‘This vacancy you were talking about …’ Hilary prompted.

‘Oh, that.’ Henry mentioned the name of one of the larger independent companies. ‘You know there’s been a reshuffle there and they’ve got a new MD. Luckily we were able to get one of our own men in. Comes from a financial background, so not only is he good with figures but best of all he knows absolutely sweet FA about the business. One of his first jobs is going to be to get rid of that clapped-out old pinko Beamish.’

‘So they’ll be looking for a new head of current affairs.’

‘Absolutely.’

Hilary digested this news.

‘He gave me my first break, you know. Back in the mid seventies.’

‘Quite.’ Henry drained his glass and reached for the decanter. ‘But then not even your worst enemies,’ he said drily, ‘could accuse you of being the sentimental type.’

∗

When Hilary turned up for her meeting with Alan Beamish she was shown – as arranged – not into his office but into an impersonal interview room with a view over the main entrance.

‘I’m sorry about this,’ he said. ‘It’s a blasted nuisance. They’re repainting my ceiling, or something. I wouldn’t mind but I was only told about it this morning. Can I get you a coffee?’

He hadn’t changed much. His hair may have been greyer, his movements slower, and his resemblance to an elderly parish priest even more pronounced: but otherwise, it seemed to Hilary that the dreadful evening he had inflicted on her during that long school holiday might have been yesterday rather than twenty years ago.

‘I was more than a little surprised to get your call,’ he said. ‘To be honest, I don’t really see that you and I have got very much to discuss.’

‘Well, for instance: I might have come to ask you to apologize for calling me a barbarian in your little diatribe for theIndependent.’

Alan had recently published an article about the decline of public service broadcasting called ‘The Barbarians at the Gate’, in which Hilary had been held up (rather to her delight, it must be said) as an example of everything he hated about the present cultural climate.

‘I meant every word,’ he said. ‘And you know very well that you give as good as you get. You’ve devoted plenty of column inches to attacking me over the years – as a type, if not by name.’

‘Do you ever regret giving me so much help,’ Hilary asked, ‘when you see what a Fury you unleashed upon the world?’

‘You would have got there sooner or later.’

Hilary took her coffee cup and sat on the window-sill. The sun was shining brightly.

‘Your new boss can’t have been too delighted with that piece,’ she said.

‘He hasn’t mentioned it.’

‘How have things been since he took over?’

‘Difficult, if you must know,’ said Alan. ‘Bloody awful, in fact.’

‘Oh? In what way?’

‘No money for programmes. No enthusiasm for programmes, either: at least not the sort I want to make. I mean, you wouldn’tbelieve their attitude over this Kuwaiti thing. I’ve been telling them for months we should be doing a programme on Saddam and his military build-up. We’re in this bloody ridiculous situation whereby we’ve spent the last few years selling him these weapons, and now we’re turning round and calling him the Beast of Babel because he’s actually using them. You’d have thought there’d be something to be said on that subject. I mean, just in the last few weeks I’ve been having talks with an independent film-maker who’s been working on a documentary about all this for years, purely off his own bat. Showed me some superb footage. But the people upstairs won’t commit themselves to it. They don’t want to know.’

‘That’s too bad.’

Alan glanced at his watch.

‘Look, Hilary, I’m sure you didn’t come all the way here just to look at the view of our forecourt, beautiful though it is. Would you mind coming to the point?’

‘That photo that went with your article,’ she said absently. ‘Was it taken in your office?’

‘Yes, it was.’

‘Was that a Bridget Riley hanging on the wall?’

‘That’s right.’

‘You bought it off my brother, didn’t you?’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘Lots of green and black rectangles, all on a slant.’

‘That’s the one. Why do you ask?’

‘Well, it’s just that there seem to be two men outside, loading it into the back of a van.’

‘What the –’

Alan leapt to his feet and came to the window. He looked down and saw a removal van parked by the steps, with the contents of his office stacked on the sunbaked tarmac: his books, his swivel chair, his plants, stationery and paintings. Hilary smiled.

‘We thought this would be the kindest way to tell you. It’s best to get these things over with quickly.’

Somehow, he managed to say: ‘We?’

‘Is there anything I should know about the job before you go?’ When no answer was forthcoming, she opened her briefcase and said, ‘Well look, here’s your P45, and I’ve even written down the address of your nearest DSS office. It’s open till three-thirty today, so you’ve got plenty of time.’ She offered him the piece of paper, but he didn’t take it. Laying it down on the window-sill, her smile broadened, and she shook her head. ‘The barbarians aren’t at the gate any more, Alan. Unfortunately, you left the gate swinging wide open. So we wandered right inside, and now we’ve got all the best seats and our feet are up on the table. And we intend to stay here for a long, long time.’

Hilary snapped her briefcase shut and made for the door.

‘Now: how do I get to your office from here?’

September 1990

1

It was purely by chance that I found myself writing a book about the Winshaws. The story of how it all came about is quite complicated and can probably wait. Sufficient to say that if it had not been for an entirely accidental meeting on a railway journey from London to Sheffield in the month of June, 1982, I would never have become their official historian and my life would have taken a very different turn. An amusing vindication, when you think about it, of the theories outlined in my first novel, Accidents Will Happen. But I doubt if many people remember that far back.

The 1980s were not a good time for me, on the whole. Perhaps it had been a mistake to accept the Winshaw commission in the first place; perhaps I should have carried on writing fiction in the hope that one day I would be able to make a living at it. After all, my second novel had attracted a certain amount of attention, and there had at least been a few isolated moments of glory – such as the week when I’d been featured in a regular Sunday newspaper article, usually devoted to vastly more famous writers, entitled ‘The First Story I Ever Wrote’. (You had to supply a sample of something you had written when you were very young, along with a photograph of yourself as a child. The overall effect was rather cute. I’ve still got the cutting somewhere.) But my financial situation remained desperate – the general public persisting in a steely indifference to the products of my imagination – and so I had sound economic reasons for trying my luck with Tabitha Winshaw and her peculiarly generous offer.

The terms of this offer were as follows. It seemed that in the seclusion of her long-term inmate’s quarters at the Hatchjaw-Bassett Institute for the Actively Insane, Miss Winshaw, then aged seventy-six and by all accounts madder than ever, had taken it into her sad, confused head that the time was ripe for the history of her glorious family to be laid before the world. In the face of implacable opposition from her relatives, and drawing only upon her own far from inconsiderable resources, she had set up a trust fund for this purpose and enlisted the services of the Peacock Press, a discreetly operated private concern which specialized in the publication (for a small fee) of military memoirs, family chronicles and the reminiscences of minor public figures. They, for their part, were entrusted with the task of finding a suitable writer, of proven experience and ability, who was to be paid an annual, five-figure salary throughout the entire period of research and composition, conditional upon a progress report – or a ‘significant portion’ of completed manuscript – being presented to the publishers and forwarded for Tabitha’s inspection every year. Otherwise, it seemed that time and money were no object. She wanted the best, the most thorough, the most honest and most up-to-date history that it was possible to compile. There was no deadline for final submission.