If one airline bought it, then others might. But the Germans had never joined the project, using the money they had saved on Eurodefender to help efface the cost of rebuilding the industrial horror of the former East Germany. Bonn would never allow Lufthansa to acquire a fleet of Skyliners for the US and Far East routes. Air France couldn't afford it and the Elysee wouldn't afford it on behalf of the national carrier.
The Belgians couldn't even dream of it, like the Dutch, and the British privatised national airline was not prepared to make more than a gesture.
If young Tim Burton succeeded, the Skyliner was sunk without trace… which was what infuriated Marian so much, the billions of ecus the project had cost. Aubrey shook his head.
"You can assure this Committee, Sir Bryan," Marian was saying, 'that when the Skyliners under construction are completed, you will have found buyers for them? Or is the short-time working announced at one of your subcontractors in my constituency the shape of things to come?"
Marian's smile remained dazzlingly innocent as her words worked like acid on the crumbling brickwork of Coulthard's self-confidence.
Marian was wearing her blonde hair drawn back from her face, accentuating her wide blue eyes and the high, prominent cheekbones. The mouth was firm in the generosity of her smile, her neck long. Even seated, she appeared to possess her father's stature, as well as his determination and confidence. To Giles, she was as beautiful as her mother had been. Most men, indeed, found her attractive, desirable then, eventually, too dauntingly intelligent for their entire comfort.
She had, however, discovered two or three men sufficiently up to scratch to partner her in affairs.
Pyott grunted with pleasure at Marian's remarks. Aubrey's mood was complacent. He was an aged senator returned to the Forum from his farm, to find himself little more than amused at antics he had once taken with the deadliest seriousness. He sipped at his whisky, enjoying Giles' pleasure at his daughter, and the scent of the promised meal. A cork popped in the kitchen, sliding seductively from a bottle of very good claret.
There will be buyers there is a great deal of interest, my dear lady," Coulthard replied, his eyes narrowed into creases of fat, his demeanour so ruffled that he had publicly patronised his inquisitor to Marian's intense satisfaction.
"I didn't know our sales and marketing division interested honourable members quite so closely," he added, his anger incapable of restraint except in sarcasm.
"Our interest, Marian…" the chairman began, leaning to her so that his words became a mutter in which was distinguished a tone of ingratiating reprimand.
"You're right, of course, Chairman," Marian murmured. This Committee is simply interested are we not? in seeing some return on the EC subsidies that were made into research and development, here and in France. Hence our interest in the sales prospects—" She paused, as if stung by an insect or a revelation. The camera cut to Coulthard, who appeared ever more uncomfortable before his eyes became hooded and inexpressive. It was no more than a moment, but something had been revealed.
Aubrey's ancient, rusty curiosity was aroused.
"What happened there, Giles? She scored a hit without realising it how?" At once it had become a diversionary game, of course; nothing of real or immediate interest to him. Real interest was confined to dinner and Giles' amicable, comfortable company.
"I saw that, too, Kenneth. Research subsidies, grants — whatever the Black Hole of Brussels calls them these days… we all know they got a bucketful of ecus at Aerospace UK, just like Stendhal-Balzac, to get the project off the ground.
Funny…" He studied the screen, but the camera had passed to an interjecting left wing MP who had taken up Marian's cry concerning jobs. There had, apparently, been redundancies at a subcontractor in his constituency. Why the lay-offs, he asked in broadest Lancashire, if there was the immediate prospect of sales?
Coulthard had recovered his habitual condescension, his corporate arrogance.
Whatever Marian had caught on the wing was gone. A glimpse of her features showed that she, too, had dismissed the moment… as Aubrey did. For, as Giles said, they all knew how much the European Commission, in one of its fits of anti Americanism and Le grand Europe moods, had poured into the initial research programme for the Skyliner.
That was all above board, allowable. Coulthard had looked, for a moment, like a man caught with his hand in the till.
Mrs. Grey appeared in the doorway and mouthed ten minutes to Aubrey, who nodded and turned to Giles.
"Another drink, my dear Giles?"
"Why not? That beef smells wonderful, Mrs. Grey." Aubrey's housekeeper retired to her kitchen suitably recompensed. General Sir Giles was an always welcome guest of Sir Kenneth.
Aubrey shuffled across the green carpet towards the drinks tray on the Victorian credenza near the bay window. The early summer evening gleamed on the grass of the park and from a hundred windows. Traffic murmured like flies. He poured himself another whisky, clinked ice for Giles' gin, and dismissed the nag of curiosity. Remembering with amusement a time when he would, in Marian's place, have worried at Coulthard like a dog at a bone a terrier at a rat, as one of his field agents had always preferred to phrase it. But, in his case, the interrogation would have been of someone unshaven and without sleep and who posed a threat. That had been a kind of war, and this was not. It was merely business… There you are, my dear," he announced brightly, handing Pyott his tumbler.
"Cheers to us, and to our very own St. Joan!" He gestured his glass towards the television. Giles Pyott raised his own almost with reverence towards Marian's image.
He was still awake when the telephone rang in the bedroom of the apartment.
The illuminated dial of the bedside alarm showed him it was two in the morning. The whole apartment was quiet, empty, the traffic outside seeming to pass it furtively, with a sense of uncertainty. When he heard her voice, he wondered for an instant whether some anticipation of her call had been what had kept him awake.
"Mitchell-it's… Barbara."
He had known she would call either her or her father. The TV news had been awash with images of the crashed 494, scorched fuselage lying like an old artillery shell in the sand of the Arizona desert, surrounded by the immobile vehicles of the rescue team, the fire department, the accident investigation.
Speculation, the fall of Vance stock on the Dow, rumours of jumpy nerves among the bigger creditors, the half-dozen banks Vance had charmed money from… it had been like watching a garment unravelling, its designer label mocked by its shoddiness.
"Sure, Barbara," he muttered, sitting up in bed and switching on the table lamp beside him. The room did not seem to warm in its glow; the place expressed his mood, even the memories that he at once entertained. The shabby, bitter last year of their marriage, the months of the divorce.
"What how are you?" he asked, changing the question, drawing back from why she must have called.
There was an exasperated exhalation, a sound he had thought not to hear again, then she said abruptly: "Daddy needs your help, Mitchell. He's in trouble—"
He snapped back: "I watch the news on TV. You can't miss him, Barbara."
"Oh, for Christ's sake-!"
The good Lord isn't why you're calling, Barbara. How is — what's his name? Tom and the baby?" Again the exasperation, even hatred, in her breathing. He felt cheap and satisfied.