Fifty-First State (16 page)

Lucy came in, with a cup of tea in each hand. She gave him one and sat down on the bed. It would have been made with loose tea leaves,
which William disliked, but he took it anyway. ‘Mum was really upset by what you said last night,' she said. ‘And that you were drunk.'

‘I wasn't. You're not pregnant, are you?'

‘No,' she said wearily and lay down beside him. ‘I'm so tired.'

‘That's what I wanted to talk to you about,' he said. And told her what he'd arranged with Mo. ‘I'm making mistakes at work,' he added. ‘Jack's annoyed.'

‘I nearly gave one patient another patient's drugs from the trolley last night,' she said. ‘I was lucky – the patient pointed it out to me.'

‘Poor old Luce,' William said compassionately. She began to cry and he consoled her. William had thought he might have to argue Lucy into moving out but he was wrong. This was the Lucy who had got on a train in her probationer nurse's uniform and gone to London one morning. She dried her eyes and blew her nose. ‘How'll I tell them?' she asked.

‘I'll tell them,' William said.

‘Let's just go and look at the outside of the house,' suggested Lucy. ‘If we can't see inside until later.'

William hesitated. He didn't want to start putting pressure on Mo, when all kinds of complicated family discussions might be taking place. ‘We can go and talk to him,' he offered.

Before they left William told his in-laws they were going to the building society to talk about the mortgage. He didn't want them to forget that he and Lucy were paying it.

At the shop, a supermarket covering the bottom of two houses in a busy street, Mo's brother Jemal was sitting behind the till with his head in a book written in Arabic.

‘Hi, Jemal,' William said.

‘Oh – William,' Jemal said, barely recognizing him.

‘Did you hear about me and Lucy maybe moving into a flat your father's got?' asked William.

‘Something about it,' agreed Jemal.

‘Well, I don't want to push, but we were wondering if we could go and take a look – just at the outside—'

‘I think they went round there – Mo and his wife and Mum – to check it out.'

‘Do you think they're going to rent it to us?' asked Lucy.

‘I think it's OK,' Jemal said to William.

‘Where is it?' asked William.

‘Oakham Street. 47 or 49.'

‘Thanks, Jemal,' said William. Jemal muttered something and went back to his book.

‘Don't get your hopes up,' William told Lucy. ‘Jemal's not exactly spot on. I was surprised to find him in charge of the shop. Mo doesn't usually
let that happen. Jemal's clever – he got eight or nine GCSEs – but he's hopeless. He went a bit vague and religious at school.'

‘Oh, William. I hope it works out.' Lucy sighed.

‘Well, if it does,' said William, ‘I hope you've got something in your little black bag for when you tell your mum.' He thought Lucy might round on him and call him heartless but instead she said, as they rounded the corner into tree-lined Oakham Street, ‘I spoke to a doctor at the hospital and got a prescription for her.'

That was when William realized how hard on Lucy the past weeks had been, harder perhaps than for him. Lucy added, ‘She needs professional help.' William carefully said nothing. ‘Oh, look!' Lucy said delightedly.

47 Oakham Street was a nice little house with a well-tended front garden, in which some late roses bloomed. The front door was open and William saw Mo up a ladder in the hall.

Mo got down, a light bulb in his hand. ‘Come on in,' he said. ‘It's small.'

The room at the back of the house was, indeed, small and seemed smaller when Mo, William and Lucy joined Mo's mother and sister, who were already in there. Mo's mother looked very old in her hijab and long Moroccan dress and Mo's sister very young, for a busy solicitor, in her black business suit. But if small, the room was light, looking out on to a small patio. The bed, couch and table looked new and there was a small separate kitchen. Lucy, in the doorway, looked excited. Then she took in Mrs Al Fasi and asked, ‘Mr Al Fasi – badly fractured wrist. Is that right?' Mo's mother agreed.

‘One seven five, OK?' Mo asked.

‘Excellent,' William replied.

‘Month in advance?' Mo said.

‘I'll bring it round to the shop before I go to work.'

‘Cash would be appreciated.'

William saw that there would be no lease but did not care. They had the place, and Lucy liked it. Nothing else mattered.

When they had gone, Lucy went and jumped up and down on the bed. She stopped and said, ‘You can shower, cook breakfast and watch TV all at the same time. Brilliant. Only one snag, though – no washing machine.'

‘We'll take our laundry round to that flat we're paying the mortgage on and put it in the washing machine we paid for,' William remarked sourly.

‘Oh, William. Don't start talking about money.'

‘I wasn't going to – I love rent, and mortgages – bring ‘em on. I'll pay them all. I'd pay your parents', if they hadn't already paid theirs off.'

Lucy laughed. It was, William realized, the first time he'd heard her laugh for some time.

Sugden's, Fox Square, London SW1. October 29th, 2015. 1 a.m.

The restaurant was almost empty. British elections are held on Thursdays because it had been decided, during the reign of Queen Victoria, that the best way to persuade the British working man, paid on Friday or Saturday, to go the polling stations and vote, was to hold elections on Thursdays, when his beer-money would have run out. The short but intense weeks running up to election day in Britain had passed and the Thursday polling day came. Voting had ended at nine and now most of the MPs who had spent six weeks in their constituencies, asking for the votes of their 70,000 constituents, were still there, watching the votes being counted or at victory or defeat parties. The journalists who had been covering the election were at their papers; party staff were assembled at headquarters.

Only a few senior civil servants were dining, and planning the future. And two renegade MPs who already knew they were still MPs, had taken advantage of an early result to sneak off from their victory parties to work out what they would be saying the next day, on
Westminster Unplugged.

Julia had nearly finished her wine, although the food had not yet arrived. Joshua refilled it. She shot him a beady glance and asked the question which was already on some lips, and which would, over the coming weeks, be on many more. ‘How did Petherbridge do it?'

Joshua shook his head, ‘Our policies appealed more, our campaign was better and so was our advertising. Petherbridge had everything under control.
Safety, Stability and Security.
'

Julia stared at him. She did not think Joshua was lying to her, but he was certainly not telling the whole truth.

Joshua Crane had kept his seat in the constituency of Finchley and West Hampstead with an increased majority. Julia Baskerville had held Whitechapel Road and Stepney Green with a reduced majority. But there had been little doubt before the election that both seats were safe for their respective parties.

The exit polls had indicated a strong swing to the Conservatives. Early results were showing the same. Two key marginal constituencies had already gone decisively to the Conservative Party. ‘Not quite a landslide, certainly a big mudslide,' said the BBC. There had been exit polls, post-exit polls and computer predictions. All the signs suggested the Labour Party should send back the champagne and the Conservatives send out for more.

Julia was tired. She had walked the streets of her constituency for six weeks and spent almost every evening in strategy meetings. She had seen her daughter only in the early mornings and for whatever time off she could spare on Sundays. Now her party had been beaten again and this time, it seemed, the Conservative Party might even have a comfortable majority, the first straight majority one party had had over its rivals for five years. There had been eleven Labour seats lost already, two being those of close friends.

Already she saw Hugh Carter, who would probably be the new Foreign Secretary, and Rod Field, the editor of the most popular broadsheet newspaper in Britain, drinking champagne at another table with Sukie Bond, the TV presenter. Julia felt sick. She also smelt a rat.

She persisted, ‘Come on, Joshua. The results of this election aren't due to more popular policies. Face it, there was hardly any difference.'

Joshua felt uncomfortable. His back had been playing him up for weeks and he'd been living on painkillers. Victory is sweet but pain has a way of souring it. He was depressed too, because his election campaign had emphasized what he knew about his marriage. Beth had been with him, when she needed to be, had smiled and shaken hands and acted in every way as a candidate's wife ought to, but she and Joshua had barely exchanged an unnecessary word during the six weeks of closer-than-usual companionship. The campaign had highlighted the fact that his marriage was little more than a business arrangement. He suspected this was probably his own fault, which did not make the knowledge easier to bear. Nevertheless, bad back and cold marriage or not, he was in. He was safe, and his party was in government.

But he was not comfortable about Julia's question. He had been helped in his own campaign by the knowledge that Barrington Chambers seemed to have money to burn. When he asked questions Barrington had tapped a finger against his nose and said only, ‘Ask no questions and you'll hear no lies. That's orders from on high.' He'd been annoyed, and also puzzled, when the party jetted in a young campaign adviser with long dark hair and a CV showing she had spent ten months as a Democratic Party aide. He put this down to Alan Petherbridge's mistrust of him as a member of the awkward squad. Until he heard the stories from fellow MPs.

He said to Julia, ‘We had more money.'

‘A lot more money,' Julia said. ‘Where did it come from?'

That, of course, was the question. Before the election forty million pounds had been donated to the Conservative Party, more than they could ever have expected. No one understood why the donations from supporters had been so generous. A constituency party can legally spend no more than £6000 on its campaign. This covers posters, leaflets and other expenses. However, the law does not regulate the cost of headquarters
staff or advertising campaigns. And the Conservatives, taking advantage of their sudden, unexpected wealth, had employed a headquarters worker in each constituency and paid for a vast advertising campaign. All over the country posters went up, simple, polished and effective, concentrating on those two constants – fear of crime and desire for gain. Though, legally, they could not buy more TV advertising space, their party political broadcasts had been much more effective. The other cash-strapped parties could not compete.

Joshua could not tell Julia where the party donations had come from. He did not know. He said, ‘Donors thought they wanted a Conservative government under Petherbridge. A party with a workable majority. The country's on the skids. We have 10 per cent unemployment. The donors were backing the party which supports business to get business moving again. The list of donors will be published.' He added, ‘God's always on the side of the big battalions, Julia. We had the cash. Our party political broadcasts were attractive – yours and the Lib Dems had the viewers brushing the dog and putting the kettle on in their millions.'

‘And what about the transport?'

Joshua suppressed a flinch and kept his face straight. He liked Julia. They worked together. But she was on the other side and he wouldn't tell her what he really thought. Douglas Clare, his friend – and occasional alibi – represented a marginal South Coast constituency. Half his constituents were wealthy commuters or low-paid middle class and the remaining 50 per cent were semi-skilled or unskilled workers, men and women either unemployed or often out of work. The situation of the last group had worsened over the past few years – jobs had been lost when tourism crashed as a result of terror threats and escalating oil prices. Two large local employers had gone bust. At the last election Douglas had only had a 1,000 majority. The Lib Dems had come second but Labour had not been far behind. The constituency was volatile. Douglas Clare was a worried man.

And then, as he told Joshua, not long after he had begun campaigning, the Transport Plan, all two pages of it, had been handed to him by his newly appointed Campaign Officer, a sharp young man sent down by Head Office. The remainder of the plan had been conveyed verbally to Douglas and his Party Chairman, operating at that point as his election agent, in the Chairman's front room, after the sharp young man had swept it for bugs (none were found).

Joshua had rung Douglas that day, at ten, an hour after the polls closed. He was jubilant. ‘It was just like the Dunkirk evacuation!' he'd exclaimed. Douglas was a simple patriot who knew about war and heroism. Perhaps uncertain of his analogy he then added. ‘Well, maybe like the Dunkirk evacuation crossed with a pilgrimage to Lourdes. Anyway, it was a real
military operation – buses, taxis – the lot.' He returned to his military comparisons. ‘The polling stations looked like field dressing stations in the First World War – the voters were coming in on crutches, walkers, practically on stretchers, practically singing “Tipperary”. There were quite a lot with guide dogs, and plenty with their carers. It was all down to that smart-arse they sent from Party Headquarters. Brilliant, really. And it's been happening all over. It makes sense. Our voters have always had a higher average age than the supporters of other parties – it is still fifty-five. And they tend to live in the country or in leafy suburbs, miles from the nearest polling station. And think of my constituency, full of old people's homes. Today, we had a fleet of luxury buses, with toilets. That got the vote out. A nice ride to the polling station and back – unless they wanted to stop off at a supermarket or for a nice cup of tea on the way back. My majority looks as if it's gone up 100 per cent,' Douglas crowed. ‘And what that bloke did with the postal votes you'd never believe. Visit them, ask if they want one. Visit them and help them with the forms. Go back again, if you have to. Think how grateful they are, for the attention as well as anything else. So who are they going to vote for? Me. That alone must have pulled in another four hundred votes. And then the mobilizing of the old and infirm – sheer genius.' Joshua had to admit he found his friend's attitude objectionable, but he reasoned it was not the place of a man in a safe seat to cast the first stone at one who had faced electoral defeat and an uncertain future. He'd benefited himself after all.