The final shortlist included two clever clogs from London—one of whom later served in a Macmillan cabinet—and the local boy, Ted Barker. When the chairman announced the committee’s decision to the local press, he said that it would be improper to reveal the number of votes each candidate had polled. In fact, Ted had comfortably outscored his two rivals put together.
Six months later the prime minister called a general election, and after a lively three-week campaign, Ted was returned as the member of Parliament for North Suffolk with a majority of over seven thousand. He quickly became respected and popular with colleagues on both sides of the House, though he never pretended to be anything other than, in his own words, “an amateur politician.”
As the years passed, Ted’s popularity with his constituents grew, and he increased his majority with each succeeding general election. After fourteen years of diligent service to the party nationally and locally, the prime minister of the day, Harold Macmillan, recommended to the Queen that Ted should receive a knighthood.
By the end of the 1960s, Sir Ted (he was never known as Sir Edward) felt that the time was fast approaching when the division should start looking for a younger candidate, and he made it clear to the local chairman that he did not intend to stand at the next election. He and Hazel quietly prepared for a peaceful retirement in their beloved East Anglia.
Shortly after the election, Ted was surprised. to receive a call from 10 Downing Street: “The prime minister would like to see Sir Ted at 11:30 tomorrow morning.”
Ted couldn’t imagine why Edward Heath should want to see him. Although he had of course visited Number 10 on several occasions when he was a member of Parliament, those visits had only been for cocktail parties, receptions, and the occasional dinner for a visiting head of state. He admitted to Hazel that he was a little nervous.
Ted presented himself at the front door of Number 10 at 11:17 the next day. The duty clerk accompanied him down the long corridor on the ground floor and asked him to take a seat in the small waiting area that adjoins the Cabinet Room. By now Ted’s nervousness was turning to apprehension. He felt like an errant schoolboy about to come face to face with his headmaster.
After a few minutes a private secretary appeared. “Good morning, Sir Ted. The prime minister will see you now.” He accompanied Ted into the Cabinet Room, where Mr. Heath stood to greet him. “How kind of you to come at such short notice, Ted.” Ted had to suppress a smile, because he knew the prime minister knew that it would have taken the scurvy or a localized hurricane to stop him from answering such a summons.
“I’m hoping you can help me with a delicate matter, Ted,” continued the prime minister, a man not known for wasting time on small talk. “I’m about to appoint the next governor of St. George’s, and I can’t think of anyone better qualified for the job than you.”
Ted recalled the day when Mrs. Thompson had asked him to think about standing for Parliament. But on this occasion he didn’t require a week to consider his reply—even if he couldn’t quite bring himself to admit that although he’d heard of St. George’s he certainly couldn’t have located it on a map. Once he’d caught his breath, he simply said, “Thank you, prime minister. I’d be honored.”
During the weeks that followed, Sir Ted paid several visits to the Foreign and Colonial Office to receive briefings on various aspects of his appointment. Thereafter he assiduously read every book, pamphlet and government paper the mandarins supplied.
After a few weeks of boning up on his new subject, the governor-in-waiting had discovered that St. George’s was a tiny group of islands in the middle of the North Atlantic. It had been colonized by the British in 1643, and thereafter had a long history of imperial rule, the islanders having scorned every offer of independence. They were one of Her Majesty’s sovereign colonies, and that was how they wished to remain.
Even before he set out on his adventure, Ted had become used to being addressed as “Your Excellency.” But after being fitted up by Alan Bennett of Savile Row with two different full dress uniforms, Ted feared that he looked—what was that modern expression?—over the top. In winter he was expected to wear an outfit of dark blue doeskin with scarlet collar and cuffs embroidered with silver oak leaves, while in the summer he was to be adorned in white cotton drill with a gold-embroidered collar and gold shoulder cords. The sight of him in either uniform caused Hazel to laugh out loud.
Ted didn’t laugh when the tailors sent him the bill, especially after he learned that he would be unlikely to wear either uniform more than twice a year. “Still, think what a hit you’ll be at fancy dress parties once you’ve retired,” was Hazel’s only comment.
The newly appointed governor and commander-in-chief of St. George’s and his lady flew out to take up their post on January 12, 1971. They were greeted by the prime minister, as the colony’s first citizen, and the chief justice, as the legal representative of the Queen. After the new governor had taken the salute from six off-duty policemen standing vaguely to attention, the town band gave a rendering of the national anthem. The Union Jack was raised on the roof of the airport terminal and a light splattering of applause broke out from the assembled gathering of twenty or thirty local dignitaries.
Sir Ted and Lady Barker were then driven to the official residence in a spacious but aging Rover that had already served the two previous governors. When they reached Government House, the driver brought the car to a halt and leapt out to open the gates. As they continued up the drive, Ted and Hazel saw their new home for the first time.
The colonial mansion was magnificent by any standards. Obviously built at the height of the British Empire, it was vastly out of proportion to either the importance of the island or Britain’s current position in the real world. But size, as the governor and his wife were quickly to discover, didn’t necessarily equate with efficiency or comfort.
The air conditioning didn’t work, the plumbing was unreliable, Mrs. Rogers, the daily help, was regularly off sick, and the only thing Ted’s predecessor had left behind was an elderly black labrador. Worse, the Foreign Office had no funds available to deal with any of these problems, and whenever Ted mentioned them in dispatches, he was met only with suggestions for cutbacks.
After a few weeks, Ted and Hazel began to think of St. George’s as being rather like a great big parliamentary constituency, split into several islands, the two largest being Suffolk and Edward Island. This heartened Ted, who even wondered if that was what had given the prime minister the idea of offering him the post in the first place.
The governor’s duties could hardly have been described as onerous: he and Hazel spent most of their time visiting hospitals, delivering speeches at school prize-givings and judging flower shows. The highlight of the year was undoubtedly the Queen’s official birthday in June, when the governor held a garden party for local dignitaries at Government House and Suffolk played Edward Island at cricket—an opportunity for most of the colony’s citizens to spend two days getting thoroughly drunk.
Ted and Hazel accepted the local realpolitik and settled down for five years of relaxed diplomacy among delightful people in a heavenly climate, seeing no cloud on the horizon that could disturb their blissful existence.
Until the phone call came.
It was a Thursday morning, and the governor was in his study with that Monday’s Times. He was putting off reading a long article on the summit meeting taking place in Washington until he had finished the crossword puzzle, and was just about to fill in the answer to 12 across—Erring herd twists to create this diversion (3,7)—when his private secretary, Charles Roberts, came rushing into his office without knocking.
Ted realized it had to be something important, because he had never known Charles to rush anywhere, and certainly he had never known him to enter the study without the courtesy of a knock.
“It’s Mountbatten on the line,” Charles blurted out. He could hardly have looked more anxious had he been reporting that the Germans were about to land on th
e north shore of the island. The governor raised an eyebrow. “Admiral of the Fleet Earl Mountbatten of Burma,” said Charles, as if Ted hadn’t understood.
“Then put him through,” said Ted quietly, folding up his copy of The Times and placing it on the desk in front of him. He had met Mountbatten three times over the past twenty years, but doubted if the great man would recall any of these encounters. Indeed, on the third occasion Ted had found it necessary to slip out of the function the admiral was addressing, as he was feeling a little queasy. He couldn’t imagine what Mountbatten would want to speak to him about, and he had no time to consider the problem, as the phone on his desk was already ringing.
As Ted picked up the receiver, he was still wondering whether to call Mountbatten “My Lord,” as he was an earl, “Commander-in-Chief,” as he was a former chief of the defense staff, or “Admiral,” as Admiral of the Fleet is a life appointment. He settled for “Good morning, sir.”
“Good morning, Your Excellency. I hope I find you well?”
“Yes, thank you, sir,” replied Ted.
“Because if I remember correctly, when we last met you were suffering from a stomachache.”
“That’s right, sir,” said the surprised governor. He was reasonably confident that the purpose of Mountbatten’s call wasn’t to enquire about his health after all these years.
“Governor, you must be curious to know why I am calling.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I am presently in Washington attending the summit, and I had originally planned to return to London tomorrow morning.”
“I understand, sir,” said Ted, not understanding at all.
“But I thought I might make a slight detour and drop in to see you. I do enjoy visiting our colonies whenever I get the chance. It gives me the opportunity to brief Her Majesty on what’s happening. I hope that such a visit would not be inconvenient.”
“Not at all, sir,” said Ted. “We would be delighted to welcome you.”
“Good,” said Mountbatten. “Then I would be obliged if you could warn the airport authorities to expect my aircraft around four tomorrow afternoon. I would like to stay overnight, but if I’m to keep to my schedule I will need to leave you fairly early the following morning.”
“Of course, sir. Nothing could be easier. My wife and I will be at the airport to welcome you at four o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”
“That’s kind of you, Governor. By the way, I’d rather things were left fairly informal. Please don’t put yourself to any trouble.” The line went dead.
Once he had replaced the receiver, it was Ted’s turn to run for the first time in several months. He found Charles striding down the long corridor toward him, having obviously listened in on the extension.
“Find my wife and get yourself a notepad—and then both of you join me in my office immediately. Immediately,” Ted repeated as he scuttled back into his study.
Hazel arrived a few minutes later, clutching a bunch of dahlias, followed by the breathless private secretary.
“Why the rush, Ted? What’s the panic?”
“Mountbatten’s coming.”
“When?” Hazel asked quietly.
“Tomorrow afternoon. Four o’clock.”
“That is a good reason to panic,” Hazel admitted. She dumped the flowers in a vase on the windowsill and took a seat opposite her husband on the other side of his desk. “Perhaps this isn’t the best time to let you know that Mrs. Rogers is off sick.”
“You have to admire her timing,” said Ted. “Right, we’ll just have to bluff it.”
“What do you mean, ‘bluff it’?” asked Hazel.
“Well, don’t let’s forget that Mountbatten’s a member of the royal family, a former chief of the defense staff and an Admiral of the Fleet. The last colonial post he held was Viceroy of India with three regiments under his command and a personal staff of over a thousand. So I can’t imagine what he’ll expect to find when he turns up here.”
“Then let’s begin by making a list of things that will have to be done,” said Hazel briskly.
Charles removed a pen from his inside pocket, turned over the cover of his pad, and waited to write down his master’s instructions.
“If he’s arriving at the airport, the first thing he will expect is a red carpet,” said Hazel.
“But we don’t have a red carpet,” said Ted.
“Yes we do. There’s the one that leads from the dining room to the drawing room. We’ll have to use that, and hope we can get it back in place before he visits that part of the house. Charles, you will have to roll it up and take it to the airport”—she paused—“and then bring it back.”
Charles scowled, but began writing furiously.
“And Charles, can you also see that it’s cleaned by tomorrow?” interjected the governor. “I hadn’t even realized it was red. Now, what about a guard of honor?”
“We haven’t got a guard of honor,” said Hazel. “If you remember, when we arrived on the island we were met by the prime minister, the chief justice and six off-duty policemen.”
“True,” said Ted. “Then we’ll just have to rely on the territorial army.”
“You mean Colonel Hodges and his band of hopeful warriors? They don’t even all have matching uniforms. And as for their rifles …”
“Hodges will just have to get them into some sort of shape by four o’clock tomorrow afternoon. Leave that one to me,” said Ted, making a note on his pad. “I’ll phone him later this morning. Now, what about a band?”
“Well there’s the town band,” said Charles. “And, of course, the police band.”
“On this occasion they’ll have to combine,” said Hazel, “so we don’t offend either of them.”
“But they only know three tunes between them,” said Ted.
“They only need to know one,” said Hazel. “The national anthem.”
“Right,” said the governor. “As there are sure to be a lot of musical feathers that will need unruffling, I’ll leave you to deal with them, Hazel. Our next problem is how we transport him from the airport to Government House.”
“Certainly not in the old Rover,” said Hazel. “It’s broken down three times in the last month, and it smells like a kennel.”
“Henry Bendall has a Rolls-Royce,” said Ted. “We’ll just have to commandeer that.”
“As long as no one tells Mountbatten that it’s owned by the local undertaker, and what it was used for the morning before he arrived.”
“Mick Flaherty also has an old Rolls,” piped up Charles. “A Silver Shadow, if I remember correctly.”
“But he loathes the British,” said Hazel.
“Agreed,” said Ted, “but he’ll still want to have dinner at Government House when he discovers the guest of honor is a member of the royal family.”
“Dinner?” said Hazel, her voice rising in horror.
“Of course we will have to give a dinner in his honor,” said Ted. “And, worse, everyone who is anyone will expect to be invited. How many can the dining room hold?” He and Hazel turned to the private secretary.
“Sixty if pushed,” replied Charles, looking up from his notes.
“We’re pushed,” said Ted.
“We certainly are,” said Hazel. “Because we don’t have sixty plates, let alone sixty coffee cups, sixty teaspoons, sixty …”
“We still have that Royal Worcester service presented by the late king after his visit in 1947,” said Ted. “How many pieces of that are fit for use?”
“Enough for about fourteen settings, at the last count,” said Hazel.
“Right, then that’s dealt with how many people will be at the head table.”
“What about the menu?” asked Charles.
“And, more important, who is going to cook it?” added Ted.
“We’ll have to ask Dotty Cuthbert if she can spare Mrs. Travis for the evening,” said Hazel. “No one on the island is a better cook.”
“And we’ll also need her butl
er, not to mention the rest of her staff,” added Ted.
By now Charles was onto his third page.
“You’d better deal with Lady Cuthbert, my dear,” said Ted. “I’ll try to square Mick Flaherty.”
“Our next problem will be the drink,” said Hazel. “Don’t forget, the last governor emptied the cellar a few days before he left.”
“And the Foreign Office refuses to restock it,” Ted reminded her. “Jonathan Fletcher has the best cellar on the island …”
“And, God bless him, he won’t expect to be at the head table,” said Hazel.
“If we’re limited to fourteen places, the head table’s looking awfully crowded already,” said Ted.
“Dotty Cuthbert, the Bendalls, the Flahertys, the Hodges,” said Hazel, writing down the names. “Not to mention the prime minister, the chief justice, the mayor, the chief of police, plus their wives … Let’s hope that some of them are indisposed or abroad.” She was beginning to sound desperate.
“Where’s he going to sleep?” asked Charles innocently.
“God, I hadn’t thought of him sleeping,” said Ted.
“He’ll have to take our bedroom. It’s the only one with a bed that doesn’t sink in the middle,” said Hazel.
“We’ll move into the Nelson Room for the night, and suffer those dreadful woodwormed beds and their ancient horsehair mattresses.”
“Agreed,” said Hazel. “I’ll make sure all our things are out of the Queen Victoria Room by this evening.”
“And, Charles,” said the governor, “phone the Foreign Office, would you, and find out Mountbatten’s likes and dislikes. Food, drink, eccentric habits—anything you can discover. They’re sure to have a file on him, and this is one gentleman I don’t want to offend.”
The private secretary turned over yet another page of his pad and continued scribbling.
Twelve Red Herrings Page 14
