A Parliamentary Affair (47 page)

There. It was out. She sniffed with relief, blew her nose and waited. Sparrow’s eyes widened and his mouth twitched. Brave lass, well done. Nevertheless, there was a hint of menace in his voice now.

‘Who told you this, Miss Stalker, may I ask? Was it your mother?’

‘No, of course not.’ Scornfully. ‘I haven’t talked to her about it. She doesn’t realise I know.’

‘Then we ought to explore how you did find out. The first problem, as I am sure you will realise, is to keep it a secret. So how do
you
know all about the alleged affair?’

Karen miserably scrunched the damp tissue between her hands. ‘Oh, several things. He keeps phoning her. I don’t hear the conversations, of course, but she looks so happy when he’s been on. And he writes her little notes.’

‘Does he, by Jove!’ Tom Sparrow muttered under his breath. ‘Do you have any of these notes, Miss Stalker?’

‘I did have. I gave it to…’ Karen’s voice trailed off and she stopped dead.

‘Who, pray?’

A stubborn expression like a mask came down over the girl’s face. She said nothing.

‘You had a letter from Mr Dickson to your mother, a letter which might have been interpreted as … ah, incriminating, shall we say? Who did you give it to? I think you had better tell me.’

Silence. That smelled bad.

‘You haven’t given it to somebody else, have you? Outside the family?’

A barely perceptible nod.

‘Outside the party?’

Slowly, woebegone, another nod.

‘It wasn’t a journalist or anyone who could make trouble, was it, Karen?’

The air froze.

Karen closed her eyes. Her heart had stopped beating, she was suspended in space, disintegrating, whirling away from everything kind and familiar, a soundless scream coming from her lips, unheard, at the edge of the world. ‘Karen? Miss Stalker?’

The room was still there, but different, as if all the old atoms had been smashed by an overwhelming force and rearranged. The nature of substance had changed. She was an alien.

Aliens fight, are aggressive, go on the attack.

She sat up straight. Her new voice sounded hard, uncompromising.

‘Yeah, but he won’t do anything with it. He can’t, see?’

‘Who was it? Why not?’

‘It was a bloke from
The Globe
.’ Karen heard the sharp intake of breath. ‘Oh, don’t worry. He can’t hurt your precious Mr Dickson, or my mother. He can’t do anything with it because he would have to explain how he got it off me. And that is not a very nice story, as I am under age.’

‘Oh, Christ.’ Sparrow put his head in his hands. Poor kid.

‘I don’t want any of that to get out. My mother doesn’t know. I just want to see Mr Dickson and persuade him to leave her alone.’

‘You’re not the only one,’ Sparrow remarked drily.

The two looked at each other, and briefly understood. But as their loyalties and objectives were different their methods must diverge. Sparrow considered. If he made this experience as unpleasant as possible the girl would not be tempted to tell her tale again in a hurry.

‘Talking to a journalist, whatever the circumstances, which we won’t go into, was not smart, you know that?’

‘Of course I do. I can’t think of anything else.’

‘And you must not – must
not
– tell anybody else, do you hear? If we’re to sort it all out quietly, the fewer people who know the better. A journalist! A bloody journalist. Jesus, Karen, you of all people should have realised. What did he say to you – that he knew all about it anyway, and you might as well tell him?’

She nodded dumbly.

‘And did he give you any evidence of that? Before you opened your big mouth, I mean?’

‘He said they had been seen together at the Party Conference in Blackpool.’

‘Oh, really? Mr Dickson was with his wife at Blackpool. Your journalist was probably making that up.’

Her mouth dropped open and the belligerence faded. An expression of fear and hopelessness slowly suffused the girl’s features.

Sparrow leaned forward. ‘You realise he probably knew very little? Maybe nothing at all. Perhaps he was fishing – they do that, you know. Find some gullible soul and wheedle it all out of them. Then they’ve got their story – after, and not before. You probably told him everything he needed – you, little Miss Karen, all by yourself.’

He was striking home. Her head was up, face full of suffering. ‘He won’t tell. He can’t. He would end up in jail. I’d give evidence. If he were to tell, or try any blackmail, I’d put him behind bars for ten years, I swear I would. And he knows it.’ She rose suddenly. ‘Look, Mr Sparrow, I would do anything on this earth to help my mother. Will Mr Dickson be here tomorrow? I need to talk to him.’

Sparrow spread his hands dismissively. ‘I really think that would be most unwise, Karen. We have already agreed that we must keep all this as quiet as possible. But I will have a word with him. Another word. And I am afraid that will have to do.’

She was frightened. This man, who ought to be helping, had turned into a brick wall. ‘But I must talk to him and persuade him. He’s leading her on. He’s more senior – she has to do what he wants. Don’t you understand?’

‘Karen, we do not know that. The adult world is still a closed book to you, that is plain. Now if you have any I sense left in that pretty head of yours, young lady, you’ll stop trying to interfere in things you know nothing whatever about. What you are trying to do is very stupid.’

Sparrow rose formally and moved from behind the desk, ‘If you take my advice you will go home right now, and you will not say a word to anyone. Not even that you have been here – do you understand? We have not had this conversation, you and I. You will speak to nobody about this affair. And, in particular, no more journalists. You have done a lot of damage already. I suggest you now leave, and keep your mouth shut from here on. Leave it to other people to sort out.’

He showed her to the street door, pushed her outside and locked it, pulling down the blind. For a few moments she stood disorientated in the street, tears running slowly down her cheeks. The sheer cruelty of Sparrow’s reaction cut her to the quick. She had not expected sympathy nor sought it, but her own pain was bad enough without having the salt of guilt rubbed into the wounds. Coming to this office was a disaster.

The agony came not merely from her own dejection and the way Sparrow had so curtly dismissed her. If this man knew, then the story was out, or nearly. The looming crash of her family, the tragedy of her parents’ divorce, was now truly on the agenda. And it was her fault. Stupid, he called her. Stupid! What an understatement. What a silly, crass, idiotic little madam she had been.

It was dark, cold and windy. Shoppers pushed past unheeding, laden with carrier bags. Somehow she found herself at the right bus stop and waited for the bus home.

Roger seemed preoccupied. Unusually for him, he made love only once, satisfying an urgent need, but then lay back and pulled her close to him, nestling her head on his shoulder.

‘You’re miles away,’ Elaine remarked.

His laugh was soft, confidential. ‘Sorry. I do have things on my mind. Things are moving at the office. Nigel has been to see the boss and told him he wants to retire. I don’t know when, but it means changes at the next reshuffle. Probably in the autumn.’

‘Ooohh!’ Her mouth a rounded, excited O, she sat up. ‘Is it known? Will you be involved?’

‘Heavens! Patience, my dear Patience! I’ve no idea, though Nigel told me he believes the PM wants to promote some younger blood, not shuffle the same old faces around. Bit of a tip-off, that, and not to be ignored. But no, it’s not official yet.’

Conscious of the compliment he paid her in revealing these confidences, she fell back again and stroked his chest, Absent-mindedly he took hold of her hand, stilling its movement, and kissed her fingers.

‘It could be that his announcement comes in the nick of time. For him, I mean, not for me. That remains to be seen.’ Her silence encouraged him. ‘Nigel says he is going because he is getting old. It’s certainly true that he has been in Parliament over thirty years, quite a stint. But there are other rumours. Maybe he’s getting demob-happy, but he ii being careless.’

‘Go on. I’m listening.’

‘He has a boyfriend. A kid of some kind, not very discreet. Installed in his basement.’

‘You’re joking!’ she breathed, eyes wide. Then: ‘But maybe he doesn’t know about his funny tenant.’

‘Like the Lamonts? No. He knows. The young man in question has turned up at the Commons and made a fuss about not seeing him. Pretty boy. Hard eyes, very knowing. Came to the department once; I had to deal with him. He looked slightly high to me. Trouble writ large, if Nigel isn’t more careful.’

‘I wouldn’t have thought it of him. He’s such a respectable character, and so decent. You can’t see Nigel like that, can you?’

‘Why not? You women ought to be able to tell – the wrong vibes, perhaps – though Nigel is always so gracious with women that I can well see you might miss it. It’s been known for a long time that he was that way inclined. The whips’ job is to protect our people so we hear all sorts of things which go no further.’

‘He’s mad. He’ll get caught. The press are sniffing for a scandal. Why on earth does he run a risk like that?’

Roger sighed. ‘Who knows? Maybe under that jovial exterior he is lonely. Or in love: it happens, even to old men. Why do you and I do this, Elaine? You understand the pressures of office, of living endlessly in the public eye, better than most people. Being correct and proper all the lime. Being nice to people you can’t stand. Even experienced politicians need some haven in their lives where they don’t have to pretend. Somewhere, or someone, to be totally honest with as you and I are. The paradox is that we have to lie through our teeth to preserve this secret garden. Maybe Nigel got fed up, pretending.’

‘He’s gone a daft way about it,’ she mused. ‘Better to choose one of your own kind. Not a stranger.’

‘This chap’s manner suggests he’s no stranger to Nigel now. And if he carries on … before too long he’ll be public property. I hope I’m not the one to have to warn Nigel, though I guess that will be the Chiefs job.’

The house was empty and she was alone. School was finished. Her father was God knows where working, for loads of people were flying away for the holiday. Her mother was still in London. Probably with Roger. It dawned on Karen how easy it must have been, with Dad away so much. Unwillingly her mind turned to her father’s continued absences. His pilot’s job required it; she had never heard her mother complain. The other way round, however, was a different matter. Dad seemed to resent the fact that Mum was not around when he came home. How odd.

Karen sat exhausted at the kitchen table, too tired even to take off her coat or put on the lights. It was a long time since she had eaten and her mouth was dry and furry. Her thoughts were an unhappy jumble. She had long since abandoned the effort to create order from the chaos in her brain. None of it was making any sense anyway. Why was it all right for Dad to be away, but not for her mother? Was that the way the world ran? It used to be so, in Victorian times. Men worked, women stayed home. That was ancient history. Not any more, surely?

The house was dark. That was comforting. Dark, quiet and warm: the heating had switched on automatically. Victorian women had had to rise with the dawn, black-lead grates, dump ashes and light fires so that husbands couldshave and wash. Servants, those wives. Not much more than slaves. How amazed they would have been at timers and programmers and thermostats and gas boilers humming away and radiators all over the house, instant and effortless. How minuscule the changes in men’s attitude meanwhile. But if men were not all New Men it must be, in part, because women preferred them that way. Maybe women had trouble adjusting too. It was a muddle.

Dark, quiet, warm, empty. A house without much personality, a shell, smart and fairly new, resembling lots of others. It had not been part of the Stalker lives long enough to have accumulated history or memories. She should put the lights on. There was no need. She should take her coat off and hang it up. Later. She was alone in the house. It would be nicer with a cat or dog, some other living being, but a pet had never been a practical proposition.

Listlessly Karen wandered around the kitchen, picking things up, aimlessly opening cupboards, disorientated and troubled. There was a fresh bottle of milk in the fridge, which must have been left by the neighbour, Barbara. Karen dolefully considered writing herself a reminder to check
how much money the milkman was owed, but the effort was too great. Barbara was nice but too talkative and brain-dead. It was a depressing duty sometimes to listen to her gushing on about how wonderful the Stalker family were. The lights were on in the house across the drive, a modern construction almost identical to their own. Barbara could be glimpsed behind her net curtains moving around in her kitchen. Karen decided against seeking her company. Silly chat seemed inappropriate after all she had been through. The misery in her heart demanded its price. She needed to be alone.

Warm, empty, quiet. She was thirsty. Greedily she drank milk straight from the bottle, and left it half full on the table. An overwhelming weariness seized her. A voice in her head warned that the most sensible thing to do was limply watch TV or go upstairs to bed, yet such mundane activity seemed an anticlimax. Tomorrow she would feel better: perhaps. Or perhaps not, with yet another night to get through wide awake and worrying.

A terrible sense of isolation and despair made her limbs leaden and her head spin. The house was all hers. She could do anything she liked, yet nobody would notice, nobody would care. Nobody ever did care: all the adults she knew were so preoccupied with their own lives that there was no room for her. She was useless, dispensable, discarded.

The little sensible voice telling her she was beat and should simply go to bed was growing fainter. Karen restlessly moved around the ground floor of the house, still in her coat. The milk had moistened her mouth but had not satisfied her thirst. She entered the living room and viewed the room’s plain furnishings with a feeling of mounting resentment. Why couldn’t her mother be like o her women? Other people had lovely stylish homes, but not the Stalkers. Other mothers spent ages fiddling with decorative schemes and catalogues; in this house, Elaine’s hurried choices were serviceable and simple, nothing dramatic, as if she did not care about her home any more than she bothered about her lonely young daughter.