‘I just wanted to thank you for your adept chairing of the committee,’ she said, with a little sideways look at George. She was very pretty in a corporate kind of way. Quite a strong jaw, though.
‘Congratulations on your new role, by the way,’ George said. ‘I can’t imagine your father or your brothers are too happy about it.’
By mutual and silent agreement, they came to a halt behind an ornate pillar where they couldn’t be seen.
Laura Steyne grinned. ‘I do love a bloodless coup,’ she said. ‘Less messy, I always find. And if I ever meet that bloody Crawley woman, I’d like to buy her a drink. Several drinks.’
‘You really wouldn’t want to meet her,’ George said with a shudder because every now and again, when he least expected it, he’d suddenly remember that night in Cannes and how Becky Sharp had promised him everything and then laughed in his face, and feel fiery hot and then as icy cold as the grave. ‘She’s an evil bitch.’
‘George … can I call you George?’ Laura Steyne seemed undaunted by the granite look on George’s face.
‘All my friends do,’ George said with what he hoped was a subtle emphasis. Under Laura Steyne’s steerage, there was no reason why Gaunt Media wouldn’t claw back their advertisers and their readers.
‘People tell me you’re one to watch,’ Laura said, staring George right in the eye. ‘That you’re a man who’s going places. So I’d think twice before you start labelling women as evil bitches. I get called that a lot, or words to that effect.’
‘But you’ve never met the woman. If you had, then—’
‘I’ve met enough strong, ambitious women who’d be admired and promoted a hell of a lot quicker if they were men. But because they have tits and two X chromosomes, they get called bitches instead,’ Laura said and George felt himself wilt inside, as if he was being given a dressing down by one of the Dames at Eton. Or Becky Sharp herself, for that matter. ‘Just a friendly warning, because I do hope that you and I are going to have a mutually beneficial friendship.’
‘I hope so too,’ George agreed. The sad and infuriating truth was that he needed Laura Steyne a lot more than she needed him. For now. To show that he wasn’t completely whipped, he ostentatiously checked the time on his watch. No flashy Rolex for him, how common, but a watch that had belonged to his great-grandfather and still kept perfect time. ‘I’m afraid that right now the only place I’m going is back home. My wife and child have hardly seen me all week.’
It was worth reminding Laura Steyne that he was a happily married man and a father too. Perfect credentials for a politician who photographed extremely well and was already tipped for a ministerial post in the next Cabinet reshuffle.
*
Usually the thought of going home, or rather going to the house in Leakington where Amelia and young George spent most of their time, filled George with a dull sort of dread.
There wasn’t much to do down there but play golf with members of the local Rotary Club who were all Conservative councillors with very strong opinions on immigrants (terrorists), single mothers (feckless tarts who didn’t deserve government handouts) and building on conservation areas (perfectly reasonable unless it was going to encroach on the unspoiled vistas from their own houses). But if he wasn’t playing golf or opening a jumble sale, then George had to spend time with Amelia.
‘There you are!’ Amelia said when he got home, as if she’d asked him to pop out to get nappies on Monday morning and he’d only just returned at seven fifteen on Friday night. ‘You almost missed bedtime.’
Amelia was in the nursery with the boy attached to her breast – did the boy spend all of his waking hours with his mouth firmly clamped around Amelia’s nipple? Though he had a perfectly lovely nursery and a cot where he’d quite happily sleep, drunk on his mother’s milk, Amelia insisted that he sleep with them when she and George came up to bed.
‘I told you right from the start that I was very strongly drawn to attachment parenting,’ she reminded him whenever George pointedly remarked that it would be nice to sleep with his wife without his child getting in the way.
Not that he had much desire to sleep with Amelia when she smelt of milk all the time and she still hadn’t lost the baby weight though the child was over a year old now.
George cast a jaundiced eye around the nursery, where there were haphazard piles of terry-towelling nappies and baby clothes and all manner of paraphernalia adorned with teddy bears and ducks.
‘Has the housekeeper quit?’ he asked. Amelia absolutely refused to have a nanny but George had put his foot down and insisted on a daily cleaner because he wasn’t having any of the local busybodies saying that the Wylies couldn’t afford help.
‘No. But now that Georgy is crawling, he pulls everything out as soon as I put it away,’ Amelia said, as Georgy released her bulbous red nipple with a little pop. She gently placed him on her shoulder and began to rub his back. ‘Haven’t you got a kiss for us?’
George dutifully came closer to kiss Amelia’s cheek and pat his son on his downy head. It was just as well that he got his needs seen to Monday to Thursday by the latest in a long line of very comely research assistants. Still, he wouldn’t say no to a little bunk up with missus. When they weren’t oozing milk, her tits were quite spectacular and she still rode that old nag of hers that George spent a fortune stabling, so when she squeezed her muscles, sometimes he thought he saw God.
About time Amelia remembered that she was married to a very powerful man, who kept her in a style to which she certainly wasn’t accustomed when she’d been living in Burnt Oak. ‘I’ve actually had quite a busy week. Did you see me on Newsnight on Tuesday?’
Amelia giggled. ‘I’m in bed long before Newsnight. Being a mum is much more exhausting than being a politician.’
‘Oh, don’t exaggerate, Emmy,’ George said, watching on tenterhooks as Amelia laid the baby down, on his back, in the cot. Go straight to sleep, you pint-sized fucker.
With a tired murmur – he really was quite a decent little chap – young Georgy clutched his cuddly Winston Churchill and drifted off to dreamland.
George hovered impatiently for another five minutes while Amelia stared at her slumbering son (though surely she was sick to death of looking at him by now), before finally retreating.
‘Let’s have a drink. A large one,’ George said as he followed her down the stairs. Despite the housekeeper, there seemed to be more piles of stuff all over the house. How many toys and clothes did one very small child need?
‘You know I can’t, George, not while I’m breastfeeding,’ Amelia said. ‘But you have one and tell me all about your very busy week.’
Rather than hanging on to his every word as she used to do, George had the impression lately that Amelia was merely humouring him, but he managed to cajole her into having a very small glass of Chardonnay as he took her through the triumphs of his week in the corridors of power.
‘And everyone agreed that I was an excellent chair of the committee,’ he said when he got to the events of that afternoon. ‘Not that I like to brag.’
‘Of course you don’t,’ Emmy agreed. She was standing in front of the Aga stirring what she promised was a Thai curry. She was quite a good, if hearty, cook. George didn’t dare even look at a carb from Monday to Thursday, otherwise he’d have to ask his tailor to let out the fat straps in all his suits. ‘By the way, I was wondering how you voted on that bill to cut nursery funding?’
Why? Well, at least she was taking an interest in his career, and after he’d wowed her with tales of his parliamentary acumen and persuaded her to have another couple of glasses of Chardonnay, then maybe she’d let him bend her over the kitchen table. She did used to like it when he bent her over things.
‘I voted for the cuts, of course,’ he said. ‘Our party position is that the poor have to help themselves. If you can’t afford to have children then, QED, don’t have children.’
Amelia snorted. George couldn’t be sure because she was half in
profile, but there might have been an eye roll too. ‘If only people who could afford to had children, then the human race would die out pretty quickly,’ she said tartly. ‘Besides, the children of the poor will still grow up to pay taxes and contribute to society, though they’ll struggle to achieve anything when you and your colleagues have closed libraries, underfunded schools and done just about everything they can to eradicate social mobility.’
‘What has got into you?’ George was appalled. It was like being in the Commons bar, stuck next to a table of shouty, rabble-rousing Labour backbenchers. ‘We personally didn’t close any libraries or underfund schools. You want to take that up with your local council.’
‘Your golfing buddies, you mean,’ Amelia sniffed. George had thought it was safe to leave her down here in the country, mouldering away as she hand-washed organic cotton nappies and experimented with baby-led weaning, but she’d obviously been mixing with some undesirable elements.
‘What do you do all day and who do you do it with?’ he asked suspiciously.
‘Unlike you, I mix with all sorts of different people when I take Georgy to baby yoga or the music-makers’ session at what should have been the local library, but it closed down. Which is fine, we can drive two towns over, but that’s not an option when you don’t drive or you can’t afford the bus fare …’
George wished that he’d decided to spend the weekend in London. ‘Oh, please, Emmy, everyone can afford the bus fare,’ he said with the confident air of a man who’d never actually been on a bus in his life, which Amelia pointed out with a lot of aggressive gesturing with a wooden spoon.
He couldn’t help but remember those little flashes of this Amelia – harder, stronger, not so docile or biddable – that he’d seen when he’d proposed. He’d actually thought that motherhood and a very generous allowance would make that different Amelia disappear.
‘You know what? I should stand for the council myself,’ she was now saying and sounding as if she meant it.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ George snapped. ‘You’d be bored to tears. It’s all planning applications and people moaning about rubbish collections.’
Amelia paused to taste her sauce. ‘I suppose you’re right,’ she mumbled and George let out a sigh of relief. Best to quash any signs of rebellion as soon as they appeared.
‘Have another glass of wine,’ he said solicitously because Amelia’s cheeks were red in a way that had nothing to do with slaving over a hot stove. ‘And shall we have a quick bunk-up before dinner? About time we gave dear little Georgy a brother or sis—’
‘This is a bigger problem than just our council,’ Amelia said as if she hadn’t heard one word of George’s very magnanimous offer. ‘It’s nationwide. I bet there are a million women, mothers, who’ve been affected by these cuts …’
‘Enough, Emmy!’ George barked, standing up all the better to loom over her. ‘Not another word. You have a baby, a successful husband and a lovely home, what more could you possibly want? I won’t stand for you having ideas. In fact, I forbid it!’
Amelia had the audacity to snort again. How George missed the young, empty-headed little Emmy who had unquestioningly adored him!
‘Oh, well, if you forbid it …’ she said and let the sentence hang with, yes, a definite eye roll this time that made George shudder. Not just because Amelia was definitely having ideas but because, in that moment, she reminded him of none other than Becky Sharp.
Six months later
THE MARCH OF A MILLION MUMS
We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore!
8th March – On International Women’s Day we call for a day of action against government cuts that impact on our children’s emotional, physical and mental well-being.
STRIKE! We call on all Mums to stop work on this day. No child-rearing, no household chores, no emotional labour.
MARCH! Take part in one of the fifty-seven marches happening in cities and towns across the UK to protest against government cuts.
DONATE! We need your time, support and money to help ALL mothers and children fulfil their potential.
For more details of how to take part, visit www.amillionmums.org.co.uk
Proudly sponsored by Mumsnet, the Women’s Institute, M&S and the Crawley Family Foundation.
Chapter 38
‘Amelia, enough! Enough of all this nonsense. I absolutely forbid you from going on television.’ George was a tinny voice on her mobile phone, forbidding her from doing something that she absolutely intended to do, much as he’d been doing for the last six months.
‘Really, George, you said in the House of Commons that you were very proud of me,’ Amelia reminded him as a make-up girl finished doing something to her face that actually gave her cheekbones. ‘That it was about time someone showed the caring side of the Conservative Party.’
George spluttered inarticulately – he’d been doing a lot of that lately too – and Amelia terminated the call. She needed to focus. She was being interviewed by Jon Snow, who she’d always had a crush on, and she needed to be on point.
She needn’t have worried, Jon Snow was perfectly lovely, though the battle-axe they’d dredged up from the Christian Wives’ Association to provide a counter-argument was perfectly horrible. She didn’t even smile when they showed footage of that day’s march and a close-up of Georgy holding a placard that said, ‘I might need a nap, but I’m still woke.’
‘So, Amelia, six months ago you started the Million Mums campaign on your kitchen table and today over a million mothers across the country downed tools and marched to protest against government cuts. How does that make you feel?’ Jon (he’d said that she could call him Jon) asked.
‘I feel very proud and humbled by each and every mother who took part in today’s protests,’ Amelia said. ‘Who realised that together we’re powerful. Instead of sitting back and passively allowing government policy to adversely affect the lives of our children, we’ve become a movement for change. Today, I’ve talked to so many women who want to be represented, to have their voices heard, whether that means standing for election to their local council or becoming a school governor. We’re taking back control for our children.’
‘And Anne Vere-Vane, chairperson of the Christian Wives’ Association, I take it you didn’t march?’
‘I did not,’ the middle-aged woman said censoriously. ‘A woman’s place, a mother’s place, is in the home, at the heart of her family, not on the streets.’
‘We took to the streets to fight for our families,’ Amelia said, though everything in her longed to backtrack and apologise in the face of the older woman’s disapproval. She asked herself, as she often did these days, what would Becky Sharp do? Becky Sharp, without a question of doubt, would take this bitch down and do it with a smile on her face. ‘Let’s not forget that there were a lot of mothers who’d have loved to march today but they had to work to provide for their families. Although, what with the cost of childcare and the drastic cuts to the Sure Start scheme …’
‘I’ve always thought that mothers who work can’t love their children very much,’ the gorgon on the other side of the table said, and though lovely Jon Snow was meant to be impartial, even he looked pretty shocked.
‘Then I pity you for having absolutely no Christian compassion,’ Amelia said calmly. ‘Because I’ve met a lot of mothers over the last six months, from all sorts of backgrounds. Mothers who are trying to survive on benefits and mothers who have three nannies, some who work because they want to but more often because they have to and some who are stay-at-home mums. But what they all have in common is their love for their children.’
Jon Snow commented, ‘It’s been said today by Conservative MP, Quentin Quadroon – a colleague of your husband George, Amelia – and I quote, “What these women don’t seem to understand is that politics is a very complicated business.”’
‘Not that complicated. And I’ve seen better behaviour at a two-year-old’s birthday party than I have
in the Chamber,’ Amelia said drily and she couldn’t help it, even though darling Jane Sheepshanks-Crawley had begged her not to because it was very unprofessional, she rolled her eyes. ‘And what they all seem to be forgetting is that the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world.’
‘I’m afraid that’s all we have time for,’ said Jon Snow. ‘Amelia Wylie, Anne Vere-Vane, thank you very much.’
After the cameras stopped rolling, Anne Vere-Vane wouldn’t even shake Amelia’s hand, but Jon Snow was happy to pose for a selfie and tell her that she’d done a great job. Glowing from the praise and the hot studio lights, Amelia switched on her phone so she could post the selfie on Instagram. She saw that she had fifteen text messages from her husband, each one more irate than the last.
‘OMG George,’ she texted back, quite irate herself. ‘Stop oppressing me. B part of the solution, not part of the problem. And make your own sodding dinner.’
*
The next few months were a happy blur of marches and meetings, lobbying and campaigning, which coincided with a snap General Election. It was quite a bloodbath for the Conservatives, who lost a significant number of seats, while three first-time candidates, all of them members of their local Million Mums chapters, were elected to Parliament. George’s majority had decreased considerably and he’d been in a foul mood ever since.
Of course Amelia wanted to get her marriage back on track but, as she’d confided to her dear, new friend Jane Sheepshanks-Crawley, she wasn’t sure if their marriage had ever been on track. ‘I just went along with whatever George wanted because I was so grateful to him for loving me and supporting me, even after all that unpleasantness with daddy’s bank.’
‘Maybe another baby?’ Jane had suggested wistfully, because she and Pitt were on their third round of IVF, in spite of the fact that they had so many little Crawleys to look after.
‘If you want another baby, then you’ll have to stop with all this radicalism,’ George had said. ‘It’s not exactly a turn-on to have you shrieking about mothers’ rights every time I switch on the television.’
The Rise and Fall of Becky Sharp Page 31
