11:59

by David Williams

  Meg’s eyes widen and she echoes, “So?”

  “I don’t see the problem. As Simon said, just a nice little poser to conjure with. One day wonder. Quite intriguing for the listeners. Good radio. No real damage done.”

  “That’s what you think, is it? That’s your professional opinion?” says Meg.

  “It’s a way of looking at it.”

  “Tell him what happened next, Simon.”

  Simon shifts in his chair as he’s called upon to speak and opens out his hands. “It was all hell let loose, basically. Marni’ll back me on this, the board lit up like a Christmas tree. Everybody wanted to tell me about hearing that original call, thinking it was strange, OK, maybe they did nothing about it at the time but they were convinced something odd was going on. Others had got your email, thought nothing more about it, but now it’s come up again… In fact, Marni had a bit of job on protecting you, to be honest. You know, people wanting to come on-air to slag you off. That’s right, Marni, mm?”

  Marni joins in the assassination. “Quite a few, yeah. What with those and the ones who’d got themselves convinced that Hassan was threatening to murder his wife or something. You know, wrong end of the stick, but it was chaos really, trying to sort out who we could safely let on the show. We could have been in all sorts of trouble.”

  “Well done you,” I say, trying not to let the irony show too much.

  “But then the mystery deepened,” says Simon. “Meg?”

  “Play the final clip, Jim.”

  Jim studies his list. “Is it this one marked Amina, Armina?”

  The name hits me low in my gut. They have the Amina connection. Did she call the show herself? Well, this is either clear-up time or shit hits the fan. Which?

  “That will be the one,” from Meg.

  Jim seems to take forever to locate the piece while accusation hangs heavy in the room. Meg the executioner, with her axe suspended over my head on the chopping block. The relief when the speakers come back to life is only temporary. Simon again, sounding a lot less comfortable than he did before, and his edginess feeds mine.

  ‘Hot topic tonight, ghosts in the machine. Poor Marni is working her little white socks off next door so please be patient, there’s so many wanting to have their say on this one. We’ll try and get to you if we can. Right now on Line 4, is it Dave? No, Shelley…’

  ‘Chelle. Michelle.’

  ‘Sorry, Chelle. Go ahead.’

  ‘Well, first of all you were asking earlier if this Hassan could get back in touch with the programme.’

  ‘That’s right, yes. You know there’s such a lot of confusion about what he might have said or didn’t say…’

  ‘But he’s not been in touch, no?’

  ‘We’ve not heard from him yet, Chelle. But of course it may be he can’t get through, the lines have been so busy tonight. Rest assured though, the minute he does…’

  ‘He won’t.’

  ‘Well, maybe.’

  ‘He won’t, I can guarantee. For a start they don’t like fuss, they’ll run a mile from it in a manner of speaking. And I can tell you for certain, honey, cos he’s told us he won’t.’

  ‘He’s told you...? Right, you know this Hassan, do you, Shelley? Chelle.’

  ‘I’ve never met him before in my life. Not in this one, anyway. But he’s come through to say that.’

  ‘Aha. When you say, come through…’

  ‘From the other side. I’ve been a medium for twelve years, Marc…’

  ‘Simon.’

  ‘Simon, sorry. Practising medium for twelve years, but all my life really.’

  ‘And you’re telling me Hassan’s spoken to you tonight?’

  ‘Well, mental transference, yes. Not a voice like you hear on the radio, if you get my meaning.’

  ‘And he told you he wouldn’t be calling us up tonight? Did he say anything else?’

  ‘He did. He had a message for a lady called Amina.’

  ‘Amina, yes, his wife. Robert who came on earlier said he remembered his wife was called Amina.’

  ‘Did he? Well, actually I wasn’t listening at that time. Amina came through from Hassan. He told me to tell her he’s sorry about the car.’

  ‘Sorry about the car?’

  ‘He was in a car crash, Simon. A few months ago. Check the details if you like, I’m just telling you what he told me. That’s how he got to…’

  She’s cut off in the middle of her sentence, Simon hitting the dump button about forty-five seconds too late in my book.

  “You handled that well,” I say to him sardonically across the table, and he comes within a gnat’s breath of a self-satisfied “Thanks” before he catches my tone and stops his mouth. I turn my attention to Meg.

  “Talk about unprofessional. You’re pointing at the wrong guy over this balls-up. What the fuck else has he been letting people say?”

  “There’s no need for language like that,” tuts Alice Winter. “You’re not in the bar now.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Leave it, both of you,” says Meg. “Listen, Marc, I want to make it quite clear that I don’t hold Simon or indeed Marni responsible for any of this. The truth is you left them up shit creek without a paddle, trying to shove your mess under the carpet.”

  “That’s a great mixed metaphor, Meg. It almost works.”

  “Are you trying to be funny?”

  I hold my hands up in my defence, but the truth is I am just beginning to see a glimmer of the absurd in all this. Simon allowing Chelle, my resident self-styled medium, to get everybody worked up about the spirits getting in touch after she’s trawled the internet for clues and wrapped them up in baloney - it has all the elements of farce. Meg, though, quickly brings me down with the next thing she says.

  “What you don’t seem to recognise is this has gone nuclear. Do you realise that poor woman had to call the police to stop people banging at her door in the middle of the night?”

  “What poor woman? Chelle?”

  “The Asian woman. Amina. She had a baby in bed. Got the fright of her life.”

  “Oh, Jesus.” A reverse image of a police car, the one I thought was tailing me, swims into view as clearly as if I’m looking in the driving mirror. Turning off The Gate towards Prince Albert Road. The difference is that the one in my head has the siren going.

  Meg piles on the pressure. “We’ve had calls stacking up at Reception this morning. And I’m not just talking about the public. The press have got hold of the story now. I’ve had to bring Sarah in from the agency to try and keep a lid on it.”

  “But there was no problem before,” I argue. “It’s your blue-eyed boy’s got everybody going cos he couldn’t handle it properly. If he’d followed my line and just said it was a slip of the tongue by Hassan he’d have nipped it in the bud on the first call.”

  “But I didn’t know your line, did I?” Simon fires back. “I didn’t know anything about it.”

  “Exactly,” says Meg. “Because you went your own sweet way, Marc, like you always do. Because you think you know better than anybody else, don’t need me or anybody else. Well, I can assure you that’s one big mistake. One big fat mistake.”

  Meg slams her hand on the table and juts her chin out at me, eyes blazing. She’s got herself into battle mood and I guess she’s expecting the next volley from me, but I don’t have anything particular to say at this point so all of us just sit there for the next few seconds, some staring at this tableau of Meg as Cruella de Vil, others looking anywhere but, until she unfreezes her body and parks her bum back in the depths of Neville’s leather seat. She places her wrists deliberately on the arms of the chair, looking around the assembly as if she’s in a play before she speaks again. “I want everybody out of this office except Marc Niven. And you, Alice. I need you to stay.”

  Simon and Marni make no effort to acknowledge never mind help Jim as they leave, I notice, and he struggles to balance all his cables and speakers on top of the lapt
op, but he just looks grateful to be granted his release. He raises his eyebrows privately at me as he passes, part sympathy, part conspiring in my opinion of Meg and this whole affair. Once the door closes behind him, Meg draws herself erect on the edge of her big chair while Alice beside her turns to a new page in her Filofax.

  Meg addresses herself directly to me, full eye contact, almost willing me to look away. “You need to understand, Marc, that I have Neville’s full authority in relation to decisions that may affect your future with us here. Naturally I’ve discussed this situation with him…”

  “What situation?”

  “Don’t be obtuse. I’ve already said I hold you entirely responsible for what is turning out to be a public relations disaster for us…”

  “Oh, lighten up.”

  Her eyes glitter. “Are you going to let me finish or do you want me terminate this interview here and now?”

  I shrug. Alice makes some cryptic note on her file. Meg continues.

  “I’m also taking into account certain behaviour traits you’ve been exhibiting over the past few weeks which, frankly, are not only disturbing, they’re completely unacceptable in our organisation.”

  What’s this about? I lean forward in my chair and say it aloud. “What’s this about?”

  “Firstly, transgressing company policy on drinking alcohol.”

  “I wasn’t even aware the company had a policy… and when did I transgress it?”

  Meg turns sideways to bring in Alice, who pulls out a folded A4 sheet from the back of her file, straightens it out with one hand as she says, “From the Code of Conduct,” then reads aloud: “Alcohol is strictly forbidden on the premises and, while social drinking in moderation is acceptable during staff leisure time, it is unacceptable just before or during working hours or at any time in quantities that adversely affect the employee’s ability to perform her/his duties.”

  “Well,” I say, cranking up my defence, “I can honestly say I’ve never been shown that rule or code of conduct or whatever you call it in nearly seven years working here. Number two, I’ve never brought alcohol onto the premises, but if you care to open Neville’s cabinet over there you might find your biggest culprit in that department…”

  “We’re obviously not referring to corporate hospitality, don’t be stupid,” says Meg, losing her patience already, but I ignore this and press on.

  “As for drinking before working hours, bearing in mind I start my shift just as everybody else is pouring into the pubs and clubs, I don’t see why having the occasional half of lager with my lunch or whatever should be frowned upon, especially – and this is the important point – as it has never, ever affected my work in a negative way, and I defy you to say different.”

  “What did Debbie Wells mention to you earlier this week, Alice?” says Meg, prompting.

  “She told me that Marc came bursting into Studio One, hours before he was due in, swearing and generally causing a disturbance, and smelling of drink. He also told her he was there for a meeting, which was a lie, and he openly criticised another employee in, well, let’s say, the strongest terms.”

  “That employee being Marni, who has been here all of two weeks?” It’s a rhetorical question from Meg, but Alice twists the knife by answering it anyway.

  “Yes.”

  “Look, that completely misrepresents the situation. Debbie seems to have some sort of grudge…”

  I’m stopped in my tracks by a magisterial hand raised by Meg and a curt “You need to listen, not speak right now. Alice has something to say about Marni. And I mean really listen, Marc. This is serious.”

  Alice flicks back a couple of pages to refer to some handwritten notes, gathers herself then starts up, looking at Meg, not me. “Marni came looking for me the other day, quite upset. Really upset, I would put it. It was the first day Marc was off, actually.”

  I close my eyes with a certain degree of resignation as she goes on. I’ve already got Marni well worked out, and I’ve second-guessed what’s coming.

  “Apparently Marc had lost his temper completely unnecessarily with Marni the night before, not once but twice, then practically ignored her for the rest of the time, even while the programme was going out,”

  “No wonder it sounded so stilted,” Meg puts in. I open my eyes briefly to hate her more plainly across the table.

  “When I dug deeper, I found out the reason, though Marni was naturally reluctant to tell me at first.” (Oh, naturally.)

  “Go on,” says Meg, as if she hasn’t already heard this.

  “The night before, Marc had insisted on driving her home, spent the entire journey telling her she was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen etcetera etcetera, and made a pass at her which Marni immediately rejected. That made Marc very angry, it seems, hence his blow-up the next time he saw her.”

  I open my eyes and Alice involuntarily clasps her hands together and moves back from the table as if she’s expecting me to leap across it to attack her.

  “That’s your take on events, is it?”

  “It’s what Marni told me.”

  “And what if I tell you it’s complete and utter bollocks?”

  Meg butts in. “We’d believe Marni.”

  “Because she’s a woman.”

  “Because you’ve got form.”

  Now I do almost leap across the table, but it’s Meg I’m wanting to attack, not Alice. “What the hell do you mean by that?”

  “What I say. You can’t deny it. Everybody knows about your affair with Sam.”

  “She was my girlfriend. My partner, actually. So what?”

  “So you were a married man. So you… screwed her life up as well, and we lost one of our best people because of you.”

  “You don’t know anything about Sam and me, or why she left. You’ve got no right to pry into my private aff… relationships.”

  Meg comes back hard. “I’ve got every right to protect employees from inappropriate behaviour. Don’t think you can just pick up poor Marni where you left off with Sam. Do you even know how old she is? And it’s not just Marni. What about Kate?”

  “Kate? Kate Foreman?” Now I’m absolutely at a loss. Alice fills me in.

  “The same day Debbie tells us you came in drunk…”

  “I wasn’t drunk.”

  “You went into the newsroom and made advances on Kate while she was working.”

  “Made advances…?”

  “Came up from behind and massaged her shoulders, even though she made it clear she wasn’t interested. It’s all documented.”

  “I don’t believe this.”

  “Well, you’d better believe it, Marc,” says Meg. “And you’d better believe I’m suspending you as of right now until further notice.”

  “What you mean, suspended?”

  “I mean I want you to leave, and I don’t want you back. You’ll get your pay sent through until we make some more permanent arrangement. You’re a walking time-bomb, Marc Niven, that’s the truth, and I don’t want you anywhere near the place. You can take that as an order.”

  I’ve been half-expecting something like this all morning but it still comes as a shock when it happens. Suspended. It somehow seems worse than a straight sacking. As if I was a criminal. That and all the nonsense leading up to it, making me out to be some sort of sexual predator. I’m dumbfounded. All I can muster in response at this point is, “You’ll be hearing from my solicitor.”

  “Look forward to it,” says Meg, who’s walked across to the office door while I’ve been trying to take all this in. She opens the door ostentatiously and stands waiting, so I have to pass her to walk through it. She almost spits at me as I leave.

  When I walk out of the lift on the ground floor I’m ignored by the receptionists. To be fair, they’re both busy on the switchboard, but I’m convinced that on every other occasion I’ve passed the desk in the last seven years either one of them has smiled or nodded, even waved. I hesitate for a moment, wondering whether I should go back an
d clear my desk, but since the only personal possessions sitting there are my Sony award and my Newcastle United mug, and since Simon and Marni are more than likely in the office talking over what went on in the meeting, I don’t bother.

  I push through the glass exit door into an unexpectedly sunny February day and hesitate again, unsure whether to head for the car or the Eldon Arms, when somebody touches my arm. Oliver? But this is a tall, jaundiced-looking bloke I’ve never seen before.

  “Marc Niven? Philip Mann, Chronicle. Could I have a quick word?”

  VI

  Well, you pay your money and you make your choice. Having just been treated like shit by Meg Reece and her cohorts, I have been handed the perfect opportunity to get my own back through the media, to dish the dirt and squeal like the proverbial pig about the injustice, my shredded rights and the real culprits in this fiasco. I could even toss in a few juicy morsels about payola disguised as sponsorship, deceit and cynical manipulation of the public that I’ve been witness to over the last seven years. But I don’t do any of this. No beans are spilled. Don’t consider for a moment that this has anything to do with loyalty, misplaced or otherwise, to my long-term employer. I don’t owe them. It has everything to do with Amina Begum Khan.

  Whatever is behind the mystery of Hassan’s message it seems clear to me that Amina doesn’t need this extra complication in her life. When I watched her struggling up the stone steps to her empty house with her child in the buggy, a carrier bag on the handle and a front door key to juggle with, it was obvious that she has a lot to deal with already, and no-one to help. Add to this the grief she must still be feeling for her dead husband and, no doubt, bills to pay…. She must be distraught with this sudden attention from the likes of Chelle and her credulous public, not to mention the press.