For Faughie's Sake (25 page)

But of course there were no cameras there to record it. I remembered what Rudi had said: the whole world would have been watching telly. The problem was that they didn’t know Jenny, or Walter. The rest of the world didn’t know that film for a damned lie.

The following Tuesday Jan asked me out. It wasn’t a date as such – technically he merely invited me to attend a public meeting, so I suppose, in one sense, he asked everyone in the village out – but I went anyway. If I’m honest, I wondered if this informal ‘date’ might lead to something else, a right good soaping, for instance.

Jan and Mag were giving a talk on Faughie council’s newly adopted policy of renewable energy. Energy was a hot topic in the village now. Since the checkpoint had been established there had been a ‘problem’ with fuel deliveries. Without diesel to operate their generators, the TV news’s massive OB unit trucks lay like beached whales by the side of the roads.

Mag’s part of the talk was complicated and boring but the good thing was that when it was Jan’s turn to talk, it was perfectly permissible to stare at him; in fact, it was the polite thing to do. He began, in his mesmerising Dutch/Scottish accent, by talking about a time, two and half million years ago, when humans first started using tools. Jan held us spellbound as he acted it out: the first man to tentatively smash something with a rock, to use the flint edge to cut.

‘That first man changed our future.’ said Jan. ‘He could not know it then, but from a modern perspective we can appreciate that this was a huge step in human evolution.’

I certainly could.

‘That primitive man believed he was only bashing something with a stone, but if he could see what this would eventually lead to: the iron age, the wheel, electricity, space exploration, the digital age; if he’d understood the significance of that first small action, you can imagine how excited he would have been.’

I could; I was very excited.

‘You and I are the descendants of that primitive man. And, credit where credit’s due, we learned fast. Let’s face it: who dares wins, right? We were resourceful. We were the smartest, the fastest. We carved out empires showing the rest of the world how to use the technology we’d created. Yes! Finally the chance to make some real money! And we’ve been making it ever since. We’ve fished, and farmed, chopped wood, mined coal, drilled for oil. We’ve been bringing home the bacon, earning an honest buck, we’ve used it up and thrown it away, we’ve even polluted the air we breathe, but we’ve created huge wealth. Huge! Multimillion-pound wealth. Billionaire wealth.

‘For whom? Are you wealthy? I’m not. Nearly every penny of mine that comes in goes straight back out again on petrol, electricity, the supermarket. Somebody somewhere is making money, but it certainly isn’t me. And now I no longer have the forests, I don’t have healthy rivers and seas, I don’t even have clean air to breathe any more.

‘I’ve been ripped off. And now everything is wasted, rubbish.

‘But you know what? It isn’t. This planet is just like us. We get ill but then, if we rest up and take care of ourselves, we get better again. That’s what the Earth does. We’ve learned that we don’t need to chop down trees, we can pollard; prune the trees and still have all the wood we need. We can fish so long as we throw the wee ones back. We can grow food and, if we manage it well, it’ll keep on growing and providing for us. We’ve already got everything we need to make all the energy we want and more, ten times, a hundred times more. Sunshine, water, wind – these things never run out.

‘So now we’re at the next big step in human evolution. Now we realise that we can’t keep using everything up and throwing it away
any more. We know it’s possible to work
with
the planet. We have the technology, not to make more money for global corporations and billionaires, but to secure the future for our children. Ladies and gentlemen, we’re all still that man with that rock; the difference is that this time we have the experience, knowledge and technology to understand its significance. Pioneering renewable energy here in Faughie, leading from the front, shining a renewable beam to light the way for others to follow, isn’t that exciting?’

I kicked off the applause. Who knew renewables could be this thrilling?

I wasn’t the only one. Jan was asking for scrap metal donations and volunteers to help install the wind and water turbines, and, in a heightened barn-raising atmosphere, all the men were putting their hands up. I put it down to Jan’s charisma and the blitz spirit provoked by that awful documentary. There was a newfound sense of community in Faughie or maybe it was only me who was newly finding it. I probably had Jan to thank for that as well. While Jan continued to captivate his audience, I suddenly saw Steven squeezing past the people in my row to get to me. As he slowly made his way towards me, he frequently apologised for bumping people and, once, for standing on Moira Henderson’s foot. He looked mortified. I was surprised: Steven never drew attention to himself like this, but I was delighted that he was so keen to sit with me.

‘Thanks for coming,’ I whispered, ‘I think you’ve missed the best bit though.’

‘Did you not see me?’ Steven asked, not taking the trouble to lower his voice.

‘Shhh! See you where?’

Steven could barely restrain himself. ‘I’ve been standing at that side door waving for the last ten minutes!’

I was baffled. I hadn’t seen him, but not only that: why was he waving? He handed me a note. It simply said: ‘Urgent – meet at my house. Tell no one. J.’ I laughed. Jenny’s message was all very cloak and dagger and quite unnecessary, probably. It was so cryptic I wondered if the note would self-destruct in the next five seconds.

‘Can I at least stay till the end and say goodbye?’ I asked. ‘Jan asked me to come; I don’t want to be rude.’

Since it had first been suggested I couldn’t stop imagining the soaping up.

‘Up to you,’ said Steven huffily.

Right, so, it was up to me. I’d stay to the end. I turned my attention back to Jan’s lovely talk. It had to be something pretty serious for Jenny to summon me like this, she’d never done that before.

‘But it does say urgent. If you want to risk the security of Faughie that’s up to …’

‘Oh for god’s sake, let’s go then!’ I hissed, and then we began squeezing past everyone in the row.

‘Sorry. Excuse me. Sorry. Oh, I’m so sorry,’ I said, much too loud.

I’d stood on Moira Henderson’s other foot.

Steven escorted me as far as Jenny’s house and then doubled back to the meeting. It was Brenda who opened the door.

‘How was Mag’s presentation?’ she asked me.

‘Terrific.’

Whatever this emergency was, it must be serious. She was an incredibly supportive mum; I’d never known Brenda to miss any of Mag’s events.

‘I couldn’t get away. We’ve just been working flat out,’ she explained in an apologetic tone.

I nodded my understanding.

‘Affairs of state,’ she muttered, lifting her eyebrows.

Brenda led me into the living room where Jenny sat at the dining table, still with the Faughie flag draped across it, punching numbers into a pensioner’s supersized calculator.

‘If we take off what she’d pay the UK in stamp duty and inheritance tax I can get the asking price down by nearly 37 per cent,’ said Jenny without looking up.

‘What asking price?’ I asked.

Jenny lifted her head, only now noticing me in the room. She turned round to face me.

‘Listen: we’re going to Faughie Castle and we need you to come with us.’

‘Why?’

‘We’re going to make an offer and we need you to persuade Dinah to accept.’

‘Oh. Right,’ I said.

This took me a few seconds to get my head round. This was exactly what I’d been after. If the committee bought the estate from Dinah I’d get my part of the bargain: Harrosie. Mine to sell to the highest bidder. I should have been pleased, and I tried to be, testing out an unconvincing smile, but I was too busy trying to stop an infestation of toatie wee imaginary beasties crawling over my skin.

Jenny wanted my help but she had mistaken me for a noble person. How ironic this whole horrible pickle was. Little did she know, but Jenny, dear selfless trusting Jenny, was actually pushing me towards feathering my own sleazy cash-for-questions nest. And what if my double-dealing ever came to light? How would Jenny and Walter and Steven and Jackie, and everybody in Inverfaughie feel about me then?

‘C’mon Trixie,’ said Jenny, ‘Now is the time for all good women to come to the aid of the party and all that.’

Brenda and Jenny had no idea of the treachery they were encouraging me towards. How could I tell them?

‘You said there wasn’t the money to buy her estate,’ I complained, ‘I remember you talking about Joe, the lollipop man, and having to fund his wages. And now you’re going to just give all the money to Dinah Anglicus?’

‘It’s our only option,’ said Brenda, entering the fray. ‘As expected, Dinah’s been called as a witness. Dinah Anglicus owns 93 per cent of Faughie. She’ll have the loudest voice in Luxembourg and, as things stand, she’s indicating that she won’t support our case.’

‘No, I’m sure she’ll … Did she actually say that?’

‘She did. It’s not in her best interests,’ said Brenda, matter-of-factly. ‘So, despite fierce opposition from Betty and her followers,
we’ve got authority to purchase Faughie Estate. In the long run it’ll be useful revenue for funding infrastructure. It’s not ideal, but we need to buy the estate now for the influence it buys us in Luxembourg.’

‘Yeah, but where’s the money coming from?’

‘We’re borrowing most of it,’ said Jenny. ‘At extortionate rates, but what can we do? Our hands are tied. We’re going to make her an offer. She can’t refuse.’

‘An offer she can’t refuse? You’re going to threaten her?’

‘Huh! I wish. I’d be a more effective Interim Leader if they let me threaten people.’

‘You know,’ I told them, playing Devil’s advocate; playing for time, ‘Faughie Estate has been in her family for hundreds of years. She told me her family fought for it.’

‘True,’ said Jenny, ‘in-bred, over-privileged, silly wee tart.’

‘Well,’ I argued, ‘if her family fought for it hundreds of years ago and she’s still sitting on it, is it not about time we had a rematch? There’s only one of her; there are a lot more of us, and the odds are on our side this time.’

‘Yup,’ said Brenda, ‘Walter lent me a book,
The Poor Had No Lawyers
, and the author, Andy Wightman, makes exactly that point. I must say you’re coming out of your shell, Trixie. I’ve underestimated you.’

You certainly have, I thought sadly, you poor principled naive fool, underestimated what a cheating, lying, low-life scum-bag I am.

‘So, you’ll help us then?’ Jenny asked.

What was I supposed to do? I could see the pragmatism of their position: to have a chance at independence they needed to buy the estate, but incurring huge debts to bribe the landed gentry seemed well dodgy. That was politics, I supposed. At least Brenda and Jenny were doing it for the common good, for Faughie. Who was I doing it for? I would personally profit while Faughians would be bonded slaves to the debt.

‘No. You go and ask her if you want but I can’t be involved, it’s too difficult, too – complicated.’

‘But we need you!’ wailed Brenda, ‘Trixie, you’re the only person in the village on first-name terms with her. I understand it goes against your principles, and I commend them, but we have to be practical. If you won’t come we’ll go without you but we’d rather you came. Please, Trixie, it might make all the difference.’

Just tell them, I told myself, they’ll understand. It comes to the same thing anyway. It won’t change anything, they’ll still have to buy the estate. Just tell them.

I cleared my throat. Fluid in my body was flowing to all the wrong places. My mouth was dry and my hands were sweating.

‘Well … let the record state that I personally am not in favour of this course of action.’

‘But you’ll come?’

‘Are you sure it’s what you really really want?’

‘FFS,’ said Jenny exasperated, ‘what are you, a firkin’ Spice Girl?’

‘No! Of course it’s not what we want,’ Brenda sighed, ‘but it’s the only chance we’ve got.’

‘Ok,’ I said calmly, ‘then I’ll do it. I’ll do it for Faughie.’

Dinah was absolutely delighted to see us. Embarrassed, I think, by the boxes stacked up in her fusty main room, she ushered us through to the kitchen where she immediately set about making tea.

‘I’ve packed everything away, so I’m terribly sorry, I can’t even offer you a biscuit,’ Dinah apologised. ‘I know you like those Fortnum and Mason ones, Trixie.’

‘Och, please don’t trouble yourself, Lady Anglicus,’ said Brenda, ‘we’re very grateful that you were able to see us on such short notice.’

‘Please, do call me Dinah.’

There were nice, slightly awkward, smiles all round.

I was surprised to see Brenda and Jenny so out of their depth. They had skilfully handled prime ministers, academics and the international press and yet here they were practically doffing their caps. Nerves probably, but if I knew Jenny she’d find her stride once they got down to discussing business.

Dinah turned from us to pour the water into the teapot and Jenny took the opportunity to swivel her eyes at me, signalling that I should open the discussion. Dinah passed us our tea cups and we all politely sipped. Now that the tea ceremony had been sorted, a bashful silence descended. Jenny began giving me the
evil eye again, right in front of Dinah. Dinah reciprocated by also staring hard at me. I was getting it from all sides.

‘Well, Dinah, the good news is that Faughie Council has found a way to buy the estate. As you’ve probably worked out from our late-night eleventh-hour appearance, the ladies are here to make you an offer.’

‘Oh, I’m so pleased!’

Another round of smiles, this time more genuine. When no one else spoke, Dinah was forced to, ‘Might I ask what you are offering exactly?’

‘The full asking price,’ said Jenny testily.

‘Oh, splendid! I must say I am relieved.’

As the tension broke we gave up the tea party pretence. Brenda whipped the papers out of her briefcase and spread them on the table before Dinah.

‘You’ll see from our calculation that if we waive the inheritance tax and stamp duty you would normally pay the UK government, we can discount the price nearly 37 per cent.’

There was a moment’s silence while everyone assessed Dinah’s reaction. Other than sipping her tea, Dinah made no reaction so Brenda took a breath and ploughed on, ‘We’d make an initial payment of 20 per cent of current market value,’ she said, pointing at a spreadsheet, ‘if you care to look at the payment schedule.’

Dinah let Brenda burble on for a few minutes but I could see she wasn’t comfortable.

‘Forgive me,’ she said coyly, ‘I’m not terribly au fait with the terminology. Eh, could you explain what “payment schedule” means exactly?’

Brenda and Jenny seemed mystified. I was a bit confused myself. Even I could hazard a guess; surely the phrase was self-explanatory? All three of us were reluctant to embarrass Dinah by stating the obvious, but again, somebody had to take the lead. Brenda and Jenny looked at me.

‘Well, if I’m understanding things correctly,’ I piped up, ‘it really just means what it says: it’s a schedule.’

Jenny and Brenda nodded along.

‘That is to say, a eh, a ….’

‘Timetable.’

‘A timetable, thank you, Brenda, a timetable for when Faughie will make the payments to you, eh …’

‘The payments,’ Dinah repeated, flatly.

‘Yes,’ said Brenda rescuing me, ‘this green figure is the forecasted revenue over the five-year period and the red figure is the payments we’ll make to you; effectively, what’ll be going into your bank account.’

‘And this is a projection?’

‘Yes, an extrapolation on the revenue we hope to generate.’

‘Not an actual, confirmed amount?’

‘No-oh, but …’

‘If I could just stop you there. I must say I didn’t expect an equity-release scheme. I’m not drawing my pension quite yet.’

So much for Dinah not knowing the terminology, but everyone obliged with a smile for her wee joke.

‘Well,’ Brenda blustered, ‘this plan may share some of the features of equity release, but –’

‘But unlike equity release I can’t continue to live here.’

‘Well –’

‘And you intend to pay instalments from the revenue you “hope to generate”?’

‘Yes, but we’re fairly confident –’

‘
Fairly confident
butters no parsnips with HMRC, I’m afraid. I understood you’d come to offer me the asking price, a much-reduced asking price as it is. Can’t you find financial backing? A mortgage even?’

‘We have a mortgage. That’s where we raised the 20 per cent down payment.’

‘So you’ll be servicing that debt too?’

Brenda took on the look of a naughty schoolgirl in front of the headmistress.

‘Yes.’

‘As well as all manner of start-up costs, wage bills, running costs.’

‘Yes.’

Dinah folded her arms.

‘But,’ Brenda pleaded, ‘I’m sure within the five-year projection …’

‘What if I can’t wait five years?’

‘Dinah, we’re not finished, hear us out,’ said Jenny. ‘Tell her, Brenda.’

‘We’re authorised to offer you a 3 per cent stake in the business,’ said Brenda, obviously reluctant to give it away.

‘Three per cent? Please. You might as well offer me cashback or a free Parker Pen.’

Brenda looked stumped. I thought toffs found it vulgar to talk about money; Dinah wasn’t so much vulgar as downright snarky.

‘The percentage is negotiable,’ said Jenny, leaving Brenda to sulk. ‘We’ll go back to the committee and ask them to reconsider, perhaps 5 per cent might be more appropriate …’

‘Five per cent of promises? Hmmm, I’d have to think about that.’

Jenny once again stepped in.

‘What would seem an acceptable percentage to you then?’

Dinah couldn’t hide her smile. Maybe this was what she’d been waiting for: a bigger slice of the pie. She shook her head, trying to shake off the tell-tale smile.

‘This piecemeal payment plan, it’s not what I had in mind.’

‘Look,’ said Jenny sighing, ‘let’s cut to the chase: Knox MacIntyre’s gone, he’s not coming back, is he? This might be the best offer you get. You call it piecemeal but owning a stake in a multimillion-pound business, well, I call that a damn good pension. And it’s tax efficient. It’s also something to leave your son.’

Dinah received the last comment like a punch in the stomach.

Jenny’s voice softened, ‘I know you’re only trying to protect your son’s legacy and this would be a way of your family retaining the title, in name at least. It’s good for tourism. Look, we don’t have to come to any decisions right now. It’s late, you’re off to Luxembourg in the morning. We just wanted you to know the options before you go. Just think about it. We’ll go back to the committee and see if we can’t add a few percentage points; you take it to your financial advisors. We’ll leave you the paperwork;
our people will speak to your people, we’ll work something out. I’m sure you realise how very important you are to us and how hard we’ll work to make this work. Please, Lady Anglicus, Dinah, just remember when you’re talking to the judge in Luxembourg: if you stay invested in Faughie, we could be looking at a great future together.’