This Honourable House (30 page)

There was another life. And it was one in which she could do what she liked, create her own agenda. Sleep with whoever took her fancy and do it openly. Better still, get married. It could be done,
and Edward had said he would. It was out of the question while she still sat in this room, but might become a reality if she quit.

The Prime Minister had moved on to the foreign situation. The intergovernmental conference bored her; rich men in rich countries putting their heads together to plot how to keep their wealth for themselves. Only the
Financial Times
would report it properly, to their own readership of rich men. The
Guardian
would burble on, print laboured letters from its more extreme readers, but fail to suggest what other form of world order could maintain the peace and prosperity of nations such as her own.

As she doodled on the blotter Diane realised that her mind was made up. She was in her fifties; she could expect a place in the next Cabinet, but not for anything much higher than her current position. Agriculture, maybe, or Leader of the House. The most elevated offices of state would go to younger people, probably men. Misogyny still ruled at Westminster, especially as the women MPs had not formed themselves into anything resembling an effective voting block. Had she been able to command the support of a hundred females as well as most of the left-wingers, then her position would have been secured; indeed, she would have entered the Cabinet far higher in the pecking order. But the left wing was not as significant as it had been in former years. As the working-class vote had shrunk so the Prime Minister had positioned the party more solidly in the middle ground. It was understandable and had been highly beneficial electorally. But it meant that Diane and her beliefs were no longer the cornerstone of the party.

It was time for her to give serious consideration to resignation. Not from the Commons – the appellation ‘MP’ was still invaluable – but from the government. She would have to choose her moment with some discretion. Better to get out while one’s health and reputation were intact; better than waiting until, as Enoch Powell had cogently warned, it all ended in tears.

Later that afternoon Diane was restless. It had gone chilly. The wind moaned through the trees lining Whitehall and it threatened to turn dark earlier than usual. Nothing pressed her to stay in the office. She debated with herself whether to stroll over to the Commons and spend the evening being convivial, but decided that it might be worth popping home to get a warmer coat.

Maybe Edward would be available for an hour or two. She had had to leave early that morning to prepare for Cabinet; he had said cheerfully that he would wait for the post. She buzzed her private office at the Commons but got no reply. Maybe he was in the library doing some research, in which case he might not like to be summoned. He would be at the flat at the usual hour later tonight.

For once she decided to take the bus. It was such an unusual act for a Cabinet minister that she felt quite secure. It would be her chosen mode of transport soon enough when the hundred thousand salary and the chauffeur-driven car had gone. She bought a copy of the
Evening Standard
and carried it upstairs to the top deck, where she opted, as she had when a child, to sit in the front row. The bus was not full and she was left to her own devices.

The paper was crammed with stories and pictures of the Bridges saga. How horrible it was, for everyone involved. The police were sure it was an attempt on Mrs Bridges’ life. How much better it might be if, as in many other countries, the personal activities of public figures attracted no interest: though of course, since this was a bomb explosion in a public street, it would have been impossible to ignore. And in other countries, even those with privacy laws, politicians and magistrates and police chiefs were just as liable to be blown to smithereens, whether by locally grown activists or madmen from overseas. The media were not to blame for every outrage.

Diane allowed herself to sink into reverie. How different her own career might have been. Suppose in those early heady days she had been more responsible: might she have married a good man, as Gail had, and settled into some form of domestic bliss? In that case, might she still have gone on to stand for Parliament, with the obligations that entailed? Absolute commitment was required. A
politician was most fortunate if their family supported them completely. It was far more likely to occur for a man than for a woman. Wives were more willing to accept a subordinate role than their husbands. Most of the men she had consorted with in her twenties were not reliable types and hardly fans of equality. At least, not in practice, whatever they might have declared.

She had been ruthless, in those days. Carefree, and determined to be carefree. Nothing was permitted to stand in her path. She recognised in herself now, with some sadness, those narrow, selfish qualities she so derided in others. There would have been no room in her diary for a husband or for children. They would have got in the way.

One had almost got in the way. And she had not allowed it. The baby … oh, the baby …

Her stop had arrived. Snuffling a little and feeling unaccustomedly sorry for herself, Diane stepped quickly off the bus and pulled her jacket around her.

It was quiet in the small apartment block. At this time of day most of the inhabitants would be out; even the retired couple from the top floor would have taken advantage of the better weather earlier and were probably shopping. The lights in the stairwell would come on automatically as it became dusk. The area behind the stairs leading down to the basement was already dark.

Diane trudged upwards. There was nothing much to hurry for; the reflections at Cabinet, unanticipated, had left her with a sense of her own vulnerability, even of her age. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, old time is still a-flying. I will love you for ever. How long is for ever? Twenty years, fifty? Not the latter, for sure, not any more. If she and Edward got married the odds were against a golden wedding. But a silver might come if their love matured and strengthened, as there was every chance it might.

The door to the flat was open. Ajar, not wide. Diane stood back in surprise. Then she recovered herself. Maybe Edward was home and had gone to take a rubbish bag to the bin. But in that case she might have heard him, or met him on the stairs.

An intruder? But a thief would shut the door behind him for fear of being discovered. Diane stepped silently into the doorway and listened, but could hear only the ticking of the clock and the fridge’s purr. It sounded comfortable, normal for this hour of the day. There was not the slightest noise of anything untoward. None the less she felt alarmed. Her heart began to thump.

On tiptoe she entered the hall and searched around for a possible defence weapon. An umbrella stood against the wall. With it in her left hand, she pushed open the door into the living room.

It was empty, with no sign of disturbance. The clock seemed to tick louder. The fridge shut itself off with a faint gurgle. On the table was the usual detritus: folders, letters, some opened, a bunch of keys, a handful of coins. On the mantelpiece the presentation pieces, some of silver, had not been moved. If the place had been burgled it had been left remarkably tidy, and by a very idle burglar.

Yet it was strange. Those were Edward’s keys. His briefcase was standing by the leg of the desk in its usual place, open, as if he had been interrupted while getting ready for work. Was he here already? If so, where was he? She peered inside the briefcase and was puzzled to see the reports he had dealt with last night. Something was definitely wrong.

Gingerly she turned over the post. Most had been opened, but not everything. He must have halted halfway through. One large envelope had a Special Delivery sticker on it; Edward must have had to sign for it. It was addressed to him, not to her. It was empty but had not been discarded.

Then she saw what must have been inside, the covering letter from the adoption agency: crisp, efficient, with no individuality. Attached was an old pink birth certificate with the spidery handwriting common in the 1960s. Edward’s birth certificate, the original. And somehow it looked horribly, desperately familiar.

The umbrella clattered unheeded to the floor as she forced herself to examine the scrawl. For
though the name of the boy child was not Edward’s, it was a name she had chosen herself. And the name in the column marked ‘Mother’ shrieked out at her as if thirty lost years had vanished at a stroke.

It was her own.

Diane did not know where to find him, but find him she must. A sound rose in her throat, a wordless cry of agony. How could this have happened? She knew the birth date, had it engraved on her soul. How could she not have realised that Edward’s must be the same? But she had not read his CV with any attention to that sort of detail. She had scrutinised the photograph, as was her stupid wont, searching shamelessly for a handsome young man, one with brains but also with physical appeal. Stupid, stupid, stupid. The habit was so ingrained that even when she had resolved to stop doing it, that was the automatic approach her eye took. So she had registered only that this was an attractive male candidate with excellent qualifications.

Hadn’t he said he kept a different date for his birthday? That occurred often enough with adopted children; some parents preferred to celebrate the date they took delivery. Only the original birth certificate would tell the truth, not the revised papers issued to adoptees to enable them to obtain a passport or driving licence. Edward could not have known without going through the agency. But now he had, and the truth was dreadful.

Diane paced distractedly about the flat, turning papers over, the pink certificate scrunched up in her hand, talking to herself in broken phrases. She had not wished to give up the baby. A little boy, perfect in every way. Tiny fingers and toes, fat dimpled knees. But she had been so young, and in the middle of her university course. To keep the child would have meant leaving her studies and her plans for a future away from her overweening parents, especially her mother. It was different then, such a stigma for pregnant girls, for illegitimate babies. To keep the child would have implied that her background had won: that motherhood and domesticity had claimed her as it had so many of the others at school, burdened with nappies and wet washing and unloved husbands while they were still barely out of childhood themselves. It had been such a struggle to win the college place and the state scholarship that went with it. To abandon it would have meant that her mother had been right. That was not going to happen.

Termination of the pregnancy had been an option, just. The law had been changed only a year or so before. There were doctors who would do it. But then abortion had not been generally available on the National Health Service and she had had no money for private treatment. Besides, something in her was revolted at the idea. Better to have the baby and give it away. Then some other woman, denied the chance of children, might be made happy. That was how it had worked for thousands: it was not the unkindest solution.

But once she had held the soft, warm infant, she had wept, and had known as night followed day that she would love the baby for always. For ever … A life sentence, to be pushed down into the deepest recesses of her soul, to be denied as if he had never existed. When asked in adult years she would say she was childless, and imply that that was not by choice but because of an infection. The truth was simpler. She did not want to experience that level of pain again. If she were to concentrate on a political career and make the best of it, then bearing and loving her own children would involve an unwarranted conflict. So her barrenness was confirmed. Nothing interfered. She had ended up in the Cabinet, had had loads of friends, had had a wonderful time with lovers galore. And she had slept with her own son.

It was as if the gods were laughing.

From downstairs came a commotion and a shout. Leaving the door ajar, just as she had found it, Diane left the flat and headed woodenly down the stairs.

The lights had been switched on. A draught came from the open street door. The elderly
neighbours were present, the woman wringing her hands and crying. The stairs extended beyond the hallway, down to the right into an ancient cellar. A turn in the balustrade concealed a darker area where bikes and boxes were stored. Diane began to descend the steps, her hand over her mouth, fearful of what she might find.

And hanging from the banister, a cord tied tightly round its neck, swinging gently in the chill air from the street, was a body.

It seemed strange, Major-General Sellers reflected, to be watching the State Opening of Parliament not from the Palace of Westminster but on the monitors of Sky TV in the international departure lounge of Heathrow airport, waiting to go holiday with his wife without a care in the world. Five years he had held the post of Serjeant-at-Arms, Five splendid, complex, infuriating years. A snip, he had been told, after commanding troops on the windswept hills of the Falklands or in the dank streets of Armagh. A wonderful retirement job. Mixing with the great, the good and the
hoi polloi
. Responsible for Members’ security, in full consultation, of course, with the police and Special Branch. Attired in eighteenth-century court dress at the Members’ insistence, as if they preferred their staff to strut like marionettes. The daftest, most extraordinary role he had ever taken on. And yet, ten weeks after leaving and retiring for the second time, he missed it dreadfully.

His replacement was acting distinctly nervous, as well she might. The lady Minister for Women’s Affairs, a formidable six-foot dame in the House of Lords, had put her size tens down: the post would no longer go by recommendation to a ‘gentleman who had borne arms’, but would be advertised, with a clear preference for a woman to succeed. Mandy Williams had risen as far as assistant chief constable in her native Lancashire. Her Bolton accent, it was said, had dazzled the lay members of the appointments board, while the others saw at once that not appointing her would cause a frightful fuss. She got it, naturally, on merit. It would not do to think otherwise.

Ms Williams was too short to bring grace to the uniform, now a mixture of ancient and modern: neither fish nor fowl, with a short ill-fitting skirt over Ms Williams’s haunches and the ruff so stiff at her throat it threatened to choke her. She had disdained to wear the sword. Sellers’s eyes twinkled; he did not blame her for that. The pesky thing entwined itself around one’s legs and made turning sharply an impossibility. But then a gentleman, especially a military type, would probably have had some practice.

At Buckingham Palace, the Queen was climbing into the State Coach. Not the glittering gold contraption of the Coronation Coach that had turned her, almost fifty years before, into the world’s favourite fairy-tale monarch. That monstrosity, which Her Majesty complained privately was so draughty, was in for repairs and renovation to be ready for the Golden Jubilee. The fabulous vehicle was popular with the tourists and public, but Sellers hated it; somehow it, and her evening dress, crown and white fur wrap inside it, confirmed her realm’s status as a clapped-out museum piece incapable of gazing into the future with any confidence.

Tradition. That was all. That was everything: the Commons and Lords seemed unable to adapt to the new century, clinging as they did to the trappings of a more flamboyant age when Britannia really did rule the waves and a quarter of the globe flew the Union Jack. But the Mother of Parliaments remained determined to resist the march of events. Its occupants refused to recognise the advance of other nations to greater world pre-eminence. They failed to note the prosperity and success of their continental cousins, deriding ‘Europe’ as if it were full of hostile foreigners bent on subjugation instead of crammed with wealthy customers. No wonder the chaps in Paris and Berlin got so exasperated. If Britain wanted to be in the leading rank once more, it had only to learn how to play the power game in Brussels. But that would involve admitting that the United Kingdom was merely one among equals, and that would not happen in his lifetime.

Sellers screwed up his eyes and concentrated. His successor was not the sole new face in the Commons. The winners of the two by-elections, sworn in promptly the week before, were identifiable by their delighted smiles and the many handshakes with which they were greeted. The New Democrats had held Benedict Ashworth’s seat with a much reduced majority; their Member was a dumpy woman in a plain blue suit with a pudding-bowl haircut. She had a frown line between her brows and had come across at the hustings as rather fierce and hot on family values. Sellers hoped she
would not prove to be another Ann Widdecombe: one was
quite
enough.

Ashworth himself had bowed out of politics. That had not been absolutely necessary. Despite the strident condemnation from both the homophobes (Lord Tebbit: ‘Time to eradicate this evil from British society’) and the homosexual lobby (‘His claim that he is not gay is an insult to us all’), his intelligence and charm might have allowed him to continue on the backbenches and maybe rise again to prominence, after many years as chairman of obscure committees, as Deputy Assistant Speaker. By their service shall ye forgive them. As far as was known he was abroad, seeking his Nirvana. The divorce had been speedy, as one might have expected, and the former Mrs Ashworth was now seen on the arm of a distinguished banker from the City.

Frank Bridges was in attendance, his expression defiant. He was not the first prominent figure to be arraigned for conspiracy to murder: the name of the unfortunate Jeremy Thorpe came to mind. The latter had been acquitted, as probably Bridges would be. Men of their ilk might utter oaths, as Henry II did about Thomas Becket, implying that they longed to be rid of a thorn in their side. But they didn’t mean it, and were as horrified as anyone when the remark was taken seriously. His current spouse Hazel was not entitled to be with him as the Commons rushed into the Lords to hear Her Majesty, but no doubt she would be visible later in the corridor near the Strangers’ Dining Room, clinging to the poor bloke as if they were joined at the hip. She had a sour look about her, as if the new marriage had failed to satisfy her, yet they were both stuck with it for the duration. Frank Bridges would escape jail, but Sellers suspected that that marriage must make him feel like a condemned man.

Gail Bridges had remarried. The event had been caught on camera for
OK!
magazine, with shyly radiant smiles from the bride and a gruff solemnity from the newly clean-shaven groom, and then she and her ex-police officer husband had disappeared from view. It was to be hoped that, despite her dreadful suffering, she would now find happiness with a man who truly loved her and put her interests first.

The other by-election victor hove into view: a portly young man with a pompous bearing whom Sellers instinctively disliked. Why, when a Member had suffered a great tragedy as Ms Clark had, did the constituency react by choosing somebody as opposite as possible? This man had no opinions of his own and appeared, if his public pronouncements were any guide, to have left his brain at home. If he had one. Even now Sellers could see him pat his pager for reassurance. He was the type of wimp who, invited to talk on a late-night phone-in programme, would put the pager on the table by his microphone and check it for the correct ‘on-line’ message, even at one o’clock in the morning.

What fools these people were, the lobby fodder, the so-called ‘PM’s Patsies’. They believed that if they stayed loyal and obsequious, promotion would be automatic. Sellers’s observations over the years, however, told him that it was the awkward squad, provided they talked sense, who were more likely to be pulled in by the whips and emasculated with the seals of office. The surgery didn’t always work: just occasionally a light would shine, an original thinker would be given a platform. This ghastly young man was likely to move in obscurity all his parliamentary life.

He so regretted the resignation of Diane Clark. Her absence had left a gaping hole, not merely among the depleted ranks of women members, but among those memorable enough to have won public affection and respect. That applied to so few MPs these days and to hardly any ministers. Too full of their own importance most of them, mouthing the same empty platitudes in the unconvincing, mellifluent tones they’d been taught by the image consultants. They bored the electorate to distraction: the UK was heading the same way as America, where even a fiercely contested national election meant that half the voters didn’t bother to turn out.

The spin doctors were absent this day. When ceremony took precedence, they went out to lunch. Last night the most senior of them would have attended at Ten Downing Street as the Prime Minister read out the pages of the Queen’s Speech; but then, they knew its contents by heart, for they had written it. Or most of it. With sheaves of private opinion polls on one side and reams of
qualitative focus-group notes on the other, they would attempt to devise memorable phrases that would please the electorate. Sound bite politics, it was called. It might have been more useful, Sellers considered, if their talents had been directed to asking what kind of nation they might be governing in ten or twenty years’ time, and what policies might be set in train to secure its long-term well-being. But short-termism ruled; prejudice, set in aspic, replaced independent research. They might claim they functioned with a deep-seated commitment to running the country in the interests of the populace as a whole, but they didn’t do it. No wonder when anything went belly-up the policy makers were so astonished.

Diane’s bowing out had been inevitable once the inquest had taken place. The sense of horror at what she had done, how she had so casually ruined a young life simply to satisfy her own excesses, had stunned her friends. The condemnation had been near total:
Woman’s Hour
alone had tried to express sympathy for a mother who both found and lost her son in a single day. It was generally agreed that had Diane been more open from the start about her adopted child, none of this could possibly have happened, not least because the young man would have made the connection, or at least mused about the chances of the coincidence. Sellers, with his Samaritan hat on, could see that it was no coincidence. The unfortunate son had as much of a taste for politics as his mother, and the same energetic, passionate approach: the genes kicked in even when one didn’t know about them. And while opposites attract, so do similarities, more dangerously. When lovers gaze into each other’s eyes, they may seek features that are comfortable or even familiar. That can lead to great love, but to utter destruction as well.

The inquest had been heartbreaking. No one had known what to say. No suicide note had been left but, with the birth certificate so clear, one would have been redundant. Edward must have committed the fatal act quite soon after opening the mail, or perhaps he had waited till he heard the old couple go out. He had been dead at least an hour when they found him. He had made sure of that. No other verdict was possible.

So Diane had had a breakdown, and was a voluntary patient somewhere in the north of England. When she emerged it was to be hoped that she could continue to function with that bright spark that had gained so much public affection. Or maybe she would be on medication for the rest of her life, and regularly need to seek asylum in the hands of the doctors. Those whom the gods wish to punish they first make mad.

Someone in the lounge was shouting at an airline official. A woman, fashionably thin with skinny black trousers and a mass of uncontrollable hair. A fuss about wanting an automatic upgrade to first class. Sellers blinked: he recognised Pansy Illingworth, newly unemployed since her newspaper’s takeover by a porn king. Her post as editor had been handed to her deputy, Jim Betts, whose lugubrious face now graced the paper’s masthead. Sales, however, had begun to fall once again.

The flight was being called. Mrs Sellers, the dear lady, was checking the tickets and passports for the umpteenth time. Sellers rose and gave the screen a final wistful glance. The carriages and limousines drove into view. In one Andrew Marquand rode with his ‘fiancée’ at his side; she looked bored. That relationship was going nowhere, which given the Ashworth scandal was probably the best outcome, or maybe Marquand had more sense. And at last the prime ministerial vehicle, with the new infant cradled on its mother’s lap. The proud parents smiled and waved as if they were royalty, as well they might. Their position in the polls was secure. Several rivals had been seen off. The opposition was riven with strife over Europe, sex, money and just about everything else. The election would probably return much the same result as before.

Business as usual. Sellers picked up his hand baggage and coat, took his place at his wife’s side, and headed for the plane.