Falling Off Air (18 page)

I frowned at him. His sympathy for Paula Carmichael seemed to have evaporated. I had never heard him refer to her as “the
woman” before. Did he feel that by committing suicide she was wasting police time?

“What was she depressed about?” I wanted to know, but Finney had had enough, and he held up a hand to stop me in midflow.

“Would you object very much,” he asked, “if we had a go now?”

T
HERE must have been a dozen of them. Not all men, but in general the job still attracts more men than women. I won't dwell
on the symbolism of the zoom lens and the victim laid bare, but that morning it felt like rape.

They were huddled around my front door, and I told the minicab driver to stop fifty yards away, so I could decide what to
do next. I paid him and got out, then stood on the pavement for a good thirty seconds without a single bright idea in my head.
They are paid to be observant, but they were chatting and laughing, their eyes reaching no farther than the end of their cigarettes,
knowing that as long as they sat outside my front door they would eventually get what they were waiting for, my fellow journalists,
some of them no better than vultures, and with nastier habits.

I wanted to run—or to punch them, and it was that urge which set me walking toward them. I had put on sunglasses to save my
swollen eyes from the early morning glare, but now I took them off and put them in my pocket. If I was going to face the cameras—and
sad to say that was more likely than that I could fell them all with one left hook—then I must engage the cameras. To cover
my eyes would be to cut myself off. To let the camera gaze into my eyes might be to garner some sympathy. When you've been
in the media too long, such cold-blooded analysis of the business of communication becomes second nature. It was in my favor,
for instance, that I had put on no makeup. I would look shell-shocked, as though this thing had hit me from nowhere, not as
though I had planned a murder. Was I calculating? Absolutely. But then I really hadn't planned a murder.

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” I said as the human wall loomed in front of me. There was pandemonium for a second. I might just as
well have said, “Mob me, gentlemen, please.” Then the cameras exploded in a flurry of clicking and I found a microphone thrust
in my face.

“Did you kill Adam Wills?” someone shouted at the back of the crowd, and there was some amused cackling from a man I knew
slightly, and whom I had thought better of. Other questions were shouted, but the theme was similar, and my brain was speeding
along its own path. I turned slightly, so that the television cameras had my full face, and I tried to look into the eyes
around me as I spoke, so that I didn't look shifty or as if I had anything to hide. My legs were shaking under me, not from
nerves but from exhaustion and misery. I could smell the stale cigarette smoke on the breath of the nearest hack and I wanted
to vomit. It would have made for great television, and it would have been the end of me. Set the agenda, I murmured to myself,
set the agenda. Don't let
them
set it.

“As you probably know, Adam Wills was the father of my twins,” I said, counting down the words to a thirty-second soundbite.
That's long for a soundbite, but this was a big story and I was a big suspect. If I was editing this story I would give me
thirty seconds. I tried, moreover, to structure my statement in such a way that if they chopped it up, it would not misrepresent
me wherever they cut. There was no point in saying “I wanted to kill Adam Wills but I didn't,” because those first six words
would make the perfect headline and the last three would end up on the floor of the editing suite. What I said instead was,
“Whatever happened between us, I could never have wished Adam any harm. I know the police have to eliminate me from their
inquiries, and I support whatever they have to do. I hope they'll be able to find the stalker too, if only to eliminate him.
They have to find Adam's killer because one day my children have to know what happened to their father, and I have to know
too. I'm sorry, I have to go …” I elbowed my way through the shouted questions to my front door.

Already I was regretting what I'd said. It would sound too cocky, too polished. The strange thing was, as much as I'd calculated
what I had to say and how to say it, I had still had a hard time not breaking down. I meant every word of it. As I emerged
from the shock of the night before, my need to know was growing like a gnawing hunger in my gut. It was almost incidental
that I had to clear my name. I was shaking too much to find my keys, and it set my teeth on edge that they managed to get
a few shots of me like that, scrabbling around in my bag, head down, incompetent. I swear one man tried to follow me right
inside my house, and my foot reached behind me and made sharp contact with his ankle. As I shut the door I heard his voice
behind me, complaining, “The bitch kicked me.” I locked the door and sat down hard at the foot of the stairs.

Erica emerged from the sitting room, her face as pale as her Swedish hair. I had not enlightened her, when she arrived, about
Adam's death or my car's involvement in it, but now I could hear the television and Sky News updating us live. The children
scuttled around her legs and came to me. I scooped them up. Erica didn't come too close. I was a suspected murderer, after
all. Who knew what evil I was capable of? A baby on each arm, I could still kick.

“I have telephoned to my agency,” she said, crossing her arms in front of her, a buffer in case I tried to headbutt her to
death. “They know about my situation. I have informed them I am leaving when you return.”

I stared at her. Leave! I wanted to shout. Get out of my house! Instead I begged.

“Just stay for today,” I said. “Please. This is all a horrible mistake and I need some time to get things sorted out.”

“There is no mistake,” she said. “Their father is dead.”

Her hips, her shoulders, everything about her down to her slightly freckled jaw was set. I looked at my watch. It was nearly
two already. I'd been at the police station since eight-thirty. Five hours of questioning and I knew it wasn't over yet. Outside
the sky was clear and blue, the temperature the fresh, sharp cool of autumn. The children were already stir-crazy, wriggling
in my arms and begging to be put down, then crying to be picked up again. We would all be carried out in straitjackets if
we were imprisoned in here all day. There was a good chance, however, that the press pack might be sufficiently stupid that
they had not realized there was an alternative way out. It did not look like it from the front, but a small lane ran along
the end of the back garden. I had no gate onto it, but after the storm part of the fence had collapsed, creating an adequate
escape route.

“Help me out 'til five,” I pleaded, “and I'll pay you double.”

Now she shifted to look at me.

“Cash,” I said. Her arms unlocked and fell to her side.

She shrugged and nodded. She was not willing, but she was mine. I had three hours to salvage my life.

Maeve's face fell when I walked into her office.

“Robin, I thought you weren't coming in until all this blows over. You look terrible.”

“I've done nothing wrong, Maeve,” I looked her steadily in the eye, “and this
is
supposed to be my first day back at work. I thought you'd be glad I've made the effort.” She gave me a twisted half-smile
and glanced away, pulling a file of papers toward her then pushing it away, just for something to do. She gestured me toward
one of the low armless chairs that put all her visitors at a disadvantage. She was wearing black, no sleeves, her arms tanned
and taut. There were no love handles on Maeve, no cuddly cellulite. She was all bone and rippling muscle, honed in the gym
morning, noon, and night.

“You look great.” I tried to bring us back to some sort of normality. “Is the black for Adam?” I nodded at the dress.

“It is.” She brushed a speck of dust from her modest breast. “I notice you, however, are not in mourning. Is there anything
we should infer from that?”

“How dare you.” My voice was low.

“I'm sorry,” she said after a moment. “That was unfair. I know that the two of you … were very close at one time.”

It was true that I had given no thought that morning to what might be appropriate, simply pulling on jeans and a leather jacket
against the chill in the air, but I was in mourning as surely as Maeve was in black.

“Maeve,” I said softly. “We've known each other a long time. Either you think I'm a murderer, in which case you shouldn't
even be talking to me. Or you're just pissed at me because my private life is messing up your professional life. If you think
I killed Adam, just ask me to leave now. If you don't, then could you please cut the crap?”

The silence stretched. Maeve examined her fingernails for what seemed like several minutes, and then she leaned back in her
chair.

“I'm not going to ask you to leave, Robin,” she said, “but don't underestimate the shit we find ourselves in.”

I realized I had been holding my breath. Now I breathed out, grateful for the “we,” and for the “ourselves.” My relief was
short-lived.

“You look like death, Robin,” Maeve continued, leaning forward again. “It's only hours since Adam was killed. You're giving
yourself no time to recover. I do appreciate you coming in, in the middle of all this, of course I do, but take some time
off.”

“What are you saying?”

“What do you mean, ‘what am I saying?’ I'm saying take some time off.”

“I don't want time off.”

“Well, as your manager,” Maeve attempted a mischievous smile here, then gave up on it, “I'm telling you that you need time
off.”

“You're suspending me.”

Maeve held up her hand and waved it to and fro.

“Not at all,” she said. “Don't be so melodramatic. We just want to let the dust settle. Let's call it compassionate leave.”

“I don't want leave, I don't want compassion.”

Maeve passed her hand over her forehead.

“Robin, you can't walk in here and expect … Look, you'll be on full pay, and of course we'll be very excited to have you back
the moment this is all over. It's just very difficult for us right now. We've lost Adam, which is a personal blow to many
of us who knew him. And how, for God's sake, can we cover his death when he was run over by one of our own … I know, I know,
not
you,
just your car. I didn't mean to imply … but you must see it's very difficult for us. Very, very difficult all round. For
us as well as you. I know that if there's anyone who is sensitive to the needs of the Corporation, it's you, so I'm sure you'll
understand …”

“Understand? Understand?” I could scarcely fit words together, and I stood there repeating it like an angry parrot. “Understand?
You're screwing me, that's all there is to understand.”

I walked out then in a red haze of anger and marched through the corridors that linked offices and studios and canteens like
a blood, supply to vital organs. For all its backstabbing, its petty fights, and its many inadequacies I had still loved this
place. Adam had loved this place. I saw no one I recognized and in my head they were all cowering under their desks, too frightened
to say hello. A black hole was opening up inside me: The Corporation was no longer my home. I was in exile.

W
HAT on earth possessed you, at a time like this, to go and talk to that woman?”

I was at my mother's, where I'd sent Erica and the kids when we escaped out of the back door. Erica had managed to take the
kids onto Streatham Common for a walk without getting mobbed, and she informed me that they had tottered and tumbled around
without a care in the world. We could sleep at my mother's to stay away from the press for as long as we wanted. Now my mother
was helping me bathe Hannah and William. Which is to say that I was sitting on the toilet seat, a glass of merlot in hand,
and my mother was perched on the edge of the bath with her customary glass of sherry. Between us we had about a quarter of
an eye on the children. Their discarded clothes lay wrinkled and muddy like shed skins all over the floor, but in the past
twenty-four hours domestic concerns like laundry had rapidly descended the list of life's priorities.

Why indeed had I spent my only three hours on a visit to Maeve? It certainly wasn't loyalty to the new job I'd never wanted.
Nor was it some misguided attempt to pretend everything was normal, which it clearly was not. Of course I had been canvassing
support, knowing that if my employer (and Adam's employer) showed faith in me, then that nebulous thing known as my reputation
would receive a boost. But I was not so stupid as to think the Corporation could save me.

“The Corporation was Adam's life,” I said to my mother, as though that explained it.

“You still haven't told me why you had to go there,” she pointed out softly. She'd been very gentle with me ever since Adam's
death. She was my mother and she saw the pain in me where everyone else assumed there was none. Still, I sensed that deep
down she was alarmed by what was happening.