The Image in the Water

by Douglas Hurd

  The young man in the corner guffawed obsequiously.

  ‘Race Relations Act, if we used it.’

  ‘But we’re going to repeal that. If anyone dared prosecute us, it would be a splendid case.’

  But David still had some sense of reality, if not of taste. ‘Leave it. Remember it if you like, store it away, but leave it for now. What next?’

  Clive Wilson consulted the informal agenda on the laptop in front of him. ‘That conference you want to go to in Cannes. It clashes with the rally New England are planning in Stratford-on-Avon Wednesday week. Anniversary of Shakespeare’s marriage. Or so they say.’

  ‘Can’t be helped.’

  ‘You really want to go to Cannes? What’s it all about?’

  But Clive Wilson was pushing too far.

  ‘It’s a Congress of the Majorities. Spaniards against the Basques, Frenchmen against the Corsicans, Germans against all those Turks in the Ruhr, Britain against the Scots. Majorities, too, have their rights, that’s the message. I’m keen we should have an international dimension.’

  Or rather, thought Clive Wilson, you’re keen to show yourself on a wider stage. ‘Sure you can get good publicity for it?’

  ‘Certainly. I’m working on the speech and interviews. Good pictures, too. I’m taking Julia.’

  ‘And little George?’

  ‘My son’s name is Simon.’

  ‘Of course. Pity.’ Central Office had argued strongly for George.

  ‘No. We’re leaving him with his grandmother.’ And thereby getting for themselves a little peace and quiet in the sun.

  The knock on the door was timid. The young man in the comer jumped up officiously to repel the intruder. It was a rule that the Chairman and the Leader of the Party were not to be disturbed. There was hurried muttering in the doorway, then a letter.

  The young man gave it to Clive. ‘A Scot apparently, though he tried to disguise the accent. Delivered by hand, insisting you got it at once. Said it was about something set to happen this morning.’

  Clive Wilson extracted two papers from the long white envelope.

  Conclusion of Minutes of the Council of the Scottish Liberation Army, May 23.

  After discussion the Council decided that the SLA would move forthwith from the political to the revolutionary phase of the independence struggle. Existing plans for military mobilisation and consequent armed action would be updated for implementation during July, detailed operations to be subject to a further decision of the Council.

  Meanwhile the Army Command was authorised to proceed at once with Operation MONTROSE.

  There was a separate letter. The Chairman of the Party read it and handed it quickly to the Leader of the Party.

  ‘Who’s Hamish McGovern?’ asked David.

  ‘Labour Member for one of the Glasgow seats. He was my pair in the Commons for a time. Reliable, never let me down. Left the Party saying he now believed in full independence because devolution had failed. Didn’t stand at the last election, and I’ve not heard from him till now.’

  Dear Clive,

  Hope things go well with you. I don’t miss the House and all that useless blather. I’m glad Alcester had the sense to make you party chairman. It’s a job for a shit, and I say that in the nicest possible way.

  I’m in touch with the Scottish Liberation Army here. Maybe you’ll not have heard of them – yet. Scotland will only be free through direct action, I see that now. After I left Labour I joined the regular Scot Nats, but they’re all talk, the same as the rest of you, no real blood in any of them. The SLA have what it takes.

  They’ve asked me to send you this. They’re keen it should reach you this Wednesday, not sooner, not later. This MONTROSE operation will be outside the law, that’s for certain. But they told me at this stage no one will get hurt, if they’re canny and behave themselves. I ken no more than that.

  They want to get in touch with you. You Tories are enemies of Scotland, we all know that. But that’s because you’ve persuaded the silly English that we’re taking you over. Once Scotland’s free we’ll be out of your hair and you can have a Tory England for ever. Labour will never win again without their votes north of the border. So that’s the shared interest between the Tories and the SLA. Can you work with them to get there? I don’t know the answer to that. Their methods are different from yours. They’ll make your old ladies of both sexes shiver. But they want to discuss it all with you, and if you’ve sense you’ll listen.

  All you have to do is to e-mail me the word aye. Then I’ll fix time and place. It’ll have to be you who sees them, not an underling. You’ll come to no harm.

  Yours,

  Hamish McGovern

  ‘Interesting?’ asked Clive.

  David said nothing.

  ‘What shall I do?’

  ‘Nothing. Nothing whatever.’

  ‘But there’s something in the argument.’

  ‘No.’ David gestured towards the young man in the corner. ‘We can’t discuss it. Nothing to discuss. Too dangerous. They’re outlaws. The answer’s no.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘No but.’

  David Alcester had made Clive Wilson and could unmake him. Clive had already overstepped the mark that morning. Their discussion was not between equals.

  Soon after, David Alcester left. The midday edition of the Evening Standard was on display outside St John’s Church. The vendor was selling briskly to people going up the steps to the lunchtime concert.

  SCOTS LAW CHIEF SNATCHED

  James Cameron (45), Procurator Fiscal of Scotland, the country’s chief law officer, was kidnapped by a group of armed men this morning as he fished the hill loch a mile from his home near Dumfries. His fourteen-year-old son, Archie, looked on helpless as the four men, wearing badges of the extreme Nationalist SLA, rushed at Cameron from a hiding place by the loch shore and after a brief struggle carried him off. The police …

  ‘They’ll frighten the fish. You won’t catch a thing with the police around.’ Louise was flinging every possible argument into the battle with her husband. She was losing, but had not yet given up. ‘Who would want to kidnap you, for God’s sake?’ she went on. ‘You’re not Prime Minister now, you’re not even the wretched Leader of the Opposition. You’re a has-been, a nobody, you’re finished with politics, thank God. These great hulking cops should be catching burglars in Perth and Dundee, not lounging around our salmon pool.’

  Peter Makewell took all this calmly. He had been almost as dismayed as his wife when the superintendent had called, but his temperament, unlike hers, accepted the kind of authority that the superintendent represented. He continued to put on his boots. Rod and flies were already organised. Peter no longer employed a gillie and it would actually be quite agreeable to have the police sergeant for company as he fished. The sergeant seemed a decent enough lad. His grandfather had run the old bakery up the hill just this side of Pitlochry, so there would be plenty to talk about. For Peter now, most interesting conversation was about the past. Of course Louise was right – the SLA were most unlikely to have the slightest interest in him – but from long experience Peter knew that the police always insisted on slamming every possible stable door after one horse had bolted. He wondered where the SLA were holding poor James Cameron: a pompous fellow, a trimmer in politics, proper in his views and fond of his comforts. Peter could not imagine him dragged across the moors or nibbling biscuits in a cave.

  ‘Anyway, there are no baps for the man’s lunch. The last two are in your bag. I’m doing the shopping this morning.’

  ‘The sergeant will certainly have brought his own.’

  Peter Makewell was anxious to get out of the house. It had rained hard during the night. He could tell this from the noise of the burn as it tumbled towards the main river. The sky was happily overcast, the prospects good. Any minute now his step-grandson would start all over again. In theory Peter was devoted to little Simon Alcester and delighted that he had been brought to stay at Craigarran
while his parents were at Cannes. In private he believed that his relationship with the lad would start in about five years’ time. Grandfathers, and certainly step-grandfathers, had little in common with babies. Meanwhile, what was required was endurance on his part and perhaps on young Simon’s as well. This was not easy in a home largely built of wood where noise in one room was noise everywhere. No doubt Simon would settle down nicely just when it was time for him to leave.

  Louise watched the two figures trudge beside the burn towards the upper loch until they were lost behind a group of rowans. On parting with her they had looked serious, even downcast, but Louise knew enough about men to see enjoyment in every sober step they took.

  She had set aside this morning for the studio that she had established in what used to be the head gardener’s cottage along one side of the walled gardens. The light was right in the old parlour there, and the silence absolute. She would certainly resist any suggestion that the police should take over the cottage as a guard post. She was at work on a bust of Peter, difficult at any time because he was a reluctant and fidgety sitter, the more so now that the salmon were coming up the river and little Simon was noisy in the home, distracting both subject and artist.

  But before she could settle down conscientiously in the studio she had to do the shopping in Pitlochry. She had thought of taking Simon in his carry-cot which converted into a pram, but it might rain again, and the supermarket would be crowded.

  ‘Mrs Mackintosh, will you look after Simon for me for an hour while I do the shopping? He’s fast asleep. He kept us up most of the night. The next bottle’s made up in the fridge when he wants it.’

  Mrs Mackintosh had been with them as housekeeper for fifteen years. A grandmother herself, she had proved more adept with the bottle than Louise. She smoothed her abundant grey hair, a sure sign that she was pleased to be in charge. ‘That’s fine, Lady Makewell, just fine. Here’s the list for Tesco’s, so far as I’ve been able to do it. The oatcakes are better from Andrew Dimmock’s down by the post office, but you know that already. He’ll have a new batch baked yesterday. I’ll just hang out the washing, and then I’ll sit here and do the beans and sweep the place out till the bairn wakes. Never doubt, he’ll be fine with me.’

  By nature Julia was restless, and she had organised her life accordingly. A rebel at school, she had used her father’s premiership as a battlefield for further rebellion at the same time as she had grown to love him. She had allowed David to seduce her as an act of defiance to her mother, but then turned to defy David once she had put herself in his power. She hopped into each cage in turn only to beat her wings against its bars.

  But this weekend in Cannes she was at ease, even happy. It was strange to feel relaxed, surrounded by comfort, able to enjoy that comfort without worrying about her husband, baby, herself. She sat beneath a huge blue umbrella on the spotless sand watching two attendants, in white T-shirts and sharp blue shorts, erect similar umbrellas on the hotel jetty, which ran a hundred metres out to sea. The early morning wind, which had prevented them doing this sooner, had now died down. To her left and right there were scuffling movements as German and Italian women collected their belongings and prepared to move to a more prestigious position on the jetty. From there they would command a nobler view of sea and yachts and be more readily noticed themselves. Julia had no inclination to move. Pigeons strutted importantly on the sand close to her toes. That morning she felt the luxury of laziness for the first time since Simon was born.

  The Congress of European Majorities was well funded, and had provided the head of each delegation with a high-ceilinged suite in the Hotel Carlton overlooking the sea. There she and David had made love last night, for once in harmony with each other. This morning the press summary shoved under their door showed that his speech to the conference yesterday, ‘England will stand up’, had been excellently received at home. In high good humour he had taken her to swim before breakfast. They had run down the jetty in identical white hotel dressing-gowns, and raced each other to the small raft out at sea. For a few minutes he had stopped being a politician. She had caught her mother on the telephone just before she went off to shop, and established that Simon was happy and well. David had walked west along the promenade to the conclave of party leaders, relishing his reception for the first time as a party leader who was likely to win an election. The polls had turned heavily in favour of the Conservatives; all those present at the conclave lived on opinion polls. For the first time, too, she did not grudge David his coming success, even though she knew the tricks by which he had advanced this far. Louise had been right in her advice at Chequers – if she could not leave her strange marriage it was better to enjoy it. Perhaps, indeed probably, every marriage was strange.

  She wondered whether to order another citron, weighing the pleasure against the effort. She wondered whether to spin out the latest Joanna Trollope novel which lay on the sand beside her, or whether it would be better to gallop through it and hope to find another in the hotel news-stand.

  A tall African figure picked his way towards her, shining in white and gold robes. Across his shoulder he carried a light wooden yoke from which descended a glistening mass of jewellery – watches, sunglasses with sparkling frames, bracelets, rings threaded on silver cord, necklaces tangled in bright confusion. This cascade created the impression that the noble African was wearing a fantastic extra garment outside his robes. Despite herself Julia had picked up something from her mother, some knowledge of such matters. She saw to her surprise that the display was not rubbish. There were no price labels. The African, acknowledging her interest, came close to her deck-chair. With dignity he raised the yoke from his shoulders and held it before her. Forgetting the dilemma over the citron and Joanna Trollope, Julia spent ten minutes on a pleasure rare in her life. She supposed that when young her mother had enjoyed shopping, but by the time her own recollection began that phase had ended. Her father Simon Russell had always dressed decently. He bought about five books a year, and solid unimaginative presents for his wife and daughter at Christmas and when he remembered their birthdays. Louise herself spent a morning choosing clothes twice a year, and bought a picture occasionally from a small gallery in Highgate. Louise had left No. 10 Downing Street on memorable expeditions: when Simon died and, much more recently, when Peter Makewell lost the last election. Each time she had descended on Harrods and Peter Jones and, in a hurry, bought the furniture, carpets and curtains needed for the next chapter of her life. Julia had heard of these expeditions, which had been packed into two or three days, but had not been invited to take part. There had been no family tradition of enjoyable shopping. Her parents were not mean, but by the time she knew them well they had too many other things in their minds and diaries.

  David, though, was mean by nature. Until recently he could reasonably defend meanness as necessary prudence. She had not forced the pace: she had simply noted that this was another underlying difference between them, a mine that might one day explode. Now, David was earning well from articles and speeches on top of his salary as Leader of the Opposition. Things were going better for him, though not to the point where he would go out and buy something useless and pretty for her. A fortnight ago he had forgotten their first wedding anniversary and had been ashamed for a minute. This was not a bad moment, Julia thought, to test the ground for a small move forward.

  ‘C’est trois mille, Madame.’

  The man spoke politely but with a firmness that, combined with his princely appearance, excluded bargaining. From his tone and the quality of his goods, Julia judged that he had some arrangement with the Carlton and its neighbours, allowing him to importune publicly the clientele of the main hotels of Cannes on their adjoining stretches of well-swept beach.

  Julia still thought in pounds. She knew that almost all of her generation led their lives in euros, although David translated prices back into sterling for political reasons. She found herself doing the same, even though she thought his dislike of th
e euro absurd. And futile too, since even he did not believe that the Tories could bring back the pound. Once at Chequers she had pointed out this incongruity in a clever teenage way to her father. Simon Russell had said, ‘It’s quite normal, Julia. Scotland, and England too, are full of pine trees planted by sentimental Jacobites long after they were peaceful subjects of King George. They loved to drink to the King over the water and throw the glass to shatter in the fireplace. A cause lingers on in men’s minds well after they have stopped doing anything about it. Women are less sentimental. Most men have a soft place somewhere.’

  Julia still did not know if this was true of David. But she must decide quickly about the pearl and glass necklace, the coils of which were now frothing in her hand.

  ‘Permettez, Madame.’

  The African deftly loosened the clasp and fastened it round her neck, taking care that his long bony hands did not touch her warm flesh. He found a small mirror somewhere in his robes and held it to her.

  It was pretty, at least out there in the open against her tanned skin. And, at just over a thousand pounds, more or less within the range that David in his present benign mood might tolerate. She had no intention of paying for it herself. He owed her something for Simon.

  ‘Les perles sont bonnes?’

  ‘Les meilleures, de Bahrain.’

  The man did not plead his case, but stood before her patiently. Julia’s courage carried her only a certain way.

  ‘Je dois les montrer à mon mari.’ A remark he must have heard many times.

  ‘Bien sûr, Madame. Je viendrai au Carlton à sept heures exacte. Si ça vous convient …’

  He left her with the necklace, knowing perhaps that his trust would strengthen her will to buy.

  But David, when he returned to the hotel at about five, had something else on his mind. ‘Damned nuisance, and all because of those bloody Scots.’ But actually he sounded quite pleased.

  ‘What exactly did the message say?’

  ‘It was from one of the private secretaries at the Home Office. He just said that after the kidnapping of that man Cameron the Home Secretary had decided that all the politicians prominent in discussing Scotland must have full-time protection forthwith. A team of three are flying out to us from the Met this evening. The French have already been alerted. There’s one of their policemen out in the corridor already.’