Carnage on the Committee (19 page)

He helped himself to more peas. 'Then there was a very jolly clash about the regional novels Rosa was so keen on, and Geraint went into an entertaining tirade about the Celtic contingent along the lines that the Scots novel was "pukelit", consisting as it did of "fucking Glaswegians saying 'fuck' between injecting themselves with heroin and throwing up", the Irish one was yet another droning exercise in misery tourism and if he had to read another piece of criminally fraudulent Welsh nostalgia about singing socialists bonding in the pits he'd puke himself.'

'Pity you couldn't have recorded the meeting and produced the edited highlights.'

'Like
Big Brother?
Now, that would be a gripping show. Rosa would be first out, I think, on the grounds off being sanctimonious and boring.'

'So how many has she on her side?' Pooley took another sip of sparkling water, as Amiss took one of wine.

'Den often agrees with her, though he defends men and his right to write from the point of view of the oppressed. Wysteria isn't interested in anything except herselff but it suits her usually to agree with Rosa, which Hugo sometimes does, especially if Europe comes into it anywhere. Griffiths is so focused on pushing his candidate that he only gets worked up against books he considers have bad authority, but he tends to side with Jack and me because he hates most of the others, as does Dervla, who has become positively clingy and who is happy now with Jack who was unffailingly courteous and respectful to her. As opposed to anyone else.'

Pooley looked at Amiss gravely. 'You're not being tempted, are you, Robert? Dervla's very vulnerable.'

Amiss bridled. 'Do you think she'd be better off with the sweepings of the latest boyband?'

'No, it's just that...'

'Oh, knock it off, Ellis. She's a nice kid but I couldn't get involved with someone who hasn't yet got the hang of how to hold a conversation. Though I have to say that between Jack urging me into bed with everyone and you warning me off someone I'm not even attracted by, I'm thinking of declaring my sex-life - or lack of it - off-limits to my friends.'

Pooley looked grave again. 'Mary Lou wanted to know if you were still pining for Rachel.'

'Did she now?' Amiss ate another forkful of potato and took another gulp of wine.

'Well?'

'Well, in truth, yes and no.'

'Go on.'

'I miss the old Rachel, not the Rachel who so lost her marbles as to fall into the arms of Eric Sinclair, who, as New Labour twerps go, is a megatwerp.'

'I've never really asked you how bad all that was, Robert.'

'Of course not, Ellis. We're Englishmen.'

'And I really shouldn't be asking you now, since we need to talk Warburton, but Mary Lou will tick me off if I don't seize the opportunity.'

it won't surprise you that it was much worse than I pretended, will it? I kept hoping she would recover from the madness and rush back to me cured of the prig-virus, but of course she didn't.'

'Why of course?'

'You haven't forgotten the press coverage?'

'What I saw was pretty grim.'

'With someone like Rachel, the effect of being held up to public odium as a marriage-breaking power-crazed bimbo ensured there was no going back. And then, of course, when he lost his job owing to getting on the wrong side of the Chancellor and being made a sacrificial victim ...'

Pooley nodded. 'I can guess. She felt bound to stick by him.'

'Exactly.'

'She's never been in touch with Jim. I think he was a bit hurt. They go back a long way.'

'She didn't want to be the cause of any split loyalties so she said she'd leave to me those people who were primarily my friends. I did the same with hers. I should have told you that, but it was hard enough

keeping the lip stiff without actually talking to anyone about her.'

'We'll never be New Men, will we, Robert?'

'I think we're sort of Third-Way Men, caught somewhere between Captain Oates and Felix Ferriter.'

'Felix Ferriter!'

'Well, OK, not Felix Ferriter, but touchy-feely-searching-for-their-feminine-side types.'

Pooley grinned. 'Fortunately, Mary Lou seems to prefer Oates to Ferriter.'

'So did Rachel once.'

'Have you heard from her since you split up?'

'Occasionally. We tried to stay friends but I wasn't sufficiently over it to be able to meet her, let alone to be so Hampstead I could meet her with that awful little git, so the occasional stiff phone call about practicalities was the only contact. Latterly, though, we've exchanged the odd e-mail. Even the odd frivolous e-mail, so, who knows, maybe she's recovering her sense of humour. Now, back to the committee meeting.'

Pooley took the hint. 'Was it very fractious?'

'The threat of Knapper pulling out so frightened the wits out of all of them - though Dervla and I would have been glad - that grudgingly and grumblingly they compromised. We came out at one with an agreed long-list. Jack wanted to stick out for cutting it down to twenty-five, but the prospect of being late for lunch put her off that. I was quite peevish with her, as the one she was gunning for as the last sacrificial victim was one I think very well of, but she can't stick it because it's about a neurotic Frenchman and Hurlingham liked its profound European significance. Eventually she said, with the air of one offering an enormous olive branch, that as a gesture, since Hermione had liked it, she'd let it stay on the list.'

'So it was a good day?'

'Considering. There were plenty of verbicuffs but no fisticuffs, Georgie was mad with excitement at being able to release the list on the appointed day and even lunch went without major incident. Oh, well, that is apart from the way Wysteria carried on when Jack called for a cigar. Said it would finish her off as her lungs were so delicate.'

'Jack's response?'

'Trotted out her oft-repeated Kipling lines about a woman being only a woman, but a good cigar a smoke. Wysteria stamped off followed by Rosa. Hurlingham, rather guiltily, stayed for a cigar and the rest of them chose to finish their liqueurs.'

'How did Wysteria seem after her ordeal?'

'I think she was fine and that Jack was right to say she was putting it on. Not that she hadn't been utterly terrified by the journey. Anyone would be. And I felt momentarily - but only momentarily - guilty for having been the cause. But she's as tough as she's nasty, Wysteria. Of course, she now loathes Jack even more than do Rosa, Den, Felix and Hugo, and I can't really blame her. Geraint Griffiths, however, seems to think Jack's a bit of a laugh, but then he has reason to think her authority good. She came in hard on his side when Rosa, to some acclaim, tried to have
Pursuing the Virgins
disqualified on the grounds that it was promoting racial hatred. Jack said it mightn't be literature but it was literate and that was more than could be said for most of their choices.'

Amiss's phone rang. 'Yes, Jack ... I'm eating with Ellis . . . Sausages and mash, since you ask, and, no, they won't be Tamworth, but they're delicious anyway. Yes . . . Yes . . . I've told Ellis you smote the whole lot of them ... You what? You unscrupulous old bat ... But what if he? . .. Oh, OIC ... Yes, will do. Bye.'

'She really likes praise,' said Pooley.

'Don't we all? It's just that we're too reserved to demand it. Mind you, she deserves it, I suppose. Turns out she hadn't talked to Knapper at all but decided praying him in aid was the only way to swat Rosa.'

'But what happens if... ?'

'She's already told him. Made him laugh, apparently. Anyway, I've to go to Cambridge tomorrow so we can plot the next stage.'

Pooley's phone rang. 'My God ... How? ... When? .. . Are you sure it was suicide? ... I'll be there in ten. Bye.'

He looked at Amiss. 'Oh, dear God.'

'What's happened?'

'It's Wysteria Wilcox. She seems to have drowned herself.'

Amiss saw Pooley off, hailed a taxi and rang the baroness, who reacted robustly. 'Don't be absurd, Robert. Wysteria's far too much of a cow to kill herselff while there are still people in the world she could make miserable. I bet it's an accident.'

'I hope you're right.'

'Of course I'm right,' she said testily. 'If you've taken the notion into your fat head that she topped herselff because I upset her this morning, expunge it forthwith. Might I remind you that in the middle of all the metaphorical swooning-on-the-chaise-longue-and-calling-for-the-smelling-salts, she grabbed every opportunity to push the books of people she considers her proteges and nearly made Dervla cry.'

'True. Now you mention it, she was really, really unpleasant in her underhand way and you did well to bawl her out.'

'So, as I said, it's an accident. Or, of course, she might have been bumped off. Let me know if that turns out to be the case. It would raise some interesting questions.' She yawned noisily. 'But I'm off to bed now and won't be available before seven a.m. whatever happens. One way or another, things will be hotting up tomorrow so I need my beauty sleep. And I suggest you emulate me. There's nothing useful you can do between now and then since you can't admit to having inside knowledge about Wysteria popping her dogs.'

'You're probably right.'

'I'm always right. But don't forget that I want you here by eleven at the latest.'

As Amiss climbed into bed, he heard Wysteria's death being announced on the BBC's eleven o'clock news. So, it turned out, did Ron Knapper, who rang Georgie Prothero, who having tried and failed to reach the baroness rang Amiss in a state of mingled hysteria and frustration. Having calmed Prothero and persuaded him to go to bed. Amiss fell asleep, but was then woken by a somewhat inebriated Dervla, who had seen the midnight news on television. As best Amiss could decipher the tumble of words, Geraint Griffiths had been on, talking of a pogrom of judges initiated by dark forces. 'Robert, I'm, like, so head-wrecked and alone,' she cried pitifully, so Amiss got up, dressed and took a taxi to the Ritz, where he held her hand as they sat on the sofa and shared a bottle of wine, spoke to her agent and made him promise to turn up at breakfast time and, at about three, put Dervla to bed and - at her insistence - slept beside her, which - at the dictates of his conscience but with extreme difficulty - he managed to do chastely in spite of her advances by dint of keeping a sheet between them. At six-fifteen he slipped out of bed, left a reassuring note for Dervla on the washbasin in her bathroom and headed off to tend to Plutarch, change and leave for King's Cross. Reaching home in time to hear the seven o'clock news, he learned that while the police still suspected accident or suicide. Den Smith as well as Geraint

Griffiths was being quoted as suspecting foul play. Having got through to the baroness with this news, Amiss was told to stop fussing and leave everything to her.

At nine, with his phone switched off. Amiss settled into the Cambridge train and began to go through his vast pile of newspapers. The news coverage was sketchy, but all the broadsheets as well as the up-market tabloids had photographs of Wysteria looking soulful: here poised against a background of apple blossom, there, with hands loosely clasped, gazing rapturously at nothing in particular.

Rosa Karp surfaced in the
Guardian
expressing her grief at having lost two such close, brilliant and wonderful friends in a matter of weeks,
The Times
featured a long quote from Geraint about attacks on free speech which was as dark as it was impenetrable and, in the
Mirror,
Den Smith pointed out the likely significance of both women having been opponents of the Iraq war. All three were asked should the Warburton go ahead: Rosa equivocated, fearing the possibility of offending the bereaved, while wanting to do what the dead would have wished. Den said he would never follow the securocrat agenda - a comment he refused to explain - and Griffiths said the future of Western democracy depended on the Warburton challenging the forces of fascism. Opening the
Sun,
Amiss was appalled to see it had eschewed Wysteria for Dervla, who was shown arriving at a recent Britpop event wearing thigh-high boots and a few scraps of sequinned denim. The headline - 'IS DERVLA NEXT?' - caused him to ring her, but there was no answer.

Readers of the news stories were pointed towards inside pages to read assessments of the Warburton long-list cobbled together the previous afternoon by Arts editors whose judgements crossed a spectrum from praise for its eclecticism to denunciations of its self-indulgence and absence of social conscience.
The Guardian
was so outraged over the shortage of regional and ethnic fiction that Amiss suspected Rosa must have been on the telephone straight after the meeting, the
Daily Telegraph
produced a general lament about the impoverished state of modern fiction and the
Daily Mail
had a 'why-oh-why?' comment piece about the craze for novels about drugs, sex and degradation.

Amiss fell asleep shortly afterwards and dreamed about Dervla's midriff.

'Here's 'is statement, sir,' said Detective Sergeant Kennison.

'Whose statement?' asked Pooley.

'The fella as found Wilcox's corpse tied up to his 'ouseboat. Funny bloke. Saw 'im late last night and tried to make 'im give a statement proper, but 'e said as 'ow I was leaving out the magic, and he made a big fuss, and to be honest, I couldn't spell 'alf the words, so it seemed easier in the end to let 'im write it 'isself. Like you said, last week, it's no 'arm to let 'em 'ang themselves.'

Pooley, who had recommended that course of action after a bruising encounter with Kennison's prose, took the couple of sheets of typescript and settled down to read. 'My name is Nigel Withenshaw and presently I roost in a little houseboat moored across from the Chiswick Eyot. I'd had a simply exhausting day, so very soon after I reached home, coming up to nine, as my friend Harry was cooking our little supper, I poured us each a glass of wine and took mine onto the deck to calm me and help me savour the enchanted evening.

it was an occasion of sensual delight, for from below were coming some exquisite Schubertian strains, the air was balmy, the gentle zephyr soothed my soul and the moonlight danced on the water between my boat and the glorious willows on the eyot. I revelled in the textures.