First Among Equals (43 page)

SIMON KFRSLAKE
137

Just over half
the members present rose and cheered while Bib Travers ran all the way to
Simon’s office to be the first to report the news. When he arrived, Simon swung
round and faced the open door.

“You look and
sound as though you’d run a marathon.”

“Like
Pheidippides, I bring great news of victory.”

“I hope that
doesn’t mean you’re going to drop down dead,” said Simon, grinning.

The new Leader
of the Conservative Party said nothing more for a few moments. It was obvious
that Pimkin had come out in favor of him. Later that night one or two other
members also admitted that they had changed their minds during the second week
because they hadn’t liked the blatant opportunism of Charles’s presenting a
priceless portrait to the nation only a few days before the final vote.

The following
morning Fiona phoned Pinikin to ask him why he had acted as he did. “My dear
Fiona,” he replied,

“
like
Sydney Carton, I suppose I thought it would be good to
go to my grave knowing I had done one honorable thing in my life.”

I
TTOOK ONLY A WEEK for Simon’s little house on Beaufort Street to
be transformed.

The usually
quaint and sheltered neighborhood became cluttered with ferries of cars bearing
photographers, journalists and television crews. Some neighbors wondered how
Elizabeth fixed such a gracious smile on her face each morning as she made her
way through the hopeful interviewers who seemed permanently camped on her
doorstep. Simon, they noted, handled the problem as if it had always been part
of his daily routine. He had spent his first two weeks selecting the Shadow
Cabinet he wanted to take into the next General Election. He was able to
announce the composition of his new team to the press fourteen days after his
election as Leader of the Conservative Party. He made one sentimental
appointment: that of Bill Travers as Shadow Minister of Agriculture.

When asked at a
press conference why his defeated rival would not be serving on the team, Simon
explained that he had offered Charles Hampton the Deputy Leadership and any
portfolio of his choice, but Charles had turned the offer down, saying he
preferred to return to the back benches for the present.

Charles had
left for Scotland the same morning for a few days’ rest by the River Spey,
taking his son with him. Although he spent rnuch of their short holiday feeling
depressed about the Dual outcome of the Leadership struggle, Harry’s original
efforts at fishing helped him deaden some of the pain. Harry even ended up with
the biggest fish.

Amanda, on the
other hand
, realizing
how slim her chances were of
catching any more fish, reopened negotiations over her life story with News of
the World.

When the
features editor read through Amanda’s notes he decided on two things. She would
require a ghostwriter, and the paper would have to halve their original offer.

“Why?” demanded
Amanda.

“Because we daren’t print the better half of your story.”

“Why not?”

“No one would
believe it.”

“But every word
is true,” she insisted.

“
I’m not doubting
the veracity of the facts,” said the
editor.
“Only our readers’ ability to swallow them.”

“They accepted
that a man climbed the walls of Buckingham Palace and found his way into the
Queen’s bedroom.”

“Agreed,”
replied the editor, “but only after the Queen had confirmed the story. I’m not
so sure that Charles Hampton will be quite as cooperative.”

Amanda remained
silent long enough for her agent to close the deal.

The
watered-down version of “My Life with Charles Hampton” appeared a few months
later to coincide with Charles’s much-publicized divorce, but it made no more
than a faint ripple in political circles. Now that Charles had no hope of
leading his party, it was very much yesterday’s news.

Amanda came out
of the divorce settlement with another fifty t1tousand pounds but lost custody
of Harry, which was all
Charles
really cared about.
Charles prayed that her irresponsible remarks reported in the paper concerning
the boy’s claim to the title had been quickly forgotten.

Then Rupert
phoned from Somerset and asked to see him privately.

As Raymond
entered his second year as Chancellor, the opinion polls showed the two main
parties were once again neck and neck. A surge in Tory popularity came as no
surprise after a change in Tory leadership, but Simon’s first year had shown a
dynamism and energy that amazed even his closest supporters. Raymond was daily
made more conscious of the inroads Simon was making on the Government program.
It only made him work even harder to iasure that his policies became law.

No one needed
to tell Simon he had a good first year as Opposition Leader. His party’s
percentage in the polls was now running neck and neck with the Government’s.

But in the
House lie often found
himself
being frustrated.
Political correipondents reported that it was the most balanced contest in
years.

For as long as
Labour held the majority, Simon often won the argument while losing the vote.

They sat facing
each other in Charles’s drawing room at Eaton Square.

“I am sorry to
broach such an embarrassing subject,” said Rupert, “but fell it was my duty to
do so.”

“Duty,
poppycock,” said Charles, stubbing out his cigarette. “I tell you Harry is my
son, and as such will inherit the title. He’s the spitting image of
Great-grandfather and that ought to be enough proof for anyone.”

“In normal
circumstances I would agree with you, but the recent publicity in News of the
World has been brought to my notice and I feel...”

“That
sensationalist rag,” said Charles sarcastically, his voice rising.

“Surely you
don’t take their word before mine?”

“Certainly
not,” said Rupert, “but if Amanda is to be believed, Harry is not your son.”

“How am I meant
to prove he is?” asked Charles, trying to control his temper. “I didn’t keep a
diary of the dates when I slept with my wife.”

“I have taken
legal advice on the matter,” continued Rupert, ignoring the comment, “and am
informed that a blood test is all that will prove necessary to verify Harry’s
claim to the title. We both share a rare blood group, as did our fattier and
grandfather, and ifflarry is of that group I shall never mention the subject
again. If not, then the title will eventually be inherited by our second cousin
in Australia.”

“And if I don’t
agree to put my son through this ridiculous test?”

“Then the
matter must be placed in the hands of our family solicitors,” said Rupert
sounding unusually in control, “and they must take whatever course they
consider fit.”

“That must
never happen,” said Charles weakly.

“It will
happen,” said Rupert.

When the Prime
Minister went into the hospital for a minor operation, the press immediately
started to speculate on his resignation. Ten days later, when he walked out
looking, better than ever, the rumors ceased immediately. In the Prime
Minister’s absence, Raymond, as Deputy Leader, chaired Cabinet meetings and
stood in for him during questions in the Commons. This gave the lobby
correspondents a chance to proclaim, like Caesarian soothsayers plucking at
entrails, that Raymond was “Primus inter pares.”

Raymond enjoyed
presiding over the Cabinet and in particular the challenge of Prime Minister’s
Questions on Tuesdays and Thursdays. He enjoyed the sensation of acting as
Prime Minister but realized he could not afford to get used to it. Indeed, when
the Prime Minister returned to Downing Street, he assured Raymond that the
operation had been a success and the likelihood ofany recurrence of the trouble
was, in the surgeon’s opinion, minimal. He admitted to Raymond that lie hoped o
lead the Party to a second victory at the polls, by which time he would be
within a few years of his seventieth birthday and ready to bow out quietly. He
told Raymond quite bluntly that he hoped he would be his successor.

“Daddy, Daddy,
open my school report.”

Charles left
the morning mail unopened as he hugged Harry. He knew nothing could ever part
them now, but he dreaded Harry’s finding out that he might not be his real
father “Please open it,” pleaded Harry, wriggling free. The school doctor had
been asked to take a sample of Harry’s blood along with six other boys from his
year so that he would not consider the request unusual. Even the doctor hadn’t
been told the full significance of the action.

Harry extracted
the envelope from the pile by Charles’s side – the one with the school crest in
the top left-hand corner – and held it out for his father to open. He looked
excited and seemed hardly able to contain himself. Charles had promised lie
would phone his brother as soon as the result of the blood test was confirmed.
He had wanted to phone the doctor a hundred times during the past week but had
always stopped himself, knowing it would only add to the man’s curiosity.

“Come on, Dad,
read the report, and you’ll see it’s true.”

Charles tore
open the letter and removed the little book which would reveal the result of
all Harry’s efforts during the term.
lie
flicked
through the pages: Latin, English, History, Geography, Art, Divinity, Games,
Headmaster. He read the last page; a small yellow sheet headed “Term Medical
Report.” It began: “Harry Hampton, Age ten, Height 4?
”,
weight 5 stone, 4 lbs.” He glanced up at Harry who looked as if he was about to
burst.

“It is true,
Dad, isn’t it?”

Charles read on
without answering the boy’s question. At the foot of the page was a typewritten
note signed by the school doctor. Charles read it twice before he understood
its fall significance, and then a third time:

“As requested,
I took a sample of Harry’s blood and analyzed it. The results show that Harry
shares a rare blood group....”

“Is it true,
Dad?” asked Harry yet again.

“Yes, my son,
it’s true.”

“I told you,
Dad, I knew I’d be top in the class. That means I’d be head of the next school
term. Just like YOU.”

“Just like me,”
said his father as he picked up the phone by his side and began to dial his
brother’s home number.

A
T THE LABOUR PARTY conference in October, Raymond delivered a
keynote speech on the state of the nation’s finances. He pressed the unions to
continue supporting their Government by keeping the twin evils of inflation and
unemployment at acceptable levels.

“Let us not
pass on three years of achievement to be squandered by a Conservative
Government,” he told the cheering delegates. “Brothers, I look forward to
presenting five more Labour budgets that will make it impossible for the Tories
to imagine a future victory at the polls.11

Raymond
received one of the rare standing ovations to be given to any Cabinet Minister
at a Labour Party conference. The delegates had never doubted his ability, and
over the years they had grown to respect his sincerity as well as his judgment.

Seven more days
passed before Simon addressed the Tory faithful at the Conservative Party
conference. By tradition, the Leader always receives a four to six-minute
standing ovation after he completes his speech on the final day. “He’d still
get four minutes,” said Pimkin to a colleague, “If he read them
Das Kapital
. “

Simon had spent
weeks preparing for the occasion since he was convinced this would be the last
conference before the election.
lie
was pleasantly
surprised to find Charles Harnpton coming forward with new ideas on tax reform
which he said he hoped might be considered for inclusion in the Leader’s speech
to the conference.

Charles had
recently been making useful contributions in the House during finance debates, and
Simon hoped that it would not be long before he would be willing to return to
the front bench. Simon did not agree with most of his colleagues, who felt that
his old rival had mellowed considerably during his time on the back benches. He
was too wary to accept that Charles had totally lost his ambition for high
office. But whatever his private misgivings, he desperately needed someone of
Charles’ ability to counter Raymond Gould at the Treasury. Simon included
Charles’s suggestions in the final draft of his speech and dropped him a
handwritten note of thanks. He received no reply.

On that Friday
morning in Brighton, in front of two thousand delegates, and millions more
watching on television, Simon presented a complete and detailed plan of what he
hoped to achieve when the Conservatives were returned to Government.

After the
peroration, the delegates duly rose for a genuine six-minute ovation. When the
noise had died down, Pimkin was heard to remark, “I think I made the right
decision.”

Sadness
overcame the House in its first week back when the aging Mr. Speaker Weatherill
suffered a heart attack and retired to the Lords. The Government’s overall
majority was only two at the time, and the Labour Party Chief Whip feared that
if they supplied the new Speaker from their own ranks and the Conservatives
were to retain the old Speaker’s safe seat the Government majority would cease
to exist. Simon reluctantly agreed that the Speaker should come from the
Conservatives’ own benches.

Charles Hampton
asked to be granted a private interview with the Chief Whip, who agreed to see
him without hesitation. Like Simon, he was hoping that Charles would now be
willing to rejoin the front bench and was merely approaching him as an
intermediary.

Everyone in the
Party was pleased that Charles had begun to regain his stature in the House
since his chairmanship of Standing Committees, and he seemed more popular now
than he had ever been.