Turn Right at the Spotted Dog

by Jilly Cooper

  While Mr Fowler banged on, yet another would-be leader, Ted Heath, sat sulking and huffed up like a great gelded tom cat whose mistress had forgotten the Whiskas.

  The Wets, in fact, are so ghastly I can’t see them posing any threat to Mrs T at all. Mr Pym stood sourly watching speeches from the gallery. Mr Walker of the mean collie eyes and the suspect vowel sounds keeps needling Mrs T about unemployment, but seems to care only about his own advancement. A fellow minister told me scathingly that Margaret thought by giving Peter Energy, she was sending him to Siberia. But the salt mines suddenly turned into the gold mines of the miners’ strike.

  On Wednesday, when Norman Tebbit made a second speech urging the conference to greater efforts to win the next election, he looked much less a leader. He fluffed several punchlines, and seemed as uncomfortable as Bernard Manning trying to play Brown Owl.

  ‘We must play as a team,’ he exhorted the delegates. ‘We must revitalise every organ in the party.’

  ‘Not Cecil’s for God’s sake,’ muttered a delegate.

  In the evening, there were plenty of parties, but they were all rather subdued. At the Institute of Directors’ bash, the urbane Ronald Allison, Mrs Thatcher’s speech-writer, had been given the night off because Mrs T had gone bopping with the Young Conservatives. He expected substantial rewrites on the big speech in the morning, he said. Mrs T, like all stars, got very strung up beforehand, but the more nervous she was, the better she spoke.

  ‘I had terrible problems at Brighton last year,’ he sighed. ‘I’d written a viciously anti-Kinnock speech, but Kinnock was so nice and sympathetic about the bomb I had to rewrite it from start to finish, cutting out all the beastly things we’d said about him.’

  On to dinner with Julian Critchley, Tory rebel, and Bill Rodgers from the SDP, who was covering the conference for the BBC. A beady Tory whip at the next table looked at us very suspiciously, speculating on what we were up to. Talk inevitably got round to Cecil Parkinson.

  ‘The trouble with Cecil,’ said Mr Critchley, ‘is that he always says what you want to hear. When I was causing trouble, and he was Party Chairman, he would always put his hand on my arm, sigh deeply, and say: “What a waste.” The thing I couldn’t cope with was the way he was always slagging off Mrs Thatcher behind her back.’

  Outside in the foyer, the hotel was offering two videos; one of Mary Poppins, the other of a horror film called Christina – ‘She’ll Possess You, She’ll Destroy you, She’s Death on Wheels,’ which seems to sum up both the loyalists’ and the Wets’ views of Mrs Thatcher.

  On balance, the people who deserved the standing ovation were the delegates, but generally I was far more impressed by Maggie’s ministers than I expected to be. If they could add curing to caring, I might even vote for them.

  The Teen Commandments

  I WAS THIRTEEN when I wrote my first book. It was called The Teen Commandments, and consisted of advice to parents on how to behave and not irritate their children to death. Sadly, before I could ram the book into a safe, and profit from its sage counsel in later life, I lost it.

  To jog my memory, and in a faint hope of reducing the guerrilla warfare at home, I asked my own children for their list of Dos and Donts for parents.

  Top of the list was unanimously: Parents should not pry.

  This involved asking questions such as: ‘Where are you going?’ ‘Who with? Will you be back for supper?’ ‘Who was that on the telephone?’ ‘Why were you so long on the telephone?’ ‘Was it a good party?’ And (worst of all), ‘Did you meet anyone nice?’

  Parents should not then resort to MI5 tactics, ringing up best friend Louise’s mother, asking if Louise had a nice time at the party, then casually asking if Louise mentioned Emily getting off with anyone – and then saying: ‘Oh, his parents are supposed to be rather nice, aren’t they?’

  Parents should not force their children to go to frightful parties where they won’t know anybody, on the premise that they might meet Master Right.

  Parents should cook and foot the drinks bill for their children’s parties, but not attend them. Nor should they invite any guest without consultation – just because a boy washes and goes to Winchester, it doesn’t stop him being a wimp.

  Parents should never make comparisons, saying: ‘When I was your age, I had hordes of boys from Eton, Marlborough and Radley after me, but we never did anything, of course – we were so innocent in those days.’

  Parents should not regurgitate the past to the accompaniment of violins, recounting how during the war they had nothing to eat, only water at meal times, and had to wash up, dry and put away because there were no dishwashers.

  Parents should not automatically turn the volume knob 45 degrees to the left whenever they enter the room. They must appreciate that homework is only possible if stereo, radio and television are blaring. They must never storm into the sitting room, howling: ‘I’m not having you glued to television on a lovely day,’ then spend the rest of the afternoon themselves watching the rugger international.

  Parents should share everything with their children: hairdriers, belts, make-up, and that utterly gross, yucky black polo-neck jersey, which was rejected with screams of mirth in the summer holidays but which has suddenly come back into fashion.

  Parents should never make personal remarks. If their children wish to appear with their hair like an upside down lavatory brush, dipped in plum jam, that’s their problem.

  Parents should provide a twenty-four-hour taxi service and always lend their children the car to practise driving. After all, Volvos are built to withstand a few gateposts and stone walls.

  Parents should not be inconsistent, howling with laughter over Adrian Mole and videos of Animal House, drooling over Madonna, then going berserk if their children behave in a remotely similar fashion. They should not hold forth on the perils of teenage drinking while clutching a second triple whisky. Nor is a half-empty packet of Rothmans in a trouser pocket proof of heroin addiction.

  Parents should never dictate their children’s diet. Four Mars bars, seventeen packets of crisps, two pounds of Granny Smiths, a litre of Coke and four mugs of hot chocolate – leaving the relevant milk-coated pans in the sink – are the ideal substitute for three meals a days.

  Parents should never answer ‘Yes’ to the question: ‘Is there anything I can do?’ Nor make the most biddable child do the most housework.

  Parents must appreciate that there’s no time like the future. Bedrooms can be tidied next year, washing brought down next week, as long as it’s then done immediately, as the child needs it before lunch.

  Parents should not throw tantrums over inessentials, such as every towel in the house wet under the bed, topless ketchup bottles, encrusted forks in ancient half-filled baked beans tins behind the sofa, and twelve newly ironed shirts hopelessly creased because someone’s rummaged through the hot cupboard after a pair of tights.

  Children should not lose too much sleep – their mothers and fathers may just be going through a difficult, rebellious age.

  But sadly, as Anthony Powell once pointed out: ‘Parents are often a great disappointment to their children. They seldom fulfil the promise of their early years.’

  The English Lieutenant’s Woman

  ‘I AM NOT going to watch it on television,’ said my husband, as I set out for the Abbey. ‘I’ve got far too much work to do. Nor,’ he added, eyeing my dress disapprovingly, ‘should you be wearing spots, you’ll just add to the wall-to-wall measles in church.’

  On the way, I perked up. It was such heaven being cheered like mad as my taxi whizzed round Parliament Square, but rather disappointing that a dustcart following us was cheered even louder.

  The first person I saw outside the church was Lynda Lee-Potter looking very glamorous in a sapphire blue coat and a big white hat. I said she looked very brown, she said it must be rust. We were soon joined by Jean Rook in an even bigger hat, and Peter Townend, the Tatler guru, who felt Fergie was ‘a leetle too bumptious
’.

  ‘Bum is the operative word,’ said a male journalist excitedly. ‘She must be a tiger in the sack.’

  Guests were rolling up. An enormous cheer greeted a handsome Brazilian polo player with blackcurrant ripple hair and a sinuous wife. Lady Elmshurst, the bride’s grandmother, who comes into the Dummer newsagents every morning and only buys the papers with nice pictures of Fergie for her scrapbook, went by, saying what a nice young man Andrew was.

  Ted Heath, more radiant than any bride because Maggie’s having such a foul time, waddled past saying he was happy to talk to anyone about sanctions. Upper-class women gingerly clanked jaws to avoid knocking each other’s hats off.

  ‘I expect we’ll find millions of chums once we get inside,’ said a beauty, looking at the press corps in dismay.

  It was bitterly cold. All around me, desperate to get an angle, purple hands were scribbling purple prose. Maeve Binchey, resplendent in a tent dress and no hat, said Thank God she wasn’t filing copy till tomorrow, when she could distil all the rubbish written by us hacks.

  Big Ben struck ten, in we surged. The Abbey with its blue carpet, faded rose satin seats, towering nave and towering naval officers in their splendid uniforms, made the perfect theatrical set. The pulpit was topped with flowers, like a Tory lady’s hat. White and pink carnations hung over the edge to catch a first glimpse of Fergie.

  The press were going mad trying to identify everyone. The pillar on my left wasn’t very communicative, but I had high hopes of the young man on my right who was steadily making notes. Alas, his brilliant shorthand turned out to be Arabic longhand. Beyond him a Japanese was sucking toffees.

  There was much speculation as to whether a girl in tuna-fish pink in the front row was Pamela Stephenson masquerading as a plain clothes human. There seemed to be far more red-heads than usual. Mr Kinnock, for example, was looking very bullish, but so he should with such a ravishing wife in her satin coat of many colours.

  As a concession to morning dress, David Steel was wearing a kilt, carefully smoothing it under him like a woman as he sat down.

  There was a rumble of interest as Mrs Barrantes – a wonderfully elongated figure in egg-yolk yellow – arrived with tonsillitis and Hector. Hector, one must add, despite having forgotten to iron his face and looking like Robert Maxwell’s younger brother, is jolly attractive. The second Mrs Ferguson, seated nearby, seemed far too nice to jab hatpins into either of them, but how would Major Ferguson react?

  And how would Maggie react on meeting the Queen? Would they go to eleven rounds over the dwindling Commonwealth? It was all too exciting. Sitting below us now was Mrs Reagan, her huge aquamarine hat so like a swimming pool seen from the air that I was tempted to dive in and cool off.

  What a pity Mr Reagan hadn’t come as well, then he and the Major, who’s appeared on television far more often in the last month, could have staged a Two Ronnies act.

  On a nearby television monitor, the little bridesmaids and the pages, straight out of HMS Pinafore, were arriving at the door.

  ‘They’re so well behaved. I expect they tranked them beforehand,’ said an American journalist.

  People with handles to their names were now nodding to Handel’s Water Music, and at last we could see Fergie, a radiant blur on the monitor. Her glass coach had more carriage lamps than a Weybridge Hacienda.

  Then suddenly like an all-honours hand at bridge, the Royal Family arrived. There was the Queen in speedwell blue to match her eyes, which are so like Prince Andrew’s; and Philip bronzed and genial, like Jason Colby without his toupée; and the Queen Mother, settling happily into her chair like a great pastel swan; and Princess Anne in A-D directory yellow, who gets prettier by the day. One forgets, too, the good looks of Mark Phillips, who, despite hardly addressing a word to his wife, chatted merrily to Princess Margaret, dashing in peacock blue. Princess Alexandra stood out in bright orange, in contrast to her husband, who keeps such a low profile that a recent photograph of them both in a Canadian newspaper described him as ‘an unidentified man’!

  All eyes, however, were on Fergie’s friend, Princess Diana, in her Nelson hat. With her huge startled eyes, and her bare knees covered by her service sheet, and her impossibly long, beautiful legs curled under her, she looked like a colt liable to bolt out of the church at any minute.

  ‘Isn’t her outfit disappointing?’ clucked a lady journalist. ‘Those spots are so old hat.’

  In fact she looked lovely – and if she’d worn something spectacular, everyone would have accused her of upstaging Fergie.

  The excitement began to bite as Prince Andrew arrived, looking handsome, but as white as his shirt and surreptitiously wiping his sweating hands on his trousers. Prince Edward, his supporter, ghastly word, was being supportive, another ghastly word. With his boyish pink face and rather unbecoming uniform (really one shouldn’t wear a brown belt with a blue suit) he looked like a trainee ambulance man.

  At long last Fergie arrived, and the Little Dummer Girl soon to become the English Lieutenant’s Woman, set out on her long walk up the church. In her impatience to get to her prince, it was as though she were roller skating under her dress.

  The Major, slightly subdued except for his punk red eyebrows, held her arm with the gentle pride of a labrador retrieving a grouse. And well he might. She looked breathtaking, her thick red-gold hair framing her face in Medusa ringlets. And the dress was a miracle – the train, glittering in the chandeliers like a huge dragon-fly wing, seemed to have a life all of its own as it rippled, irridescent, over the river of blue carpet.

  Following it, Prince William, determined to give his mother a heart attack, played bumps-a-daisy with little Laura Fellowes.

  ‘Dearly Beloved,’ intoned the Dean.

  Next it was Runcie. As he quavered on about the dreadful day of judgement, one couldn’t help wondering how many hat pins he’d used to secure his mitre, or whether he’d had his handbag searched on the way in like the rest of us.

  Everyone looked happier now. Diana, though hardly taking her eyes off Prince William, beamed several times at the bride. The Queen, whatever anyone has written to the contrary, looked cheerful throughout, far happier than she had at Anne’s wedding. Maybe you relax once your first child is married. Even Philip smiled sympathetically when Fergie fluffed Andrew’s names. Perhaps he won’t be so shirty to Wogan about cue cards in future.

  Above all, it was touching how Andrew and Sarah gazed into each other’s eyes and made their vows as though they really meant them, and how after each ‘I will’, you could hear the great muffled roar of approval from the crowd outside. The marriage service over, one half-expected the Major to blow his whistle for the end of a chukka.

  A suntanned Prince Charles, who, at last, seems to be emerging out of Princess Diana’s shadow, then had to read a ludicrously convoluted lesson from ‘Ephesians’. With opening sentences of 107 words, one is amazed St Paul ever got anything published.

  ‘Lead Us Heavenly Father’ was the Major’s cue to step back and sit next to his ex-wife. A shade unforgiving, he never once in church or on television appeared to address a word to her. It seemed impossible that two people on next door seats could sit with their thighs at an angle of 120 degrees.

  In the row behind, Ronnie’s son-in-law, a sturdy Australian, had been firmly placed between Hector Barrantes and the second Mrs Ferguson (if you have a supporter, why not a divider) in case, horrors, Hector tried it again.

  Now they were off into the vestry. Philip guided the Queen Mother, but Mrs Barrantes was not helped by the Major, who looked as though touching the elbow she had given him thirteen years ago would have given him fifth degree burns.

  So long was spent in the vestry, you’d have thought they were consummating the marriage or at least opening a bottle. Meanwhile the television cameras roamed laboriously over stained glassed windows and the more comely choir boys.

  The one moment of excitement was when Mrs Thatcher, looking absolutely furious in a purple hat, chic
ly chosen to match the black eye she might get from the Queen, appeared on the monitor. Any minute one expected a rash of empty seats, leaving only a trail of molehills on the blue carpet. Poor Mrs Thatcher – even the unctuous Sir Alistair was beastly about her hat on television; perhaps now she’s given him his knighthood, he doesn’t feel the need to suck up to her any more.

  Finally the organ broken into Elgar’s triumphal march, and the radiant new Duchess of York, having swept a beautiful curtsey to the Queen and grinned at her mother and stepmother, set out down the aisle. But she was still Fergie, you could warm your hands on the glow of happiness, and you half-expected flowers to spring out of the molehills as she passed.

  Praise should also be given to her husband, who, with his wonderfully demonstrative and un-Royal way of showing he loves her, is truly a Prince Charming. Out into the sunshine they went, and the bells and the cheers rang out, and I suddenly experienced a shaming feeling of anticlimax. Over the last few months, we’ve got to know Fergie so well it seemed awful not to be going along to the reception to knock back champagne and cheer her on her way.

  But there was still work to be done. Jean Rook was in a tizz because her car hadn’t arrived. I persuaded her to join me on the underground.

  ‘But I haven’t been on a tube for twenty years,’ she protested, looking at the gaping masses nervously. ‘What does one do?’

  ‘Put your money in this machine,’ I said.

  ‘Goodness,’ said Miss Rook in delighted surprise, ‘It’s actually given me the right change.’