“Cockatoo.”
“More like a lobster. Revolting, actually.” She looked down at a piece of shrivelled meat upon her plate. “I see we have very slim pickings.” Mrs. A. entered the room at this moment. “Ah, my good woman.” Lady Flaxman greeted her with what seemed to Harry to be artificial warmth.
“I am not your good woman. I will not be called a good woman in this house.”
“Only a turn of phrase.”
“There are turns of phrases and there are turns of phrases.” Mrs. A. picked up Lady Flaxman’s plate and returned to the kitchen, delighted with her sally.
“Your father,” Lady Flaxman said, “happened to mention something about retirement.” Harry began to listen more intently. “Absolute nonsense of course. Is he a shy violet?”
“He is about as shy as King Kong,” Guinevere replied.
“Precisely my point.”
Over the next few days Harry found out more about Asher Ruppta’s death; he also learned that “Miss Sally Palliser” had inherited the business until Ruppta’s son reached the age of twenty-one. He was anxious that her married name should not be published, so he decided to steer the story of Ruppta’s death in a more sensational direction. He had not forgotten his discovery of the financial relationship between Asher Ruppta and Cormac Webb. Now, with Ruppta gone, Flaxman had more or less invited him to pursue the story with additional vigour. Harry’s enthusiasm had been quickened by the fact that Webb had found himself again in government as parliamentary under-secretary at the Home Office. So Harry called in James Thorn, now chief political correspondent of the Chronicle.
Thorn was fatter than before, and had acquired a pretentiousness that might have been mistaken for gravity. He still wore pinstriped suits, and had a rose in his buttonhole. “How can I help you, old boy?”
“What do you think of Cormac Webb?”
“Webb is a coming man. A coming man.”
“He may not be coming for very long.”
“Oh?”
“He may be going. He’s put his hand in the till.”
“Is that so?” Thorn was always careful. He knew that Harry liked to disconcert him with a sudden remark or jibe. He retaliated by remaining as bland and as serene as he could manage. That annoyed Harry even more, so that the two men could reach a height of ill temper without either of them betraying the fact.
“I did a story, a few years back, about the connection between Webb and Asher Ruppta.”
“That was when you were a journalist.”
Harry was not sure if this was simply a statement of fact, or a barb. “It was a good one, too. The story stood up.”
“Why was it never published?”
“Pressure from above.” He raised his eyes to the ceiling.
“From God?”
“As good as.”
“I see.”
“But do you see?”
“Sir Martin, I suppose, had ‘business dealings’ with Ruppta.”
“So we couldn’t chase the connection between Webb and Ruppta.”
“Now that he’s dead—”
“It doesn’t matter. We can go after Webb.”
“You know that Webb is close to Harold Wilson, don’t you?”
“Yes. I did know that.”
“I don’t imagine that the prime minister will be very thrilled if the Chronicle makes a target of him.”
Harry supposed that Thorn wanted to protect himself, and that he would try at all costs to avoid provoking Downing Street. The world of political journalism was run on the lines of a mutual benefit society, where ministers and politicians tried to maintain the most agreeable relations.
“Have you ever heard,” Harry asked Thorn with a smile, “of the freedom of the press?”
“Of course.”
“It’s only a phrase. It doesn’t mean anything. But you can use it, can’t you?”
“I suppose it is an excuse.”
“That’s it. An excuse.”
“People do pretend to take it seriously.”
“Do they really? That is good news. So I want you to find out if Webb had any more recent dealings with Ruppta. Or with anyone else. I want to find out how bent he is.”
Thorn found the remark distasteful, but took care not to show it. “I know his secretary vaguely. Bright young man.”
“He wouldn’t want his future career spoiled, would he?”
“I sincerely doubt it. If I were to tell him of your previous suspicions—”
“Proven.”
“Then he might co-operate.”
“What’s his name?”
“Askisson.”
“Arrange to meet him for a drink.”
Thorn did not like being told what to do by a man whom, as he told his friends, he considered to be an “oik.” But he really had no alternative. “And then pour poison in his ear?”
“Something like that.”
A few hours later, Harry encountered Martin Flaxman in the executive lift; his father-in-law had indeed regained some of his energy. “Is there a bun in the oven?” Flaxman asked him. Harry must have seemed perplexed. “Is she up the spout yet?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so.” Harry did not want his father-in-law to know that they were no longer lovers.
“You don’t think so? What has thinking got to do with it? She needs an heir, doesn’t she? If you can’t do it, I’ll get in someone who can.” Harry looked at him in amazement. Flaxman chuckled, and held on to his arm with a strong grip. “Just joking.” And then he added, “I think.”
Harry returned to his office quickly. He was practically being accused of impotence. He was startled when the subject of his reverie stepped into the room; he quickly rose to his feet and knocked over his chair. “Ants in your pants?” Flaxman smiled at his discomfiture. “Not much else.”
Harry had the urge to blot this man out of existence. But he smiled back at him, and said nothing.
“I want you and Guinevere to come to dinner next week.”
“We would be delighted.”
“Oh? Would you?” He did not quite believe his son-in-law.
“Absolutely. Guinevere hasn’t seen you in weeks.”
“But she never did want to see me. Before she was married. Silly cow.”
Flaxman went over to the window, and looked down into Fleet Street. It was an overcast day of cold rain. Harry closed his eyes and envisaged his father-in-law hurtling downwards, past the grey and blackened bricks, onto the dark street below. He opened his eyes just as a pigeon fluttered and flew into the obscure sky.
Two days later James Thorn came into Harry Hanway’s office or, as he put it, “just dropped in for a chat.”
“I had a drink with Askisson last night.”
“Oh yes?”
“He is concerned, of course, about your allegations against Webb.”
“Not allegations. Facts. Known as ‘bribery and corruption.’ ”
Thorn thoroughly disliked the phrase. “He is worried, quite frankly. He would like to know where he stands.”
“And what does that mean in English?”
Thorn, used to dealing in well-oiled platitudes, was annoyed now by Harry’s sardonic manner. “Let me put it this way. He thinks that he may be able to help you.”
“So he knew about it already.”
“I wouldn’t go as far as that.”
“I would go further. He is involved.”
“Now that is going too far, Harry.”
“One of your favourite words, isn’t it? Far?” He pronounced it with an Harrovian accent.
Thorn glared at him, but Harry regarded him with calm indifferent eyes. “Does he want to meet?”
“I think so. He doesn’t trust the ’phone.”
“A born conspirator.”
They met beside the Thames, in front of the Royal Festival Hall, with Thorn as a somewhat unwilling third party. It was another leaden overcast day, and the river seemed to Harry to be grey and sluggish in the fading ligh
t. He could see at once that Stanley Askisson was nervous, but Askisson’s first question surprised him. “Do you have a brother called Daniel?”
“How did you know that?”
“I was with him at Cambridge. I was a friend of his.”
“Oh.”
“I hear that he’s doing well there now.”
“I haven’t seen him for years.” He had no intention of mentioning the meeting at their father’s funeral. “We’ve lost touch.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. We were never really close. Let’s get down to it, shall we?”
“I don’t know what you have learned about Cormac. But I had nothing to do with it.”
“What is ‘it’?”
“You tell me.”
Harry looked across the river at the dim northern bank, the water slipping away beneath the level of his vision. “Bribery. Corruption. Call it what you like.”
“I know nothing of that.” Askisson looked away as he said it, as if his attention had been drawn to something in the water.
“Of course not. But if at some point I were to ask you certain questions—”
“As long as my name is kept out of it.”
“I guarantee it.”
On the following morning he received a telephone call from Cormac Webb. “We’ve met before. More than once,” Webb said to him. “At Flaxman’s house—in the house of your father-in-law, I mean—I knew then that you were on the rise. I have a nose for things like that. You have all the right qualities.”
“Oh?”
“Boldness. Ruthlessness. Cruelty. Look at newspaper proprietors, Harry. Bastards.” Harry laughed. “In a world like that, we can’t afford to be meek and mild. Isn’t that so, Harry?”
“I wouldn’t know, Cormac.”
“Tiger tiger burning bright. That’s what you’ve got to be. In the forests of the night. I don’t think you really want to do me any harm, Harry.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“What’s in it for you?” That was true enough. “On the other hand, if I can help you—”
“What do you mean?”
“Calm down. Nothing illegal. As such. I might give you a lead. I might tip you off. Something of that sort. I could help you, for example, with a story about the prime minister.”
“Nothing libellous, I hope?”
“About Harold? Good heavens, no. Whatever gave you that idea?” Webb became more confidential. “It’s going to be the biggest story of the year. If I give it to you, then I need something in return. I need a guarantee that you will drop the absurd interest in my affairs. Then I might be prepared to help in future, you see.”
“I see.”
“If the story I give you turns out to be correct—which it will—then you know you can rely on me. Do you see what I’m offering you?”
Harry Hanway was aware that Webb was desperately anxious to conceal the bribes he took from Asher Ruppta. He could face criminal prosecution, even though Ruppta was dead. “So what is this news?”
“Do you accept my terms?”
Harry was becoming impatient. “Yes.”
“The prime minister is going to resign next week, citing pressure of work. But that’s not really the problem. His mind is going. There’s a word for it. Senility? Is that it? And there may be something else.”
“What?”
“We will have to discuss it privately.”
Harry, curiously enough, believed Webb. He trusted him to the extent of placing a story in the following day’s Chronicle in which it was insinuated that the prime minister had come to the conclusion that it was time to leave. Harold Wilson’s press secretary denied the “unfounded rumours” the next day. On the day following that, Harold Wilson resigned.
Cormac Webb telephoned Harry that afternoon. “Congratulations. Everyone is saying that you know more than the Cabinet Secretary.”
“I have good sources.”
“So you do. I have my promise, right?”
“Yes.” He paused for a moment. “When are we going to have that private meeting?”
“Whenever you wish.”
They met three evenings later, in a small Soho restaurant. “Did you ever read a story by Max Beerbohm called ‘Enoch Soames’?” Webb asked him.
“Not that I can remember.” In fact Harry had read very little of anything, but he was not about to admit that fact.
“Enoch Soames meets the devil in a Soho restaurant. This is the one.”
“Oh?” Harry looked around without interest.
“Soames was a minor poet who, after talking to the devil, made a pact with him. He would give him his soul in exchange for one favour. He wanted to return to life in a hundred years’ time—1996—and to find out if he had been remembered by posterity. He would appear in the Reading Room of the British Library and look up his name in the catalogues there. The devil agreed. The deal was done. And this was the point, you see. Enoch Soames had not been remembered at all. His name was absent from the catalogues, except for the titles of two books he had published at his own expense. There and then he is consigned to hell.” Webb looked around with satisfaction at the snug restaurant, with its red plush seats and its artfully shaded lamps. “You have to be careful whom you meet in restaurants.”
“I’ve known that for a long time.” They discussed small idle things for a while. “You said there may have been another reason for Wilson’s resignation?” Harry eventually asked him.
“A very interesting one. There may be a plot brewing.”
“What kind of plot?”
“Look around you. Everything is falling to pieces. Strikes everywhere. Unemployment rising through the roof. Inflation going up every month. It can’t be sustained.”
“You sound like a Tory.”
“These are just the facts of the matter. Everyone is aware of them.” He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “There are some people who propose a drastic solution.”
“What would that be? A general election?”
“Oh no. That wouldn’t do at all. The government might be returned. A smaller majority, perhaps. No. That would not be drastic at all.”
“What would?”
“A military coup.” Webb sat back in his chair and smiled broadly; his eyes widened, and he looked at Harry with evident interest.
“You aren’t serious.”
“Oh yes. Deadly serious. Harold believed that the army was ready to take over the government. So are others.” He leaned forward again, and whispered some names. “That’s why Harold resigned. He wanted to ward off the coup.”
“How many people know about this?”
“A few. The conspirators, naturally. Most of the Cabinet. Some senior civil servants. Two or three newspaper proprietors have been alerted.”
“Among them?”
“Your man? I don’t know.”
“So what do we do? What do you do?”
“We do nothing. We wait. They have already been unsettled by Harold’s departure. We watch and wait.”
After he had left the restaurant Harry walked along Old Compton Street. For the first time it seemed to him to be drab and unprepossessing, with all the signs of weariness and wear. This is what Cormac Webb had meant by “the facts of the matter.” There could be no doubt that the city was in decline; it looked wan and uncared for, its buildings in a bad state of repair, its inhabitants gloomy and irritable. This was a sullen time.
Three days later Harry and Guinevere Hanway were preparing for dinner with Sir Martin Flaxman. “Mummy says she won’t be coming. When you two get together you behave like fishwives. That’s what she says. Nothing but foul language.”
“She is quite good at that herself.”
“That’s not the point. According to her. A lady should still be treated like a lady.”
When they arrived at Cheyne Walk, however, they were surprised by the beaming presence of Lady Flaxman dressed in a low-cut red silk dress revealing the beginnings of the darknes
s between her scrawny breasts. “I’m so pleased that you could come,” she said to them both, “I haven’t seen you in an age.” She put out her cheek for Guinevere to kiss, but her daughter merely brushed it with her own. “Darling,” Lady Flaxman said to Harry, “I do think that you have put on a little weight. It can’t be that woman’s cooking.”
Sir Martin stood by the fireplace, his hands clenched behind his back; he was rocking slightly, backwards and forwards, as if he were about to take a spring. “Here she comes,” he said. “The bartered bride.”
“Good evening, Father.”
“And here is my favourite son-in-law.”
“If you can’t say anything nice, Martin, don’t say anything at all.”
“I am nice, Maud. Nice as pie.” Sir Martin poured the drinks, and made a point of filling the glasses to the brim. “May I propose a toast,” he said, “for the cure of barrenness.” Guinevere blushed.
Harry resisted the urge to hit him. “A quick word, sir?”
“Well, darling,” Lady Flaxman said to her daughter, “the fighters are in the ring. There will be blood on the floor. I see it coming. And we have ringside seats. Aren’t we lucky?”
“I have had a talk with Cormac Webb,” Harry was saying. “He told me about a coup. Have you heard anything about it?”
“Coup? As in military coup?”
“That’s it.”
“What bloody coup? Nobody tells me anything.”
“The army against the government. Mountjoy. Hatton. Burleigh.”
“Toy soldiers. No lead in their pants. They couldn’t arrange a picnic, let alone a coup. Does Webb believe this nonsense?”
“It seems so.”
“He is a cunt. Don’t trust anything he says.”
“I have had some confirmation.”
“Oh?”
Harry whispered something to him but, to his evident discomfiture, Flaxman burst out laughing. “They talk about coups,” he said, “because they have nothing better to do. They are pathetic. They are just posturing.”
“I don’t know if there is a word for it,” Lady Flaxman said, “but things keep on disappearing in this house.”
“What do you mean, Mother?”
“Little things. Handkerchiefs. Earrings. Only the other day I put down a small pair of scissors and, when I turned round, it was gone.”
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