A Parliamentary Affair (63 page)

Betts nodded dumbly. He had no doubt she meant it, as she glanced over her shoulder at her distinguished companion, who was saying nothing but smiling to himself.

The gossip switched to other well-known names who were working hard to make themselves targets for
The Globe:
the archbishop said to have made two parishioners pregnant – one might be carelessness, but the second suggested a divine plan to help newspapers. Divorcing royals would keep
The Globe
and its rivals happy for a while, with fun to follow in identifying the latest paramours. Now that nearly all the House of Windsor were funded by the Queen herself instead of the state, most had quietly scaled down their public activities. No pay, no show. Only Diana, busy building herself an independent court, though resourced goodness knew how, was frequently seen smiling at cameras, shaking what remained of the hands of lepers and AIDS victims. The road to heaven is paved with bad intentions.

Betts resigned himself to chasing royals for a while. Yet Miranda’s reaction to the Muncastle name made her instantly vulnerable and offered the opportunity for revenge, without anyone pointing a finger at him. If
The Globe
couldn’t use the information, perhaps a friend elsewhere could. Serve the bitch right.

The stuffy atmosphere of the committee room above Milton Conservative Club was not helped by the persistent blue haze of Keith Freemantle’s cigar. Senior party agents come in all shapes and sizes. Mr
Freemantle, recently retired from active service but brought back into the fray to supervise the
by-election,
was short, stocky and energetic. A Midlands accent which raised eyebrows in Milton if not in Hambridge betrayed origins and long years of devoted service in the nation’s second city. Freemantle favoured striped shirts and non-matching silk bow-ties intended to cause comment, thus making a statement about the unconventional means frequently necessary to do his job.

Outside the night was gloomy and wet. Crowded with Freemantle round the rickety baize table were the candidate and his wife, nervous and strained; the official MP ‘friend’, the ebullient Freddie Ferriman, thumbs hooked behind braces; Mary, the part-time agent, already exhausted; Mrs Farebrother, the ladies’ chairman, and Mr Bulstrode, the chairman; Fred Laidlaw, the Young Conservative chairman, enthusiastic at his first-ever election; next to him Ferriman’s tall American girlfriend Marlene; and an earnest young man from HQ’s research department by the name of Dominic Quincy d’Abo.

Freemantle looked around, sighed and decided to brief all present in the simplest possible terms.

‘First, timing. Polling day is Thursday, February the sixteenth. That’s thirteen working days from today, not counting Saturdays and Sundays. Nominations are due in tomorrow, so it’s on parade at nine sharp at the council chambers in the morning, Marcus and Alison, please. The press will be outside for a photocall. Our returning officer is the council’s chief executive, Mr Day. Seems a reasonable bloke. We get the full list of nominations before five o’clock. We expect lots of
hangers-on
.’

‘The National Front are thinking of standing,’ Fred murmured. He harboured no resentment at Marcus’s nomination but could not help reflecting that there was a lot of avoidable trouble ahead. ‘Creeps,’ said Freemantle crisply, implying that anyone worried by the Front deserved the same epithet.

‘What about postal votes?’ Mary piped up. It was not that she wanted an answer, but it seemed an intelligent question.

Freemantle gave her a withering glance and puffed smoke at her. ‘I’m afraid today was also the last day for applications for postal votes. It’s too late, dear. If they’re not actually dead and want to vote we can take them to the polls. Shouldn’t be a problem: we’ll have lots of cars on polling day.’

‘It’s winter,’ said Mary faintly.

‘Certainly, but we’re also still working on the old register so most will be dead anyway.’ There had been a choice about waiting for the fresh register at the end of February, but traditionally no more than three months should elapse before a vacancy was filled. Any longer risked the Liberal Democrats seizing the initiative and moving the writ themselves.

Bulstrode intervened. ‘We ’ave all the appeals letters ready to go out. The kitty is pretty empty ’ere, but we’re ’oping we can do well enough to ’old some over for the general election.’

‘That may be a bit ambitious,’ Freemantle told him. ‘There are nearly sixty-three thousand electors in this seat so your permitted expenses are just over twenty-eight thousand pounds and you’ll need every penny.’

‘You sure?’ Fred asked doubtfully.

‘Of course. You’re allowed over sixteen thousand pounds for a county seat plus eighteen point six pence per elector. It isn’t like a normal election at all when the limit here would be – let me see – around seven thousand pounds. How much did you spend last time?’

‘Bit less than that. Around five thousand.’ Bulstrode was embarrassed. He and the wealthier committee members had provided most of it. The appeals list, desperately cobbled together at the last minute, owed more to hope than to history. It was increasingly clear that the by-election would be a frightening new experience.

Freemantle responded testily, ‘Even with that increased limit, it’s easy to go over. Nobody, but nobody, spends or authorises any money without my express permission. I’m not having a lifetime’s career ruined by a successful court challenge over expenses. Is that clear?’

Everyone present nodded gloomily. Freemantle gestured to Dominic. ‘Your turn. Give us your political assessment.’

The young man glanced at his notes. ‘We currently hold the seat by a large margin – Sir Nigel had three times the vote of the loser at the general election. Really, we have every chance. It would in fact take a huge swing to topple us.’

Mrs Farebrother raised an eyebrow. ‘The Liberals have changed their candidate. The chap who did it last time was a bumbling old idiot. They’ve picked a thirty-year-old computer whizzkid by the name of…’ – she consulted a press cutting –’Nicholas Spencer. Oxford and Harvard, no less. Got a house in the middle of our best ward. Sounds very smooth to me. He’ll go down well with our traditional voters, especially around Milton.’

Dominic raised his head. ‘Nicholas Spencer? If it’s the same chap, then I know him. We were up at Trinity together.’

‘Well, I hope you’re not planning to go and help him,’ Freemantle commented tersely. These wet-behind-the-ears types who thought everything could be done on the old-boy network drove him up the wall. ‘However, you’re right, we can expect some tactical voting. Our task will be to encourage the Labour vote as far as possible, so we’ll constantly attack Labour and ignore the Liberal. Pretend he doesn’t exist, see. No mentioning him in leaflets or on the doorsteps. If anybody asks the Liberal candidate’s name, look vague and say you’ve no idea, OK? We don’t want them riding to victory on our coat-tails.’

The discussion continued for another hour as poster sites were booked, literature approved, canvassing allocated, timetables and transport arranged. Eventually Freemantle stubbed out the remainder of his cigar. Another by-election; another test of stamina, courage and wiliness. Another occasion when the electorate, freed of the burdensome obligation of choosing a whole government, might feel free to blow raspberries. ‘One more thing,’ he said sternly. Those whose attention had been wavering sat up. ‘We’re going to win this seat. I don’t want to hear any talk to the contrary. We win all the seats I fight, always. Marcus is the next MP for Milton and Hambridge and that’s how we’re going to talk about him. No moaning minnies. Is that clear?’ His audience exchanged encouraging half-smiles. All set: candidate chosen, first-class organisation, a safe seat. It was hard to understand why everyone present felt uneasy.

In a room over a shop in downtown Hambridge, not far from the aircraft factory, another meeting was taking place. Mr Standish was by now fully recovered from his accident, though arthritic twinges on damp days were an uncomfortable reminder. He had had plenty of time to think through his opposition to Marcus Carey. Whichever way he looked at it in those long weeks out of action, he had come to the conclusion that he could not and would not accept an intruder as his future MP. The country was already going to the dogs. The socialists had always cultivated the black and minority vote, and were welcome to it. He was a patriot.

His views as reported in the local newspaper had drawn quite a response. Briefly he toyed with the idea of helping the Liberals but they seemed much too eager. Nor did he wish to stay in the wilderness for ever. Better to make a temporary protest, until local sanity was restored and his good sense would be the better appreciated. Then he would be invited to return in triumph to the local Conservatives, preferably to replace that fool Bulstrode as chairman.

Tonight’s campaign meeting of ‘Independent Conservatives’ to choose a candidate to stand against Marcus Carey was the outcome of his cogitations. As for the candidate, Standish naturally expected it to be himself.

The little-used room was half full of damp people shaking out umbrellas and hanging sodden jackets on the back of their seats. In the front row sat an assortment of old ladies in moth-eaten coats, one carrying three torn plastic bags stuffed full of personal belongings, a hopeful look on her face. Nearby a couple of nondescript men in stained raincoats gave off a faint tired smell. Further back two ex-forces veterans, one with a stick, sported proud campaign medals on their chests. Beside sat a teacher who was telling them to nods of agreement that discipline in schools could only be kept by beating children, and that the party for which he had voted all his life had gone soft on crime. An elderly couple who had lived in South Africa and thus knew all about blacks sat close together, holding hands. The young girl journalist from the local paper kept quiet, wondering if she was the only press representative present and whether she would be brave if anyone got nasty. She need not have worried. The sour-faced man in the donkey jacket sitting slumped and morose at the back was, unknown to everyone else, from Special Branch; all those attending had been secretly photographed as they entered.

Standish counted: about thirty people. Not enough to win the seat, maybe, but enough, if they were willing to do the legwork, to get leaflets delivered and dent the majority sufficiently to ensure the other side got in.

The teacher was asking irritably if it wasn’t time to start. Standish checked his watch, but as he gathered his papers there was a loud commotion caused by a group of late arrivals. It appeared that a band of local, skinheads had decided to join the fun. The hint in Mr Standish’s remarks as reported in the
Hambridge Gazette
was that the black was to be stopped at any cost. That suited them fine. Shaven heads agleam and chains a-jingle they clumped in and settled noisily at the back, swigging from a bottle of cheap whisky.

The lawyer rose, pushed his spectacles up his nose and cleared his throat. He felt suddenly very nervous. No time for second thoughts. Given the motley crew now present with their likely short attention span, it was best to get cracking.

‘Ladies and gentlemen: we are here tonight to consider putting forward a candidate for the by-election. I don’t know about you, but as a lifelong local resident and … ah … right-wing voter I really do not feel I can support the official candidate.’

‘Hear, hear!’ piped up an old soldier. His companion banged his stick on the floor in approval.

‘I am not a racialist…’ Standish made to continue.

‘But I am!’ yelled one of the skinheads. His companions hooted and nudged each other viciously. One fell off his chair with a crash and was hauled back with a friendly cuff by his pals.

Standish swallowed hard. ‘As I was saying: I do not consider the official candidate at all suitable for this area, and I propose we put up our own choice, to go under the Independent Conservative banner.’

‘Good idea! Quite right!’ The old lady in the front was on her feet, brandishing her umbrella.

‘Er … thank you, madam.’ Standish frowned and motioned her to sit down. ‘As I was saying…’

A stick was raised. ‘Might it not be a good idea, sir,’ enquired the old soldier gruffly, ‘to support the National Front?’

‘I’ve thought about that,’ said Standish, briskly. In fact he had dismissed the idea very quickly. The Front was a recognised bunch of nutters. He wanted to make a serious point. ‘We’ll get far more votes if we call ourselves Independent Conservatives. That’s what we are, after all.’

‘King and country!’ shouted the old lady at the front, jumping to her feet again. ‘That’s what we should be fighting for! Rule, Britannia…’ And she was off, singing in a high, wavering voice.

Standish tried to wave her down, but the rest of the audience, thinking this was part of the agenda, struggled to its feet, and with the skinheads bawling loudest joined in with varying degrees of
tunefulness but total sincerity: ‘Britons never never never shall be slaaaa-aaaves!’ Standish noted with a sickening feeling that the menacing young men at the back thought it appropriate to accompany the anthem with Nazi salutes. It was fortunate that the old soldiers, standing to attention at the front, did not see them.

Before the audience launched into a reprise, Standish shushed earnestly, and as they subsided into their seats he continued quickly, ‘I take it that’s agreed. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Now, who do you want as your candidate?’

‘Not you!’ yelled a skinhead. He was huge, as wide as he was tall, with a wild black moustache and two days’ growth of stubble. ‘Too bloody high and mighty!’

‘Yeah, Big Dave’s right,’ agreed his colleague, a tall, gaunt youth in leather with an amateurish tattoo of a bloodstained knife on one cheek and ‘Terry’ on the other. He stepped out into the aisle and walked forwards, boots clanging menacingly, examining everyone present with a practised hypnotic stare. At last he found what he wanted and stopped before a nondescript little man in a mackintosh. Leaning forward he grabbed the man’s lapels in one hand and hauled him out, propelling him threateningly towards the front.