The Barbershop Seven (141 page)

Of course, most people who had started watching had already changed channel, and Velure was getting edgy. They needed something to happen, and Patsy had already blown the sex card.

To the dismay of several of those present, Darius Grey, the new Minister for Health, had stolen the early part of the show, and had gone off on a passionate discourse on the future of health care in Scotland. It was politics at its most raw and socially responsible. Only Winona Wanderlip was impressed, but with every second that Grey spoke, she'd begun to realise that here was a genuine political challenger in their midst. The lad was only twenty-five, but it didn't mean that the press wouldn't grab him by the nostril hair, and start turning him into a
thing
.

As Bellows nodded sagely to another one of Grey's points, Mandy passed him a note.

Larry. Time to ask Longfellow-Moses about Hookergate!

Bellows glanced at the note and looked up at Grey. The young lad was slightly thrown by the note thing – lack of experience, you see – which was enough to allow Bellows to break into his flow on radicalising health care for the elderly.

'Well, I think we all agree with your thoughts on that. One for the future, eh, Jesse?' he said, turning back to JLM.

'Absolutely, champion,' said JLM. 'My first priority in government has always been to promote the ideas of the young. You see, it's my...'

'Yeah, great,' said Bellows. 'Now, one of the things that a lot of people have been talking about is the little matter of Hookergate.'

The smile froze on JLM's face, but he did his best to keep his shoulders straight, and his mouth turned up at the corners.

'Hell, it sounds like something Bill Clinton would've got involved in, but it happened right here in little old Scotland. Tell us all about it, Jesse.'

JLM looked down at the carpet, nodding, sorting out his persona, so that when he looked up he would be in character. He'd had a meeting earlier with Velure, and they'd agreed on a variety of subjects that would not be touched upon. Hookergate had been one of them. If Bellows was going to pull that one out the bag, nothing would be inviolable. JLM cast Velure a quick and vicious glance, which television picked up in all its beautiful scorn, then smiled at Bellows.

'You know as well as I, Larry,' he said, 'what the media are like, especially in this country. While we strive to bring serious issues to the breakfast tables of the people of Scotland, the press are more interested in pointless tittle-tattle, in helping to create political legends such as myself, only so they can knock them down again. The first battle of any government is with the media. That is why it is the first instrument to be taken under state control in dictatorships. But in democracies such as ours, it is time that the media realised their responsibilities, it is time that they matured into the freedoms which have been granted to them.'

'A lovely polemic, Jesse,' said Bellows, 'but to get back to the question in hand. Is it true you porked your secretary, then had her stiffed when she threatened to talk?'

JLM laughed. Minnie pulled herself away from him a little, lovely body language, and waited to hear the bluster with which he would answer.

'Preposterous!' barked JLM.

'So, why is it you've been unable to recruit a new secretary since Mrs Walters was killed in a mysterious automobile accident? Some say it's because no one will touch the position for fear of the same thing happening to them. You're the First Minister for Chrissake, surely you can get someone to work for you?'

JLM hesitated. This was going way further than even the press had gone. They hadn't been aware that he was without a secretary. Someone from the inner circle must have talked. And if they'd talked about that...

'Look,' said JLM, and Minnie was now a couple of feet away from him, staring intently, 'Veronica was a very dear and lovely woman. Very sweet, very, very dear.'

'You mean, she charged a lot for sex?' said Bellows. 'Am I picking you up right?'

Minnie sniggered.

'She was lovely,' said JLM, with especial emphasis, 'a very lovely, lovely person. I never, never, never had relations with her. Ever.'

'Sexual relations?' said Bellows.

'I never had relations,' said JLM. 'And I can assure you that I was absolutely devastated when I learned that she had died so tragically. Devastated.'

Bellows did his sage nod, wished he was having this discussion with a politician who mattered, if there's such a thing, then gave Minnie a look of immense sympathy, as though she had cancer or something.

'Minnie,' he said, 'you've stood by Jesse through these difficult times. Was there ever a moment when you thought, I've had enough? I'm just gonna blow this guy off?'

The camera closed in on Minnie. Here we go, thought most of the people in the room, and almost everybody still watching on television. The usual stand-by-your-man crap.

'Hell yes!' said Minnie. 'And don't look at me as though I had cancer, Bud! I know I should stand by my husband, and the last thing I would want is for anyone to think me disloyal. But when you've caught your husband with his face buried deep between another woman's thighs, well you find that loyalty stretched.'

'That wasn't Veronica!' sputtered JLM, which probably wasn't the best rejoinder.

'Hey, Cowboy!' said Bellows.

'Who was it then?' said Minnie, looking outraged, but actually delighted that JLM had been so stupid as to be sucked in.

'Maybe it was this trollop!' said James Eaglehawk who had, up until now, been unable to get a word in, was feeling a bit left out and was desperate for an opportunity. And as he said the words, he stepped forward, thrusting several full colour photographs of JLM and an unknown woman into the hands of the other combatants and in front of the camera.

'Wow!' said Bellows, very impressed. 'Getta loada these!'

'Who's this?' said Minnie, indignantly, but not actually in the least bit bothered.

'Well, clearly that isn't me in the photographs,' said JLM with a politician's ease for the lie, even though it blatantly was him in the photographs. 'I've never seen this woman before in my life.' Not in a couple of months at any rate.

'Hell!' said Bellows, 'you shouldn't be embarrassed, Jesse. You take a great photo!'

'Oh,' said JLM, not sure what to do now. Never one to look a compliment in the mouth.

'Well,' said Bellows, 'Minnie, let's take a moment here. Remember we're on live television.'

Bellows reached out and took hold of Minnie's hand. He knew how to work the scene. A brief moment of hyperactivity, then slow things down; let everyone relax a little, then crank it way back up again. A rollercoaster. Suddenly he wasn't doing political insight, he was Geraldo or Jerry Springer. This would play great back home, if they ever got to see it.

'You've just been shown photographs of your husband having unbelievable sex with another woman. Millions of people have just watched as you were publicly humiliated. This man you call your husband has just degraded you in front of the entire world. You have been humbled, stripped of your dignity, your reputation lies like canine poop in the dirt. He has demeaned and cheapened you, to the point where there's not a single viewer out there who will consider you any better than some slimy, pustulant bug, ready to be squished on the windshield of history. How does it feel?'

JLM wanted to interject but somehow the moment wasn't right, even for him. Minnie stared at the floor, head racing. She hadn't intended that it should all fall out quite like this. She wasn't thinking about her humiliation, of course. Couldn't give a damn about that. She was, like all the best political animals, trying to decide what was going to play best with the voting public. What was going to get her the most sympathy? Anger, forgiveness, tears, outright venom? Difficult to make a decision without a team of highly paid advisors giving her feedback.

'You tell him to stick it up his ass, darling!' said a voice from the back.

They turned. Veron Veron had risen to his feet. It talks!

'Veron!' said JLM.

'Who's the poof?' said Velure, off-camera.

Veron bristled, and pointed a crooked finger.

'You are so much better than him, darling, so much better. You have so got to walk away.'

Minnie said nothing, eyed Veron Veron up for a short while, then turned back to JLM.

'This is, like, who?' said Bellows.

'He's supposed to be my dresser,' said JLM, attempting to give Veron a bit of a death stare.

Minnie remained silent. She too, turned and gave Veron a bit of a death stare. He was meant to be keeping his mouth shut.

'I'm her lover!' Veron exclaimed violently to the world, delighted with the release of the truth.

A few jaws dropped. Minnie felt speared by the revelation and said nothing.

'Cool,' said Bellows. 'And we all had you pegged as totally homosexual.'

'Minnie?' said JLM, looking at her like a lost dog, desperately hurt. That man-thing which allowed him to have no end of sexual partners, but as soon as he found out about his wife having one, he was devastated.

'Oh for God's sake, Jesse,' she said. This wasn't going to plan. No point in her husband's credibility being shot to pieces live on TV, when the same thing was happening to her. 'Don't look at me like that. You've slept with every tart you've ever met in your entire life.'

'I have not!' he protested.

'Ha!' said Eaglehawk from the back, and with that he threw some more pictures of JLM and an assorted bag of women into the mix.

Bellows grabbed at some of them and held them up for the camera. There were hundreds of them. Hundreds of photographs and hundreds of women. Big women, small women, short and tall women, Indians and Chinese, brunettes and blondes, wildly attractive to downright bogmonsters, the full panoply of the Scottish melting pot. JLM had had sex with more women than, well, Eleanor Roosevelt.

Bellows turned and smiled at the camera, then looked back to Veron Veron, fascinated that this man actually slept with women. Veron Veron remained standing, full of indignation, at the back of the room.

'Jesus,' muttered JLM.

'You're really porking this guy?' said Bellows to Minnie, while turning some of the photos of JLM to the camera.

'I love her!' exploded Veron from the back, 'and she loves me!'

Minnie dropped her head into her hands. Breathe, breathe, breathe.

'This is fantastic,' said Velure to anyone who was listening.

Things were getting a little out of hand, but Larry Bellows had decided that maybe it was time to stir things up and let this crowd of loons completely implode. He could step in and pick up the pieces later on; this was going far further than he'd anticipated.

'Startling revelations,' said Bellows, more fuel to the fire. 'Would you like to take this opportunity to resign from the post of Prime Minister, Jesse?'

'I bloody well would not!' answered JLM, ignoring the slip. In fact, enjoying the slip. Prime Minister sounded good.

There were a few looks thrown his way. And again, as he was primed to do for every set of circumstances from now on, James Eaglehawk stepped into the fray, this time waving printed documentary evidence.

'Here's the proof!' he exclaimed. 'The proof that you, Jesse Longfellow-Moses, had Veronica Walters murdered. It's all here. You're a killer, Jesse. You're going to prison. Prison! You're finished!'

JLM rose to his feet to meet the challenge of Eaglehawk head on.

'It's lies!' he shouted. 'All lies! I will not be cowed by these monstrous allegations!'

'Come with me!' shouted Veron Veron to Minnie. 'Let's leave this place together and go to Mykinos.'

Minnie's head sank a little lower.

'What about me?' said a quiet voice, in amongst the tumult.

Everyone turned and looked at Rebecca Blackadder who, like most of the others, had been silent up until now. Barney Thomson glanced to his side. This had been fun right enough. Wouldn't have missed it for the world, even though it must've been making fair viewing on live TV. But he was a little disconcerted by what Blackadder might be about to say, and he raised an eyebrow at her.

'Don't,' said Minnie, looking round and shaking her head. Suddenly, having been in control, she was now on the verge of tears. Just as much as it was going belly up for Jesse, it was going down the pan big for Minnie. They were
all
coming out of the closet.

The audience looked from Blackadder to Minnie to Blackadder. Blackadder quickly glanced at Barney, a guilty look, squeezed his knee, then leant forward towards Minnie.

'Minnie,' she said, softly, 'forget the men, forget politics. You don't need any of it. We have each other.'

'Heeeeeeey!' said Larry Bellows. 'Lesbians. Coooooool! Did you know about this?' he said to JLM.

JLM was beginning to look a bit lost.

'No,' he croaked.

'Minnie?' said Veron Veron, desperately.

Barney sat back, looking with some awe at Rebecca Blackadder. You think you know some people, and then, poof! Up in smoke. But then, Hell, he had never known her. God, he didn't even know himself.

'I thought you were sleeping with Michael,' said Barney, rather bluntly.

A little gasp went round the crowd at this information. Blackadder turned to look at Barney, her eyes boring into him, angry and upset.

'How could I be?' she said. She swallowed, becoming overcome with the emotion of the moment; the emotion, in fact, of Michael's death. 'He was my brother.'

A moment's silence, and then another, bigger gasp around the room.

'You slept with your brother?' ejaculated Larry Bellows.

'No, of course I didn't sleep with him!' said Blackadder, and this time Minnie rose from her seat and crouched down beside Blackadder, and the two women cuddled in next to one another.

Veron Veron, for his part, was outraged. He stood aghast, millions of hurtful insults galloping towards his mouth at once, all catching in his throat. Eventually the wee fella decided he just wasn't going to be able to get any words out, and stormed from the room, with a swish, a fizzle and a swoosh.