Goodfellowe MP (31 page)

‘Oh, Lionel, you’ve been at it, you have.’ Goodfellowe’s tone was conciliatory, even indulgent.

‘It’s always been handled as friends, nothing more,’ Lillicrap insisted.

‘It must have been worth several tens of thousands over the years. Yet not a word of it in the Register. A straight gift. An inducement. You haven’t even scribbled overpaid articles about the pleasures of the peat moors to justify it. At least Frank Breedon has that.’

‘Michael and his family come to my house, as friends. I don’t charge them, of course I bloody don’t.’ He tried to sound offended at the thought. ‘So when I go to visit him, as a friend, at his home or his hunting lodge, he doesn’t charge me either.’ At this point Lillicrap’s bravado began to fracture, his tone grew less amenable. ‘Look, I was nothing of importance in politics when it all started. We scarcely discussed politics. No one was twisting my arm. There was nothing to put in the flaming Register.’

‘But then it changed, didn’t it? Slowly the time together became more political,’ Goodfellowe coaxed.

‘Maybe we discussed mutual interests over a drink or two …’

‘And he introduced you to Freddy Corsa. Who asked you to invite along some other friends. Political friends. Like Brother Breedon. And me. You started
running his errands, handling the loans he made available, facilitating all his contacts, encouraging his schemes to buy friends with holidays and well-paid articles. In return he picked up your bills. You should have registered it all, Lionel.’

‘Tom, you must believe me. It’s not what you make it seem. This isn’t sleaze. It all happened so gradually. Perhaps I should have registered it as an interest at some point, but it was so difficult to know when I had crossed the line, between friendship and …’

‘Between friendship and corrupting influence. A line so difficult to see, so easy to cross, someone once told me. And he knew what he was talking about.’

‘Look, perhaps I made a mistake. A genuine mistake. I promise I’ll register it from now on, without fail. I’ll keep it all above board.’

‘Too late. Too late,’ Goodfellowe whispered, so that Lillicrap had to bend almost double to hear. ‘Your fingerprints are everywhere, leaving their grubby marks. On my membership of the Committee, where you thought I would do as I was told by you. And as you were told by Corsa. They were all over my first meeting with Corsa, at the toyshop. They’re on the loans, and on the money he offered me for articles. Worst of all, it was you who leaked the news of Sam’s adoption to him.’

‘I’ve told you that was a complete accident. I never intended …’

‘No one is going to believe you, Lionel, not when you’re blasting away at wildlife for free beside Freddy Corsa and the Chairman of the Committee which has just passed his Bill. They’re going to say it stinks.
That you are in the jampot beyond your elegant cuffs and right up to your elbows. They’ll ask how you can afford the house and the big cars and the foreign holidays on the pittance you earn. They’ll ask where it all came from. And when they find out, your colleagues will transform into a pack of moralizing hypocrites, and do you know what they’re going to do?’

‘What?’

‘They are going to crucify you.’

‘Tom, for old times’ sake. As old friends. Please give me a chance.’ Lillicrap made a desperate grab for Goodfellowe’s arm. Their intense and sustained deliberation just below the Front Bench had begun to attract attention around the House, it was evident that something was afoot, but Lillicrap didn’t notice. His eyes saw only the horror of crucifixion and the dragging of his body through the dust of many streets.

Calmly, Goodfellowe bent to pick up the Whip’s fallen pen, placing it carefully back into Lillicrap’s hand.

‘One last chance. Please, Tom. I beg you.’

‘You should never have involved Sam in this,’ Goodfellowe concluded, and rose to take his seat on the benches.

The Minister had finished his speech and the Opposition spokesman was gathering his papers to make his reply when Goodfellowe rose to his feet.

‘On a Point of Order, Madam Speaker.’

‘Point of Order, Mr Goodfellowe,’ she intoned,
staring at him through spectacles in an enquiring manner. At the end of the Front Bench, Lillicrap’s face had taken on the appearance of warm wax.

‘I must apologize, Madam Speaker, for being unable to give you any prior warning of my Point of Order. In all honesty, I am not entirely sure that a Point of Order is the correct manner in which what I have to say should be put. But I know it must be put, and before this debate goes any further.’

‘You’d better put it then, and quickly,’ the Speaker interjected, wary as always about self-indulgent Members who wasted both their own breath and their colleagues’ time.

‘Madam Speaker, it is well known that during the Committee stages I held serious doubts about the passage of this Bill. Those doubts have now become rock-hard certainties. For the House to approve the Bill at this time would be immoral, corrupt and probably unconstitutional.’

The atmosphere of the Chamber of the House of Commons does not travel well through television. The action can be seen and the words heard, but it is like experiencing sex through cartoons. The essence is missing. Yet for those who are there at the time, nothing else seems to matter. For many politicians, speaking from the Floor of a packed and attentive House is much like copulation. There is a tremor of terror and anticipation as you begin, and there is a mystery special to each occasion which decrees that no matter how many times you have gone through the motions before, you never know whether this time the earth will move or will simply
fall in on top of you. That is the terror of failure, but it is risked time and again for the few elusive moments of fulfilment which leave a man, or a woman, exhausted and in triumph. Goodfellowe had begun with no teasing, no gentle anticipation but instead a full-frontal assault that left those around him gasping. Immoral? Corrupt? Unconstitutional? It was as though the fair maidens of the House were staring at the glinting point of a knife in some dark alleyway.

‘It is with great regret that I must inform the House that the passage of this Bill has been sought by means of bribery and blackmail by those who stand to gain from it.’

Up in the visitors’ gallery, Corsa turned to an elderly gentleman sitting next to him. ‘Can he do this? Accuse people? Slander them?’

‘Parliamentary privilege,’ the old man whispered. ‘In the Chamber he can say what on earth he likes and not a court in the country can touch him.’

Down on the Floor, Lillicrap began to squirm with dread. The end of the Front Bench was beginning to feel like the trapdoor on the gallows.

Goodfellowe continued: ‘As a member of the Standing Committee, and solely because I was a member of that Committee, Madam Speaker, I have been offered bribes.’

A collective drawing-in of breath could be heard around the benches. The Prime Minister, who had been preparing to leave after his colleague’s speech, sat transfixed as though nailed in position.

‘I have been offered substantial inducements for
the explicit purpose of gaining my support for the Bill so that I would help push it through Committee.’

‘What sort of inducements?’ an Opposition Member could be heard muttering.

‘The inducements were of several kinds. Offers of free holidays.’ Behind him, Goodfellowe could hear Breedon clearing his throat as though preparing to intervene. ‘Most surprisingly, perhaps, I was offered an extraordinary sum of money in exchange for articles I might have written. Now, many Members of this House are gifted authors whose talents are justifiably rewarded when they contribute articles of substance to newspapers.’ He had to get that point in quickly, before he lost half of his audience. ‘But it is truly surprising that a man of my meagre literary talents should be offered any sum, let alone a King’s Ransom of nearly twenty thousand pounds. In my case. Madam Speaker, I can confirm that the offer was intended as a bribe.’

Up in the gallery Corsa had arched forward, gripping the carved rail in front of him. Goodfellowe momentarily caught his eye.

‘For a while, in an attempt to obtain documentary evidence, I played along with the idea.’ A useful point. That would explain the note he had written to Corsa, should it ever come to light. But mentally Corsa was already resolving to burn it. ‘And when I thought the matter had gone far enough and I refused to co-operate, the sources involved then turned to blackmail.’

The whole House writhed with excitement.

‘But still I would not participate in their plans, so
the sources turned to my family. Quite simply, Madam Speaker, they threatened my family in order to get at me.’

Further along the bench a female Member was all but swooning in emotion. She had never experienced anything like this before, not in the House, at least.

‘They invented stories about my family, invaded their privacy, took photographs in their most intimate moments, to try to get me to change my mind on the Bill.’ He had marked the photographs of Sam in the most public of manners. Corsa would never dare publish them now.

‘And all this has been done simply to speed the passage of this Bill, because to certain interests this Bill means profit. Vast amounts of it. And they want it now, at any cost.’

‘Who? Who is it?’ Urgent moans and sighs of anticipation began to rise on every side, but Goodfellowe was determined to keep them unfulfilled, breathless for more.

‘Behind the legitimate newspaper interests which this Bill seeks to regulate, there is a hidden network of money men who have little direct interest in newspapers, but great interest in news. They want to manipulate the news for their own benefit, and for the disadvantage of others. We thought the Bill was about selling newspapers; they knew it was about selling news.’ (‘Who? Who?’ the cries continued.) ‘But sadly their identity will remain hidden under this Bill for, as we discussed in Committee, the ultimate ownership of a newspaper can be extraordinarily difficult to identify.’

‘Hear, hear!’ Betty Ewing was stamping her foot in agreement.

‘Much to my regret. Madam Speaker, I have been unable to obtain documentary evidence of these matters, other than the photographs which, frankly, I would not care to have revealed.’ He knew this was going to be the difficult bit, the unexpected withdrawal. It induced a perceptible sense of disappointment. Breedon was beginning to mutter. ‘Charlatan. The whole thing’s preposterous.’ ‘Name them! Name them! Parliamentary privilege!’ others were beginning to demand. The House was beginning to wriggle out from beneath him.

‘I shall not identify them,’ Goodfellowe responded. ‘Since I cannot as yet prove this matter in court, I will not mimic the practices of the press by naming people without hard evidence.’

In the gallery, Corsa released his grip on the wooden balustrade and threw himself back into his seat like a bowstring from which the tension had been released. Around the House, some Members began to scoff and mutter that it all amounted to nothing more than limp accusation and privileged posturing. ‘He dreamed it up over his breakfast,’ Breedon was claiming for all to hear. To start upon the act of love is always a step into the unknown, to withdraw at the peak of expectation is a leap towards certain oblivion. It was time for Goodfellowe to seize the moment once more. Time to take the gamble.

‘Madam Speaker, the House will be aware that these matters have been of great concern to me for some time. That is why I urged in Committee that
Members record every financial contact with the press – not that I believed any of them would bow to pressure, but simply because I knew there was a possibility that such pressure might be exerted. I wanted to gather as much evidence as possible.’

‘You haven’t got any,’ Breedon was barking.

‘It was always going to be difficult to prove these allegations, since we are dealing not just with money, but also with the motivations for giving it. But the House will understand that I felt I had to try.’

Goodfellowe was looking directly at Lillicrap, who seemed about to melt. He could gather enough circumstantial evidence to ruin the Whip in Parliament, but not to prove criminal misdoing on his part, even less on the part of Corsa. Yet ruining Lillicrap might be the only measure of justice he could guarantee. On the other hand …

‘It is not my word alone that I ask the House to accept. Firm evidence was always going to be difficult to obtain, which is why at every step of the way I have consulted with and taken guidance from my Honourable Friend, the Committee Whip.’

As one sentient creature, the House turned to Lillicrap.

‘It was his view, Madam Speaker, that the allegations were so serious, and might have involved other Members in allegations of corruption, that absolutely no one else should be informed. He decided that the business of the Committee should continue as normal while I tried to obtain documentary evidence. In that effort, sadly, we have failed. But my Honourable
Friend has been aware of the bribery and blackmail which has been aimed at me. He will be able to confirm everything I have said today.’

The figure of Lillicrap now commanded the collective attention. His head had been buried in his hands in a manner most took to be studied concentration. Now the head came up, his features set grim but with a flush of hope filling his cheeks. He was alive. The trapdoor was still in place. There was a way out, a chance of reprieve. He straightened himself in his seat. As though his life depended on it, and very slowly, he nodded in agreement.