Conflict of Interest

Jim’s only vice appeared to be vintage cars – ‘my habit’, as he described it – an obsession absorbing most of his spare time. Over the years he’d assembled quite a collection, and such was his passion for rally driving that one of his colleagues had written up a diary piece about him which had appeared one Sunday, alongside a photograph of Jim in goggles and cap, much to his chagrin – not to mention the amusement of his media contemporaries.

In the last twenty years Kate and Jim had seen whole tides of people come and go in the constant flux of the City media world they both inhabited. So although she was in PR, and he a journalist, their relationship had for many years gone way beyond the usual constraints. In fact, Jim had been a P

R man once himself, after his first job as a reporter with the Aberdeen Press and Journal. PR hadn’t suited his temperament, however, and he’d moved to a job with the City office of the Telegraph, which was where he was when Kate first met him. These days, it was their custom to meet for dinner every few months. There was always some client to whom the meal would be billed – ‘journalist briefing’ – and Kate made sure her secretary chose one of London’s better restaurants. With Jim there was to be no stinting – Kate was always guaranteed a delightful evening.

Her face required only touching up. Standing back from the mirror she brushed her dark, shoulder-length hair, checking her appearance as she did so. She was wearing her new Favourbrook jacket for Jim – a sumptuous affair in burgundy brocade, with ornate, antique-gold embroidery – he always noticed things like that. She never wore much jewellery, although she had always loved the ruby solitaire which hung from a gold necklace around her neck – her thirtieth birthday present to herself.

Then it was time for her medication. She checked her blood levels, took out her insulin pen, and gave herself a shot.

The diabetes had been diagnosed when she was in her late teens. She’d fainted a few times at school and begun suffering from dizzy spells; it hadn’t taken much to work out the problem. The treatment, however, had been a lot harder to accept. As a girl she’d been terrified of needles. Having to inject herself was a trauma she’d just had to come to terms with – there had simply been no other way.

All that was long gone, of course. She’d become so used to it, now she could do it in the dark. It was all so much a part of her life that she rarely even thought about her diabetes. As long as she didn’t hugely overindulge in chocolates or desserts, it wasn’t even an issue. It certainly didn’t stop her enjoying herself.

A short while later she was being dropped off at The Ivy by one of the Lombard Jaguars. The restaurant, much loved by ‘the mediahedin’ as Jim called them, and showbiz celebrities, was one of her favourites – so much so that she could nearly always command her preferred table, tucked discreetly near the back, but with an ideal purview for star-spotting. As she stepped into the restaurant she saw that Jim, ever the gentleman, was there before her. In all the years she’d known him, he had never kept her waiting.

‘Kate, lovely to see you,’ he greeted her in his warm, Scottish brogue, as he stood to give her a hug.

Then as she sat opposite, ‘I’ve ordered our usual.’

She glanced to where the wine steward had appeared with a bottle of Dom Perignon. ‘Wonderful.’ She smiled across at him, warmly.

Conversation was, as always, a medley of the latest inside information, gossip about who was doing what in City newsrooms, and high-jinks from the world of PR. The champagne flowed freely, a table of Hollywood luminaries pulled up in a stretch limo – grotesquely out of place in the narrow street outside – and all was set for another night at the top. But soon after ordering, Jim took the conversation in an unexpected direction which she found deeply disturbing. They had been discussing Lombard’s latest client wins, and which ones Kate would be working on, when he remarked, ‘You’ve taken on some new staff, too?’

Kate nodded. ‘We have our first Research and Planning Director. Poached from MIRA.’

Across the table from her, Jim’s brow furrowed. ‘Aye. And some American. Is it Elliott North?’

‘Ah. Yes.’ Elliott North was a subject she didn’t care to embark on. Now she told Jim, ‘I try to keep him away from people I like.’

Jim’s eyes twinkled. ‘Well, my dear, I’m afraid you didn’t succeed in my case.’

She looked over at him, startled.

‘I had him on the phone the other day—’

‘That’s outrageous,’ she exploded, leaning across the table. ‘He knows perfectly well you’re my contact. It’s marked clearly on the media list.’

Jim raised his eyebrows. ‘Well, I get the impression that subtleties of that kind really don’t feature—’

‘He wasn’t rude to you, was he?’ She was horrified.

‘Oh, no. Nothing like that.’ Jim took a sip of his champagne, before his expression turned serious. ‘Something potentially much worse.’

As Kate regarded him with a look of apprehension, he told her, ‘You’ll recall the piece I wrote on Jacob Strauss when he took over as CEO?’

How could she forget it. It had provoked forty minutes of heated debate at a Starwear traffic meeting. Amongst all the press coverage the announcement had generated, The Sunday Telegraph’s was the only one that had provided a less-than-enthusiastic analysis, along with the news piece. It wasn’t that it was particularly negative; just that Jim had questioned the relevance of Jacob Strauss’s prior experience, running small-scale retail operations in America, to his new role as the head of a global organisation. Kate had thought it was fair comment. North had been ferocious in his contention that Jim Ritchie had way overstepped the mark, and should be regarded as Starwear’s media enemy number one. For all Kate’s efforts to explain that universal adulation from the British press was a hopelessly naive expectation, North just hadn’t understood. On the subject of Jacob Strauss, it seemed to Kate, he had gone native. Objectivity just wasn’t there.

Now, Jim was telling her, ‘The moment he came on the phone, he was banging on about the profile. I thought it was quite positive, myself. I’d mentioned all the sporting icon stuff, the hero status in America, and, and, and. But he didn’t see it that way.’

Kate cringed.

‘He told me my comments about Jacob’s previous business experience were completely unwarranted, and that Jacob’s entrepreneurial achievements were widely acclaimed in the States.’

‘So what did you say?’

Jim smiled caustically. ‘I told him it was very convenient for him that his client had been so successful in a country where I didn’t have easy access to business records. That seemed to take the wind out of his sails.’

‘Jim, I’m so sorry.’