A Woman's Place

Who’s Who

Some of the people in this book will be found in current or recent editions of Who’s Who, The Times Guide to the House of Commons and Vacher’s Parliamentary Companion. The following, however, appear unaccountably to have been omitted.

BAMPTON, EDWARD, MP. Born 1946 in Yorkshire. Minister of State, Home Office. Educated Huddersfield Grammar School. Stubbs Fine Cloths 1962–73. Chairman and Managing Director, Bampton Engineering Ltd, 1974–86. Elected (Cons.) for Hebden Bridge 1983. Campaigned for John Major 1990, 1995. Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Ministry of Defence, 1992–3. Married 1969 Jean; two d. Clubs: Kirklees Conservative Club, Huddersfield Royal British Legion, Yorkshire Cricket. Recreations: bird-watching, real ale.

CHADWICK, MARTIN. Civil servant. Born 1952. Educated Shrewsbury and Jesus College, Oxford. Son of Sir Matthew Chadwick, CB, KCMG, former Perm Sec at the Home Office. Married with two children. Current residence: Sittingbourne, Kent. Club: Athenaeum. Recreations: writing Latin verse, collecting ties.

DICKSON, ROGER, MP. Born 14 Feb 1952. Secretary of State for the Environment. Educated Wandsworth Comprehensive School, London; Associate of the Institute of Bankers 1975; MA in Administration and Politics, the Open University, 1982. Tarrants Bank 1968–75. Chairman, Dickson and Associates 1975–87. Contested Hammersmith (Cons.) 1979, returned for North-West Warwickshire 1983. PPS, Dept of Trade and Industry 1987. Whip 1990, Senior Whip 1992. Minister of State, Department of the Environment, promoted Secretary of State on resignation of Sir Nigel Boswood, q.v. Married 1980 the Hon. Caroline Tarrant, d. of Lord Tarrant q.v.; three children. Clubs: Carlton, St Stephen’s. Recreations: home, family, taking risks.

FERRIMAN, FREDERICK, MP. Born 1934. Educated Marlborough, Christ Church, Oxford; MA 1955, third class (Greats). Farmer and company director. First elected 1974 (Cons.) for Northampton West. Chairman, secretary or treasurer of various Conservative backbench and all-party parliamentary committees and groups. Member national council, Freedom Association, 1988– Member Public Accounts Committee, Committee of Privileges. Gave extensive evidence to the Nolan Committee on Standards in Public Life. Clubs: Carlton, White’s, Cecil, IOD. Recreations: politics and business.

HARRISON, DEREK, MP. Born 1961. PPS to Ted Bampton MP q.v. 1993–. Educated Hatfield School and the University of Kent at Canterbury (BA, Accounting). Research Assistant to Edwina Currie MP 1989–90. Conservative Central Office, family issues desk, 1990. Research Officer, Adam Smith Institute, 1991–92. Elected 1992 (Cons.) Cotswolds North. Unmarried. Clubs: Carlton, Brooks’s. Recreations: bridge, country pursuits, reading, not walking.

LAIDLAW, FREDERICK, MP. Born 29 March 1972 in Milton, Hampshire. Educated Hambridge Secondary School, Southampton University (BSc in Business Administration). Sales Executive, Bulstrode and Co, 1992–6. Elected (Cons.) for Milton and Hambridge, Hants. Unmarried. Clubs: none. Recreations: keeping my head above water.

QUIN, KEITH, MP. Born 1952 in Manchester. Educated Bury Grammar School and Hull University (BA Hons History). Lecturer in sociology and trade union history, Kingston upon Hull College of Further Education (now the University of Humberside) 1972–83. Elected (Lab.) Manchester Canalside 1983. Married to Councillor Mrs Edith Quin JP; no children. Member various backbench Labour and all-party groups. Recreations: conservation of endangered species.

STALKER, ELAINE, MP. Née Johnson. Born 13 October 1956. Educated King Edward’s High School for Girls, Barham, and Barham University (BA Hons, History and Politics). Voluntary worker, mental handicap projects, and part-time tutor, Open University, 1982–92. Member Barham City Council 1985–91, deputy leader Conservative group. Elected (Cons.) Warmingshire South 1992. Married 1977 Michael Stalker, senior pilot with British Airways; marriage diss 1995. One d., Karen, born 1978. Clubs: none. Recreations: family, home, domestic arts.

YORK, ANTHONY, MP. Born 1 August 1963. Educated Haileybury and Christ Church, Oxford (History). Executive, Nick Leeson and Sons, New York, (international dealers) 1990–92. Rothschild’s 1992–5 (assistant to Norman Lamont MP). Director, York and Sons Ltd, Avon, 1988–. Member executive cttee, Friends of Friendless. Churches. Returned (Cons.) for Newbury. Unmarried. Clubs: Marylebone Cricket Club, RAC, Royal Dorset Yacht. Recreations: sport, music, travel.

Chapter One

The State Opening of the new Parliament, the very grandest of official occasions, was finally under way.

London seemed cleaner, younger, as if full of hope at this new beginning. By ten o’clock traffic had been halted on the route and sawdust scattered for the horses. Flags fluttered from hastily erected white and gold poles. Crash barriers by Buckingham Palace, the Mall, around Parliament Square and along Whitehall kept crowds of many nationalities in check as they clutched cameras, guidebooks, umbrellas and lunch. Police and guardsmen squared their shoulders under close-fitting black or red tunics, their breastplates and bayonets flashing in the sun.

Elaine Stalker hurried towards the House of Commons. Not for the first time she was struck by how different it was compared to a normal day. In place of traffic noise the lilt of martial music came fitfully on the breeze. Far off she could hear the tramp of hard boots from the barracks on Birdcage Walk accompanied by jingling harness and champing horses and the intermittent bark of commands. It was as if the air were charged with extra oxygen, just because the Queen was on her way.

Elaine had not expected to be pushing past camcorder-toting tourists and heading for her rightful seat on the green benches. In South Warmingshire the election had been so close that throughout the campaign she had steeled herself for defeat. She had even made tentative but discreet inquiries about a proper job afterwards. Some days during the campaign had been no more than a series of hostile encounters with disgruntled electors and a sneering press; the hours of election night as the votes were silently counted were a torture. It was a shock, therefore, to win by a margin of 2,503 – a whisker in an electorate of 75,000 but, as Churchill had once pointed out, for a majority one was enough. Photographs taken on the night showed her disbelieving face, as if about to protest that the returning officer had made a mistake. What a pity she had had no one to celebrate with, no husband on her arm.

That her success was shared by the government and party of which she was a member was an even bigger surprise, not least to its own adherents. Opinion polls had been pessimistic almost to the final day. At the last moment, however, the challengers had made several useful errors. The worst was the Opposition Party rally in Newcastle the Thursday before the poll at which to loud fanfares the leading protagonists were introduced as Cabinet Ministers, as if the election were already won. The voters observed grimly that their own role in the matter seemed of small account, and duly voted for the devil they knew.

Elaine felt weak with amazement, but weary. After her first contest her main emotion had been euphoria but that had soon ebbed away amid late nights, failed ambitions and muddled relationships. Dead ends had beckoned, of which the most significant had been her long affair with a government Minister, Roger Dickson. Nothing whatever had come of it, unless being older and wiser counted; but it had ruined her marriage and changed her life. It had not affected him, her erstwhile lover. Roger had avoided both discovery and contrition and now sat confidently on the front benches. Just as she would expect, she mused, in a House so exclusively male. Her reflections made her smile wryly, even as she paused to acknowledge several members of the public who recognised and stopped her.

She pushed past a group of pupils from Westminster School who by tradition stood in everyone’s way on the narrow pavement opposite the sovereign’s entrance to Victoria Tower. As she waited to cross the road Big Ben struck ten-thirty. She glanced up and nodded, greeting the glittering clock tower as an old acquaintance.

‘Good morning. Isn’t it exciting?’

A dark-haired young man was at her side. He held out his hand in greeting. Elaine squinted up at him: it was a pest, being a woman at Westminster and so much shorter than her colleagues. This chap must be six foot one, and at a guess not yet twenty-five years old.

‘Hello. Aren’t you Fred Laidlaw – the victor at Milton and Hambridge? Congratulations, and welcome.’

Her slim companion grinned shyly. ‘Yes, that’s right. Not with the same endorsement as Nigel Boswood at the last general election, of course, but it’s a great relief to have taken it back from the Liberals after that awful by-election.’

‘Glad to have you on board.’ Elaine was amused at how easy it was to slip back into Westminsterese, the boys’ public school style of the back corridors. ‘Without your success and a few others like it we’d have been heading for the wilderness. As it is, this Parliament could be unpleasantly like the last one, with our majority too close for comfort.’

She took Fred’s arm and pointed. ‘The best place to see is by the entrance gates to our car park. Once the carriages have passed, those in the know run inside to the MPs’ family room and watch it on TV.’

Fred looked disappointed. ‘I thought I’d watch out here and then go into the Chamber.’

The musicians were coming nearer with the blast of a long-forgotten imperial march. Across the square grey-haired members of Huntingdon Women’s Institute pulled out miniature Union Jacks to wave at the Queen. Big Ben was striking again; nearly time. A sergeant-major nearby opened his mouth, threw back his head and bellowed a command. Elaine and Fred instinctively stepped back.

‘Look, there’s Johnson.’ The royal coach was preceded by a diverse selection of notables. One government whip, officially entitled Vice-Chamberlain to Her Majesty’s Household, had duties which included sending the Queen every week a word-picture of the Commons to give colourful counterpoint to the Prime Minister’s staider audiences. This year it was to be Gregory Johnson. In black tails and striped pants, with grey topper and gloves in hand, he peered down from a black and gold carriage drawn by four caparisoned white horses, for all the world like a male Cinderella going to the ball. He waved cheekily at them and bowed.

More coaches and several sleek Daimlers followed; the Chief Whips of the Lords and Commons whom the crowd, not knowing their faces, assumed to be flunkeys; detectives and princes large and small – no princesses this year – and ladies-in-waiting, their wary eyes on the Crown Jewels in silk-lined boxes. A dozen detectives were present too, though not obviously so, since they were for the most part dressed uncomfortably in livery as coachmen. At last came the Household Cavalry, whose deafening hooves made further conversation impossible, and finally the Irish State Coach with the Queen.

‘Since you insist on being there in person, let’s go.’ Elaine grabbed Fred’s hand and started to run, down inside the steep cobbled courtyard, through into Speaker’s Court, up the Ministers’ stairs to the back of the Speaker’s Chair and thus to the Chamber, all before the Queen was yet out of her carriage.

Panting slightly, Elaine pushed Fred ahead of her. ‘Don’t sit down: go to the bar of the House, and when the front benches move off towards the Lords slide in behind. That way you’ll be on telly and all your new constituents will see you.’

Fred grinned gratefully and turned to gaze about him.

The Chamber was packed. The Prime Minister and Opposition Leader conversed with colleagues on both sides. Not for years had any MP worn formal dress, but Greville Janner sported a rose in his buttonhole and Nick Soames had a carnation the same cheery hue as his cheeks. Elaine spotted Freddie Ferriman: unfairly, for he never worked at it, his majority had gone up again. Derek Harrison had also done well. There were new faces, some returned as Fred had been in seats lost in by-elections, such as Anthony York, who had won back Newbury. She caught a heart-stopping glimpse of Roger Dickson near the Prime Minister, but he was deep in conversation with the Chancellor and did not notice her.

Elaine and the Speaker were not the only women on duty. At the far end of the building the Queen patted a silvery-grey curl, gathered up her pearl-encrusted handbag and took a deep breath.

Lights dimmed as the great procession began. The Lords Chamber was packed to the gunwales and suffocatingly hot. Yeomen of the Guard and gentlemen ushers and equerries, Garter Kings of Arms and Heralds Extraordinary and Poursuivant filed in. With a rustle everyone stood: archbishops and peers in ermine and lace, peeresses in old tiaras and new frocks, ambassadors in vivid robes with sashes and decorations, judges in powdered wigs, the Lord Chancellor in floor-sweeping black and gold, and guests dressed to the nines and desperately nervous stuffed into the galleries on four sides: all stood hushed and waiting.

The lights went up dramatically as the Queen entered and moved slowly in her full-length gown up the steps to the throne.

‘My Lords, pray be seated.’

Somebody was missing: the elected House, all 659 of them. The Lower House must be summoned. The Lord Chamberlain lifted a white wand as if to conduct an invisible orchestra. In the distance Black Rod, otherwise an amiable retired soldier of impeccable reputation, bowed, turned on his heel and, preceded by a couple of policemen trying to keep straight faces, headed for the Commons. A few yards away Fred was caught by the cameras with a besotted expression.

There, trivial tradition turned into constitutional propriety as the great doors were slammed in Black Rod’s face. For the hereditary monarch is not allowed into the Commons, not since her ancestor three centuries ago tried to arrest five defiant MPs at the start of the civil war which cost him his life, and which asserted the supremacy of Parliament.

The Queen’s messenger hammered ceremoniously on the door and was duly admitted. Madam Speaker stepped down and followed him; the Prime Minister linked with the Leader of the Opposition, Ministers with front-benchers, and all danced in a stately minuet towards Central Lobby.

Then the scramble started. Fred Laidlaw innocently filed behind the Chancellor and nobody dared impede him, such was his rapt determination. Elaine tried to tuck in behind but Tom Pendry nimbly beat her to it. She was swept along in the crush and barely kept her feet. For the next ten minutes at the bar of the Lords she had a fair view only of Pendry’s pink scrubbed neck.

It wasn’t the Queen’s own speech, of course. It was written for her by the government, a list of well-trailed announcements. If occasionally inflections of the regal voice or a slight raising of an eyebrow might imply royal dislike, she could change none of it.

‘My Lords and Members of the House of Commons, I pray that the blessing of Almighty God may rest upon your counsels.’

The Queen’s face showed no emotion as she handed the speech to an obsequious Lord Chancellor who gingerly climbed backwards down the steps from the throne. Then she rose and was gone.

The crowd of Members broke up in a general hubbub and sauntered back to restaurants and bars, seeking spouses, collecting coats, greeting friends. The House would resume later for a five-day debate on the Gracious Speech, in reality on the government’s future programme. Elaine, still mindful that cameras were rolling, strolled out into the Lobby.

Fred Laidlaw found himself a trifle uncertainly in Central Lobby. People took no notice of him, for as yet he was unknown. He could easily have been a Commons researcher or the son of one of the older Members.

‘Well, if it isn’t Fred.’

He spun round and saw a stocky man who was smiling at him in encouragement. Shyly Fred held out his hand, which was grasped with some warmth.

‘Keith Quin. Labour, Manchester Canalside.’

Fred was nonplussed. He was fairly sure he wasn’t supposed to fraternise with the Opposition on his first day. ‘Mr … er, Quin? You’re Labour, aren’t you? I’m Tory, I’m afraid…’

‘Aye, lad. You won back that by-election seat, didn’t you? I know about you. The Labour candidate you beat was my niece. She said you acquitted yourself fine. She didn’t have a chance, of course, but it’s necessary experience. She’s after mine when I retire.’ Quin gave a conspiratorial wink.

Fred was at a loss how to reply.

‘Grand place, isn’t it?’ Quin gestured at the great lofted ceiling, its mosaics of the four patron saints agleam in the television lights. Marble statues of statesmen halted in frozen mid-sentence, here a Harcourt, there a Balfour, names which meant nothing whatever to an awed Fred. ‘Like a ruddy cathedral. That’s what it’s supposed to be, see, a place of worship.’

‘Who are we supposed to be worshipping?’ Fred was genuinely curious.

‘That’s the question. Nye Bevan reckoned it was designed for the most conservative religion of all – ancestor worship.’ Quin eyed him up and down. ‘Come from an ordinary background, do you, lad? Aye, I thought so. Then remember what else Bevan said – that it’s not your ancestors, or mine, that got worshipped in there. It’s the buggers who kept ’em down in their place. People like us are here to change things, not preserve ’em in aspic. Whatever our party. Don’t forget.’

It dawned on Fred that there existed a whole etiquette of which he was totally ignorant. He wondered if he should offer this man a drink, but before he could speak Quin pointed towards the Lords.

‘There’s somebody’ll be glad to have a word with you, I’ll be bound. One of the better sort. See you around.’

Fred turned to see a slightly bowed figure beckon him over. It was Lord Boswood, the former holder of his seat until scandal had forced his resignation two years earlier.

It had been a busy election for Nigel Boswood, with many appearances on television as a respected pundit. His reputation had been partially restored by a press which had found juicier quarry in the sex lives of current Ministers; former targets were old hat. He had missed the daily cut and thrust, yet he had also been heartily thankful that for the first time in over thirty years he was not himself a candidate. It was a young man’s game.

As he greeted his successor Nigel Boswood felt nervous. With a struggle he remembered Fred as a gawky youth offering bursts of enthusiasm during university holidays. When on graduation with a degree in business administration no job had materialised, Fred had returned to his parents’ home and made himself useful around the Conservative office. Soon an energetic Young Conservatives branch was up and running with Fred its star. In due course a businessman supporter took pity on the youngster and found him a minor management position; but it was clear that the boy had set his heart on politics. So here he was, an MP already, the youngest in the House.

Boswood sighed. There were far too many around like that for his taste, youngsters with no experience whatever who lived and died within the political process alone. Never been anywhere or done anything. Never held a proper job, never run a company, never had to struggle, not really. Not travelled much, except with student railcards across Europe; for this was the new generation which casually saw Berlin or Budapest or Prague as extensions of home and had no idea of the price paid in blood to make those places free, let alone accessible.

‘Ah, young Laidlaw! How pleasant to see you. Enjoyed it today?’

‘Sir Nigel … I mean, Lord Boswood…’ Fred stammered. Another complicated encounter, his third of the day.

‘Nigel,’ said Boswood firmly. He put a hand on Fred’s elbow. ‘Now, as I didn’t know I would see you, I have committed the cardinal error of not having booked a table for lunch. But I can offer you hospitality in the Peers’ bar, and then I will take you, if you are not otherwise engaged and will permit, to the secret place where we’ll find the best cuisine in the entire Palace of Westminster.’

‘Oh – right.’ Fred pricked up his ears. ‘That sounds like an excellent idea. Where is it?’

‘Not the Peers’ guest room. That’s still too full of terrible old English cooking – spotted dick and wet cabbage. Most of their lordships, for all we’ve forty years of life peerages behind us, are still hereditary: so nursery food predominates. No, we’ll go to the Lords’ staff dining room. They’re the real aristocrats around here; they don’t stint themselves.’

Up in the press gallery James Betts tapped out the last lines of his sketch for the Globe and finished off a cigarette.

Vitriol laced with sugar for the State Opening, naturally. Readers would recognise the description of the Prince of Wales as morose and bitter; should his mother live as long as her mother, His Royal Highness would be in his seventies before he came to the throne. Freedom from family ties had certainly increased the Prince’s productivity as far as public engagements were concerned: now he had over 500 a year to his credit. That’s what we pay them for, grunted Betts to the computer screen.

Pity Diana hadn’t attended, though. Since her announced retirement from public life, her face had been seen peeking wistfully round comers at airports and ski resorts throughout the world. Betts would lay money that she’d be in the pages of Hello! again before the year was out, as her sister-in-law had before her, showing off once more why her husband was daft to prefer anyone else. Then there was that gorgeous designer wardrobe, the constant renewal of which demanded the oxygen of publicity. Why on earth would any company offer their beautiful clothes or the latest jewellery, or sell them to her at sharp discounts, if no new photographs were available for the cover of Paris-Match?

Betts bent to his task and added a few words about the more recognisable characters of the Commons, including the ‘naughty boys’, Mellor, Yeo and Hughes, confined to the back benches after losing the battle against the public pillory. Mellor at least had expected to be returned to office after the election, but his former friendship with the Prime Minister was far too distant. A twinge of cramp, which still came and went, reminded Betts of another miscreant, Roger Dickson. It had been moments before the planned confrontation of the man with a question about his own misbehaviour that Betts had collapsed with the stomach infection which would make him tremble whenever he saw eggs for the rest of his life. The question could yet be asked, any time. What was missing and had never resurfaced was the hard evidence, that letter written by Dickson to his girlfriend; without it, the man could deny the story for ever – and probably would. Some lucky beggars would always get away with it.

On the other hand, there was the lady herself. Betts sucked his teeth. Touching forty, certainly, but footloose and fancy free. Her husband had done a bunk with another dame – one could hardly blame him. And that daughter, Karen. Must be around eighteen now, a real looker. Two women, both with a taste for the trousers, he was certain. Both worth watching, carefully.

George Horrocks turned away from the television, put down his sherry and gratefully accepted a canapé from his sister-in-law. The smell of roast pork wafted tantalisingly from the kitchen. This was infinitely better than dull meals in his club surrounded by old bores; Betty was an excellent hostess and a civilised and intelligent person, more like an older sister.

Horrocks pushed his hair off his brow in an unconsciously boyish gesture. It was many years since he had left the army; although the wrong side of fifty he had kept himself fit. Tall and lanky, he could be taken for a much younger man, especially since he still had most of his hair, apart from a slowly increasing bald spot, luckily hidden from the mirror, at the back of his head. He did not mind that its fairness was sprinkled generously with silver. For George was no ladies’ man, and was uncomfortable when a woman who spotted his qualities would try to flirt with him. All that, he felt, had been left behind long ago when Margaret had walked out on him. It was fortunate there had been no children.

‘I confess I find it very watchable, Betty.’

Betty Horrocks bustled into the kitchen to serve the roast potatoes. ‘It is grand, isn’t it? Of course you could get more involved, George, if you wanted, when your year of office as Deputy Lord Lieutenant’s over.’

George’s expression was thoughtful. ‘I might just do that.’

‘And should you be in the least interested I could find you a job, one job in particular.’

Horrocks finished his sherry. ‘Plotting again, Betty? What have you in mind?’

Betty Horrocks stood up, a dish of steaming peas in one hand and a bottle of 1990 Beaujolais Villages in the other. Smartly dressed and verging on the stout, she had been left prosperous in her widowhood. She motioned George to the dinner table. Since her husband had died, it gave her pleasure to look after his younger brother from time to time, especially when his burgeoning interest in the political world was available to be exploited.

‘I wanted to talk to you about that. Our MP, Elaine Stalker, is a lovely person, an excellent constituency Member and a good woman. At least that’s my point of view and as her Conservative Association chairman I know her better than most. What she lacks is a decent social life and nobody should be without that. I was wondering, if I were to introduce the pair of you properly, whether you wouldn’t see your way…’ Her voice tailed away as her courage failed her.

George was silent, his lips pursed. He did not like anybody to organise his life, as his sister-in-law was aware. But his eyes were not hostile. It dawned on Betty Horrocks that the same thought might already have occurred to him. She swallowed and tried again.

‘…to maybe asking her out?’

‘Oh, Jayanti darling, it makes me want to cry.’

‘It is indeed a beautiful ceremony. We are very privileged to be able to watch it,’ Jayanti Bhadeshia agreed cautiously. His wife’s predilection for the Queen was a family joke. He was not, however, about to argue with her.

Pramila Bhadeshia was eating brightly coloured Indian sweets. She licked her fingers like a child before reaching for a linen napkin. ‘The High Commissioner was there – did you see him? What’s he done to deserve that, I’d like to know. Wriggled his way to it, that’s what, giving money to the President’s campaign. Here am I with royal blood in my veins and I cannot be there. It isn’t right!’

Her husband sighed. His wife’s conviction that she was descended from a nineteenth-century maharaja was subject to some dispute by the present incumbent’s family. The increased dowry her father was obliged to give for her in order to support the claim, however, had been more than acceptable. ‘If it upsets you, don’t watch.’

‘No, it does not upset me. It’s that every Asian man present is a visitor. Nobody attends by right.’

‘That is simply not possible at the moment. There are no Conservative Asian members of the House of Lords – only Shreela Flather, I was forgetting her. There’s that fool from the LSE – Desai, isn’t it? – but he’s Labour; and one from the Chinese community – Baroness Lydia Dunn from Hong Kong. Maybe it’s acceptable if they’re female. Better chance for you, my dear; than for me, perhaps.’

Bhadeshia was trying to tease his wife but she would have none of it. An audible sniff came also from a tiny figure in a dark blue sari huddled in an armchair in the corner – her mother. With a sinking feeling he recognised the emergence of a hobby horse and prayed silently that this one would be short-lived.

His wife was a strong-minded character, one of the features he secretly liked best about her; he recognised that much of the driving force of their household, of its financial success and standing, came from her. It made her a superb businesswoman too. Had he married a quieter, more complaisant woman, he would have still been the owner of only one or two shops instead of a whole chain. The Bhadeshia name was becoming better known commercially back in East Africa too, which felt like sweet revenge. Certainly he would never have had thirty million pounds in shares and on deposit at the bank. That much of it had disappeared in the demise of the Bank of Commerce and Credit International rankled deeply but he was nevertheless a man of substance. Yet that conferred obligations, of which fact his wife was never slow to remind him.

But when she developed an obsession nothing would calm her until her objective had either been achieved or been shown to be completely impossible, usually after the expenditure of large sums of hard-earned money. Take their house, with its swimming pool and lawns, its live-in maid and gardener. Pramila had decided she wanted to live near the huge Lakeside shopping complex, the biggest shopping mall in the country. ‘It reminds me so much of New York,’ she would say wistfully. Hendon was no longer grand enough; the Brent Cross shopping centre ‘too poky’. A house in Essex big enough for themselves, their four growing children and Pramila’s mother and sister was a thoroughly expensive proposition.

The business was not a bottomless treasure chest. On the contrary: the international side devoured cash, though the outlook this year was more promising. He had had to dip into the money put aside for the sister’s dowry to keep the mortgage within reasonable limits. Discussion of Lakshmi’s wedding had been postponed for a year or two yet, until depleted funds had been replaced. Then there were his own two daughters, Priya and Sabita, still in their teens. A wedding for one cost over £100,000 these days, while dowries didn’t bear thinking about. And the boys – Amit was on the way to becoming a doctor, which meant years of college fees, and Varan wanted to go into business like his father. Not for him a cold Cash and Carry at all hours: he’d expect a handsome start in life. Bhadeshia groaned inwardly.

‘You are not listening to me, Jayanti,’ Pramila accused him with awesome accuracy.

‘I hear you, my sweet. You are right, the British system is riddled with prejudice. But what am I, a simple Hindu businessman, able to do? We should be thankful we were allowed to come here in safety as children. Had we stayed in Uganda we would have been mincemeat for Amin’s dogs. It is enough to live in peace unmolested.’

‘That is a long time ago. Now we are British, and we are part of Britain.’ An ominous note had entered her lilting voice.

Jayanti wondered gloomily what was to come next.

‘There should be recognition. The moment has arrived.’

Pramila sat up straight and twitched her red sari with the aanchal draping her head, as if she were about to make an announcement. She waited till her husband was gazing at her expectantly.

‘I am now listening, my dear. What have you in mind?’

‘First answer me this. Aren’t you the most respected Asian businessman in London and one of the most successful? Aren’t you a donor to charities of every kind? Aren’t you an active supporter of the Conservative Party, which has just won another election? Wasn’t Margaret Thatcher a great admirer of yours? Didn’t she once say she wished more English-born businessmen were like you?’

‘Ye … yes.’

Pramila rose and went to the wall next to the mantelpiece. Despite the warmth of the day a coal-effect gas fire burned in the grate; the women of his family felt the cold in England. She pointed to a framed photograph showing herself and her husband, one on each side of the former Prime Minister, all in sparkling evening dress and smiling broadly.

‘She would have looked after you, Jayanti. I know it. Now she cannot do it, you must push yourself.’

‘Doing what?’

‘You should be a member of the House of Lords – yes, you. You should be Lord Bhadeshia, and take your seat like Lord Young and Lord Jakobovitz and the other Jewish lords, whose high position in British society is guaranteed. My bones demand it. You would be brilliant, my darling, I know it.’

Bhadeshia felt weak. In the corner the eyes of his mother-in-law glittered, though the diminutive body had not budged.

‘And you…?’

Pramila bent her head modestly, then smiled. ‘I would be Lady Bhadeshia. At last.’

Once the House was adjourned Elaine had no more to do and felt flat. It was without question marvellous to be part of all this. Yet how weird the ceremony was, and how incongruous. How deceitful: a ruler who is not a ruler, in an imperial crown without an empire, in evening dress in broad daylight, reads a speech which is not a speech to Lords who cannot lord it and Commons who strongly believe themselves to be very uncommon indeed. The gold glisters, but real wealth and control lay neither in the wool of the medieval Woolsack nor in the jewels on Her Majesty’s head but on computer screens recording foreign exchange and stock markets in Singapore and Tokyo, Frankfurt and Sydney. Down in Canary Wharf young dealers in red braces switched their attention back to the purchase and sale of Deutschmarks, dollars and yen, marking shares up and down in a dozen languages, thus deciding who would live in style this year and who pay more taxes, casually exercising power vastly greater than any wielded with such meticulous ceremony by either the feudal monarch and her doddering peers or by Members of her Parliament.

Chapter Two

‘I don’t believe this.’

Elaine stood in her tiny Commons office and gaped despairingly at the sackful of mail spilled out on the floor. She squatted down and, without yet opening the envelopes, began to sort it into piles: handwritten blue envelopes on one side with constituency postmarks on top and more distant letters underneath; and large brown envelopes on the other. Anything with a typed address went to the bottom of the heap. Ordinary pleaders for help would gain her attention first, today as ever.

‘How many did you say came today?’

Diane Hardy, fifty-something, plump, bespectacled and efficient, a Commons secretary for twenty years, pulled her cardigan across her ample bosom and grimaced. ‘Around two hundred. Much the same yesterday. Don’t just stare at it all, Elaine – it won’t vanish by itself. Here’s a paper knife. Or, if you prefer, I can get a bit of clerical assistance – cost you around a fiver an hour, but some student’ll be glad of it.’

‘Maybe I can get Karen in, once her exams are over.’ Elaine riffled through an already opened heap of paper, mostly printed matter from the previous day’s intake. With Mailsort computer programmes it was all too easy to address each missive personally to her, couched in the friendliest terms; it would be impossible to second-guess what was and wasn’t significant.

Diane sensed Elaine’s flattened spirits and indicated one folder of scrawled letters. ‘There are compensations, you know. You have some nice fan mail. Lots of old gents. Mr Sutton as usual, and Mr Papps, and old Bill Rivers who is so sweet. And a new one: look at this – Your victory was a special event which will have been welcomed by all right-thinking people. You are a very wonderful lady. Seeing you on television with your lovely smile warms the cockles of my heart. I should love to meet you face to face – and so on. Goes on for ten pages.’

Elaine took the letter, examined it and giggled. ‘Pity he’s writing from Leicester Prison, then, isn’t it? What’s the name – ah, signs himself Graham Dunn. Send him an acknowledgement, but put him in the funny file, just in case.’

She would not have considered for one moment accepting the invitation to meet. Once, several years earlier, she had innocently arranged to have tea in a hotel with the besotted Sutton. He turned out to have lost his wife in mysterious circumstances and was apparently seeking a replacement. The obligation of courtesy towards constituents did not extend to fulfilling their every fantasy.

‘What on earth are they writing about?’ Elaine mused. ‘I know it was a big surprise when we won, but they can’t all be fans. Or furious.’

‘They aren’t. But now the election’s over it’s business as usual. Please will you sign an Early Day Motion in protest against the culling of rabbits or to congratulate Luton Football Club on winning the cup or demanding the end of nuclear dumps in East Timor. That sort of thing.’

‘I wasn’t aware that Luton had won the cup,’ Elaine answered faintly. ‘And I haven’t much idea where East Timor is. Why on earth should everyone assume that MPs are knowledgeable about everything? We’re expected to chum out instant opinions – is that really what the punters want? Why can’t politicians sometimes be permitted to say, I don’t know – or even I don’t care or It’s none of our concern?’

Diane sniffed. Her considered view of the British public en masse was unrepeatable.

No votes were anticipated for several days, until the Queen’s Speech debate was out of the way, and no Question Time for either the Prime Minister or anyone else. The House was therefore unusually quiet after the excitement of the State Opening. Older, wiser Members were on the plane to Tenerife; plenty of other occasions would offer themselves in the years ahead when late-night divisions, hour upon midnight hour, would push their voting record to the point where boasts to local newspapers would be in order.

It was also international conference time. The Foreign Secretary was in Geneva at another round of talks on what to do about Bosnia. In Cairo, Dr Boutros Boutros-Ghali, United Nations Secretary-General, was spreading his hands self-deprecatingly about the failure of the latest UN mission in Central Africa. The new US President, who had won her campaign on an entirely domestic ticket, was engrossed in the Oval Room of the White House in a discussion on the rape of American forests. The Globe’s political editor, faced with a half-empty Commons or an all-expenses paid trip, had plumped for Switzerland. At least on the plane one might expect a better class of risqué stories from this Foreign Secretary than from the chap he had replaced.

The troublemakers, the ambitious and the hangers-on never left Westminster. Thus it was that Jim Betts, standing in for his absent boss, was to be seen lounging in Members’ Lobby against the bust of Ramsay MacDonald a few minutes before six in the evening.

His attention was caught as the thickset figure of Minister of State Edward Bampton pushed through the swing doors. Judging from his direction Bampton had come from the Smoking Room, where gossip was dispensed along with the doubles. From his expression he had heard unpleasant news.

Betts riffled quickly through his mental card-index. Bampton was a Yorkshireman and overweeningly proud of it. He was always good for a misogynist dig or an appeal to traditional preferences such as warm beer and smoky pubs. Nearing fifty and about average height – which meant he was shorter than the typical Tory MP – podgy and ruddy-faced, he wore on his sleeve a cheerful resentment at being downgraded and, as he saw it, overlooked by the party hierarchy. His post at the Home Office, where he held responsibility for prisons, was a minor position; his role boiled down to carrying the can whenever the privately employed escort service lost a dangerous prisoner. It was widely believed that, if Bampton had his way, most of the more violent guests of Her Majesty would never have seen the light of day again.

Betts interposed himself neatly between the man and his intended destination. It seemed likely that Bampton was heading straight for the whips’ office on the other side of the Lobby with the intention of thumping the table and saying his piece. Once inside he would be soothed and patted, fed a large Teacher’s and a little flattery and talked out of whatever was eating him. The time to strike was now.

‘You look fed up, Ted, if you don’t mind me saying so. What’s the matter – the missus found out about the girlfriend?’

Bampton scowled at the banter. ‘I don’t go in for that sort of stuff, as you well know, Jim. That’s for fools who can’t keep their trousers up. But I can’t say I’m a happy man.’

Betts hazarded a guess. ‘There’s a reshuffle in the offing. Details out tomorrow. Is that it?’

Bampton glanced around quickly and dropped his voice. ‘Too bloody right,’ he muttered. ‘Once again the best jobs have gone to wet-behind-the-ears smart alecs with posh accents and public school backgrounds. We might as well still be in the age of pocket boroughs.’

Bampton warmed to his theme. ‘Don’t the party realise that people like that go down like a lead balloon in my part of the country? What we need up north are real men, businessmen, who know what the world’s about. Run a business, fought for customers, chased the debts, got the money in week by week to pay the wages. Fought off the creditors and the liquidators and knocked the competition for six to boot. I’ve done all that, but who cares? I tell you, if we had a few more of my sort in this place and in Cabinet, we’d have better decision-making at the top, and we might be popular in between elections as well.’ He paused for breath.

Betts shrugged sympathetically. ‘Got to be on the inside, haven’t you? Mind you, look at Roger Dickson. He’s a self-made man – I mean, he married money, but nobody died and left him anything. Came up the hard way and doing all right.’

Betts and several other journalists were floating Dickson’s name as a means of initiating comment on potential candidates for the next leadership contest. Even though the party had won, nobody expected the current holder to last long. Musings about the possible next leader were standard fare, and meat and drink to Bampton.

‘He’d be preferable to the idiot we’ve got at the moment, campaign winner or no.’ The Yorkshireman glowered. ‘Do you know the PM offered to come to my constituency during the campaign? We told him not to bother, he’d only cost us votes.’ He checked himself: off-loading a few jewels of his deepest political thinking, while enjoyable, was risky. ‘Now Dickson has something about him, I’ll grant you that. Though he has enemies too – some people didn’t like how he handled Environment. But he’s done well this time. The Foreign Office, so I hear. Big move; puts him in a perfect position for the next contest, provided he watches his step.’

The leading article formed itself in Betts’s mind. Ministers and backbenchers welcomed Dickson’s appointment … spurred talk of his chances … fresh-faced, replacing the jaded features of … reshuffle failed to dampen criticism of the Prime Minister … one senior backbencher inferred that the PM’s reputation had suffered as a result… Bampton’s remarks on his current leader would be stored for future use.

‘And what about yourself, Ted? Surely they haven’t sidelined you yet again?’

‘No – not exactly.’ Bampton was wary. ‘I’m a Minister of State, after all. Should be grateful for the opportunity to serve, I suppose. But I was hoping for a move up this time. In fact I’d been promised, after a manner of speaking, a chance at Trade and Industry. That’s more in my line.’

Equanimity restored by the brief opportunity to let off steam, Ted patted Betts resignedly on the back.

‘I suppose I’ll have to be satisfied for the moment. Keep my mouth shut and carry on plotting, eh?’

* * *

Elaine took a deep breath, lifted the overflowing waste-paper bin towards her, carried the mess out into the corridor, emptied the lot into the brown carriers marked ‘Paper only’ and returned with it to her office. For the next hour, fortified by a weak gin and tonic from a chipped mug, she twice filled the bin and emptied it again from the disorderly heaps on her desk. One note pleased her, from a Labour MP asking her if she would occasionally pair with him. That might make life easier. The monitor announced that one of the new Members, Anthony York, was making what must be his maiden speech. She would not leave until everything was cleared.

It was several hours before the dark red plastic of the last in-tray reappeared, unsullied by any further missives. In a tired gesture of victory, Elaine wrote ‘Empty!’ on a slip of yellow paper and stuck it to the tray with Sellotape. It would serve to encourage her next time the sheer drudgery of Commons life threatened to overwhelm her.

The phone rang. To get some peace Elaine had diverted her calls. She frowned.

‘Sorry to intrude, Mrs Stalker,’ the operator apologised, ‘but I have your daughter on the line. Will you take the call?’

Elaine’s mood lightened immediately. ‘Sure, put her on.’

A click, and a familiar voice was shouting in her ear.

‘Yeah!’ Karen squealed. ‘That’s it! Mum, I’ve finished. Had my last oral today. No more exams. I’m free!’

‘Well done – but don’t be too cocky. I mean, if you don’t pass you may have to retake them next year.’

‘Never – I’d rather die. But I will get them. In fact, I wanted to ask you, Mum. If my grades are high enough I’d like to accept that offer from the London School of Economics. I know the place is physically a dump, but the teaching’s good and there are theatres and art galleries and London night life and I could see something of you. What do you think?’

‘You won’t have the money for the night life, madam.’ Elaine was deliberately prim. Now there was no father at home to lay down the law she felt the weight of responsibility for her only child. A thought occurred to her: ‘Are you planning to live with me – is that it? Because honestly, Karen, I haven’t room. The flat has only one bedroom, as you well know…’

‘No, no. You’d cramp my style and I yours. But keep an eye open for digs for me, would you? Your name might make the difference.’

‘Will do. Meanwhile, where are you off to now?’

‘Nottingham. Mark’s house – his parents are in America. We’re invited to a big party – the whole weekend, the entire class – to celebrate the end of exams. And the end of our time at college together, so we’ll all get maudlin and drunk. Should be great.’

Elaine reflected briefly on the unsuspecting householders who probably did not realise quite what Karen and her friends, well-meaning youngsters though they might be, could do to a property over forty-eight hours.

‘Be careful. Remember what happened…’ She did not add, ‘…last time you got drunk.’ Karen had ended up in hospital having her stomach pumped and had nearly died of alcohol poisoning. Elaine had never found out exactly what had triggered the near-tragedy; and Karen would never tell her.

The girl’s voice soothed. ‘Don’t worry – I’m more careful than most. I know I can’t take it. But there was one more thing, Mum.’ The voice took on a wheedling tone.

‘Yes?’

‘I’m skint. Can I have some money?’

He was trembling. It was worse once he had sat down, with everyone patting his shoulders, the nods of congratulation, the kindly if patronising remarks from the Labour Member opposite who followed. Anthony York ran a hand through his fair hair and could feel a rivulet of sweat trickle down his back. He bit his tongue and fought back a feeling close to tears.

Before this, his hardest moment had been the final selection at Newbury. Not many seats could be regarded as rock solid these days, but Newbury had been one of them until it had been lost in an unhappy by-election. Nevertheless the expectation of a substantial majority in more normal times and the beauty of the area had attracted a large contingent of would-be candidates. When Anthony’s grave manner, impeccable reputation and distinguished appearance had fought off a dozen ex-MPs and two former Ministers squeezed from their seats by boundary changes, nobody was more surprised than he.

A maiden speech was a dramatic event – a great milestone in a politician’s life, and a signpost to the future. The disappointment he felt in his own performance, therefore, was all the more acute. If ever he were to rise to great heights, today’s amateurish phrases and ill-formed philosophy would be examined intently for clues as to his judgement, character and potential.

His parents, the editor of the local paper, the regional radio station – all would be waiting to hear from him. They would be at least curious, at best excited and proud. Perhaps he could buy a video of his performance, but doubted if he could bear to watch himself and learn, as he had been advised to do. The thought of being brought face to face with his own inadequacies made him cringe.

He wished profoundly he had done it better.

Edward Bampton pushed aside the ministerial red box and set himself to brood. Of course he ought to be grateful; the reshuffle could as easily have resulted in his being booted out. But the fact was he was bored and longed for a change. The Home Office job looked important on paper, gave him considerable clout in the government hierarchy and for anyone with a smidgen of interest in the criminal justice system would have been much prized. Indeed, there had been adverse comment when he, a non-lawyer, had been appointed to it three years before. Most of the barristers and solicitors who littered the Tory benches would have given their eye teeth to have spent the last hour with the set of ministerial files currently on his desk.

Yet for Bampton the adjournment debates he had to answer, the clauses he had to take through standing committees, the pointless criticism from irate backbenchers about the latest crime figures, the useless knowledge he had acquired on appeals and rights to silence, the endless decisions on immigration cases, any one of which made a lifetime’s difference to an entire family, were insufficient. Faced by senior civil servants who were acknowledged international experts on all these subjects, he frequently felt out of place. The moment to complain to the whips had passed but his gut reaction was still deep impatience.

A soft tap came at the door; it opened to reveal Derek Harrison, tall and saturnine, standing hesitantly on the threshold.

Like most ministers above the lowest rank, Bampton was entitled to a bag-carrier, a ‘gofer’ and general factotum. In true Westminster tradition the more lowly the post – and this one was unpaid – the grander the title. So Harrison was his Parliamentary Private Secretary, or PPS. Technically it was the first rung on the ministerial ladder; when a PPS was caught misbehaving his resignation would be reported as that of ‘a member of the government’. The PPS was part of the ministerial team and attended meetings, other than the most confidential or high-powered, alongside his master. Often, however, the task boiled down to pouring the drinks and listening hard, then flattering his boss in the post-mortem afterwards.

Another part of the job involved the assiduous planting of useful questions with even more helpful supplementaries on ambitious backbenchers who aspired to become PPSs in their turn. On occasion a PPS might find himself mouthing his master’s speech before a puzzled or irritated outside audience as he attempted to explain that due to unforeseen circumstances they would have to put up with him instead. That could be a neat opportunity in the right hands; but in the main the PPS acted as eyes and ears of his boss around Westminster, and as friend and confidant.

‘I’m sorry – you’re busy.’ Harrison gestured at the still open box, its gold letters on red leather gleaming in the lamplight. ‘Shall I come back later?’

‘No, I’m done.’ That wasn’t strictly true but Bampton had had enough. ‘Fancy a pint?’

‘Sure.’

The boxes were locked and stacked on the desk. It was safe to leave them there; for the office, on the upper ministerial corridor, was guarded by police night and day.

The pair headed for the Kremlin, officially called the Strangers’ Bar, down at Terrace level. Outside was windswept and damp, a typical English evening, but inside the place was smoky and packed.

Derek Harrison wrinkled his nose. His own preference would have been a quick dash across the road to the St Stephen’s Club. Its elegant white interior, looking out towards St James’s Park, was graced by many distinguished names from the party, exactly the sort an up-and-coming chap ought to know. The previous year it had been full of disgruntled ex-MEPs who had lost their seats; they tended to drown their sorrows in Slivovitz and Calvados to show off, but their conversation, peppered with references to Leipzig and Paris, intrigued and attracted Harrison. There would be a few businessmen, something in the City or doing well in imports. Their casual attitude to fifty-pound notes fascinated him most of all.

The Kremlin was buzzing as Members and hangers-on absorbed the implications of the reshuffle. The rumour factory had been so vigorous that the Prime Minister had decided to go ahead a day or two early. A copy of the Downing Street press notice lay soggy with beer froth on the bar and was consulted by all who passed.

Harrison lost sight of Bampton for a moment and found himself in a group of both Labour and Tory Members. He was instantly on his guard.

‘I’d have thought he’d have been more radical.’ Keith Quin lifted his pint glass, took a long swallow and smacked his lips ruminatively. ‘Settled a few scores and that. After calling them right-wingers bastards, you’d have thought he’d have got rid of a few. Instead he’s put Hamilton in the Cabinet and promoted Lady Olga Maitland. She may have the biggest majority in the Commons now, but the thought of her in your whips’ office…!’

Quin was trying to impress two new MPs, Harrison noted, both Conservatives. Fred Laidlaw, a half-pint of lager in his hand, was looking somewhat dazed: at a guess it was close to his bedtime. Anthony York, however, nursed a bitter lemon, which took some courage in this place. York had made his maiden speech. He was now one of the crowd and permitted such a modest eccentricity. Both newcomers, hesitant about concurring with their companion but unsure how to respond otherwise, turned in relief to Harrison.

The older man responded smoothly. ‘On the contrary. The Prime Minister boxes clever with those he can’t count on. That’s why he’s still on top despite all the criticism. He works on the Lyndon Johnson principle: Better to have the beggar on the inside pissing out than on the outside pissing in.’ The crudity made his listeners snicker.

Bampton motioned to Harrison from the other side of the bar. Obediently he detached himself and moved over, exchanging pleasantries on the way with both Labour and Conservative MPs. He made mental notes of several new faces, male and female, but he was pretty sure that the attractive fair-haired girl in a short skirt that revealed smooth thighs, perched on a bar-stool talking animatedly to Michael Brown, the victor at Brigg and Scunthorpe, was not an MP. She was pretty, and as she caught his eye smiled at him. He hesitated in passing; then an impatient look on Bampton’s face forced him to press on.

‘You keep your eyes to yourself,’ Bampton chided as soon as they were together. ‘I saw you give that lass the once-over. Trouble, that’s all they are.’

‘Just because you’re happily married, Ted, doesn’t mean that the rest of us are suited to monogamy.’ Harrison was not angry; his sex-life was the subject of frequent gossip to which he was utterly impervious. ‘As a confirmed bachelor, I have to spread it around a bit or it’ll atrophy. Use it or lose it. Know what I mean?’

Bampton grunted.