The Knives

by Richard T. Kelly

  At his side for the stride back across the walkway Mark Tallis thrust his iPhone under Blaylock’s nose. ‘Twitter’s on fire. Look.’

  David Blaylock CLEARLY the most formidable Tory Minister #OneNation

  Punchy stuff from the Home Sec! #Blaylock4Leader

  But Blaylock’s eye had been caught by something he wanted to scroll to, and he seized the phone to do so. It was something much less laudatory, from a broadsheet commentator.

  We knew David Blaylock wants to be Tory leader. He’s just shown he’s prepared to win ugly, by blaming all our nation’s woes on immigrants.

  He repaired to his hotel room, slumped into the sofa, accepted a mug of Lemsip and let his spads talk at him – about fringe events, lobbyists seeking audiences for their clients, ‘security industry engagement’. Did he want to see for himself the new cutting edge of radiation screening and millimetre-wave cameras? Did he want to meet ‘the new breed of detector dog’? Not this afternoon.

  Tallis looked disappointed. ‘Well, for what it’s worth, Claymore Security have a suite at the Arsenal–Chelsea game next Tuesday, they slipped me a pair of tickets. I wondered about you and your boy …?’

  ‘It’s a thought. Cheers, Mark.’ Blaylock tucked the tickets into his top pocket. His phone pulsed – Geraldine. She had James Bannerman on the line.

  ‘David, I’m in receipt of a letter from Messrs Gary Wardell and Duncan Scarth, who claim to be the chief operating officers of the Free Briton Brigade? In light of the ban on their marching through the East End they have requested a small “static” demonstration, which I am inclined to grant as a gesture to their freedom of expression. We will offer them a suitably cramped location and a narrow window of time, so as to minimise disorder.’

  Blaylock rubbed his forehead, trying to recall where he had heard the name of Duncan Scarth. ‘It’s your call, Chief. Good luck.’

  Deborah Kerner had entered, with a stranger in tow: a shortish but sportif fellow in a blue suit and broad-striped tie, with a strong jaw and a rather knowing dimpled smile.

  ‘David, this is Gavin Blount? Gavin did security stuff for the Cabinet Office in the last government, now he’s Political Director in Belfast. Ex-Grenadier Guard, don’t you know.’

  Blount’s grip was firm, his gaze level, his accent faintly West Yorkshire. ‘I admired your speech.’

  ‘Gavin wrote this great paper on system inefficiencies, and … I just thought, hey, you guys ought to meet properly. Coffee, Gavin?’

  ‘Thank you, black, one sugar.’

  ‘Same for me,’ said Blaylock, taken aback by Deborah’s uncommon readiness to play maid, peering at the cover of the paper she had passed him: Driving Change: Leadership & Command Structure in the Civil Service.

  Blaylock grunted. ‘“Command”. That’s a dirty word in Whitehall.’

  ‘I know.’ Blount showed his dimples. ‘Those military connotations. I don’t say the team should be running round in fatigues. But, too many clever types pushing paper around has … limitations. Too many people in Whitehall obsess over “structure” but run a mile from “command”, because it’s not how the wiring looks in the diagram …’

  They talked politics a while, and the cold Blaylock had felt coming on all morning began to rasp in his throat, yet he found Blount’s company so agreeable he nearly called for a tumbler of whisky. In no time he was being chivvied by Ben about the fringe meeting he was due to attend.

  ‘No, I need a lie down. Cancel for me, yeah? Just give them the full contrite bollocks.’ He shook hands with Blount. ‘I trust we’ll meet again.’ The younger man turned smartly, as if with a click of his heels, and Deborah showed him to the door.

  Tallis lingered. ‘Can we talk about the parties this evening?’

  ‘Nope. Let’s see what’s the best offer come 6 p.m.’

  ‘You like Gavin?’ asked Deborah, returning.

  ‘Sound man.’

  ‘Yeah, imagine him in your team meetings in place of old Cox.’

  Blaylock threw her a look as if to say he understood very well that she had been match-making. Tired and achy, he went to his darkened room, lay back on the cool quilted throw-over and checked his phone messages. Jason Malahide had invited him to dinner à deux, an impertinence at which he was nearly too jaded to scoff.

  He gave in to the temptation to check the BBC News reports on his speech and quickly wished he had not. Someone from the Institute of Directors was quoted as saying that ‘after Jason Malahide’s big energetic vision of a Britain open for business, it was depressing to hear David Blaylock’s little Englandism’. Martin Pallister had gone for the high hand. ‘The Home Secretary’s empty posturing over an issue where he’s already failed barely merits comment. I will just sit here and wait for his words to come back and bite him.’

  Tugging absently at the match tickets in his top pocket he thought for a moment, then called Jennie, and knew instantly from her voice that nothing he might say would please her.

  ‘Does Alex fancy coming with me to Arsenal next Tuesday?’

  ‘He has plans, I believe. Have you done anything about the week of the tenth?’ He realised he was caught in negligence once again. ‘Remember, the school’s doing “Take Your Kids to Work”? I’m bringing Cora to chambers, have you thought about something doable with Alex?’

  ‘Fine. Yes. I have. I will.’

  ‘Okay. You don’t sound so cheery.’

  ‘I’m a bit done in, I had my speech this morning.’

  ‘Yeah, I heard.’

  ‘What did you think?’

  A heavy exhalation down the line. ‘I realise it’s the Tory way to say “This is how it worked for me so all you lot need to do likewise.” But, y’know, David … what are your lot actually planning to do to bring a load of jobs back to the north? And, sorry, General bloody Patton? I know how you felt about the army, how painful it was for you, so it does pain me a bit to hear you trying to package it up and sell it.’

  ‘Okay, forget I asked, goodbye Jennie.’ Riled, deflated, he fumbled for the Actifed bottle, took a swig and hauled a pillow over his head.

  Presently the phone vibrated anew. He didn’t expect a contrite Jennie, and was not disappointed. It was his friend Jim Orchard, Lord Orchard of Sherwood.

  ‘I’ll go to the foot of our stairs. I was expecting the machine.’

  ‘Always at your service, Jim.’

  A guffaw came down the line, a jolly collegiate hur-hur. ‘Well done on your speech. Very purposeful. “Always do your best, lads and lasses, just like my old dad told me to.” Hur-hur. Yes, I liked all that.’

  ‘I hoped you would.’

  ‘Might I possibly have your company this evening? Appreciating you’ll have more attractive offers on your dance card.’

  ‘It’s a lovely thought but I’m under the weather.’

  ‘Poor you. Can you not be tempted by a rogan josh and a pint or two of fizzy piss at the Raj Doot?’

  Now it was Blaylock’s turn to guffaw.

  ‘Yes, I sense you are easily swayed …’

  *

  ‘You’re looking well, Jim.’

  ‘I don’t believe you. Bloody politician.’

  Closing in on seventy, Jim Orchard still took his pleasures as he found them. Tall enough, he carried a gut not quite cloaked by his generously cut lightweight suit. A railway worker’s son and grammar school boy who went into the construction game after a Cambridge scholarship, he had directed millions toward party coffers and enjoyed the ear of every Tory leader since Blaylock was in short trousers.

  ‘Well, believe this, I’m glad to see you. I had offers. Jason Malahide also proposed dinner tonight.’

  ‘Whereabouts? In the library with the lead piping?’

  ‘Yeah. I know an ambush when I see it.’

  ‘It’s a shame, how the two of you dance round each other. Much better if you could just demand satisfaction from him, like Castlereagh did with George Canning. Invite him civilly to pistols at dawn on Putney Hea
th, hur-hur …’

  Blaylock smiled, and waited for the waiter to take away their plates. ‘If I was counting my enemies I’d neither stop nor start with Malahide. There’s Belinda Ryder, the civil liberties champ—’

  ‘Oh, that’s how it is when you’re a possible leader. It breeds resentment. Your successes bring more grief than your cock-ups. They’re counted more heavily against you, right?’

  Blaylock didn’t rise to what Orchard implied.

  ‘But, yes, that civil liberties crowd. It’s strange to me, David, once upon a time we had a very, very clear view on the defence of the realm. We were bloody well for it, and the state had to ensure it. Now we have all these strange fish, complaining how tough we make it for people we suspect of evil intent. Defending freedoms their granddads may or may not have died for … It’s relatively new. Let’s face it, Winston was a fairly avid phone-tapper long before anyone thought to make it a statutory process.’ Orchard had begun to tap impatiently at the table-top.

  ‘I know. Don’t get yourself too vexed.’

  ‘Oh, it’s just I fancy a smoke. My point is, don’t you fuss yourself unduly about Belinda bloody Ryder. Or that lightweight Malahide.’

  ‘Darlings of conference can go a long way. All the way.’

  ‘Well, quite, that is partly why I still seek your company.’

  ‘I’d never expect you to make a lousy bet like that.’

  ‘It is perfectly sound. Of course, the man has to want the top job.’

  ‘I’m not in the running. I have my job to do.’

  ‘Ah, Trollope! “No motive more selfish than to be counted in the roll of the public servants of England” … C’mon, David, who do you think you’re talking to? Let me run the book on your actual “rivals”, if I may be so crass. Caroline Tennant? Needs to get some kids, I’d say. Before that, a husband. Also, a sense of humour.’

  ‘I don’t think the public reckon a divorcee is the greatest role model.’

  ‘Wasn’t a problem for Eden. Though it might depend on who’s the second Mrs Blaylock … Where did we get to? Malahide, yes. Pleases conference and speaks to Essex and all that, but we have those votes priced in already. North of Watford he’s pretty obnoxious. Which is where you come in, riding astride today’s stirring peroration.’

  ‘Home Secretaries don’t get to be leader any more. It’s the job, there’s always something turns up to cut their reputation to shreds.’

  ‘Oh, stop bloody whining. The knives are out for you, always. But that is the mission you accepted, David. So you have to face the knives, with fortitude. Just as we ask of the great British public.’

  The waiter was offering complimentary Courvoisiers. Blaylock demurred, and saw that Orchard looked at him disapprovingly, then clear past him altogether.

  ‘Well I never, who’s the Jane?’

  Blaylock saw Andy half-rise from his neighbouring perch, a hand on his jacket, and he turned to see a woman arrive purposefully by their table – a woman with height and figure, a swishy blonde bob and a boxy black jacket over a cinched red dress, a woman of a sort to make Blaylock sit up straight and hope his brow wasn’t gleaming with sweat.

  ‘Home Secretary? I’m Abigail Hassall. You were meant to be on my panel earlier today? Please, no need to get up—’

  But Blaylock stood anyway, discarding his lividly turmeric-stained napkin, for he was feeling towered over by this woman in her high-heeled leather boots. Standing, he found himself distracted by the course of her long pendant necklace and made himself meet her eye.

  ‘I’m so sorry you were ill. But glad you’ve made such a recovery.’

  ‘Oh, you know, the capsaicin in chilli, it’s medicinal … I trust you managed without me.’

  ‘It was all a bit Hamlet without the prince. But, anyhow, I’ve got the message you’re averse to talking to me. Your prerogative, of course.’

  ‘No aversion. I just don’t do interviews of the sort you have in mind.’

  ‘How do you know what I have in mind? There are some things I’m keen to ask you but I wouldn’t say they’re for publication.’

  ‘Oh, if you’re just after an off-the-record chat I’ll talk to you any time anywhere.’

  She laughed, one short ‘Ha’, and gestured around the busy restaurant.

  ‘Look, I’ll buy you a drink, somewhere quiet, if you can wait for me and Lord Orchard to settle up.’

  Orchard, though, was studying him closely from seated, his rheumy eyes alight with amusement. ‘The bill? Never you mind, a mere bagatelle, dear boy. A mere bagatelle …’

  *

  They walked abreast down the hotel corridor, Andy five paces behind. One glance through the smoky glass front of the upper floor lounge was enough to tell him they’d get no privacy. And so they repaired to Blaylock’s suite; she arranged herself on one of two facing sofas while he, sitting opposite, upended two little bottles of Chilean Shiraz into two long-stemmed glasses.

  ‘OK, are you wearing a wire or any sort of recording device?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘If you’re lying I’d have to kill you. Have you killed, rather.’

  She rolled her eyes and made an empty-handed gesture.

  ‘To be clear, this is not an interview, not a profile, not any kind of “piece”. You wanted a conversation?’

  ‘Well, we can try …’ Looking mirthful, sceptical, and very attractive, she crossed her legs and brushed an imagined speck from her dress as it rode up.

  ‘I did see what you wrote on me in the Corresondent. I guess you dug around a bit, persuaded a few people to sing?’

  ‘Not so much. I haven’t been on the Westminster beat that long.’

  ‘No? So who are you? How did you get to this esteemed perch?’

  ‘I’ve, ah, bounced around a bit, I suppose. Started out with Reuters. Was in Tokyo for a bit, then Bhutan, Turkmenistan. I was a financial journalist, really, until quite recently.’

  ‘You wanted to write about people instead of money?’

  She sipped her wine and considered. ‘Personae are interesting. But not vastly more than money. Money dictates behaviour to such a degree. Yes, though – the actors in the game have come to interest me more. Plus, it’s good to keep changing, I think. Too much of the world is people sticking to their own square yard of experience.’

  ‘What did you study at college?’

  ‘Anthropology.’

  ‘Right, makes sense.’

  ‘Do you mind if I ask the questions for a bit?’

  ‘Shoot.’

  ‘Your having this military background – have you found it useful to you in politics?’

  ‘No. There aren’t any transferable skills. The whole methodical thing about recognising you’re in a hole and figuring how to get out of it – that ought to be a help, but it’s not. The army is all about the team, loyalty, shared responsibility. Basically I’ve learned in politics to never, ever expect the same standards of behaviour. Politics is just about the individual – the black arts, the slippery pole. You are doomed to failure if you imagine otherwise.’

  ‘How long was your army career?’

  ‘Short. Sandhurst, commissioned, joined my regiment in Westphalia, holding back the Russian hordes a while. Six months in Northern Ireland, the long war, a bit livelier.’

  ‘How lively?’

  He liked the manner of her invigilation, and had further decided that her right was her best side. She’s studying me. I may as well perform, the beast in the jungle.

  ‘A few running gun battles. One time I was stuck in a Saracen that got pretty well perforated. An IED went off under my feet. After that was Bosnia, lively in places. Then my regiment got put out to pasture as a training unit in Canada, and I decided three years had been enough.’

  ‘It wasn’t because the army was facing cutbacks?’

  ‘The army is always facing cutbacks. No, I just didn’t see it as an environment in which I could function, long term. I went back to Bosnia, first for Oxfam, then Feed t
he Children. Then home, I took an MBA at Durham, joined a company an old mate of mine had started, stone importing, got to be a director.’

  ‘You wanted to earn some money.’

  ‘I didn’t succeed. But, yeah, I tried to be responsible for a profit-and-loss account in the real world. The Tory way, you know?’

  ‘You were married with a son by then?’

  ‘I don’t discuss my family. The stone business was short-lived, then I slipped into journalism. Just like you.’

  ‘How did that happen?’

  ‘It had occurred to me in Bosnia, actually. Where my regiment were, in Vitez, the press were close by. I’d watch them and think it was a better gig. Just to shake my head over things, act like someone should do something? I mean, they were capable guys, and girls – one or two of them caught a stray bullet. But it was a comfier position for sure.’

  She tapped the rim of her glass. ‘As a soldier – did you ever kill anyone?’

  He coughed. ‘Not that I know of. I used reasonable force to incapacitate. There were times I fired a ton of ammo in the enemy’s general direction and didn’t have the chance to assess the damage afterward.’

  ‘Do you think the army made you an aggressive person?’

  He set down the glass he had been nursing. ‘The Colour Sergeant tells you, “If the time comes, you’ve got to bayonet the baby.” That’s the deal, you have to do things no civilian would. Your training puts an unnatural level of aggression into you for that purpose. But there are also means by which it’s suppressed in you, too. I mean, I’m not an aggressive person, not now.’

  ‘I’ve heard it said you can be.’

  ‘What, I seem that way to you?’

  ‘You’re probably different off-duty.’

  ‘I am never off-duty, Abigail.’

  She laughed. ‘Listen, I wouldn’t blame you. But you’re saying everyone’s got you all wrong?’

  ‘Me and a hundred others. Listen, I know one or two MPs who are pretty awful, talentless, slack bastards. But more often the way politics is reported … I don’t recognise the story, and I’m a character in it.’