‘So what did you do?’
‘I walked out of her office there and then. Drove up into the hills. Thought about it. Came back to England. Started Ninetyminutes.’
We walked on in silence until we came to Clerkenwell Green, where we sat on one of the benches. Of course it wasn’t green any more, but it was a relatively quiet oasis away from the traffic of Farringdon and Clerkenwell Roads. ‘You never told me this,’ I said.
‘No.’
‘You should have done.’
‘I didn’t think it was relevant.’
‘Guy!’
‘I still don’t. The point is, I couldn’t admit to myself that it was relevant, let alone to you. All that stuff is in the past. Really. You’ve seen me every day for the last five months. You can see I’ve changed.’ He turned to me, begging for my agreement.
‘Yes, you have,’ I said. ‘Do you think Henry will find out?’
‘I don’t think so,’ Guy said. ‘The only number in LA I would give him was Lew, my agent. He knows the story, or most of it, but I know Lew. His first instinct will be to lie. He’ll cover for me without really knowing why.’
‘You hope.’
‘I hope.’
He probably would. People did that kind of thing for Guy, as I knew very well.
We sat looking up at the dour façade of the Old Sessions House, the Masonic Centre for London, which seemed to frown down on the trendy bars and restaurants springing up around it. A latex-clad cyclist chained his bike to the pale-green railings of the public lavatories that decorated the centre of the green and sauntered into the one remaining caff in the area.
‘Should I tell Henry?’ Guy asked.
I thought about it. My strategy with Orchestra was to tell them everything. We would be working together through tough times and we needed to trust each other. But Henry thought Guy was flaky already: this would just make it worse. Also, I was inclined to accept Guy’s point of view. He had changed, I knew that. The past just wasn’t relevant.
‘No,’ I said. ‘We’ll leave it to him to find out, if he can.’
Henry still harboured doubts about Guy, but he definitely liked the business. Guy, Ingrid, Gaz and I made a presentation to Henry’s partners later on that week that seemed to go well. Guy and I went back to Orchestra’s offices the following day to thrash out a deal.
It took time. Essentially, we were arguing about what proportion of Ninetyminutes Orchestra’s ten million pounds would buy. After several hours we were still some way apart when Henry raised the question of Tony’s stake.
‘I’m not happy with how little of the company management will have after this round,’ he said. ‘Whatever price we agree, it’s going to be less than ten per cent. I don’t like that. Not enough incentive.’
‘I wouldn’t argue with that,’ I said. ‘Perhaps you should pay more?’
‘That’s not what I mean, and you know it,’ said Henry. ‘It’s Guy’s father. He must be diluted.’
‘That’s going to be difficult,’ said Guy.
‘How did he end up with so much of the company in the first place?’ asked Henry.
‘We were desperate,’ I replied.
‘Well, I don’t mind giving him some uplift on the value of his shares, but we need to figure out a way of getting you chaps a bigger stake.’
‘I’m not sure he’ll agree to that,’ said Guy.
‘I’ll make it easier for him,’ said Henry. ‘He’d better agree to it, or there will be no deal.’
‘We have our board meeting on Monday. We’ll discuss it then,’ said Guy.
So Guy and I went away to plan our approach to Tony. Guy had told Henry it would be a difficult discussion. Neither he nor I had any idea just how difficult.
23
July 1992, Mull
The airfield was nothing but a strip of mown grass with an unmanned caravan beside it, which contained a cash box for landing fees. But only a few yards away was a hotel with a Scandinavian-style conservatory giving an excellent view of my landing. None of us had any desire to fly any further that day, so we checked in. Half an hour later we were in the bar. A couple of hours after that we were all well on the way to getting plastered.
You couldn’t blame us. Guy’s nerve had been seriously shaken and alcohol was his natural refuge. I had kept mine, but had a felt a surge of relief when we had finally landed. Mel had been terrified. Even Ingrid, who had seemed to stay cool, was knocking them back. For all of us at that age and in those circumstances drink was the natural response.
None of us mentioned what had happened. Far from admitting his error, Guy indulged in alcoholic bravado. I let him. Deep down I knew that I had trusted Guy for too long and that as a result of that trust he had almost killed us. It was a truth that I was unwilling to face, or at least not yet. I was unsure whether the girls had realized exactly what had happened. I wasn’t about to tell them. I was quite happy to share in the excitement of being alive.
The nearest we got to touching on the subject was when Mel put down her rum and Coke and said: ‘Tomorrow.’
‘What about tomorrow?’ said Ingrid.
‘Sod tomorrow,’ said Guy.
‘Tomorrow I’m going to take the train home.’
‘Won’t work,’ said Guy. ‘We’re on an island.’
‘Good point. I’ll take a ferry and then a train.’
Guy looked at her for a moment, as though considering argument. There was no point. ‘OK,’ he said.
‘I’ll go with you,’ said Ingrid.
‘Davo?’ After all the bravado, Guy suddenly looked small, deflated. He needed my support.
‘We’ll make sure the girls get away OK and then I’ll come with you,’ I said. ‘But I think we should fly straight back to Elstree. Provided the weather’s OK.’
‘That makes sense,’ said Guy, relieved. He stood up and reached for our glasses. ‘My round.’
We drank on into the evening, nourishing ourselves on crisps and peanuts. Ingrid’s eyes began to close. ‘I’m sleepy,’ she said, with a small smile on her face, and slipped over against Guy’s shoulder. He moved her upright. She slipped over again. He lifted her up. She waited a few seconds and then fell back. This time he let her head rest there.
It was innocent drunken fun, but there was something about it that sparked a surge of irritation in me. The purpose of this trip had been for me to get closer to Ingrid. How was I supposed to do that when she was slumped against Guy? In fact, how was I supposed to do that when she was so drunk? A little tipsy was fine, but I didn’t want the start of a relationship to be a drunken bonk that she wouldn’t remember and couldn’t prevent.
I felt Mel tense next to me. ‘Guy?’ she said.
‘Yes?’
‘Where were you on Tuesday?’
‘Tuesday? I don’t know. Why?’
‘Because you said you’d come round to my place on Tuesday.’
‘Did I? I don’t remember that.’ Guy was the picture of innocence. Hammy, unconvincing innocence. You would never have known he was an actor.
‘So where were you?’
‘I was with Davo. Wasn’t I, Davo?’
I remembered Tuesday. We had gone to a bar in Chelsea. Guy had picked up an American redhead. I had left early. Guy knew he could rely on me to cover for him in these situations.
But not this time.
‘Only at the beginning of the evening. I left at half past eight.’
Guy looked at me askance. ‘That’s not right. That can’t be right.’
‘I got home for the nine o’clock news. I can remember it.’
Mel was watching this. She wasn’t dumb. She could see that there was a little wedge between me and Guy. She hammered at it.
‘So what did you do when David left you?’