“True, but things have changed since—”
“Nothing has changed except my estimation of the value of your word,” said Charles, suddenly realizing that Spencer had never intended he should return to the board. “You gave me your assurance—”
“I won’t be spoken to like this in my own office.”
“If you’re not careful, the next place I shall do it will be in your boardroom. Now, will you honor your undertaking or not?”
“I don’t have to listen to threats from you, Seymour. Get out of my office before I have you removed. I can assure you that you will never sit on the board again as long as I’m chairman.”
Charles turned and marched out, slamming the door as he left. He wasn’t sure with whom to discuss the problem and returned immediately to Eaton Square to consider a plan of campaign.
“What brings you home in the middle of the afternoon?” asked Fiona.
Charles hesitated, considered the question, and then joined his wife in the kitchen and told her everything that had happened at the bank. Fiona continued to grate some cheese as she listened to her husband.
“Well, one thing is certain,” she said, not having spoken for several minutes but delighted that Charles had confided in her. “After that fracas, you can’t both be on the board.”
“So what do you think I ought to do, old girl?”
Fiona smiled; it was the first time he had called her that for nearly two years. “Every man has his secrets,” she said. “I wonder what Mr. Spencer’s are?”
“He’s such a dull middle-class fellow I doubt if—”
“I’ve just had a letter from Seymour’s Bank,” interrupted Fiona.
“What about?”
“Only a shareholder’s circular. It seems Margaret Trubshaw is retiring after twelve years as the board secretary. Rumor has it she wanted to do five more years, but the chairman has someone else in mind. I think I might have lunch with her.”
Charles returned his wife’s smile.
Andrew’s appointment as Minister of State at the Home Office came as no surprise to anyone except his three-year-old son, who quickly discovered how to empty any red boxes that were left unlocked, refilling them with marbles or sweets, and even managing to fit a football into one. As Robert didn’t fully understand “For Your Eyes Only,” it didn’t seem to make a lot of difference that Cabinet committee papers were sometimes found glued together with old bubble gum.
“Can you remove that latest stain in the red box?”
“Good heavens, what caused it?” asked Louise, staring down at a jelly-like blob.
“Frog spawn,” said Andrew, grinning.
“He’s a brainwashed Russian spy,” warned Louise, “with a mental age about the same as most of your colleagues in the House. Yes, I’ll remove the stain if you sit down and write that letter.”
Andrew nodded his agreement.
Among the many letters of commiseration Simon received when he did not return to the House was one from Andrew Fraser. Simon could imagine him sitting in his old office and implementing the decisions he had been involved in making just a few weeks before.
There was also a letter from Ronnie Nethercote inviting him to return to the board of Nethercote and Company at £5,000 a year, which even Elizabeth acknowledged as a generous gesture.
It was not long before Ronnie Nethercote had made Simon an executive director of the company. Simon enjoyed negotiating with the trade unions at a level he had not experienced before. Ronnie made it clear how he would have dealt with the “Commie bastards” given half a chance. “Lock them all up until they learn to do a day’s work.”
“You would have lasted about a week in the House of Commons,” Simon told him.
“After a week with those windbags I’d have been only too happy to return to the real world.”
Simon smiled. Ronnie, he felt, was like so many others — imagining all Members of Parliament were unemployable except the one they knew.
Raymond waited until the last Government appointment was announced before he finally gave up any hope of a job. Several leading political journalists pointed out that he had been left on the back benches while lesser men had been given Government posts but it was scant comfort. Reluctantly he returned to Lincoln’s Inn to continue his practice at the bar.
Harold Wilson, starting his third administration, made it clear that he would govern as long as possible before calling an election. But as he did not have an overall majority in the House few members believed that he could hold out for more than a matter of months.
Fiona returned home after her lunch with Miss Trubshaw with a large Cheshire Cat grin on her face. It remained firmly in place during the hours she had to wait for Charles to get back from the Commons after the last division.
“You look pleased with yourself,” said Charles, shaking out his umbrella before closing the front door. His wife stood in the hallway, her arms crossed.
“How has your day been?” she asked.
“So-so,” said Charles, wanting to hear the news. “But what about you?”
“Oh, pleasant enough. I had coffee with your mother this morning. She seems very well. A little cold in the head, otherwise—”
‘To hell with my mother. How did your lunch with Miss Trubshaw go?”
“I wondered how long it would take you to get round to that.”
She continued to wait just as long as it took for them to walk into the drawing room and sit down. “After seventeen years as secretary to your father and twelve years as secretary to the board there isn’t much Miss Trubshaw doesn’t know about Seymour’s or its present chairman,” Fiona began.
“So what did you discover?”
“Which do you want to hear about first, the name of his mistress or the number of his Swiss bank account?”
Fiona revealed everything she had learned over her two-hour lunch, explaining that Miss Trubshaw usually only drank fortified wine but on this occasion she had downed most of a vintage bottle of Pommard. Charles’s smile grew wider and wider as each fact came pouring out. To Fiona he looked like a boy who has been given a box of chocolates and keeps discovering another layer underneath.
“Well done, old girl,” he said when she had come to the end of her tale. “But how do I get all the proof I need?”
“I’ve made a deal with our Miss Trubshaw.”
“You’ve what?”
“A deal. With Miss Trubshaw. You get the proof if she remains as secretary to the board for a further five years, and no loss of benefit to her pension.”
“Is that all she wants?” said Charles, guardedly.
“And the price of another lunch at the Savoy Grill when you’re invited back on the board.”
Unlike many of his Labour colleagues Raymond now enjoyed dressing up in white tie and tails and mixing with London society. An invitation to the annual bankers’ banquet at the Guildhall was no exception. The Prime Minister was the guest of honor and Raymond wondered if he would drop a hint as to how long he expected the parliamentary session to last before he felt he had to call an election.
At the pre-dinner drinks Raymond had a quick word with the Lord Mayor before becoming involved in a conversation with a circuit court judge on the problems of the parity of sentencing.
When dinner was announced Raymond found his seat on one of the long fingers stretching away from the top table. He checked his place card. Raymond Gould QC, MP. On his right was the chairman of Chloride, Michael Edwardes, and on his left an American banker who had just taken up an appointment in the City.
Raymond found Michael Edwardes’s views on how the Prime Minister should tackle the nationalized industries fascinating, but he devoted far more of his attention to the Euro Bond manager from Chase Manhattan. She must have been thirty, Raymond decided, if only because of her elevated position at the bank and her claim to have been an undergraduate at Wellesley at the time of Kennedy’s death. He would have put Kate Garthwaite at far younger and was not surprised to learn she played tennis in the summer and swam every day during the winter — to keep her weight down, she confided. She had a warm, oval face, and her dark hair was cut in what Raymond thought was a Mary Quant style. Her nose turned up slightly at the end and would have cost a lot of money for a plastic surgeon to reproduce. There was no chance of seeing her legs as they were covered by a long dress, but what he could see left Raymond more than interested.