Best Kept Secret

by Jeffrey Archer

  The Bishop of Bristol, the Right Reverend Frederick Cockin, has agreed to act as moderator at an election debate to be held at Colston Hall next Thursday, May 19th at 7.30 p.m. Major Alex Fisher, the Conservative candidate, and Mr Reginald Ellsworthy, the Liberal candidate, have both agreed to take part. Sir Giles Barrington, the Labour candidate, has not yet responded to our invitation.

  ‘I still think you should ignore it,’ said Griff.

  ‘But look at the picture on the front page,’ said Giles, thrusting the paper back into his agent’s hands.

  Griff looked at the photograph, which showed an empty chair in the middle of the stage at Colston Hall with a spotlight beamed on to it, above a caption that read: Will Sir Giles turn up?

  ‘Surely you see,’ said Giles, ‘if I don’t turn up, they’ll have a field day.’

  ‘And if you do, they’ll have a heyday.’ Griff paused. ‘But it’s your choice, and if you’re still determined to be there, we have to turn this situation to our advantage.’

  ‘How do we do that?’

  ‘You’ll issue a press statement at seven o’clock tomorrow morning, so we get the headlines for a change.’

  ‘Saying?’

  ‘Saying that you’re delighted to accept the challenge, because it will give you an opportunity to expose Tory policies for what they’re worth, and at the same time let the people of Bristol decide who is the right man to represent them in Parliament.’

  ‘What made you change your mind?’ asked Giles.

  ‘I’ve been looking at the latest canvass returns, and they suggest you’re likely to lose by over a thousand votes, so you’re no longer the favourite, you’re now the challenger.’

  ‘What else can go wrong?’

  ‘Your wife could make an appearance, take a seat in the front row and ask the first question. Then your girlfriend turns up and slaps her in the face, in which case you needn’t worry about the Bristol Evening Post because you’ll be on the front page of every paper in the country.’

  23

  GILES TOOK HIS seat on the stage to loud applause. His speech to the packed hall could hardly have gone better, and speaking last had turned out to be an advantage.

  The three candidates had all arrived half an hour early, and then waltzed around each other like schoolboys attending their first dance class. The bishop, acting as moderator, finally brought them together and explained how he intended to conduct the evening.

  ‘I will invite each of you to make an opening speech, which mustn’t last longer than eight minutes. After seven minutes, I will ring a bell.’ He gave a demonstration. ‘I’ll ring it a second time after eight minutes, to show that your time is up. Once you’ve all delivered your speeches, I will open the meeting to questions from the floor.’

  ‘How will the order be decided?’ asked Fisher.

  ‘By the drawing of straws.’ The bishop then held out three straws in a clenched fist and invited each candidate to pick one.

  Fisher drew the short straw.

  ‘So you will be opening the batting, Major Fisher,’ said the bishop. ‘You will go second, Mr Ellsworthy, and, Sir Giles, you will go last.’

  Giles smiled at Fisher and said, ‘Bad luck, old chap.’

  ‘No, I wanted to go first,’ protested Fisher, causing even the bishop to raise an eyebrow.

  When the bishop led the three men on to the stage at 7.25 p.m, it was the only time that night when everyone in the hall applauded. Giles took his seat and looked down at the packed audience. He estimated that over a thousand members of the public had turned up to watch the jousting.

  Giles knew that each of the three parties had been issued with 200 tickets for their supporters, which left some 400 undecided votes to be played for; just about his majority at the last election.

  At 7.30 p.m., the bishop opened proceedings. He introduced the three candidates, then invited Major Fisher to deliver his opening address.

  Fisher made his way slowly to the front of the stage, placed his prepared speech on the lectern and tapped the microphone. He delivered his words nervously, keeping his head down, clearly fearful of losing his place.

  When the bishop rang the bell to indicate that he had one minute left, Fisher began to speed up, which caused him to stumble over his words. Giles could have told him it was a golden rule that if you have been allocated eight minutes, you prepare a seven-minute speech. It’s far better to end slightly early than to be stopped in the middle of your peroration. Despite this, when Fisher returned to his seat he was rewarded with prolonged applause from his supporters.

  Giles was surprised when Reg Ellsworthy rose to present the Liberal case. He didn’t have a prepared speech, or even a list of headings to remind him what subjects he should concentrate on. Instead, he chatted about local issues, and when the one-minute bell went, he stopped in the middle of a sentence and returned to his seat. Ellsworthy had achieved something Giles would have thought impossible; he’d made Fisher look good. Nevertheless, a fifth of those assembled still cheered their champion.

  Giles rose to a warm reception from his two hundred supporters, although large sections of the crowd sat on their hands. Something he’d become familiar with whenever he addressed the government benches. He stood by the side of the lectern, only occasionally glancing at his notes.

  He began by describing the Conservatives’ failures in office, and outlining what the Labour Party’s policies would be should it form the next government. He then touched on local issues, and even managed a dig about pavement politics at the expense of the Liberals, which brought laughter from the packed hall. By the time he’d come to the end of his speech, at least half the audience were applauding. If the meeting had ended then, there would have been only one winner.

  ‘The candidates will now take questions from the floor,’ announced the bishop, ‘and I hope this will be done in a respectful and orderly manner.’

  Thirty of Giles’s supporters leapt up and threw their hands in the air, all of them with well-prepared questions calculated to assist their candidate and undermine the other two. The only problem was that sixty other equally determined hands also shot up at the same time.

  The bishop was astute enough to have identified where the three different blocks of supporters were sitting, and skilfully selected non-partisan members of the general public who wanted to know such things as where the candidates stood on the introduction of parking meters in Bristol, which gave the Liberal candidate a chance to shine; the end of rationing, which they all approved of; and the proposed extension of the electrification of the railways, which didn’t advance anyone’s cause.

  But Giles knew that eventually an arrow would be shot in his direction, and he would have to make sure it didn’t hit the target. Finally he heard the bow twang.

  ‘Could Sir Giles explain why he visited Cambridge more times during the last parliament than he did his own constituency?’ asked a tall, thin, middle-aged man, whom Giles thought he recognized.

  Giles sat still for a moment while he composed himself. He was just about to rise from his place when Fisher shot up, clearly not surprised by the question, while assuming everyone present knew exactly what the questioner was alluding to.

  ‘Let me assure everyone in this hall,’ he said, ‘that I will be spending far more time in Bristol than in any other city, whatever the distractions.’

  Giles looked down to see rows of blank faces. It seemed the audience had no idea what Fisher was talking about.

  The Liberal candidate rose next. He clearly missed the point, because all he had to say was, ‘Being an Oxford man, I never visit the other place unless I have to.’

  A few people laughed.

  Giles’s two opponents had supplied him with the ammunition to fire back. He stood and turned to face Fisher.

  ‘I feel bound to ask Major Fisher, if he intends to spend more time in Bristol than in any other city, does that mean that were he to win next Thursday, he won’t be going up to London to take his seat
in the House of Commons?’

  Giles paused to wait for the laughter and applause to die down, before adding, ‘I’m sure I don’t have to remind the Conservative candidate of the words of Edmund Burke. “I was elected to represent the people of Bristol in Westminster, not the people of Westminster in Bristol.” That’s one Conservative I’m wholeheartedly in agreement with.’ Giles sat down to sustained applause. Although he knew he hadn’t really answered the question, he felt he’d got away with it.

  ‘I think there’s time for just one more question,’ said the bishop, and pointed to a woman seated in the middle of the hall about halfway back, who he felt confident was neutral.

  ‘Can each of the three candidates tell us where their wives are tonight?’

  Fisher sat back and folded his arms, while Ellsworthy looked puzzled. Eventually, the bishop turned to Giles and said, ‘I think it’s your turn to go first.’

  Giles stood and looked directly at the woman.

  ‘My wife and I,’ he began, ‘are currently involved in divorce proceedings, which I hope will be settled in the near future.’

  He sat down to an uncomfortable silence.

  Ellsworthy jumped up and said, ‘I have to admit that since I’ve become the Liberal candidate I haven’t managed to find anyone who’s willing to go out with me, let alone marry me.’

  This was greeted by peals of laughter and warm applause. Giles thought for a moment that Ellsworthy might have helped to lessen the tension.

  Fisher slowly rose to his feet.

  ‘My girlfriend,’ he said, which took Giles by surprise, ‘who has joined me here this evening and is sitting in the front row, will be by my side for the rest of the campaign. Jenny, why don’t you stand up and take a bow.’

  An attractive young woman rose, turned to face the audience, and gave them a wave. She was greeted with a round of applause.

  ‘Where have I seen that woman before?’ whispered Emma. But Harry was concentrating on Fisher, who hadn’t returned to his seat and clearly had more to say.

  ‘I thought it might also be of interest for you to know that this morning I received a letter from Lady Barrington.’

  A silence descended on the hall that none of the candidates had achieved all evening. Giles was sitting on the edge of his seat as Fisher produced a letter from an inside jacket pocket. He slowly unfolded it and began to read.

  ‘“Dear Major Fisher, I write to express my admiration for the gallant campaign you are waging on behalf of the Conservative Party. I wanted to let you know that if I were a citizen of Bristol, I would not hesitate to vote for you, as I believe you are by far the best candidate. I look forward to seeing you take your seat in the House of Commons. Yours sincerely, Virginia Barrington.”’

  Pandemonium broke out in the hall, and Giles realized that all he’d achieved in the past hour had evaporated in a single minute. Fisher folded up the letter, slipped it back into his pocket and returned to his place. The bishop tried valiantly to bring the meeting back to order, while Fisher’s followers continued to cheer and cheer, leaving Giles’s supporters to look on in despair.

  Griff had been proved right. Never give your opponent a platform.

  ‘Have you managed to buy back any of those shares?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Benny, ‘Barrington’s are still riding high on the back of the better than expected annual profits, and the expectation that the Tories will increase their majority at the election.’

  ‘What’s the share price standing at now?’

  ‘Around four pounds seven shillings, and I can’t see it dropping in the near future.’

  ‘How much do we stand to lose?’ asked Fisher.

  ‘We? Not we,’ said Benny, ‘only you. Lady Virginia won’t lose anything. She sold all her shares at a far higher price than she originally paid for them.’

  ‘But if she doesn’t buy them back, I’ll lose my place on the board.’

  ‘And if she did buy them back, she’d have to pay a hefty premium, and I imagine she wouldn’t be happy about that.’ Benny waited for a few seconds before adding, ‘Try to look on the bright side, major. By this time next week, you’ll be a Member of Parliament.’

  The following day, the two local papers didn’t make good reading for the sitting member. Hardly a mention of Giles’s speech, just a large photograph of Virginia on the front page, looking her most radiant, with a copy of her letter to Fisher printed underneath.

  ‘Don’t turn the page,’ said Griff.

  Giles immediately turned the page to find the latest poll, predicting that the Tories would increase their majority by twenty-three seats. Bristol Docklands was eighth on the list of Labour marginals most likely to fall to the Conservatives.

  ‘There’s not a lot a sitting member can do when the national tide turns against his party,’ said Griff, once Giles had finished reading the article. ‘I reckon a damn good member is worth an extra thousand votes, and a poor opposing candidate can lose a thousand, but frankly, I’m not even sure an extra couple of thousand will be enough. But that won’t stop us fighting for every last vote until nine o’clock on Thursday night. So make sure you never let your guard down. I want you out on the streets shaking hands with anything that moves. Except Alex Fisher. If you come across that man, you have my permission to throttle him.’

  ‘Have you managed to buy back any Barrington’s shares?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, major. They never once fell below four pounds and three shillings.’

  ‘Then I’ve lost my place on the board.’

  ‘I think you’ll find that was always part of Barrington’s plan,’ said Benny.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It was Sandy McBride who picked up your shares the moment they came on the market, and he’s been the main buyer for the past twenty-one days. Everyone knows he’s Barrington’s broker.’

  ‘The bastard.’

  ‘They obviously saw you coming, major. But it’s not all bad news, because Lady Virginia made a profit of over seventy thousand pounds on her original investment, so I reckon she owes you one.’

  Giles couldn’t have worked any harder during the final week of the campaign, even if at times he felt like Sisyphus pushing his boulder up a hill.

  When he turned up at campaign headquarters on the eve of the poll, it was the first time he’d seen Griff looking depressed.

  ‘Ten thousand of these were dropped into letterboxes right across the constituency last night, just in case anybody might have missed it.’

  Giles looked at a reproduction of the front page of the Bristol Evening Post with Virginia’s photograph above her letter to Fisher. Underneath it were the words: If you want to be represented in Parliament by an honest and decent man, vote Fisher.

  ‘That man’s a piece of shit,’ said Griff. ‘And he’s been dumped right on top of us from a great height,’ he added as one of the first volunteers strolled in carrying the morning papers.

  Giles slumped back in his chair and closed his eyes. But a moment later he could have sworn he heard Griff laughing. He was laughing. He opened his eyes and Griff passed him a copy of the Daily Mail. ‘It’s going to be close, my boy, but at least we’re back in the race.’

  Giles didn’t immediately recognize the pretty girl on the front page, who had just been chosen to star in The Benny Hill Show. Jenny had told the showbiz correspondent about the job she’d been doing before she got her big break.

  ‘I was paid ten pounds a day to escort a Tory candidate around his constituency, and tell everyone I was his girlfriend.’

  Giles didn’t think it was a very good photograph of Fisher.

  Fisher swore out loud when he saw the front page of the Daily Mail.

  He drained his third cup of black coffee and got up to leave for campaign headquarters, just as he heard the morning post landing on the mat. Any letters would have to wait until tonight, and he would have ignored them if he hadn’t spotted one with the Barrington’s company crest on it. He bent down,
picked it up and returned to the kitchen. He tore it open and extracted two cheques, one made out to him, for £1,000, his quarterly payment as a director of Barrington’s, the second for £7,341, Lady Virginia’s annual dividend, also made out to ‘Major Alexander Fisher’ so that no one would know it was her 71⁄2 per cent stockholding that made it possible for him to be on the board. No longer.

  When he got back this evening, he would make out a cheque for the same amount and send it on to Lady Virginia. Wondering if it was too early to phone her, he checked his watch. It was a few minutes past eight, and he was meant to be standing outside Temple Meads meeting voters as they came out of the station on their way to work. Surely she would be awake by now. He picked up the phone and dialled a Kensington number.

  It rang several times before a sleepy voice came on the line. He nearly put the phone down.

  ‘Who is this?’ Virginia demanded.

  ‘It’s Alex Fisher. I thought I’d call to let you know I’ve sold all your Barrington’s stock, and you’ve made a profit of over seventy thousand.’ He waited for a thank you, but nothing was forthcoming. ‘I wondered if you had any plans to buy back your shares?’ he asked. ‘After all, you’ve made a handsome return since I’ve been on the board.’

  ‘And so have you, major, as I’m sure I don’t have to remind you. But my plans for the future have changed somewhat, and they no longer include Barrington’s.’

  ‘But if you don’t buy back your seven and a half per cent, I’ll forfeit my place on the board.’

  ‘I won’t be losing a lot of sleep over that, major.’

  ‘But I wondered, given the circumstances . . .’

  ‘What circumstances?’

  ‘Whether you might consider a small bonus would be appropriate,’ he said, looking down at the cheque for £7,341.

  ‘How small?’

  ‘I thought, perhaps five thousand pounds?’