matrons. He extended a hand.
‘Good evening. I’m Francis Urquhart.’
‘Sally Quine.’ She was cool, less gushing than most guests.
‘I’m delighted you could come. And your husband…?’
‘Beneath a ton of concrete, I earnestly hope.’
Now he could detect the slightly nasal accent and he glanced discreetly but admiringly at the cut of her long Regency jacket. It was red with large cuffs, the only decoration provided by the small but ornate metal buttons which made the effect both striking and professional. The raven hair shimmered gloriously in the light of the chandeliers.
‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs…? Miss Quine.’ He was picking up her strong body language, her independence, and couldn’t fail to notice the taut expression around her mouth; something was bothering her. ‘I hope you are enjoying yourself.’
‘To be frank, not a lot. I get very irritated when men try to grope and pick me up simply because I happen to be an unattached woman.’
So that’s what was bothering her. ‘I see. Which man?’
‘Prime Minister, I’m a businesswoman. I don’t get very far by being a blabbermouth.’
‘Well, let me guess. He sounds as if he’s here without a wife. Self-important. Probably political if he feels sufficiently at ease to chance his hand in this place. Something of a charmer, perhaps?’
‘The creep had so little charm he didn’t even have the decency to say please. I think that’s what riled me as much as anything. He expected me to fall into his arms without even the basic courtesy of asking nicely. And I thought you English were gentlemen.’
‘So…Without a wife here. Self-important. Political. Lacking in manners.’ Urquhart glanced around the room, still trying to avoid the stares of the matrons who were growing increasingly irritated. ‘That gentleman in the loud three-piece pinstripe, perhaps?’ He indicated a fat man in early middle age who was mopping his brow with a spotted handkerchief as he perspired in the rapidly rising warmth of the crowded room.
She laughed in surprise and acknowledgement. ‘You know him?’
‘I ought to. He’s my new Minister of Housing.’
‘You seem to know your men well, Mr Urquhart.’
‘It’s my main political asset.’
‘Then I hope you understand your women just as well, and much better than that oaf of a Housing Minister…In the political rather than the biblical sense,’ she added as an afterthought, offering a slightly impertinent smile.
‘I’m not sure I follow.’
‘Women. You know, fifty-two per cent of the electorate? Those strange creatures who are good enough to share your beds but not your clubs and who think your Government is about as supportive and up-to-the-mark as broken knicker elastic?’
In an Englishwoman her abruptness would have been viewed as bad manners, but it was normal to afford Americans somewhat greater licence. They talked, ate, dressed differently, were even different in bed so Urquhart had been told, although he had no first-hand experience. Perhaps he should ask the Housing Minister. ‘It’s surely not that bad…’
‘For the last two months, your Party has been pulling itself apart while it chose a new leader. Not one of the candidates was a woman. And according to women voters, none of the issues you discussed were of much relevance to them, either. Particularly to younger women. You treat them as if they were blind copies of their husbands. They don’t like it and you’re losing out. Badly.’
Urquhart realized he was relinquishing control of this conversation; she was working him over far more effectively than anything he could have expected from the charity representatives, who had now drifted off in bitter disappointment. He tried to remember the last time he had torn apart an opinion poll and examined its entrails, but couldn’t. He’d cut his political teeth in an era when instinct and ideas rather than psephologists and their computers had ruled the political scene, and his instincts had served him very well. So far. Yet this woman was making him feel dated and out of touch. And he could see a piano being wheeled into a far corner of the huge reception room.
‘Miss Quine, I’d like very much to hear more of your views, but I fear I’m about to be called to other duties.’ His wife was already leading the tenor by the hand towards the piano, and Urquhart knew that at any moment she would be searching for him to offer a suitable introduction. ‘Would you be free at some other time, perhaps? It seems I know a great deal less about women than I thought.’
‘I appear to be in demand by Government Ministers this evening,’ she mused. Her jacket had fallen open to reveal an elegantly cut but simple dress beneath, secured by an oversized belt buckle, which for the first time afforded him a glimpse of her figure. She saw he had noticed, and had appreciated. ‘I hope at least you will be able to say please.’
‘I’m sure I will,’ he smiled, as his wife beckoned him forward.
Royal palaces are dangerous places in which to sleep or serve. They have far too many windows.
December: The Second Week.
The signs of festive celebration were muted this year. Mycroft, with the pressure of work easing as journalists forsook word processors for the crush of Hamley’s toy counter and the karaoke bars, trudged aimlessly through the damp streets in search of…he knew not what. Something, anything, to keep him out of the tomb-like silence of his house. The sales had started early, even before Christmas, yet instead of customers the shop doorways seemed full of young people with northern accents and filthy hands asking for money. Or was it simply that he’d never had time to notice them before? He made a pretence at Christmas-shopping along the King’s Road, but quickly became frustrated. He hadn’t the slightest idea what his children might want, what they were interested in, and anyway they would be spending Christmas with their mother. ‘Their mother’, not ‘Fiona’. He noticed how easily he slipped into the lexicon of the unloved. He was staring into the window of a shop offering provocative women’s lingerie, wondering if that was really what his daughter wore, when his thoughts were interrupted by a young girl who, beneath the makeup and lipstick, looked not much older than sixteen. It was cold and drizzling, yet the front of her plastic raincoat was unbuttoned.
‘’Ullo, sunshine. Merry Christmas. Need anything to stick on top of your tree?’ She tugged at her raincoat, revealing an ample portion of young, pale flesh. ‘Christmas sale special. Only thirty quid.’
He gazed long, mentally stripping away the rest of the raincoat, discovering a woman who, beneath the plastic, imitation leather and foundation, retained all the vigour and appealing firmness of youth, with even white teeth and a smile he could almost mistake as genuine. He hadn’t talked to anyone about anything except business for more than three days, and he knew he desperately missed companionship. Even bickering with his wife about the brand of toothpaste had been better than silence, nothing. He needed some human contact, a touch, and he would feel no guilt, not after Fiona’s performance. A chance to get back at her in some way, to be something other than a witless cuckold. He looked once again at the
