Conflict of Interest

‘Just say it.’ She was insistent.

‘It’s Elliott. Maybe it’s just me but he seems somehow different …’

She was shaking her head with a smile. ‘In a few weeks you won’t be quite so diplomatic’ Then, catching his embarrassment, she reached out to touch his arm. ‘It’s not just you.’ She glanced about the basement garage to make sure they were alone. ‘I haven’t felt comfortable about him ever since he arrived.’

Kate evidently wanted to confide. He was flattered. ‘How do you mean?’

‘Well you know what everyone in the City thought about Nathan? That didn’t just happen by accident. That happened because we managed his relationships. We made sure he was out there, pressing the flesh with analysts and reporters. They got to know him well and respect his views. So when they needed an angle on an industry story, Nathan was the head honcho they turned to.’

Stepping closer, she told him, ‘A couple of weeks ago I wrote to Jacob, suggesting an analyst briefing. Nothing formal. More an evening drinks meeting, with Jacob making a ten-minute presentation, you know, “different man, same strategy”, the kind of thing the City wants to hear. Next thing I know, Elliott North is marching into my office wanting to know what I’d been thinking of, writing the letter, why Jacob needed to meet analysts out of results season, etc., etc.’

Chris raised his eyebrows.

‘I couldn’t believe it at first.’ Kate was animated before checking her voice and glancing about them again. ‘I explained what the idea was. North said he thought it was a waste of time. I told him Jacob had to meet and greet if he wanted to build up the kind of rapport that Nathan had had. He stormed off. Then I started thinking – why the hell do I need to justify myself to Elliott North? I’m in charge of Starwear’s financial PR.

‘But things get worse.’ Kate paused for a moment to take breath. ‘Two days ago I took a call from Steve Evans at the FT requesting an interview with Jacob. Steve has always been a friend of Starwear’s – very on-side. I phoned Jacob recommending we go ahead with the interview, but he wasn’t in, so I left a message with his PA. This time I get an e-mail from Mr North. He’s heard about the interview and wants to restrict the area of questioning. I e-mail him right back, saying that’s crap. Telling someone of Steve’s stature there are no-go areas is like waving a red flag to a bull.

‘The interview was yesterday afternoon, and I went to Cavendish Square to meet Steve and take him upstairs to the CEO’s office. The drill is, after a few minutes of polite banter, I leave them to it, then call both parties later in the day to see how it was for them. So, I take Steve upstairs, and who should be sitting there with Jacob, but Elliott North. What’s more, when I signal it’s time to leave, he sits tight.’

‘Did he stay—’

‘The entire duration.’

‘And what did Steve make of it?’

Kate rolled her eyes. ‘He just thought it was bizarre. He liked Jacob – liked him a lot. He’s particularly impressed with all the Quantum Change stuff. But he said North just sat there in silence, wringing his hands like some dyspeptic Ayatollah.’

‘Was that the phrase he used?’ Chris chuckled.

‘It was.’ But her amusement soon faded. ‘I can’t operate with a control freak double-guessing me.’

‘You’ve spoken to Mike?’

She nodded. ‘He said “patience”. North’s not used to working in a structured operation. Mike says he’s got to learn to let go.’ She pulled a face. ‘He’s also got to get right off my back.’

Chris was contemplative for a moment before he asked, ‘Insecurity?’

She shrugged. ‘Could be.’ Then, consciously adopting Personal Manager mode, she said, ‘I don’t want you feeling uneasy about Elliott. He’s a displaced person right now, but he’ll sort himself out.’

Chris took a step towards his car.

‘He’s new to London. Probably just needs a good … social life.’ Kate made light of it, delivering a meaningful smile which intended more than she said.

Chris grinned. ‘I guess.’

He was still grinning as he drove his car up the ramp of the basement garage and into the street. ‘Social life’ indeed! He hadn’t had one of those for a while. His last girlfriend, Sophie, had been an on-off affair which had finally fizzled out six months before. It had been more his fault than hers that things hadn’t worked out – she’d got tired of always being the one to make the running.

Reflecting on his love life, his thoughts inevitably turned to Judith. Judith, Judith, Judith, his grande passion. The reason, he knew, his subsequent relationships with other women had never lasted very long; Judith had spoiled him for them. There were times, in his darker moments, when he wondered if he’d ever feel about anyone else the way he had about Judith. There had been such intensity, such passion, he sometimes doubted anyone could expect to have that more than once in their lives.

They had met at Oxford – he in his final year, she in her first, but both visiting the same professor for weekly discussions on American literature. Judith, with her lithe, petite frame and dark, tousled hair, caught his eye, but it hadn’t been love at first sight. The emotion came later, when they’d both gone to listen to a debate on the future of the novel, and found themselves, afterwards, continuing the discussion late into the night. It was her passion he was drawn to more than anything. With Judith, there were no half measures. What she felt, she felt and expressed strongly – something which Chris, who’d been brought up in a culture of reserve, found utterly captivating. Later, they’d laugh about how intensely they’d discussed Hollywood, the Internet and literacy standards. They’d circled round each other for several weeks, each wishing something would happen, but fearing the possibility of rejection – unexpressed emotion rising ever greater each time they met.

Then at the end of Michaelmas term, shortly before they were due to leave for Christmas, they found each other at the same carol service at St John’s, followed by a glühwein party in Tom Allwood’s rooms. It remained in Chris’s memory as an evening of ultimate enchantment, beginning with the candlelit ri

tual in the chapel, enjoyed for the first time with someone who provoked feelings in him he hadn’t known he possessed, and carrying on through an evening’s festivities suffused with promise. At the party, he and Judith stood in one corner, so absorbed in each other they could scarcely break away to refill their glasses. Until it was time to leave, then they’d slipped into their coats and walked the frosted, cobbled streets, aglow with good feeling, willing on the moment they were alone in his room, inhibitions dissolved.

The next six months had been the most intense and ecstatic of Chris’s life. Somehow he managed to do enough work to pass his exams. Then came the summer vacation when the two of them travelled to France together on what had felt, at the time, like a glorious, extended honeymoon. On their return, Judith had helped him choose and decorate the flat in Islington. Once she’d finished at Oxford in two years’ time, they decided, she would join him in London.

For a while the arrangement had worked well, as they weekended together, either at Oxford, which Chris loved, or in London, where together the two of them made the city their own. But Judith, who had been a supporter of environmental causes since before she arrived at university, became more and more involved in green issues. There were so many of them: energy emissions and the ozone layer, rainforests, passive smoking, food additives, whaling, child labour, nuclear waste. Fundraising and campaigning became an increasingly important part of her life; Chris found himself with the choice between seeing less of her, or joining in.