Children of the Master

by Andrew Marr

‘You mean you don’t think I’ll win?’

  ‘I’m no’ saying that … Well, not quite. It’ll be hard, obviously. Those guys from London … I’m just saying … What about the kids? You’re barely ever home at the moment, and when you are, you’re like a great big grumbly bear with a sore head. This … this is all numbers and tactics … doing folk down … putting the best face on. Is that how you want to live your life? Do you actually want a family, big man?’

  Davie grunted. This could go either way. Mary’s temperature was rising, and he could see a full-blown row blowing in his direction. He was too damned tired for that. ‘Hey, darling. Wheesht. I know I’ve been an annoying bugger recently. Aye, a bear. It’s been a hard pounding, you know, down the road. I’ve got more than a hundred employees dependent upon me’ – he stabbed his chest with a squat finger. ‘That’s a lot of families, a lot of bread on a lot of tables. And it’s harder getting the contracts in than it used to be. There’s less and less money coming through the council. Everybody’s squeezed by the banks. Bloody taxman’s on my back too, emails every week. So aye, I know I look like I’m not noticing, not listening. And sweetheart, I’m sorry. But see here, if I get a new start, in politics, all of that’ll be off my shoulders. The boys in the office are well capable of dealing with it.

  ‘I know politics is a mad business, but look at it this way.’ (I’m making a bloody speech, he thought. Good tactics? Bad tactics? Hell, but it has to be said.) ‘The kids carry on here, nothing changes, except that they get regular stays in London – and that can’t be bad for them. I go down there and I work my arse off, we don’t have any scratchy moments, and then I’m home at the weekends and we can enjoy ourselves. The old days again. Play our cards right, and we’ll end up living down there at least some of the time. A whole new life.’

  As he’d been talking, Mary had started to comb out her hair, never a good sign. ‘You mean you’ll be down there having the time of your life, dandering about – gadding – up to all sorts. I’ll be left up here alone with the ironing. Where’s my company? Where’s my life? What about our marriage?’

  ‘You’ve got Mum – you like her. And you never see me during the week anyway. Not properly. You spend all your time thinking about the boys. All you’ll do is swap a grumpy, distracted builder for a rising young politician, spreading his wings.’

  ‘As long as it’s only your wings. And by the way, do bears have wings?’ He could see that she wasn’t entirely convinced, but at least there was now a half-smile on her face. Storm ducked. Davie yanked down his boxers and slid under the covers. After a few moments of tense waiting, he moved his arm across and began to stroke Mary’s left breast through her nightie. She groaned, exhaled and turned towards him …

  ‘Brace yourself, Janet.’ The old joke. But just at that moment a loud musical clang echoed up the stairs.

  ‘Jesus Christ almighty. Who’s that at this hour?’

  ‘Well I’m not bloody going,’ said Mary. ‘Your dressing gown’s hanging in the bathroom.’

  Pulling it around him as he hopped down the hallway, Davie saw a tall silhouette in the frosted glass of the front door. He had a nasty suspicion that he recognised it.

  ‘Ah – Mr White. This is a bit of a surprise. Er, late, and all …’

  ‘I’ve never come across a politician who sneaks off to bed at this hour, Mr Petrie. Take it I’m welcome?’ Murdoch White pushed his way into the house, pulled off his wet overcoat and made himself at home in the front room. ‘Newsnight’s still on, man. A small one would do fine.’

  Davie gave in without even trying to fight. He went upstairs to pull some clothes back on. Mary was lying under the duvet, and didn’t respond when he explained. She just lay there, pretending to be asleep.

  Downstairs, White had given up on the telly and turned the sound down. He drained his whisky, and turned to Petrie. ‘Things all right upstairs?’

  ‘Oh, yes. We tend to turn in early.’

  ‘Well that’s going to stop, I can promise you. But I mean, things all right – you know – in the bedroom department?’

  ‘Mr White!’

  ‘Oh, I know, not my business. But you see, Mr Petrie, it is now. In a way, that’s why I’m here. On paper, and at first impression, you seem to me to be an absolutely ideal candidate, a man who can help revive our party and bring it back to power. We have faith in you. Some important people know your name. Now, that’s a big thing I’m saying.’

  ‘Aye, and you know I’m grateful, Mr White …’

  ‘But if we’re going to put in the time, and the energy, and who knows, the money as well, to help your career, David Petrie, we need to be sure that you can go the distance. Being in politics is a lot like being a top-flight sportsman. We can’t have any distractions. If it turns out that you’re a secret homo, or you bash yourself off to kiddie porn, I need to know now. Even if you and your wife are fighting all the time – that’ll weaken you for what’s ahead.

  ‘You need to be a good sleeper. You don’t have to have a clear conscience, but you do have to be able to put it to one side. You need to eat well, and to have no more than one or two drinks a day. You need energy, strength, oomph. Forgive me, but you need to be able to crap regularly. More politicians have been pulled down by irregular bowel habits and poor sleeping patterns, just being a bit pasty and weary, than by all the clever ploys of their enemies. So I need to know you inside out. Are you clean, man? Are you strong? What’s behind that shiny pink young face?’

  And I thought I made speeches, Davie thought. ‘Jesus, Mr White, you make it sound like I’m joining the SAS or MI6. I thought I was just trying to be a Labour candidate.’

  ‘Oh, you can be a Labour candidate without our help, if you’re tough enough and wily enough. You can probably become a Labour MP without our help. You might even rise to be a junior minister one day – you’ve got what that takes. But I thought I’d made it clear to you that I’m talking about something different. Something a bit more interesting. I want you to be able to go all the way. And that’s not like the SAS, it’s like running a marathon every week of the year. As far as MI6 is concerned, then sure, you’re going to need a brilliant memory and a talent for skulduggery, and always to be the best observer in the room. The shrewdest. The most attentive. Does all that put you off? Does it frighten you, Petrie?’

  Davie realised that he was sitting on the edge of his own sofa, his back upright, while Murdoch White sprawled; he seemed to himself like a little boy at an interview. So he went over to the sideboard and poured himself a glass of wine, forcing himself not to offer the older man a top-up.

  ‘No, Mr White, it doesn’t frighten me. I’m happily married. No skeletons. I’ve got a pair of good kids – too old for ADHD, too young for drugs. I have the odd glass, but no problems there. As to fit, well, I don’t go to the gym or anything like that, but if you’ve ever tried to run a building company, you’ll know you need to be a pretty tough physical specimen. I think I am. Tough. Pay attention. If I remember rightly, you won your first by-election with a majority of just 2,224.’

  Murdoch White, for the first time, shifted slightly in his seat. ‘I did. But what’s that got to do …’

  ‘Which you increased to 6,550 at the general election two years later. Memory. Or at least a head for numbers. No, I think you and your friends – about whom I’m increasingly curious, by the way – have put your chips down in the right place.’

  The two men sat silently, staring at each other, neither smiling.

  Petrie stood up again. Where was Mr White staying tonight, he asked politely.

  ‘Where? Here, I hope. You’ve got a spare room, surely, in a big house like this?’

  There was a beat. The clock ticked.

  ‘OK, sure. Just as long as you’re not going to monitor my visits to the lavatory.’

  Murdoch White laughed. Davie showed him to a small room next to the two boys’. After climbing into the narrow bed he lit a cigarette, strictly forbidden by Mary Petrie,
before going to sleep.

  As Davie returned to bed he thought, ‘The man sleeping in my spare room was once one of the most powerful men in the country. George W. Bush knew him by name. He’s addressed the United Nations. And now he’s in my house. Am I ready for this?’

  David the Ruthless

  Study weakness, particularly in your friends.

  The Master

  Mary certainly wasn’t ready. The following morning she listened to her husband’s explanation of their unexpected guest’s presence with an expressionless face. She made breakfast for Mr White, with the minimum of words and a few tight smiles. Fergus was hammering a football up and down the corridor, a tiny freckled fury in a Celtic shirt, while Callum sat at the kitchen table, swinging his feet and eyeing their visitor.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘My name is Mr Murdoch White. I’m a friend of your daddy’s.’

  ‘That’s a silly name. And no you’re no’. Why are you staying in the spare room?’

  ‘I’m in the Labour Party, like your daddy. And we’re going to make your daddy a very important man. Would you like that, Callum?’

  ‘My daddy’s already got a heid the size o’ an elephant’s arse. That’s what Mr Smedley says. Mr Smedley’s a teacher. And he’s a coon … a coon … a …’

  ‘A councillor, Callum,’ said Mary Petrie, without the ghost of a smile.

  But Callum was now in full flow. ‘Mr Smedley’s my teacher and he’s a coonsollar, and he disnae like Daddy. We call him Mr Smelly.’

  ‘That’s a bit rude, young man,’ said Murdoch White.

  ‘Well, he is smelly. He’s got a smelly bum. He says everybody’s got a smelly bum. But they don’t.’

  Suddenly concentrating, White pushed his plate away. ‘This Mr Smedley. Does he ever – touch you, Callum?’

  ‘For goodness’ sake, Mr White, let the boy alone,’ said Mary, her face crimson.

  ‘No, he’s just smelly. But he rubs his thing. He doesn’t think we can see, but we can. He sits behind his desk and he rubs his thing.’

  Mary gaped. Murdoch White smiled, and took out a small notebook from his jacket pocket. At this point a bleary Davie arrived in the kitchen. He had a list longer than his arm of people to see, but he had to get down to the office first, and check that everything was moving forward. There were still houses to be built.

  White turned to him. ‘So. Councillor Smedley. The teacher. A Labour man, of course – couldn’t be anything else, around here.’

  ‘Aye, Wally Smedley. Smelly Smedley, the kids call him. Been around for years. No friend of mine, but.’

  ‘Oh, I think you’ll find he’s going to be a great supporter.’

  ‘Wally Smedley? With respect, Mr White, you don’t have the local knowledge. I’m telling you, he’s not one of ours.’

  ‘With respect, Mr Petrie, I think you’ll find that I do, and that he is. Just ask your most observant son here.’ He left to go upstairs, ruffling Callum’s hair as he went.

  ‘I don’t like your new friend, Dad.’

  Davie arrived at the newly built two-storey office behind the superstore where his business was now based. Waiting for him on his desk were the minutes of the last meeting of the planning committee, with half a dozen paragraphs highlighted in bright-green marker pen. His secretary had left a few ‘must read’ emails on his screen. The timber suppliers in Alloa hadn’t been paid, again. The local bank had closed and there was now a useless head office up in Glasgow, but Davie had a private number, and spent a stressful but useful few minutes on the phone. A foreman had phoned in sick. One of the bungalows in James Murphy Close was taking in water after the heavy rain.

  It took him an hour to escape. A routine morning. Success was delegation, he reminded himself – delegation with just a whiff of fear behind it.

  Back at the house, Murdoch White had returned downstairs, established that the boys had left for school, and asked for another round of toast. After he’d scraped his plate and she’d made a second pot of tea, Mary finally asked him, with impeccable good manners, how long he hoped to be staying with them.

  ‘Well, I’ve got a life of my own, Mrs Petrie. I wanted to get back to Arran, but I think I’ll stop here for as long as Davie needs me. I have to keep an eye on things, don’t I? Just so long as the contest’s hanging in the balance. Say – a month?’

  Mary Petrie was quite a woman. She had taken nervous horses over high stone walls. She’d played on in a hockey match for half an hour with a cracked shinbone. She’d won an essay prize at university by not sleeping for a week. She’d shut her ears to the protests of her distraught parents so she could marry a hairy-arsed builder from the grotty little town she now lived in. She’d given birth twice without an epidural – not even gas and air. But in all her long life Mary Petrie would never do anything as remarkable as she did now. What she did was – nothing. She didn’t reply. Nor did she gasp, goggle, throw the teapot or scream. She just gently replaced a carton of milk in the fridge, and began to rub away the marks around the sink. Then – ‘A month it is, Mr White,’ she said. ‘If you can stand us, you will eat with the family. But no more smoking in this house, if you please.’

  Taking her measure, the former foreign secretary stood and nodded. ‘Here’s my proposition, then,’ he said. ‘I will stay until your husband has been selected as the prospective parliamentary candidate for Glaikit. On the evening of the general election I will come back and accept a glass of whisky, and light one small cigarette. Agreed?’

  ‘Agreed,’ said Mary. ‘And while you’re here, you can help the boys with their homework, too.’

  ‘Your boys, Mrs Petrie, are very vigorous, and seem quite intelligent. But I’m afraid they are beyond help.’

  When Davie returned to the house, he put his iPad on the kitchen table.

  ‘Mr White, I’ve made a kind of wee spreadsheet. All the party members in the five branches who really matter. Here are the ones who I know will back me whatever happens. Here are the ones we need to win over. In the last column there are just a few notes. Nothing much.’

  ‘Well, we’re off and running then,’ said White. ‘I’m going to go down to the council building and sniff around a bit. You can find me at the Wallace Bar at lunchtime.’

  ‘The Wallace? That’s a bit rough for the likes of you, Mr White.’

  ‘It’s where the union boys drink. At least it was ten years ago, the last time I passed through this godforsaken hole. And I’m a Crusade man myself. Fully paid up. Happened when the bastards gobbled up the draughtsmen’s union. Buy you a pint of 80 Shillings if you happen to stop by.’

  ‘No, I don’t think so, Mr White. I wouldn’t be welcome there. But I thought the idea was that you were going to come around with me.’

  ‘You need to be seen by yourself. Make some good, strong, one-to-one contacts. If I show up in somebody’s front room, I’ll be the centre of attention. That’s no good. So you go off and do your thing, Mr Petrie. Unless I’m badly mistaken, you’ll do it very well. And then come down to the Wallace and have a pie and a pint, and tell me all about it, and meet the boys. I’ll have warmed them up nicely for you. Promise.’

  And indeed, Petrie had been around long enough to know the drill. When a politician enters a house looking for support, what’s the first thing he doesn’t do? He doesn’t talk about politics.

  He began with a retired couple, long-standing party members and well respected in the city centre branch, where he had least support. ‘No point trying to pull the wool over your eyes; you know why I’m here,’ he told them at the doorstep. After he’d been invited in, his eyes flicked desperately around the living room for the photographs. Yes, there they were. A middle-aged couple in the sunshine, somewhere abroad – could be Australia, could be South Africa – but not dressed for a holiday. And another picture, of a grinning boy and girl with dirty knees, in the sweatshirts of the local school. So, one grown-up child overseas. Don’t see them enough. Cost of air travel. Prestwick. A
nd another one who still lived nearby, hence the grandkids. The local school – that was the way in.

  ‘Those two look a bit older than my Callum, but he loves it there. Whose are they?’

  ‘They’re our youngest, Katy’s. They’re a wild pair, but they’re lovely kids. They come around every weekend. The swings. A kickabout in the park. Poor George is going to give himself a heart attack with those kids one day. But you wouldn’t have it any other way, would you George?’ George looked uncertain, but nodded dutifully.

  ‘And didn’t I hear that your older girl went off abroad and made something of herself?’ said Davie, guessing wildly.

  ‘Aye, she married a computer whiz-kid from Dundee, and they’re off in San Francisco, living the high life. No kids. She Skypes us every week, and that’s great, but we hardly ever see her.’

  ‘Skype, eh? Didn’t have you down as a computer guru, George.’

  George raised his mottled, hound-dog face. ‘I’m no guru, Mr Petrie. But even though I’m retired, I haven’t got all day. Let’s cut to the bloody chase, shall we? You want to be our candidate?’ With that, he began to cough uncontrollably.

  ‘Aye, I do. Because the local hospital’s bloody useless, George, and you know it as well as I do,’ said Davie, revelling in his own quickness.

  A quarter of an hour later, after consuming some home-made gingerbread and a mug of tea, David Petrie felt he had them in his pocket. There was always the danger that some big figure from London might arrive and blow them over, but they seemed too prickly and too proud of the town for that.

  The second home visit was rather harder. Elspeth Cook, stern matriarch, was something of a legend in the local party. Her angry divorce years back had split two branches in bits. She lived in one of the few harled prefabs from the 1940s that were left on the outskirts of Glaikit. The veteran of many Labour conference speeches, she had the uncompromising face of a class-war fighter who felt more sure of herself the more she was defeated. Davie felt nervous as he knocked on her door. He barely knew her, and he was all too conscious that he didn’t have a plan.