No further than Southdon, she found, much to her chagrin.
As the last few guests were finally leaving, after having drunk and eaten everything they could find, and the venue had been reduced to a rather melancholy shell of a place, with plates and glasses and empty bottles everywhere, there had been a heated discussion among the editorial team about where they should go for their celebration. Bernice was keen to revisit some of her haunts up in town, places she'd not seen for months. Many of the others wanted to go back down to Southdon since it was that much nearer home for them. Others, like Dave and Wobs, didn't seem to mind either way. Chris eventually swayed her.
"I really think we should go to the Dog and Duck," he said. "After all, it describes journalistic habits perfectly: to get the story you dog them, then once it's appeared, you duck...."
So the Dog and Duck it was. Bernice did wonder whether Chris had an ulterior motive for insisting that they go back down to work: he had mentioned, apparently casually, that his parents were on another of their trips abroad, and so he had the house to himself. Was he planning anything, by any chance? she wondered - and then decided she was being too optimistic.
They took the train back down to Southdon, and then walked through the cool autumn evening to the pub. Wright's buildings were mostly in darkness, and they couldn't help recalling to each other that amazing weekend of just a few weeks ago, but which now already seemed like some kind of ancient history, an epic tale that had been passed down from generation to generation.
It was with these nostalgic thoughts that they began the serious business of drinking in the Dog and Duck. As it was a Friday night the pub was even more packed than usual, which did not add to its charms. In addition to being ugly and uncomfortable, it was now also crowded, noisy and smoky. However, as Dave put it, once they had all had an eyeful the decor would hardly matter.
"So," said Bernice starting on her second gin and tonic, "how do we all feel now that the first issue is well and truly on the streets?"
"It still feels unreal for me," said Terence. "I went down the High Street earlier this week, into W H Smith to have a look for the magazine. It was strange in there: the place was full of our marketing department reading rival titles. Anyway, there it was, our magazine, sitting there on the shelves. And do you know what? - there was somebody flicking through it, reading it, trying to decide whether to buy it or not. I stood behind him for about five minutes, beaming deadly rays into his brain to make him buy it."
"And did he?" asked Janice.
"No, the wretch finished reading it and walked off. I could have killed him," said Terence with disgust. Bernice was relieved he hadn't taken the law into his own hands again. "But when do we get to hear how many copies have been sold - how many did you say were printed?"
"Well, we printed 120,000 copies, of which 110,000 went into the newstrade," said Bernice. "I'm afraid it'll be several months before we have a good idea of how they've gone."
"Months?" said Kate, appalled. "But that means that until then we'll be sailing blind."
"Don't forget there's the survey," said Terence who at Bernice's request had re-written most of it from marketing's pitiful first attempts.
"True," said Kate, mollified slightly. "When do we get the results?"
"The closing date for returning the forms is 28 October, so we should have some results just before Christmas," said Bernice.
"Can't we get anything sooner?" asked Pete. "It's horrible this writing in the dark - "
"Yes, you can barely see your pencil," quipped Chris.
" - I mean not knowing whether the angle you are taking is right or not," continued Pete ignoring Chris's facetiousness.
"You could look at some of the forms in marketing - from a cursory glance, and not wishing to pre-empt Tiny Tim's flipcharts or methodologies, readers seem pretty positive. Of course, it's hard to draw any reliable conclusions, but they do give you a steer." My God, she thought, having talked after Charles today I'm starting to talk like him.
"Actually, I've already done my survey," said Chris smugly as he put down his gin and tonic.
"What?" said Pete, who had been allowed out for the night - or part of it, at least - but was only drinking orange juice.
"It's not exactly a survey, more a piece of spot research. Well, actually I spoke to someone I saw reading The Business on the train."
"What? You just went up to them and asked them, did you?" said Pete, amazed at Chris's effrontery.
"Sure," he said, "what's the problem? Anyway, she was pretty...enthusiastic about it - thought it was a bit heavy in places, but generally very interesting."
"Did she say anything about the design?" asked Wobs who was drinking yet more Lucozade, which he always seemed to have with him.
"'Fraid not, old man," said Chris who tended to patronise Wobs, not least because he was small and didn't seem to mind.
"That's the trouble with the bloody public," said Dave, who had been drinking quite solidly, perhaps to make up for the missed opportunities at the launch, "they just don't appreciate all our efforts. Pearls before swine."
"It is true, to a certain extent," agreed Bernice. "Much of the effort we put into a magazine is for ourselves."
"And our rivals, don't forget," added Dave.
"True," said Bernice.
"And that's something that worries me," said Dave.
"Excuse me Bernice," interrupted George, "I really must be getting a move on - hope you'll excuse me."
"Of course, of course," said Bernice as he rose slowly and bid goodnight to the rest of the team. Poor old Gorgeous, she thought, he must feel a bit out of place amongst the hard-drinking, hard-swearing young monsters that we are. But that is the nature of the beast, she concluded, effectively deeming anyone over 40 as being unsuitable for the high-pressure world of monthly journalism. The question of what would happen to her as a journalist when she hit this age barely crossed her mind: she was too busy worrying about more immediate problems like being 30.
"Yeah, as I was saying," went on Dave, not at all affected by George's interjection. "I was talking to some of the agencies at the do this evening. Some of them are quite sharp, they know what's what. And the funny thing is, not one of them knew of any plans by Business Monthly."
"What kind of plans?" said Yasmeen as she came back from the bar, bearing drinks for herself and the others. All that evening she had been silently debating with herself whether to stop being teetotal and to try a gin and tonic. Daringly, she had decided that she would: hadn't she recently decided that this new job was going to be her big chance to grow, to try new things?
"I mean counter-offensives. Thanks - " Dave said as Yasmeen handed him his nth gin and tonic. "Even if you are the biggest and best - well, let's say most powerful - you do not just sit there and let some whippersnapper come along and try to knock you off your perch. You fight back, you play dirty, you do something. But they are manifestly doing nothing. It's very worrying," he concluded.
"Is it? " asked Chris, not really following this. "Surely it's good for us, no?"
"In the short term, perhaps," continued Mowley, "but if there's something more than meets the eye, could be bad news for us later on...."
"Something more? Like what?" asked Kate.
"Dunno. Wish I did. I don't like these mysteries. But mark my words, what is all not seems it...." He drew reflectively on his cigarette, trying to work out where that last sentence went wrong.
By now Dave was well and truly pickled, and since the others were not far behind they barely noticed his moments of incoherence. Although Yasmeen found her first gin and tonic strange, its rapid effects soon outweighed any lingering doubts about drinking it all. Her second followed soon after, which led inevitably to the third and then beyond into drinks that were no longer being counted.
They were all talking and laughing freely, finally shedding the weight of the launch that had pressed down on them for the last two months. Rather like sleepwalkers, they were beginning to wake up from the zombie-like activity they had been engaged in, and as they emerged blinking into the light of everyday life, they looked around and saw, almost for the first time since they had come together as a team, that they were people, made of flesh and blood, and that they had been working with other similarly-constructed people. And they began to wonder what the others were really like, their professional training working hand in hand with normal human inquisitiveness, the origin of all journalism.
Even in her increasingly befuddled state Bernice couldn't help but notice the sly looks that were passing between them, as each man sized up each woman and vice versa, and each woman compared herself with the other women, and the men with the men - except for Pete, who feeling himself left out of things by virtue of his tedious sobriety and very different concerns and preoccupations, had excused himself and gone home to his wife and family. Sadly, nobody noticed.
And then Bernice was conscious that she was staring at Chris, and that Chris was staring at her. She felt a very palpable stirring of desire for him, and become very aware of his physical presence. And he too moved closer as if responding to the ancient signals that Bernice was by now sending by her looks and posture. He too became aware of Bernice in a way that he had only felt vaguely in the office. True, the office environment had helped him arrive at this moment: being thrown together with someone for many hours a day inevitably brings a closeness, a natural rapport. But now he felt that he was passing beyond that naturalness to far stronger feelings.
And yet something held him back. In all the countless relationships he had formed with women in the past, not one of them had involved someone nominally his superior, his boss. He found this new element disconcerting. In the past it had always been him in charge, him controlling the situation; now he wondered where he stood with regard to Bernice, who among them had the power, who held the dominant position. He felt a disquiet, something approaching fear, to find himself in this ambiguous position. It paralysed him, simultaneously provoking and throttling his desire.
Nor was he alone. Bernice too was conscious of some nagging doubt in the back of her mind. Not of the reality or strength of her desire for this attractive, funny, sexy individual, but of the morality of progressing that desire. Morality? she almost said out loud, as the less moral part of her encountered this block. What was she talking about? This was the 1980s - the late 1980s at that: what was she worrying about such antiquated concepts for?
But she was. She was acutely aware that she had recruited Chris, that she was responsible for him, and that she had power, albeit of a limited kind, over him. If she embarked on a relationship with him now, what retrospective light might that shed on her choice of him for the post? Had a part of her chosen him because of these nascent feelings? After all, he had hardly turned out to be a natural journalist yet, for all his qualities. So if she had erred in selecting him, did that debar her from allowing herself to take advantage of the situation?
And what about the ethics of taking advantage of Chris? As her junior he might feel that he had to play along with her, worried that his career might suffer, or that he might lose his job. How could she allow herself to put him in such a difficult, nay, impossible position? And how in these circumstances could she ever know whether his responses were caused by true, reciprocated feelings, worried prudence or even plain cynical ambition?
It was with these thoughts churning through their increasingly confused brains that Chris and Bernice sat staring at each other, making occasional small talk, both conscious that they wanted to take the next step, both strangely inhibited, both sensing a kind of failure. Meanwhile the others continued their own passing of glances, their own small talk, their own gradual loss of mental clarity.
Eventually the evening came to an end, though no one remembered how, not even Wobs who while drinking non-alcoholic beverages seemed to be similarly distant from the world. And nobody really remembered how the taxis were ordered, how they were paid for, and how they all got home to their respective beds - alone. Alone, that is, this time. But just as tomorrow always brought another issue to be written, subbed and designed, so it also always brought the hope of rectifying past omissions, of editing and emending history to turn today's defeats into victories.
