by Prue Leith
He pressed the button to bring the picture into close-up and waited for it to focus. He’d already noticed the traces of lipstick round his daughter’s mouth, but now he saw the bracelets and rings and a necklace, obviously one of Ruth’s. He wondered where the line between a little girl dressing up and a ten-year-old wearing unsuitable adult things came. He thought crossly that Ruth should not let Andrea wear her jewellery, she might lose it.
And then it hit him: Andrea was wearing THE necklace! The lost Yemeni necklace! He was sure of it.
He lowered the camera and hurried to her, ‘Andrea, where did you get that necklace?’ The child, absorbed by the television, did not respond. Oliver put his hand briefly over her eyes to get her attention and then said, ‘Darling, where did you find that necklace? Mummy and I have been looking for it for ages.’
Andrea put her hand up to feel the necklace. ‘Oh!’ she said, ‘in the dressing-up box. With this dress. Mummy bought it in a jumble sale and I wore it with big wings to be a fairy in that school …’
‘But the necklace … In the dressing-up box? Are you sure?’
‘Yes, I’m sure. Why, Dad? What’s the matter?’
Oliver’s hope that this was indeed the missing necklace was rapidly turning to relief. There was no question, this was it. He found himself laughing. ‘Sorry, darling, but that necklace belongs to someone else. Do you mind if I take it off you?’
After a while, Oliver began to worry that Toppy would get restless so he hoisted his daughter onto the cob’s back, led her across the road, and opened the field gate for them. He picked up Obi to prevent him following Andrea, who kicked Toppy into a trot. ‘Bye, Dad,’ she called, waving her free hand above her head. She looked, he thought, absolutely at one with the horse, her shoulders relaxed, her bottom planted deep into the animal’s back with no danger of bouncing, her long hair flying. Andrea settled Toppy into a canter and Oliver watched the pony’s rotating bum and his daughter’s almost immobile back. Those girls of ours sure can ride, he thought.
Back inside, Oliver picked up the necklace and turned it over in his hands. On closer examination, he could see that the gold bells were old and buffed, the intricate raised pattern slightly worn, the hook at the back of the neck large and unusual, the coral beads differing in size and shade, the flat lapis pieces worn and shiny with age. It was obviously not modern. But half a million? Amazing!
He rang Ruth again.
She picked up the phone with, ‘Have you still got Andrea there?’
‘She’s on her way. I sent her back by the fields since she has no saddle, no bridle, no hat, no boots.’
‘Don’t be pompous, Oliver.’ Ruth’s voice was tired and patient, maddening, in fact. ‘That child could ride anything. She’ll be fine.’
‘All the same, she’s only ten …’
‘Oliver, butt out. Andrea, we agreed, is in my care. She and Mattie are my responsibility. Unless you want to argue for custody? Do you?’
‘Ruth, please, let’s not go there. What I rang about was to say that Andrea was wearing the necklace, the famous lost Yemeni necklace.’
There was silence for a few seconds, then Ruth said, ‘Good Lord, how did she get it?’
‘She found it in the dressing-up box. I thought you said you had looked for it, Ruth. I have been going through merry hell about that wretched necklace, and all the time …’
Ruth’s voice rose. ‘Don’t blame me, Oliver! OK, maybe I didn’t look in the dressing-up box, but did you? Did you look anywhere at all?’
Oliver resisted the temptation to remind her that she’d said she would turn the house out.
‘Look, it’s found now,’ he said wearily. ‘I just rang to tell you. At least we won’t have to recompense the Treasury for the value of it. Though I bet they’d rather have the money than the jewellery.’
That night, half-watching television on his own, Oliver made a decision. Not a big one, like whether to go for divorce, or resign as an MP, or write a book. But one that might help him think about these things.
He would go away. Book a cottage somewhere warm. The summer recess still had six weeks to run, he had no government job to occupy him, the children were off to pony camp so he’d not see much of them anyway, and he was hardly welcome at home.
He’d go for a good long stretch, maybe a month, somewhere far from here; somewhere pretty and quiet, on his own. Completely on his own. No work colleagues. No children. Above all, no politicians.
And no wife, he thought, with a small stab of guilty satisfaction.
* * *
Ruth had been furious.
‘You’re so bloody selfish, Oliver,’ she’d said. ‘When the going gets tough for all of us, you take off on a nice little retreat!’
‘Ruth, you wanted me out of the house. I’d have thought out of the country was even better.’
‘I’d not mind if you were out of the world,’ she’d barked, ‘but what about the girls? You’re their father. Shouldn’t you be there for them?’
Oliver had felt his temper rising, but told himself Ruth was having just as grim a time as he was and was just mouthing off. He answered coolly. ‘The girls are fine. They are both going to pony camp, and then Mattie is going somewhere to play polo, remember? Anyway, I’ve spoken to them both. Separately. Their attitude was pretty much, “Go for it, Dad, you need a break.” And anyway, I’ll talk to them every day, as always.’
‘And what about me?’
‘If you want a break, let’s find a time when I can have the girls. Maybe at half-term? They could come up to London. I would love that, and so would they.’
Ruth said, ‘Mmm’ in a manner that managed to convey both non-commitment and dissatisfaction, and ended the call.
Oliver’s gîte was on a tributary of the Loire, very pretty and cheap, and he found it oddly satisfying to be on his own. The absence of company, obligations and family, and his decision not to open emails and to keep his mobile switched off, meant he had finally been able to start writing.
He had been thinking for a long time, but more pressingly since his troubles, of a book (or perhaps it would just be a pamphlet) on how the pressures of public office dehumanised politicians; how the desire to do good is corrupted by the need first to get elected, and then to stay in power, and above all not to make mistakes. It made you so risk averse that you could no longer do the sensible or honourable thing. He had wanted to stand shoulder to shoulder with Kate over the allegations of an affair, but the risk of being thought too close, the danger of innuendo and gossip losing him his job, had made him a coward, and worse, a poor friend.
He wished he could talk to Kate. Not just to apologise and try to explain his powerlessness in the face of the spin machine, but he wanted her thoughts on this book. There was a time when he could talk to Ruth about ideas or politics, but she was no longer interested. Poor Ruth, she had realised early on that being an MP was compromising his principles, and she’d become critical of all politicians. On the other hand, she’d been pleased at his every promotion and she’d been as ambitious as he, maybe more so, about the top job. It was odd. Maybe he just did not understand her. Maybe he had not tried hard enough to understand her. Now, he thought, I don’t even want to.
He remembered a conversation with Kate late one night after a dinner in the crypt under Whitehall Palace. Kate had been frothing at the mouth over an article in the paper about the myriad checks that a school had to do before putting children into a mini-bus.
Oliver had said, ‘But it’s sensible to ensure the driver has a licence, the bus has good tyres, that the parents are content their children should go, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, but it’s the documentation that goes with it, the need for volunteers who go with the children to have criminal record checks, the pages of boxes to tick. It’s a miracle schools still take children anywhere. And who is assessing the risks of not taking them to a play or concert, or to play football in the next town, or to the Science Museum?’
Ol
iver smiled at the memory. Kate, when she was angry or excited, coloured up like a child, with shiny eyes, her chin slightly lifted, cheeks aflame. Damn it, I miss her, he thought.
She might approve of his ideas for common sense in policy making. He’d been shocked to discover that the latest rules governing workers in charities had led to services closing down for lack of volunteers prepared to go through the clearance process. Who was that helping? Regulation, and codes of practice, should only be there, he thought, to ensure a better service, not to cover the back of the provider while making things worse for the recipient.
The trouble was that if anyone responsible for the spending of public money took any risk at all and something went wrong, they got crucified by the same papers that fulminated about bureaucracy.
Oliver had planned the shape of the book, written a synopsis, and made himself a reading list of books and speeches he thought he might research. He had even written to two left-wing think-tanks asking if they would be interested in publishing his work, if it ever came to fruition. One of them had replied that his thesis sounded more Tory than Labour to them, so no. The other was interested, but only if it could be published while his notoriety made him newsworthy. But Oliver was determined to stay away from the personal. He’d had enough of the press to last him a lifetime.
Early in the morning, when the dawn had barely broken and the mist was still on the river, he would walk along the water’s edge, or late in the evening after a day’s solid writing, he would sit on the river bank idly watching leaves chase each other down the stream in eddies and swirls. He marvelled that he had not, until now, valued time by himself. He thought perhaps his interest in the political tension between doing the right thing and in taking risks might be more to do with his own life and career than in propagating ideas that were hardly new. The simplicity of this self-imposed exile seemed to give him licence to think about himself in a way that would have seemed indulgent, even shameful, to the pre-scandal Oliver.
He rang Ruth and the girls every day as promised, but it was never satisfactory. Ruth was full of suppressed anger and would not understand how, when they were going through the hell of separation and possible divorce, he could take himself off to France. She complained of having to look after Obi. She resented Oliver wanting the dog in the flat at weekends when he was there, yet minded him ‘dumping’ Obi back with her in the week or when, like now, he was away. Like the children, Obi seemed to be a bone to be quarrelled over.
Andrea and Mattie seemed broadly indifferent to him. He wondered if they would notice if he disappeared altogether. But then he remembered Andrea’s anxious face when she’d asked him about divorce, and he’d remind himself that children, above all, had to be cool: Mattie could no more express concern for him than she could admit to anxiety.
One lunchtime, when he’d had a demi-carafe of good red in the village café, the desire to talk to Kate crystallised into action. He would ring her up.
But then he remembered. That had been one of the blockers all along: she wasn’t in any phone book and he didn’t have her number. He’d tried Googling her and all he got was painful press stuff about their alleged affair. Nothing Fancy did not have a website. They had no friends in common and he was reluctant to contact his old office for her number. It would only start the rumour machine spinning again. He walked home, determined to find a way.
And at last he did. He remembered that at the height of the media interest he had refused the Suskind wedding invitation because Kate was doing the catering and he had to avoid being in the same room as her. He didn’t have the Suskind home number either, so he tried Service de Renseignement but was told they were ex-directory. He rang David Suskind’s office, spoke to his secretary and got their home number.
He hesitated. He liked Susan Suskind. But she was a gossip, no doubt of that. And then he thought. So what? Why should he care?
‘Oliver, how lovely to hear you! … Where are you? I do hope you are all right … It must have been so ghastly …’ She prattled on with Oliver saying almost nothing, until she ran out of steam and said, ‘But what can I do for you?’
‘Actually, I would like Kate McKinnon’s telephone number if you have it,’ he said evenly.
‘Good Lord, don’t you have it? I mean …’
‘No, I’ve never had it. But I would like it now if you’ve got it.’
The woman was desperate, he could hear, to draw him into juicy revelations. But he would not play, and finally she went to her address book and read out Kate’s mobile number, her home number and her email address.
Of course she might gossip, but, thought Oliver, so what? Let her. At least, at last, he had Kate McKinnon’s contact details.
He toyed with the idea of emailing her. That way he could say what he had to say in a measured way, and get the tone right. Or he could ring her.
He hesitated, and then suddenly picked up his mobile and dialled.
He heard the ringing tone, but when it stopped he was not sure that she had answered. The reception was terrible. ‘Hello … Kate?’ he said. ‘Is that you? Kate?’
‘Who is it? I can’t hear you, I’m sorry.’
He heard that, clear as a bell, and his heart lifted at the sound of her voice. ‘It’s Oliver,’ he said, ‘Oliver Stapler.’
But she still could not hear. ‘You’re breaking up. I’m driving. Rotten signal. Who is it?’
He cut the call, paced round the living room for five minutes then called again.
This time she answered at once. ‘Hello,’ she said, brightly, ‘was it you just now? I’m sorry about that, no signal, but it’s OK now. Who is speaking?’
‘It’s Oliver.’
‘Oliver?’ Her voice sounded dead.
‘Oliver Stapler. I wanted—’
‘No,’ she stopped him short. ‘No. I can’t speak to you. Sorry.’ And she put the phone down.
Oliver held his mobile in his hand, staring at nothing. For so long he had thought of speaking to Kate, of trying to explain, of somehow being forgiven. It had never occurred to him that she would refuse to talk to him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Kate pulled into the service station and stopped at the petrol pumps. She turned the engine off and pulled her key out of the ignition. Her hand was trembling. She held it up in front of her face, willing her fingers to hold still. But the car key and house key jingled together with the violence of her shaking. She dropped them into her lap and held the steering wheel tight.
She did not understand the shaking hands, red face, knot of horror in her gut. She’d thought she was done with Oliver. How could it be otherwise after his callous indifference to her? Of course he had never loved her, but he was supposed to have been a friend. Well, now he’d seen the article he would not even be a distant acquaintance. He would hate her, of course. And scorn her. Her stomach contracted in shame. Why, oh why had she admitted to Jarvis that she’d been in love with Oliver? Why give him the satisfaction?
He must want to talk to her because he’d read the article. To berate her for telling her story to the press. Kate pushed her fingers into her hair, clutching it to drag it down over her face. She was mortified at having been so indiscreet with Jarvis. And she was alternately miserable at having cancelled Oliver’s call and glad she’d had the courage to put the phone down on him. She told herself he deserved all he got.
She still had her head in her hands when she was startled by a bang on her window, right next to her head. She jerked up to see a burly biker, tattoos on his neck and a shaven head, grinning at her through the window. He was gesturing at her to lower the window.
Oh God, she thought, road rage. That’s all I need now. She shook her head, fumbled with her keys, trying to find the ignition. And then suddenly she was crying, great out-of-control sobs which made it difficult to get the key into the ignition and turn it. But she managed it, and the car, still in gear, jerked forward. As she jammed her foot on the clutch she was conscious of the leather-clad gu
y jumping clear. Horrified, she watched him in her rear-view mirror. He stumbled and righted himself.
Relieved, but still desperate to get away, Kate drove the car round to the far side of the filling station, and stopped again. She must pull herself together. She looked in the mirror over the windscreen and saw great mascara streaks down her cheeks. God, she was a mess. She had to rummage in her handbag for some cream to remove the mascara and then open her briefcase for her spare pack of tissues. As she did so she saw the edge of newsprint sticking out of the back pocket of the case.
Kate had tormented herself half a dozen times with reading the article and she knew it almost by heart. Now she pulled it out again. The headline yelled across the double-page spread:
‘I WAS A FOOL. I LOVED HIM,’ SAYS KATE
And then in smaller letters:
Jarvis Stanley meets the woman at the centre of the Minister and the Cook Scandal
There was a blurry picture of her and Toby ducking photographers on their way to school, and a much larger one of them both looking happily into camera. It was captioned, ‘Kate and son Toby in happier times’. Rake (now her ‘media manager’) had persuaded her it was better to use a good photograph from her album than another one of the stolen ones that made her look furtive or angry or frightened. And there was a picture of Oliver and Ruth all dressed up for dinner, captioned ‘Ruth Stapler stands by her man’. Kate’s eyes ran down the familiar text:
Six months ago, Kate McKinnon had everything. She was a confident, good-looking woman with a successful, fast-growing business, a job she loved, a private house with a garden in which she felt safe and happy, a circle of friends that included the rich and famous, and a young son, Toby, doing well at school and the apple of her eye … But she also had a secret passion which was her undoing.
