Fiona laughed. “Did you go to Charles’s wedding?”
“My darling, the only Etonians who have ever been seen in Hammersmith pass through it as quickly as possible on a boat, representing either Oxford or Cambridge.”
“So you weren’t invited,” said Fiona.
“I’m told that only Amanda was invited, and even she nearly found she had another engagement. With her doctor, I believe.”
“Well, Charles certainly can’t afford another divorce.”
“No, not in his present position as Her Majesty’s. Financial Secretary. One divorce might go unnoticed but two would be considered habit-forming, and all diligent readers of Nigel Dempster have been able to observe that consummation has taken place.”
“But how long will Charles be able to tolerate her behavior?”
“As long as he still believes she has given him a son who will inherit the family title. Not that a marriage ceremony will necessarily prove legitimacy,” added Pimkin.
“Perhaps Amanda won’t produce a son.”
“Perhaps whatever she produces it will be obvious that it’s not Charles’s offspring,” said Pimkin, falling into a chair that had been momentarily left by a large buxom lady.
“Even if it was I can’t see Amanda as a housewife.”
“No, but it suits Amanda’s current circumstances to be thought of as the loving spouse.”
“Time may change that, too,” said Fiona.
“I doubt it,” said Pimkin. “Amanda is stupid, that has been proven beyond reasonable doubt, but she has a survival instinct second only to a mongoose. So while Charles is spending all the hours of the day advancing his glittering career she would be foolish to search publicly for greener pastures. Especially when she can always lie in them privately.”
“You’re a wicked old gossip,” said Fiona.
“I cannot deny it,” said Pimkin, “for it is an art at which women have never been as accomplished as men.”
“Thank you for such a sensible wedding present,” said Alexander, joining his wife of two hours. “You selected my favorite claret.”
“Giving a dozen bottles of the finest claret serves two purposes,” said Pimkin, his hands resting lightly on his stomach. “First, you can always be assured of a decent wine when you invite yourself to dine.”
“And second?” asked Alexander.
“When the happy couple split up you can feel relieved that they will no longer have your present to quarrel over.”
“Did you give Charles and Amanda a present?” asked Fiona.
“No,” said Pimkin, deftly removing another glass of champagne from a passing waiter. “I felt your return of the bogus Earl of Bridgwater was quite enough for both of us.”
“I wonder where he is now?” said Alexander.
“He no longer resides in Eaton Square,” said Pimkin with the air of one who has divulged a piece of information which can only guarantee further rapt attention.
“Who would want the phony earl?”
“We are not aware of the provenance of the buyer, as he emanates from one of Her Majesty’s former colonies, but the seller …”
“Stop teasing, Alec. Who?”
“None other than Mrs. Amanda Seymour.”
“Amanda?”
“Yes. Amanda, no less. The dear, silly creature retrieved the false earl from the cellar where Charles had buried him with full military honors.”
“But she must have realized it was a fake.”
“My dear Amanda wouldn’t know the difference between a Holbein and an Andy Warhol but she still happily accepted £10,000 for the impersonation. I am assured that the dealer who purchased this fabricated masterpiece made what I think vulgar people in the City describe as’a quick turn.’”
“Good God,” said Alexander. “I only paid £8,000 for it myself.”
“Perhaps you should get Amanda to advise you on these matters in future,” said Pimkin. “In exchange for my invaluable piece of information I’m bound to inquire if the real Earl of Bridgwater is to remain in hiding.”
“Certainly not, Alec. He is merely awaiting the right moment to make a public appearance,” said Fiona, unable to hide a smile.
“And where is Amanda now?” asked Alexander, obviously wanting to change the subject.
“In Switzerland producing a baby, which we can but hope will bear sufficient resemblance to a white Caucasian to convince one of Charles’s limited imagination that he is the father.”
“Where do you get all your information from?” asked Alexander.
Pimkin sighed dramatically. “Women have a habit of pouring their hearts out to me, Amanda included.”
“Why should she do that?” asked Alexander.
“She lives safe in the knowledge that I am the one man she knows who has no interest in her body.” Pimkin drew breath, but only to devour another smoked salmon sandwich.
Charles phoned Amanda every day while she was in Geneva. She kept assuring him all was well, and that the baby was expected on time. He had considered it prudent for Amanda not to remain in England advertising her pregnancy, a less than recent occurrence to even the most casual observer. She for her part did not complain. With £10,000 safely tucked away in a private Swiss account there were few little necessities she could not have brought to her, even in Geneva.
It had taken a few weeks for Charles to become accustomed to Government after such a long break. He enjoyed the challenge of the Treasury and quickly fell in with its strange traditions. He was constantly reminded that his was the department on which the Prime Minister kept the closest eye, making the challenge even greater. The civil servants, when asked their opinion of the new Financial Secretary, would reply variously: able, competent, efficient, hardworking—but without any hint of affection in their voices. When someone asked his driver, whose name Charles could never remember, the same question he proffered the view, “He’s the sort of minister who always sits in the back of a car. But I’d still put a week’s wages on Mr. Seymour becoming Prime Minister.”
Amanda produced her child in the middle of the ninth month. After a week’s recuperation she was allowed to return to England. She discovered traveling with her offspring was a nuisance and by the time she arrived at Heathrow she was more than happy to turn the child over to the nanny Charles had selected.
Charles had sent a car to pick her up from the airport. He had an unavoidable conference with a delegation of Japanese businessmen, he explained, all of them busy complaining about the new Government tariffs on imports. At the first opportunity to be rid of his oriental guests he bolted back to Eaton Square.
Amanda was there to meet him at the door. Charles had almost forgotten how beautiful his wife was, and how long she had been away.
“Where’s my child?” he asked, after he had given her a long kiss.
“In a nursery that’s more expensively furnished than our bedroom,” she replied a little sharply.
Charles ran up the wide staircase and along the passage. Amanda followed. He entered the nursery and stopped in his tracks as he stared at the future Earl of Bridgwater. The little black curls and deep brown eyes came as something of a shock.
“Good heavens,” said Charles, stepping forward for a closer examination. Amanda remained by the door, her hand clutching its handle.
She had a hundred answers ready for his question.
“He’s the spitting image of my great-grandfather. You skipped a couple of generations, Harry,” said Charles, lifting the boy high into the air, “but there’s no doubt you’re a real Seymour.”
Amanda sighed with inaudible relief. The hundred answers she could now keep to herself.
“It’s more than a couple of generations the little bastard has skipped,” said Pimkin. “It’s an entire continent.” He took another sip of christening champagne before continuing. “This poor creature, on the other hand,” he said, staring at Fiona’s firstborn, “bears a striking resemblance to Alexander. Dear little girl should have been
given a kinder legacy with which to start her life.”
“She’s beautiful,” said Fiona, picking Lucy up from the cradle to check her nappy.
“Now we know why you needed to be married so quickly,” added Pimkin between gulps. “At least this child made wedlock, even if it was a close-run thing.”
Fiona continued as if she had not heard his remark. “Have you actually seen Charles’s son?”
“I think we should refer to young Harry as Amanda’s child,” said Pimkin. “We don’t want to be had up under the Trade Descriptions Act.”
“Come on, Alec, have you seen Harry?” she asked, refusing to fill his empty glass.
“Yes, I have. And I am afraid he also bears too striking a resemblance to his father for it to go unnoticed in later life.”
“Anyone we know?” asked Fiona, probing.
“I am not a scandalmonger,” said Pimkin, removing a crumb from his waistcoat. “As you well know. But a certain Brazilian fazendeiro who frequents Cowdray Park and Ascot during the summer months has obviously maintained his interest in English fillies.”
Pimkin confidently held out his glass.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
JAMES CALLAGHAN’S RESIGNATION as Labour party leader in October 1980 took none of the political analysts by surprise. Unlike his predecessor he was over sixty-five, the age at which his party had recommended retirement.
Those same analysts were surprised, however, when Michael Foot, the veteran left-winger, defeated Denis Healey by 139 votes to 129 to become the new leader of the Labour party. The analysts immediately predicted a long spell of opposition for the socialists.
The Conservatives took much pleasure in watching a leadership struggle from the sidelines for a change. When Charles Seymour heard the result it amused him that the Labour party had ended up replacing a sixty-year-old with a sixty-four-year-old, who in turn was being replaced by a sixty-seven-year-old. Lord Shinwell, who at the age of ninety-six was the oldest living former Labour Cabinet minister, declared that he would be a candidate for party leadership when Foot retired.
When the election for the Shadow Cabinet came a week later Andrew decided not to submit his name. Like many of his colleagues he liked the new leader personally but had rarely been able to agree with him on domestic issues and was totally opposed to his defense and European policies. Instead he took on the chairmanship of the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs. Raymond for his part considered that Foot was destined to be no more than an interim leader and was therefore quite happy to serve under him. When the election to the Shadow Cabinet was announced Raymond came eighth. Michael Foot invited him to continue shadowing the Trade portfolio.
When Andrew entered the Commons Chamber the day after the election he walked up the gangway and took a seat on the back benches for the first time in fourteen years. He looked down at Raymond lounging on the front bench and recalled his own words “There may well come a day when I sit and envy you from the same back benches.”
Andrew was not surprised when he heard from his local committee in Edinburgh that he would once again have to submit himself to reselection as their candidate some time during 1981. When the Labour conference the previous October had approved the mandatory reselection of Labour MPs he had realized his biggest battle would be internal. Frank Boyle had even managed to replace another of Andrew’s supporters with one of his own henchmen.
Roy Jenkins, the former deputy leader of the Labour party, was returning from Brussels as soon as his term as President of the European Commission came to an end. After delivering the Dimbleby lecture on television Jenkins made no secret of the fact that he was considering founding a new party that would take in those moderate radicals who felt the Labour party had swung too far to the left. The party conference had removed the power of selection of the leaders from Members of Parliament; for many this was the final straw, and several Labour MPs told Jenkins they were ready to defect. Andrew would have preferred to remain loyal to the party and try to change it from the inside, but he was fast coming to the conclusion that that hour had passed.
In his morning mail was a curt note from the constituency secretary informing him that Frank Boyle was going to oppose him for the nomination. Andrew flew up to Edinburgh on the day of the meeting, fearing the worst. No one met him at the airport, and at party headquarters David Connaught greeted him with a glum face.
Andrew stood in front of the committee in a cold, cheerless room and answered the same questions that had been put to him only three years before. He gave exactly the same answers: where he stood on nuclear disarmament, why he was in favor of a close association with the United States, his attitude to a wealth tax—on and on, predictable question after predictable question, but he never once allowed them to exasperate him.
He ended with the words: “I have been proud to serve the people of Edinburgh Carlton for almost twenty years as the Labour member and hope to do so for at least another twenty. If you now feel unable to reselect me I would have to consider standing as an independent candidate.” For the first time, one or two members of the committee looked anxious.
“We are not intimidated by your threats, Mr. Fraser,” said Frank Boyle. “The Labour party has always been bigger than any individual. Now we know where Mr. Fraser’s real interests lie I suggest we move to a vote.”
Twelve little slips of paper were passed out. “Fraser” or “Boyle” were scribbled on them before they were sent back to the chairman.
Frank Boyle slowly gathered up the slips, clearly relishing Andrew’s discomfort. He unfolded the first slip of paper. “Boyle,” he said, glancing at the others round the table.
He opened a second—“Fraser”—then a third, “Boyle,” followed by “Fraser, Fraser, Fraser.”
Andrew kept count in his head: four-two in his favor.
“Fraser,” followed by “Boyle, Boyle, Fraser.”
Six-four in Andrew’s favor, with two still unopened: he only needed one more vote. “Boyle.” Six-five. The chairman took some considerable time opening the last slip.
“Boyle,” he announced in triumph.
He paused for effect. “Six votes all,” he declared. “Under standing order forty-two of the Party Constitution,” he said, as if he had learned the words off by heart before the meeting, “in the result of a tie the chairman shall have the casting vote.” He paused once again.
“Boyle,” he said, lingering for a moment. “I therefore declare that Frank Boyle is selected as the official Labour party candidate for the constituency of Edinburgh Carlton at the next general election.” He turned to Andrew and said, “We shall no longer be requiring your services, Mr. Fraser.”
“I would like to thank those of you who supported me,” Andrew said quietly and left without another word.
The next day the Scotsman came out with a lengthy article on the dangers of a small group of willful people having the power to remove a member who had served his constituents honorably over a long period of time. Andrew phoned Stuart Gray to thank him. “I only wish the article had come out the day before,” he said.
“It was set up for yesterday,” Stuart told him, “but the announcement from Buckingham Palace of Prince Charles’s engagement to Lady Diana Spencer moved everything else out—even the Rangers—Celtic report. By the way, doesn’t Boyle’s nomination have to be confirmed by his General Management Committee?”
“Yes, but they are putty in his hands. That would be like trying to explain to your mother-in-law about your wife’s nagging.”
“Then why don’t you appeal to the National Executive and ask for the decision to be put to a full meeting of the constituency party?”
“Because it would take weeks to get the decision overturned and more importantly I’m no longer certain that I want to fight the seat as a Labour candidate.”
Andrew listened to the reporter’s question and said, “Yes, you may quote me.”
As the date for an election drew nearer Charles decided it might be wis
e to introduce Amanda to the constituency. He had explained to those who inquired that his wife had had rather a bad time of it after the birth, and had been told by her doctors not to participate in anything that might raise her blood pressure—though one or two constituents considered that the Sussex Downs’ Conservatives would find it hard to raise the blood pressure of a ninety-year-old with a pacemaker. Charles had also decided to leave Harry at home, explaining that it was he who had chosen a public life, not his son.
The annual Garden Party held in the grounds of Lord Cuckfield’s country home seemed to Charles to be the ideal opportunity to show off Amanda and he asked her to be certain to wear something appropriate.
He was aware that designer jeans had come into fashion, and that his clothes-conscious wife never seemed to dress in the same thing twice. He also knew that liberated women didn’t wear bras. But he was nevertheless shocked when he saw Amanda in a near see-through blouse and jeans so tight it looked as if she had been poured into them. Charles was genuinely horrified.
“Can’t you find something a little more … conservative?” he suggested.
“Like the things that old frump Fiona used to wear?”
Charles couldn’t think of a suitable reply. “The Garden Party will be frightfully dull,” said Charles desperately. “Perhaps I should go on my own.”
Amanda turned and looked him in the eye. “Are you ashamed of me, Charlie?”
He drove his wife silently down to the constituency and every time he glanced over at her he wanted to make an excuse to turn back. When they arrived at Lord Cuckfield’s home his worst fears were confirmed. Neither the men nor the women could take their eyes off Amanda as she strolled around the lawns devouring strawberries. Many of them would have used the word “hussy” if she hadn’t been the member’s wife.
Charles might have escaped lightly had it only been the one risqué joke Amanda told—to the bishop’s wife—or even her curt refusals to judge the baby contest or to draw the raffle; but he was not to be so lucky. The chairman of the Women’s Advisory Committee had met her match when she was introduced to the member’s wife.