to his waist.

  ‘Great turnout for MacMorrow,’ commented his father. Martin Gillies, a greyer, more weathered version of Ben, put his hand over his bowl to prevent a further dollop of carbohydrates landing on his own plate. He had fought – and won – the battle of death-by-cooking years ago, hence Kath’s eagerness to lavish this visible demonstration of her affection on her one and only son, so long absent in London.

  ‘Everyone knew Angus,’ said Kath, pouring extra marmalade sauce over Ben’s bowl, unheeding of his protestations.

  Martin grunted. ‘Not everyone loved him though.’

  ‘He was well respected.’

  ‘Like a Doberman is respected.’

  ‘Martin, it’s not like you to be so uncharitable,’ Kath said, her round face, still winsome despite the loss of youth, puckering in disapproval. ‘He wasn’t so bad, the bark was a lot worse than the bite. I do believe he was an old softie under that gruff exterior.’

  Martin Gillies grunted. ‘That’s what Ruby Spence thought, anyway.’

  ‘Martin!’ Kath’s voice was sharper this time, but she couldn’t repress a smile. ‘That was just gossip.’

  ‘Do I detect scandal?’ Ben, with the glimmerings of a memory of what life had been like living in a small rural town, laid down his spoon and wiped his mouth. He hadn’t visited Hailesbank since his parents had moved back up here and he’d spent the last few days reconnecting with his roots.

  ‘Well …’ Kath finished rinsing her hands at the kitchen sink, dried them carefully on the bright red towel (carefully chosen to match the feature wall), and sat back down at the table. Despite her protestations at her husband’s loose remarks, she was the real gossip queen of the family. She leaned forward across the table, with a conspiratorial air. Martin, his wine glass at the ready, leaned forward too. Ben, feeling his overfed stomach bulging against the waistband of his jeans, made up
the tight little circle, three heads close together, as if someone might overhear and report them to the Stasi.

  ‘They did say …’

  He listened. Or at least, a part of his brain tuned in to the inconsequential talk. Another part, inevitably, drifted back to the funeral. More specifically, the part of his brain that was wired to women homed in on the photographer, Daisy Irvine.

  Diz. He hadn’t thought about her for years. She’d changed in many respects, but her eyes were the same – big, expressive, slightly startled – just like they used to be when her bully of a father had shouted at her over nothing. They were grey as rain clouds but much more desirable. The mouth was the same too. Curvy. Mobile. She had lips that trembled and quivered and that you longed to still with a kiss. When they curled into a smile, they transformed the eyes from shadowy to alive.

  Stop it Ben Gillies, he chided himself. What’s this about? You’re heartbroken, remember?

  Thoughts of Martina were fading as memories began to flood back. Daisy Irvine had been a skinny little thing. Sixteen years old and never been kissed. He grinned inwardly. Ben, you liar. Remember that time they ran for shelter to the bridge over the Hailes? They’d arrived laughing and giggling and already wet and he’d taken one look at her shivering body, slight and slim under her damp shirt, and he’d hauled her into his arms and started kissing the hell out of her. She’d responded too, until some old geezer had come along with a dog. The bloody creature had jumped up on them, barking and spoiling the moment. Ben could still remember the sense of frustration, and embarrassment, and almost relief that they didn’t have to draw back from whatever might have happened next.

  ‘… I don’t know whether MacMorrow had done anything about it before he popped off.’

  Ben had lost track of the conversation, a fact that hardly escaped Kath Gillies. ‘Ben?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You haven’t been listening.’

  ‘Sure I have.’

  What did I just say?’

  ‘That … er … that...’ That you could drown in that girl’s eyes.

  ‘I knew it! What were you thinking about?’

  ‘Does Daisy Irvine have a boyfriend?’ Damn. He hadn’t meant to say anything and now of course his mother would make something of it.

  He was right.

  ‘You fancy her?’ Kath was delighted.

  ‘No!’ His fair skin coloured easily. It always had done, so not for the first time Ben cursed this easy betrayal. ‘I was just trying to catch up with gossip, that’s all.’

  ‘He fancies Daisy, Martin! Just wait till I tell Janet.’

  ‘Mother, for God’s sake. It was just a question.’

  ‘Don’t go spreading rumours, Kath. It’ll only backfire,’ Martin rebuked his wife, getting up reluctantly to stack the dishwasher.

  ‘You were saying something about Angus MacMorrow not doing something before he died,’ Ben dredged up desperately from his consciousness in an effort to distract his mother.

  It worked, at least for the moment. ‘The Herald’s senior sub editor retired a few weeks ago. I know they’d hired someone else but I heard at the funeral that the person was offered a better job and left them in the lurch. So I think they’re a bit desperate.’

  ‘And your point is?’ Ben, who knew perfectly well where his mother was going, was nevertheless going to make her spell it out. It was a small revenge for putting him on the spot about Daisy Irvine. His father, sensing a minor drama, turned from the sink with soapy hands and watched, grinning.

  ‘Well I thought … I wondered …’ Kath floundered slightly, evidently embarrassed to suggest that her son should even consider moving back to small-town Scotland after his big-shot job in London, ‘Really, Ben, you know very well what I’m hinting at.’

  Ben sat back in his chair, folded his arms and surveyed his mother teasingly. Then he said very slowly, ‘You’re suggesting that I don’t renew my contract at The Express and that instead I take a very poorly paid job on a really crap local newspaper – for what reason?’

  ‘You could have a crack at Daisy Irvine,’ Martin grunted mischievously, just loud enough for his wife to hear him and explode, ‘ Martin!’ before he swung back to the sink, chuckling.

  ‘I just thought it would be nice, dear, if you did something a little less stressful for a while – and if your father and I saw a bit more of you. Even just for a few weeks while they find someone? And after all,’ she paused significantly, ‘you could turn that “crap local newspaper” into something rather better, couldn’t you?’

  It was, Ben found to his surprise, a tempting suggestion. On the other hand, his jeans were quite tight already.

  Chapter Five

  Armed with the letter, which felt like an unexploded grenade in her pocket, Daisy was full of good intentions. She’d get in early, talk to one or two people about it, make a plan.

  Half way to the office, she discovered she’d left the letter on the kitchen table and had to do a smart three-point turn and wind her way back round the narrow country road to retrieve it. When she finally got to the offices of The Hailesbank Herald, they had the air of a guerrilla outpost in Cuba when the news of Che Guevara’s death arrived from Bolivia – shocked, gloomy, and not hopeful for the future. The new edition of the paper had just arrived from the printer.

  ‘The funeral’s in the centre,’ said Ma Ruby, stating a fact that every person in the room knew already. It was still early, before the front door opened to the public. This was the time when everyone met over The Diary, the bible for the day’s activity; when news was exchanged, gossip picked over, orders given, plans made.

  Sharon Eddy was there, in the smart casual clothes she favoured on working days – neat enough to get by if she had to interview someone important, comfortable enough to allow her to clamber over fences or beard a farmer in his den without having to worry about being encumbered by spiky heels or revealing skirts. Dave Collins, the junior reporter – Dishy Dave – was lounging at his own desk, trying to look cool and uninterested, but sneaking looks across at the group all the same. A freelance sub called Ed Hackitt (whose name had caused considerable amusement and not inconsiderable ribbing) grabbed a pair of scissors off a desk and sliced through the strapping that bound the pile together.

  Daisy watched, disconcerted. It didn’t seem right to drop her little bombshell.

  ‘Give it here, Ed.’

  Ma took the paper from the young sub, spread it out on a desk, and stooped over it, the fleshy rolls at her waist plumping into several bulging folds above her skirt. Her purple blouse was rising and falling with a speed that was quite alarming. With a pang of sympathy, Daisy noticed that her grey hair, tinted to blonde, looked drier and more flyaway than ever. She caught a whiff of warm body drenched with Givenchy’s Ange ou Démon and moved delicately away. No one ever said anything to Ma about the perfume that mingled with mild body odour. She was, somehow, untouchable.

  They all stared at the paper in silence. Ma gave a small sniff and turned away. Sharon, Ed, and Daisy had worked on the spread, choosing the best of Daisy’s photos as Ed laid out the pages.

  ‘Perhaps you should’ve made that pic of Provost Porter bigger?’ Dave said. ‘The man’s got an ego the size of a house. Either he’ll be on to us or his wife will. Guaranteed.’

  ‘Sod ’em,’ Sharon said belligerently. ‘You can bet your life Angus would have vetoed that. He never did have any time for that pair.’

  ‘Still …’

  ‘Still nothing.’ Ruby’s voice cut across their shoulders as she pushed her plump body back closer to the desk to see the pages better. ‘This is a tribute to Angus, not to the likes of Provost Porter.’

  Sharon turned and slid her pert backside onto the desk, crossing her slim legs just above her ankles and swinging them lazily back and forth. Her blonde fringe fell forward into her eyes and she brushed it aside in a well-practised gesture. ‘Ruby’s right. Anyway,’ she paused for effect, then said dramatically, ‘Angus has g
one. And until we hear anything to the contrary, I’ll be acting as editor. We’ve got a paper to publish.’

  There was a moment’s pause. Daisy seized her chance. ‘Well maybe we have got a paper, Sharon, maybe we haven’t.’ Several bodies swung round to look at her. She brandished the letter in her hand. ‘I’ve got news.’

  Sharon’s voice was snippy. ‘Thought I was the news hound round here.’

  Daisy ignored her. ‘It’s important.’

  ‘Oh yeah? So how’ve you come by it then?’

  Daisy took no notice of the jibe. That was just Sharon. Even though they had to work as a team, she never could bear Daisy to steal a march on her. On this occasion, though, Daisy felt no elation at beating the chief reporter to a story. The discovery of the letter in her pocket had brought with it a whole spectrum of emotions: guilt at having taken the letter in the first place, anger at what the shock of the news had done to Angus and sheer, blind terror about the possibility of losing her job. And on top of all that, the last thing she wanted was to witness the end of a paper that had served Hailesbank for a century or more.

  ‘They’re going to close us down.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘It’s true. Listen.’ Daisy unfolded the letter and read, ‘You will be only too aware of the falling circulation of The Hailesbank Herald … increasingly poor quality … considerable concern … situation untenable … we fear we will be forced to close the offices in Hailesbank and merge the paper with The East Stoneyford Echo, with obvious consequences for yourself and your staff.’

  There was a short silence, then Sharon said scathingly, ‘Don’t arse around Daisy, that isn’t funny. Give that here.’ She jumped off the desk and snatched the letter from Daisy’s hand. Her face changed. ‘Bloody hell.’