Edge of Eternity (68 page)

‘Thank you,’ said Jasper, his heart beating faster. ‘Do you mind if I return the call?’

‘Of course not, go right ahead.’

Jasper went to the study and phoned Pugh. ‘Did you take part in the march?’ said Pugh. ‘Did you hear the speech?’

‘Yes, and yes,’ said Jasper. ‘It was incredible—’

‘I know. We’re going all out with it. Can you give us an I-was-there piece? As personal and impressionistic as you like. Don’t worry too much about facts and figures, we’ll have all those in the main report.’

‘I’d be happy to,’ said Jasper. It was an understatement: he was ecstatic.

‘Let it run. About a thousand words. We can always cut if necessary.’

‘All right.’

‘Call me in half an hour and I’ll put you through to a copy taker.’

‘Couldn’t I have longer?’ said Jasper; but Pugh had already hung up.

‘Blimey,’ said Jasper to the wall.

There was an American-style yellow legal pad on Woody Dewar’s desk. Jasper pulled it towards him and picked up a pencil. He thought for a minute then wrote:

‘Today I stood in a crowd of two hundred thousand people and heard Martin Luther King redefine what it means to be American.’

*  *  *

Maria Summers felt high.

The television set had been on in the press office, and she had stopped work to watch Martin Luther King, as had just about everyone else in the White House, including President Kennedy.

When it ended she was walking on air. She could hardly wait to hear what the President thought of the speech. A few minutes later she was summoned to the Oval Office. The temptation to hug Kennedy was even harder for her to resist than usual. ‘He’s damn good,’ was Kennedy’s slightly detached reaction. Then he said: ‘He’s on his way here now,’ and Maria was overjoyed.

Jack Kennedy had changed. When Maria had first fallen in love with him, he had been in favour of civil rights intellectually, but not emotionally. The change was not due to their affair. Rather, it was the relentless brutality and lawlessness of the segregationists that had shocked him into a heartfelt personal commitment. And he had risked everything by bringing forward the new civil rights bill. She knew better than anyone how worried he was about it.

George Jakes came in, immaculately dressed as always, today in a dark-blue suit with a pale-grey shirt and a striped tie. He smiled warmly at her. She was fond of him: he had been a friend in need. He was, she thought, the second most attractive man she had ever met.

Maria knew that she and George were here for show, because they were among the small number of coloured people in the administration. They were both reconciled to being used as symbols. It was not dishonest: though their number was small, Kennedy had appointed more Negroes to high-level posts than any previous president.

When Martin Luther King walked in, President Kennedy shook his hand and said: ‘I have a dream!’

It was meant well, Maria knew, but she felt it was ill-judged. King’s dream came from the depths of vicious repression. Jack Kennedy had been born into America’s privileged elite, powerful and rich: how could he claim to have a dream of freedom and equality? Dr King obviously felt this too, for he looked embarrassed and changed the subject. Later, in bed, the President would ask Maria where he had taken a wrong step, she knew; and she would have to find a loving and reassuring way to explain it to him.

King and the other civil rights leaders had not eaten since breakfast. When the President realized this, he ordered coffee and sandwiches for them from the White House kitchen.

Maria got them all to line up for a formal photograph, then the discussion began.

King and the others were riding a wave of elation. After today’s demonstration, they told the President, the civil rights bill could be toughened up. There should be a new section banning racial discrimination in employment. Young black men were dropping out of school at an alarming rate, seeing no future.

President Kennedy suggested that Negroes should copy the Jews, who valued education and made their kids study. Maria came from a Negro family who did exactly that, and she agreed with him. If black kids dropped out of school, was that the government’s problem? But she also saw how cleverly Kennedy had shifted the discussion away from the real issue, which was millions of jobs that were reserved for whites only.

They asked Kennedy to lead the crusade for civil rights. Maria knew that he was thinking something he could not say: that if he became too strongly identified with the Negro cause then all the white people would vote Republican.

The shrewd Walter Reuther offered different advice. Identify the businessmen behind the Republican party and pick them off in small groups, he said. Tell them that if they don’t co-operate their profits will suffer. Maria knew this as the Lyndon Johnson approach, a combination of cajolery and threats. The advice went over the President’s head: it just was not his style.

Kennedy went through the voting intentions of congressmen and senators, ticking off on his fingers those likely to oppose the civil rights bill. It was a dismal register of prejudice, apathy and timidity. He was going to have trouble passing even a watered-down version of the bill, he made clear; anything tougher was doomed.

Gloom seemed to fall on Maria like a funeral shawl. She felt tired, depressed, and pessimistic. Her head ached and she wanted to go home.

The meeting lasted more than an hour. By the time it finished, all the euphoria had evaporated. The civil rights leaders filed out, their faces showing disenchantment and frustration. It was all very well for King to have a dream, but it seemed the American people did not share it.

Maria could hardly believe it but, despite all that had happened today, it seemed the great cause of equality and freedom was no farther forward.

28

Jasper Murray felt confident he would get the post of editor of
St Julian’s News.
With his application he had sent in a clipping of his article in the
Daily Echo
about Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. Everyone said it was a great piece. He had been paid twenty-five pounds, less than he had got for the interview with Evie: politics was not as lucrative as celebrity scandal.

‘Toby Jenkins has never had a paragraph published anywhere outside the student press,’ Jasper told Daisy Williams, sitting in the kitchen in Great Peter Street.

‘Is he your only rival?’ she asked.

‘As far as I know, yes.’

‘When will you hear the decision?’

Jasper looked at his watch, although he knew the time. ‘The committee is meeting now. They’ll put up a notice outside Lord Jane’s office when they break for lunch at twelve-thirty. My friend Pete Donegan is there. He’ll be my deputy editor. He’s going to phone me immediately.’

‘Why do you want the post so badly?’

Because I know how bloody good I am, Jasper thought; twice as good as Cakebread and ten times better than Toby Jenkins. I deserve this job. But he did not open his heart to Daisy Williams. He was a little wary of her. She loved his mother, not him. When the interview with Evie had appeared in the
Echo
, and Jasper had pretended to be dismayed, it had seemed to him that Daisy had not been completely deceived. He worried that she saw through him. However, she always treated him kindly, for his mother’s sake.

Now he gave her a softened version of the truth. ‘I can turn
St Julian’s News
into a better paper. Right now it’s like a parish magazine. It tells you what’s going on, but it’s frightened of conflict and controversy.’ He thought of something that would appeal to Daisy’s ideals. ‘For example, St Julian’s College has a board of governors, some of whom have investments in apartheid South Africa. I’d publish that information and ask what such men are doing governing a famous liberal college.’

‘Good idea,’ Daisy said with relish. ‘That’ll stir them up.’

Walli Franck came into the kitchen. It was midday, but he had evidently just got up: he kept rock-and-roll hours.

Daisy said to him: ‘Now that Dave’s back in school, what are you going to do?’

Walli put instant coffee into a cup. ‘Practise the guitar,’ he said.

Daisy smiled. ‘If your mother were here, I guess she would ask if you shouldn’t try to earn some money.’

‘I don’t want to earn money. But I must. That’s why I have a job.’

Walli’s grammar was sometimes so correct that it was hard to understand. Daisy said: ‘You don’t want money, but you do have a job?’

‘Washing beer glasses at the Jump Club.’

‘Well done!’

The doorbell rang, and a minute later a maid showed Hank Remington into the kitchen. He had classic Irish charm. He was a chirpy redhead with a big smile for everyone. ‘Hello, Mrs Williams,’ he said. ‘I’ve come to take your daughter out to lunch – unless you’re available!’

Women enjoyed Hank’s flattery. ‘Hello, Hank,’ Daisy said warmly. She turned to the maid and said: ‘Make sure Evie knows Mr Remington is here.’

‘Is it
Mister
Remington, now?’ said Hank. ‘Don’t give people the idea that I’m respectable – it could ruin my reputation.’ He shook hands with Jasper. ‘Evie showed me your article about Martin Luther King – that was great, well done.’ Then he turned to Walli. ‘Hi, I’m Hank Remington.’

Walli was awestruck, but managed to introduce himself. ‘I’m Dave’s cousin, and I play guitar in Plum Nellie.’

‘How was Hamburg?’

‘Very good, until we got thrown out because Dave was too young.’

‘The Kords used to play in Hamburg,’ Hank said. ‘It was fab. I was born in Dublin but I grew up on the Reeperbahn, if you know what I mean.’

Jasper found Hank fascinating. He was rich and famous, one of the biggest pop stars in the world, yet he was working hard to be nice to everyone in the room. Did he have an insatiable desire to be liked – and was that the secret of his success?

Evie came in looking gorgeous. Her hair had been cut in a short bob that mimicked the Beatles, and she wore a simple Mary Quant A-line dress that showed off her legs. Hank pretended to be bowled over. ‘Jesus, I’ll have to take you somewhere posh, looking like that,’ he said. ‘I was thinking of a Wimpy bar.’

‘Wherever we go, it will have to be quick,’ Evie said. ‘I’ve got an audition at three-thirty.’

‘What for?’

‘A new play called
A Woman’s Trial.
It’s a courtroom drama.’

Hank was pleased. ‘You’ll be making your stage debut!’

‘If I get the part.’

‘Oh, you’ll get it. Come on, we’d better go, my Mini’s parked on a yellow line.’

They went out and Walli returned to his room. Jasper looked at his watch: it was twelve-thirty. The editor would be announced any minute now.

Making conversation, he said: ‘I loved the States.’

‘Would you like to live there?’ Daisy asked.

‘More than anything. And I want to work in television.
St Julian’s News
will be a great first step, but basically newspapers are obsolete. TV news is the thing now.’

‘America is my home,’ Daisy said musingly, ‘but I found love in London.’

The phone rang. The editor had been chosen. Was it Jasper, or Toby Jenkins?

Daisy answered. ‘He’s right here,’ she said, and handed the receiver to Jasper, whose heart was thudding.

The caller was Pete Donegan. He said: ‘Valerie Cakebread got it.’

At first Jasper did not understand. ‘What?’ he said. ‘Who?’

‘Valerie Cakebread is the new editor of
St Julian’s News.
Sam Cakebread fixed it for his sister.’

‘Valerie?’ When Jasper understood he was flabbergasted. ‘She’s never written anything but fashion puffs!’

‘And she made the tea at
Vogue
magazine.’

‘How could they do this?’

‘Beats me.’

‘I knew Lord Jane was a prick, but this . . .’

‘Shall I come to your place?’

‘What for?’

‘We should go out and drown our sorrows.’

‘Okay.’ Jasper hung up the phone.

Daisy said: ‘Bad news, obviously. I’m sorry.’

Jasper was rocked. ‘They gave the job to the current editor’s sister! I never saw that coming.’ He recalled his conversation with Sam and Valerie in the coffee bar of the student union. The treacherous pair, neither had even hinted that Valerie was in the running.

He had been outmanoeuvred by someone more guileful than himself, he realized bitterly.

Daisy said: ‘What a shame.’

It was the British way, Jasper thought resentfully; family connections were more important than talent. His father had fallen victim to the same syndrome, and in consequence was still only a colonel.

‘What will you do?’ Daisy said.

‘Emigrate,’ Jasper said. His resolve was now stronger than ever.

‘Finish college first,’ Daisy said. ‘Americans value education.’

‘I suppose you’re right,’ Jasper said. But his studies had always come second to his journalism. ‘I can’t work for
St Julian’s News
under Valerie. I gave in gracefully last year, after Sam beat me to the job, but I can’t do it again.’

‘I agree,’ Daisy said. ‘It makes you look like a second-rater.’

Jasper was struck by a thought. A plan began to form in his mind. He said: ‘The worst of it is that now there won’t be a newspaper to expose such things as the scandal of college governors having investments in South Africa.’

Daisy took the bait. ‘Maybe someone will start a rival newspaper.’

Jasper pretended to be sceptical. ‘I doubt it.’

‘It’s what Dave’s grandmother and Walli’s grandmother did in 1916. It was called
The Soldier’s Wife.
If they could do it . . .’

Jasper put on an innocent face and asked the key question. ‘Where did they get the money?’

‘Maud’s family were rich. But it can’t cost much to print a couple of thousand copies. Then you pay for the second issue with the income from the first.’

‘I got twenty-five pounds from the
Echo
for my piece on Martin Luther King. But I don’t think that would be enough . . .’

‘I might help.’

Jasper pretended reluctance. ‘You might never get your money back.’