Conferences are Murder by Val McDermid

like Kinnock purged socialism from the Labour Party, Union Jack and his cronies purged Socialism Today from the newsagents. So I am no longer the news editor of a radical monthly magazine. I’m just another freelance desperately scratching a living off a shrinking market.” Dick stared at the floor, hands involuntarily bunching into fists.
    â€œWhat’s that got to do with Union Jack? Did the union refuse to bail you out of trouble?” Lindsay asked. For as long as she could remember, Socialism Today ’s finances had been less stable than Mexico’s. The difference was that banks didn’t fall over themselves to lend billions to struggling left-wing publishing houses.
    Dick snorted. “What are you on? One of the weird American
pills that warp your sense of reality? Tom Jack didnae wash his hands of us when we were in trouble. That I could have understood, though forgiving would’ve been something else again. Naw, it was Union Jack himself that put the shaft in.”
    â€œGoing to stop talking in riddles and tell me the story?” Lindsay asked, the brisk words softened by her tone.
    â€œNothing much to tell. We ran a story about eighteen months ago alleging that Tom Jack was going behind the backs of the union executive and dealing directly with the firm of accountants who were putting together the statements of accounts prior to the merger with the other unions. Nothing wrong with that in itself, except that the piece went on to reveal that Union Jack was suggesting all sorts of creative accounting tricks to make our finances look a lot healthier than they really were. Some of the wee tricks he’d thought of were borderline illegal.”
    Lindsay sucked her breath in sharply. “Pick the bones out of that, eh?”
    Dick nodded grimly. “We thought we had it copperbottomed, but Union Jack insisted it was a set-up. He announced he was going to sue, and our source inside the accountants got cold feet and bottled out of going in to bat for us. So Union Jack took us to the cleaners. We couldn’t even pay the lawyer’s bills, never mind the damages. The four of us that owned the magazine on paper all had to dive headlong into bankruptcy.”
    Dick’s blue eyes had a new bleakness Lindsay had never seen there before. It wasn’t surprising. He wasn’t some reckless kid with no one to worry about but himself. He was an experienced professional, a man who knew the risks, but had always managed to avoid exposing his wife and children to them.
    â€œHelen and the kids?” she asked.
    â€œWe’re okay. We managed to keep the house. When I joined the Socialism Today management collective, the office lawyers recommended that we put it in her name, that and the car. So it could have been worse, I suppose.”
    Lindsay felt anger rising, a taste as distinctive as bile. “And the union just stood by and let this happen?”
    â€œLindsay, the executive committee were in Tom Jack’s pocket.
He said crawl, they said, how low. Sure, there were plenty of people in the union jumping up and down about it, but nobody walking the corridors of power gave a shit about a wee magazine with a dozen journalists and a nasty habit of bursting balloons. The trouble is, Lindsay, this union isnae for the rank and file any more. And until we get rid of Tom Jack once and for all, nothing’s going to get any better. He’s got to go.”
    Lindsay stood up and stretched. “I don’t think I can take any more of this debate. Are they open?”
    Dick glanced at his watch. “Ten minutes ago. What are we doing, wasting good drinking time?”
    In spite of the earliness of the hour, the student union bar was doing a brisk trade. Dick ordered a pint of bitter and turned to Lindsay. “What’re you for?”
    â€œD’you know, I don’t think I can face drink,” she said in a tone of incredulity. “You’d better make it a