To Play the King

  He saw Urquhart appear just in time for the three-fifteen p.m. start, forcing his way through the scrum which surrounded the Speaker's Chair and squeezing past the outstretched limbs of other Cabinet Ministers perched untidily along the Front Bench. Urquhart smiled across the Dispatch Box at McKillin, a fleeting parting of thin lips to expose the incisors, the first warning shot of the afternoon's campaign. Behind Urquhart's position sat the Honourable Lady Member for Dorset North, bobbing obsequiously as her master took his seat, wearing a garishly crimson outfit which stood out like a traffic beacon amidst the gloom of grey suits and which would show well on the television screens. She had been practising her expressions of support all morning in front of a mirror. She was a handsome and well-presented woman, early forties, with a voice like a hyena, which rumour had it could reach top C in bed, as even some members of the Opposition claimed to know. She'd never make Ministerial office, but her memoirs would probably outsell the rest.

  McKillin leaned back, giving the impression of a relaxed demeanour while he studied the press gallery above his head; over the finely carved balustrade he could see the heads of the scribblers, faces strained in expectation, their pencils and prejudices sharpened. He wouldn't keep them waiting, he would get in there at the first opportunity, show his colours and retire from the field before the real battle started and it all got out of control. Human rights, that was it. Damned good idea.

  Already Madam Speaker had called the first question, to ask the Prime Minister his engagements for the day, and Urquhart was giving his standard and calculatedly unhelpful response, detailing a few of his official appointments 'in addition to answering questions in the House'.

  ‘It'd be the first bloody time.' It was The Beast, from his seat below the gangway which he claimed by right of constant occupation. He looked dyspeptic; perhaps his sandwiches and pint of bitter had disagreed with him.

  Urquhart gave short shrift to the first question, about a local by-pass, posed by a conscientious constituency member with a small majority, and it was McKillin's opportunity. He leaned forward and inclined his head towards Madam Speaker.

  'The Leader of the Opposition.' Madam Speaker's voice summoned him to the Dispatch Box. He hadn't even finished rising to his feet before another voice cut through the bustle.

  'You couldn't mistake him for a Leader of the Opposition, the grovelling little shit.'

  McKillin felt his cheeks flush with anger, then astonishment. It was The Beast. His own side!

  'Order! Order!' trilled Madam Speaker. In an atmosphere charged like this, with so many hot MPs rubbing shoulders and jostling elbows, she knew it was vital to stamp her authority on proceedings from the first moment of disruption. ‘I heard that. The Honourable Member will withdraw that remark immediately!'

  'What else would you call someone who threw away all his principles and got caught licking the boots of the Royal Family. He's made a complete balls of it.'

  Opposition Members sat largely silent, stunned. Government backbenchers, too, were uncertain, not knowing whether to agree with The Beast or to denounce his vulgarity, but knowing it was essential to make as much noise as possible and stir the pot. In the midst of the growing uproar The Beast, his tangled forelock tumbling across his face and his baggy sports jacket unbuttoned and open, was on his feet and ignoring the repeated demands of Madam Speaker.

  'But isn't it an undeniable fact—'

  'No more!' shrieked the Speaker, her half-moon glasses slipping down her nose as she flushed uncomfortably hot beneath her wig. ‘I shall have no hesitation in naming the Honourable Member unless he withdraws his remarks immediately!'

  'But . . .'

  'Withdraw!' Cries demanding his retraction grew from all sides. The Serjeant at Arms, the parliamentary constable, dressed for the part in executioner's garb of black cloth court dress, complete with silk stockings and ceremonial sword, was standing to attention at the Bar, waiting on Madam Speaker's instructions.

  'But . . .' began The Beast once again.

  'Withdra-a-a-a-w!'

  There was pandemonium. The Beast looked around, seeming unperturbed, as if he could hear none of the noise nor see the flailing hands and Order Papers. He smiled, then at last seemed to appreciate that his game was up for he started nodding his head in agreement. The din subsided, allowing him to be heard.

  'OK.' He looked towards the Speaker's Chair. 'Which words do you want me to withdraw? Grovelling? Little? Or Shit?'

  The tidal wave of outrage all but drowned Madam Speaker's cries. 'All of it! I want it all withdrawn!' Eventually she was heard.

  The lot? You want me to withdraw the lot?'

  'Immediately!' The wig had been shaken askew and she was attempting to readjust herself, desperately struggling to maintain her temper and sense of dignity.

  'All right. All right.' The Beast held up his hands to silence the tumult. 'You all know my views about grovelling to their Royal Mightinesses but . . .' - he stared around fiercely at the pack of parliamentary hounds snapping at his heels - 'if you rule I can't say such things, that I've got to retract it, then I shall.'

  'Now. This instant!'

  There was a baying of approval from all sides. The Beast was now pointing at McKillin.

  'Yes, I was wrong. You obviously can mistake him for a Leader of the Opposition. The grovelling little shit!'

  In the cacophony of shouts from all sides there was not the slightest chance for Madam Speaker to make herself heard, but The Beast didn't wait to be named, gathering up his papers from the floor and throwing a lingering look of insolence in the direction of his party leader before withdrawing himself from the Chamber. The Serjeant at Arms, who could lip-read the Speaker's instructions, fell in beside The Beast to ensure he remained withdrawn from the premises of the Palace of Westminster for the next five working days.

  As The Beast's back passed through the doors and beyond, some semblance of order began to be restored to the Chamber. From beneath her wig, still slightly askew, Madam Speaker gazed in the direction of McKillin, her eyes enquiring after his intentions. He shook his head. He didn't want any longer to ask some fool question about human rights. What about his own human rights? All he wanted was for this cruel and exceptional punishment to come to an end, for someone to come and gently cut him down from the parliamentary gallows on which he was swinging, and hope they might give him a decent burial.

  'How do you do it, Francis?' Stamper demanded as he strode into the Prime Minister's office in the House of Commons.

  'Do what?'

  'Get The Beast so wound up that on his own he's more effective at stuffing McKillin than a dozen Barnsley butchers.'

  'My dear Tim, you've become such a sad old cynic. You look for conspiracies everywhere. The truth - if you could ever recognize it as such - is that I don't have to wind him up. He comes ready wound. No, my contribution to the fun is more along these lines.' He indicated the television with its display of the latest teletext news. The building societies had finished their emergency meeting and the result of their deliberations was flashing up on the screen.

  'Christ. Two per cent on mortgages? That'll go down like a shovel of shit in drinking water.'

  'Precisely. See how much concern the average punter has for the homeless when the mortgage on his own semi-detached roof starts burning its way through his beer money. By closing time tonight the King's conscience will seem an irrelevant and unaffordable luxury.'

  'My apologies for ever having uttered a cynical remark in your presence.'

  'Accepted. Voters appreciate clear choices, Tim, it helps them concentrate. I am presenting them with a choice which is practically transparent. The King may be a rare orchid to my common cabbage, but when the buggers start starving, they'll grab for the cabbage every time.'

  'Enough cabbage to give the King chronic wind.' 'My dear Tim, you might say that. On such matters I couldn't possibly comment.'

  The King was also seated before his television screen, where he had remained sile
ntly watching events since the televising of Prime Minister's Question Time had begun. He had left instructions not to be disturbed but eventually his Private Secretary could restrain his sense of uncase no longer. He knocked and entered with a deferential bow.

  'Sir, my apologies, but you must know that we are being inundated with calls from the media, wanting some reaction, some guidance as to your feelings about events in the House of Commons.

  They will not take silence as an answer, and without a press officer . . .'

  The King seemed not to have noticed the intrusion, staring fixedly at the screen, unblinking, his body taut, the veins at his temple a vivid blue against the parchment skin of his skull. He looked ashen - not with anger, the Private Secretary was well used to the flashes of fire which sparked from the King. The stillness suggested more a man on a different plane, driven deep within himself, the strain indicating that the search to find equilibrium had proved futile.

  The Private Secretary stood motionless, watching the other man's agony, embarrassed at his intrusion yet not knowing how to dismiss himself.

  Eventually the King spoke, in a whisper, but not to the Secretary. 'It is no use, David.' The voice was parched and hoarse. 'It cannot be. They will no more let a King be a man than they would any man be King. It cannot be done - you know that, don't you, old friend . . . ?'

  Then there was silence. The King had not moved, still staring, unseeing, at the screen. The Private Secretary waited for several seemingly endless seconds and then left, pulling the door gently behind him as if he were closing the lid on a coffin.

  Sally rushed across to the House of Commons as soon as she received the summons. She had been in the middle of a pitch to a potential new client, one of the country's leading manufacturers of processed beans, but he had been most understanding, impressed even, and had assured her of the business. With contacts like that he seemed uninterested in further credentials.

  A secretary was waiting for her at St Stephen's entrance to escort her like a VIP past the long queues of visitors and through the security gates, rushing her past several hundred years of history. It was her first time; one day, she promised herself, she would be back and take a calmer look at the glories of Old England, when she had the patience to queue for several hours with all the rest. But for the moment she preferred the preferential treatment.

  They showed her straight into his office. He was on the phone, pacing around the room in his shirtsleeves, trailing the cord of the telephone behind him, animated, issuing orders.

  'Yes, Bryan, I am well and my wife is well. Thank you very much, now shut up and listen. This is important. You will be receiving details of a new poll tomorrow afternoon. A telephone poll following the panic in the markets. It will be a startling one. It will show the Government in a ten-point lead over the Opposition, and my personal lead over McKillin having doubled.' He listened for a moment. 'Of course it's bloody front-page news, why on earth do you think I'm giving it to you? That front-page poll will be supported by an editorial inside your newspaper, something along the lines of "Mortgages and the Monarchy". It will blame the problem with sterling and international confidence four-square on the King and his flawed personality, and those opportunistic politicians who have sought to encourage him in what you will conclude are his grave errors of judgement for seeking to take on the elected Government. Are you listening?'

  There was a mild squawking on the end of the phone and Urquhart rolled his eyes in impatience.

  'You are to suggest that their unprincipled support for the King has shattered the Opposition and ruined the credibility of McKillin, and even more seriously has cast the country into a constitutional mess which is causing deep economic anguish. Reluctantly you will call for a thoroughgoing review of the Monarchy - restricting its powers, its influence, its size, its income. Take it all down carefully. Yes, I've got time . . .' He paused. 'Now we come to the important bit, Bryan. Pay great attention. Your editorial will finish by concluding that so much economic, political and constitutional uncertainty has been created that it requires an immediate solution. No time for extended debates, parliamentary commissions of inquiry - not while every shareholder and mortgage-payer in the country is swinging on the hook. The matter needs to be dealt with decisively. Once and for all, in the national interest. You are to suggest that the only established means of deciding who governs Britain is to hold an election. Do you understand? An election.' He looked across at Sally and winked.

  'My dear Bryan, of course this is something of a shock, that's why I'm giving you the opportunity to prepare. But just between the two of us, until tomorrow. No running down to the bookies to put a couple of quid on an early election, now. Another of our little secrets, eh? You call me, only me, Bryan, day or night, if you have any questions. OK? Bye.'

  He turned with an expectant expression towards Sally. She offered back a serious, hard look, almost a scowl.

  'So who's supposed to be producing this magical overnight poll of yours, Francis?'

  'Why, you are, my dear. You are.'

  Her bug eyes sank back into their sockets as if trying to hide. It was after midnight and she had been sitting in front of the computer terminal ever since the last of her staff had departed for the night and left her on her own. She needed space to think.

  Preparing a questionnaire had been simple. Nothing fancy or out of the ordinary. And she had on the shelf any number of computer disks with their random digit dialling facilities which would give a spin to the sample and so to the results, to drive the survey upmarket or downmarket, give added weight to council-house tenants or the substantial leafy glades of suburbia, question only company directors or the unemployed. The trouble was she had no idea how much the sample needed to be leant on to get the desired result -Urquhart was clearly ahead, but by how much? By however much, it would be more after The Times had sounded off. There was so much unease and anxiety around, it was a perfect time to hotwire the bandwagon.

  She wandered around her scruffy premises. The overheads were kept low, all the flash was up front in the reception area, all the quality poured into the strategy and the thinking. The mechanical side was low life. She walked alongside rows of open booths, covered in cloth for sound-proofing, where tomorrow the motley collection of part-time staff would gather to sit in front of their individual computer screens, phoning the randomly chosen telephone numbers thrown out by the mainframe, mindlessly reading out the required questions and equally mindlessly tapping in the answers. They would not suspect. They were junkies in torn jeans, off-duty New Zealand nurses worrying about missed periods, failed businessmen who had suffered from the mistakes of others and fresh-faced students eagerly waiting to make their own. All that mattered was they were vaguely computer-literate and could turn up at two hours' notice. They had no means of knowing what was happening to the information they gathered, and wouldn't care. She paced along the carpet worn with time and well trodden with gum, examining the polystyrene tiles missing from the corner where the gutter had blocked and backed up, running a finger along the open metal shelves overflowing with computer manuals and telephone directories, and dispatch dockets cast around like sweet wrappers on a windy day. Little natural light penetrated in here to expose the workings of the opinion-research industry. She told clients it was for security, in reality it was simply because the place was a dump. A pot plant had struggled and withered and eventually died, and now doubled as an ashtray. This was her empire.

  It had its advantages, this air-conditioned, computerized, paperless empire. A few years ago she would have needed to shift a ton of paper to do what she had been asked to do; now she had to lift no more than a couple of fingers, tap a few keys - the right keys, mind you - and there you had it. Your result. Urquhart's result. But there was the rub. He had been uncompromisingly specific about the figures he wanted, had already given them to Brynford-Jones. No matter how much she toyed with the specs or put a wobble into the weighting of the sample, what was required was more than
a little spin. She would have to end up doing what she had never done before, and fiddle the result. Take two figures, one Government, the other Opposition, and work backwards. Not so much massaging as beating them to pulp. If she were found out she would never work again, might even be put away for criminal deception. To lie, to cheat, to steal the opinions of ordinary men and women and abuse them. For Francis Urquhart. Is that what her dreams were all about?