by David Harley
Ignoring the barrage of questions, Matt went on.
‘This incident is symptomatic of the state of politics in this country. Our public life has reached a new low with the ENP’s crude and dishonest campaign in this election. The nationalists are running scared: they’re losing all the arguments, so they’ve resorted to using intimidation and physical violence against their opponents. I’ve got a message for James Crouch: your scare tactics won’t work. I’m not going to stand down. We won’t be silenced. Together with our millions of supporters – whose numbers are growing every day – we’ll fight back, by peaceful and democratic means, to restore freedom and fairness to the way this country is governed. I’m prepared to put my life on the line, if that’s what it takes to win this election in the interests of our people, and make our country free, safe and fair once again. Thank you, that’s all for now – as I said, I’m still under doctor’s orders.’
Less than two minutes later, their car was speeding through the City. Sam showed Matt the first real-time tweets: they were all overwhelmingly positive, condemning the assault on Matt and praising his courage. ‘Serious questions for Crouch to answer’ was the title of the Reuters report that came out a couple of minutes later. Sitting together on the back seat, Matt and Sam looked at each other, both poker-faced. As they passed by St Paul’s, Sam could hold back no longer and burst out laughing. Matt shook his head, smiling broadly.
‘You couldn’t make it up,’ he said. ‘A few well-chosen words at the right moment, and we’ve regained the initiative.’
Sam continued scrolling through her tweets.
‘There’s quite a storm out there,’ she said. ‘Crouch must be seething.’
The prime minister turned off the TV in his office, and threw the remote into the far corner of the sofa. He began pacing up and down in front of the window that looked on to the rose garden. Penfold didn’t need to be a clairvoyant to know that an explosion was imminent.
‘Barker didn’t produce a scrap of evidence for this absurd story, yet they all lapped it up. Why didn’t our usual friends in the media go after him and expose this cock-and-bull story as a pack of lies? I thought journalists were supposed to be relentless in their pursuit of truth. Don’t they realise there’s an election on and they’re supposed to do what we say?’
‘Perhaps they were caught by surprise. Don’t worry, Prime Minister: the media cycle will move on as usual, and in a few hours this ridiculous story will probably be forgotten.’
‘”Probably be forgotten” isn’t good enough, Penfold. The damage will have been done. I want it killed, immediately.’
‘I’ll pass the message on to the editors, and to the owners in Paris and Sark. They’ll understand perfectly.’
‘What about News International?’
Penfold hesitated.
‘It’s not entirely clear who’s in charge at the moment. By the way, Mrs Barker’s on a flight back from Sydney tomorrow evening, with the children.’
The prime minister stopped pacing up and down. He suddenly looked more relaxed.
‘That could be useful. At first he won’t know which way to jump. Keep an eye on her. If necessary, I’ll speak to her myself.’
PART 3 – DESCENT INTO DARKNESS
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The following Sunday morning, Sam left the flat early to do some shopping. Matt was still lying in their warm bed, half asleep, when he received the phone call from hell.
‘We’re back!’ said a loud and cheerful woman’s voice.
At first the voice’s very familiarity disoriented him, and he needed a few seconds before he could place it. Then as the realisation sunk in, his heart plummeted and went into free fall, like a plane with sudden engine failure dropping out of the sky.
Please, not her, Matt said to himself, as he tried to muffle his groan with his fist. Not now, just when everything was going so well again.
While he was excited at the prospect of seeing the children, Jenny was the last person he wanted to meet or talk to. His days were full enough already, with the demands of fighting a general election and the pleasures that came with building a new life with Sam. He didn’t need any additional distractions or calls on his time. Matt was certain that Jenny didn’t begin to realise the extent to which his life had been turned upside down, and he had become a different person. She would almost certainly try to pull him back to being who he was before. He wished he’d never answered the phone.
‘How are you?’ he spluttered. ‘How are the children? Why the sudden return?’
In their eight years of marriage – and he doubted she had changed, at least not on this point – Jenny had rarely given a direct answer to any question, however simple. Nor did she ever confine herself to a single succinct sentence when she could use several lengthy paragraphs instead. When the mood took her, she was capable of ignoring the question altogether.
‘Where shall I start?’ she said. Before Matt had a chance to reply, she was off again, treating him to a detailed account of everything that was going on in her life. He guessed this was the official, sanitised version, and wondered how long it would take her to come round to explaining why, if everything had been so marvellous, she had decided to leave it all behind and suddenly come back to England.
‘In case you were wondering, I haven’t come back because I was missing you.’
He supposed that was some kind of consolation.
‘We all had a wonderful time,’ she said. ‘The children absolutely loved it.’
He waited for her to get to the point.
‘It’s funny how sometimes things all come together at once. I was beginning to feel a little homesick for the music school and my old pupils – nothing serious, just the odd pang of regret. Then out of the blue the school sent me an email offering me a pay rise in my old job if I came back, and the chance of promotion. A day or two later, quite separately, I met a man and we started seeing each other. His name’s Ross. He’s in minerals.’
Jenny stopped talking for a moment. Knowing she was waiting for his reaction to her news, Matt remained silent, and she continued.
‘Ross had to go to England for a few months to work on a project, and he asked me to go with him. So here we are. You two should meet.’
Now there was no holding her back. Matt sat up in bed, rearranged the pillows behind his head and let her gush away, mostly over his head. She reeled off a long list of places and people he had never known, nor ever wanted to. Perhaps she had taken too much Australian sun - she sounded very upbeat. Matt thought he heard a slight twang in her voice: it would be typical of Jenny to drop a screaming hint to make sure that everyone knew that she had just come back from somewhere far away, necessarily a place where the sun shone, the surfers adored her and the living was easy.
Only half-listening as she droned on, he pulled up the covers and played around with his iPad. Skimming through the political pages of the online edition of the Sunday papers, he managed in time to suppress a chuckle when he saw The Observer had named him “Winner of the Week” after his altercation with Crouch.
Matt considered for a moment whether or not he cared about Ross’s arrival on the scene, and quickly decided that, if Ross was hitting on Jenny, he should be given every encouragement.
She gave him a blast about the nice man who had complimented her on how well behaved the children were in the departure lounge at Sydney airport. His name was Bill and they were on the same flight. It turned out that he had a niece and nephew in England who were the same age as Sophie and Jack. She accepted his offer to buy her a coffee, and as boarding commenced, they exchanged phone numbers.
‘You shouldn’t do that,’ Matt said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Things have changed a lot since you left. From now on, you have to be careful about giving information about yourself and the children to people you don’t know.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous – this man was just being friendly and passing the time. Has going i
nto politics made you even more paranoid than you were before?’
‘I’m not joking, Jenny. We shouldn’t be discussing this over the phone.’
‘It sounds to me that you need someone to bring you back to earth. That was always my role before we broke up.’
Matt punched the pillow, but let it pass.
‘Come round to the house and you can tell me whatever’s on your mind. The children are dying to see you. How about tomorrow some time? I’ll cook something nice and we can have a proper conversation. We haven’t spoken for ages – we’ve got a lot to catch up on. Are you with anyone these days? Bring them along – they’d be very welcome.’
He hesitated about whether he should tell her about Sam and decided against it, on the grounds that he couldn’t face the fake enthusiasm and stream of questions that would inevitably follow. He had nothing to hide, but equally it was none of her business. Rather than being bounced, he would be the one to choose when it was the right moment.
‘I’d love to come round, but the timing’s difficult. I’ve got election meetings all day.’
He heard Jenny snort.
‘Surely you’re not so busy that you haven’t got time to see your own children for the first time in almost a year – ’
‘Six and a half months – ’
‘Whatever – you know if you wanted to, you could find the time. Sophie and Jack talk about you non-stop. They wouldn’t understand if you didn’t come and see them as soon as you can. What’s this obsession about politics anyway? I hope you’re not getting things out of proportion.’
Matt counted to ten, and then breathed out, making a low whistling sound.
‘You never really understood did you? You never even tried to understand. I’ll come round this evening around six, before the children go to bed. Later on, I’m making a speech to several thousand people at a football stadium and doing two TV interviews. So I can’t stay for supper.’
‘Please yourself. Thank you for giving us some of your valuable time. I hope you’ll forgive me for reminding you that you’ve got two wonderful children who love you to bits.’
The choice before him was between swallowing his pride and going round to strangle her.
‘You must be tired after the flight,’ he said. ‘Recriminations are a waste of everyone’s time. See you later. Just one thing – why did you come back?’
The line went dead. Matt shrugged and went off to take a long cold shower, trying to wash any Jenny-related worries out of his mind. Now that she was back, he had to deal with the situation. She didn’t mean anything to him any more. He wasn’t going to let her unsettle him or spoil his life.
As he was drying himself in the bathroom, he heard the key in the lock.
‘Have you only just got up?’ Sam shouted out. ‘Some people have all the luck, spending the entire Sunday morning in bed, leaving the rest of us to do the work.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I had some unexpected news.’
After he had dressed quickly and helped Sam put away the shopping, he made some coffee and they sat at the kitchen table, in their usual places, facing each other.
‘You can’t imagine how pleased I am to see you,’ he said.
She looked surprised.
‘What’s the matter?’ Sam replied. ‘I’ve only been away for a couple of hours. You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’
‘I have, in a way. Heard, not seen. Let me explain.’
‘That’s wonderful,’ said Sam, after Matt had told her about Jenny’s return, sounding as if she really meant it. ‘Seeing the children again will do you the world of good. You hardly ever talk about them, but I’m not stupid – I know how much they mean to you. I can’t wait to meet them.’
‘I’m sure you’ll get on well together. I wish they hadn’t come back at the start of the most hectic period in the whole campaign. Their being back in the country opens up another flank of weakness and vulnerability. I’ll be scared stiff for their safety.’
‘We can handle it,’ said Sam. ‘I’ll block off some time in the diary for you to see Sophie and Jack every other day, and speak to Rob about getting them some discreet protection. I’m ready to stand in for you whenever that’s feasible.’
Sam seemed to have thought of everything. Her smooth efficiency reassured him. Yet he knew that the problem he faced went way beyond matters of internal organisation and time management. Simultaneously protecting his children, preserving his sanity, and overthrowing the government would be a testing set of challenges at the best of times. He felt encircled and hemmed in. Everywhere he looked, he saw nothing but obstacles. How was he going to cut his way through the thorns and thickets that barred the path to victory? He thought of what might lie ahead for Sophie and Jack, Sam and him, Rob and the others and the hundreds of thousands of Alliance supporters all over England, and for the country: he knew he couldn’t let them down, and hoped they would all survive.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
As soon as he entered the old house, Matt succumbed to the warm welcome. The children – Sophie in a fuchsia nightie and Jack in light-blue pyjamas with a kangaroo motif – were waiting for him in the hallway, beside themselves with happiness and excitement.
‘Come on you two, race you upstairs!’
He made a point of huffing and puffing and arriving last on the landing.
‘Have you come home?’ asked Jack, jumping up and down in his bare feet on the pile carpet.
‘I’m here now,’ said Matt. ‘Even when we’re not together, I’m always thinking of you. The whole time.’
‘Daddy,’ said Sophie, grabbing his hand, ‘I want to see you more often, so I can tell you about my friends at school.’
‘Of course, sweetie. I want to hear about everything you do. We can have nice chats on the phone.’
‘It’s better when I can touch you. Sometimes I try to call you but you don’t answer.’
He rubbed his eyes and forced a smile.
‘It’ll be easier now you’ve come home. Come on, let’s sit down together.’
They went into the children’s bedroom, and the three of them snuggled up in the creaky rocking chair. He read them several bedtime stories, as they listened with serious concentration. By the time he had finished, Jack’s eyes were firmly shut and Sophie was yawning. He lifted them up and dropped them gently on their beds. Before turning out the light, he tucked them in and gave each of them one last kiss. As he left the room, he stopped in the doorway to listen to their soft and even breathing. He could have stood there forever.
When he went back downstairs, despite the layers of dust and piles of unopened boxes, the house felt friendly. He smelled what he guessed was Jenny’s walnut bread baking in the kitchen, and the sweet scent from a tall vase of peach-coloured roses which stood on the grand piano – Jenny’s only true love, he used to call it - in the living room. Jenny must have worked hard to make everything look nice.
She came out of the kitchen, wearing a colourful print blouse over her jeans, and a pair of coral earrings that he had given her during their year in Italy. He was even cheered by the familiar sound, which always used to get on his nerves, of Hamish the hamster relentlessly spinning on his squeaky wheel in his cage next to the microwave. The children must have retrieved Hamish from the neighbour who had looked after him while they had been in Australia.
After telling Matt to sit outside on the deck, Jenny brought a bottle of sparkling white wine which she asked him to open, and produced some tasty snacks with tiny pieces of smoked salmon and cream cheese on oatmeal biscuits.
‘However did you find the time to prepare all this?’ he asked.
‘Luckily the shops were still open,’ she replied. ‘You and I haven’t seen each other for ages, and I wanted everything to be just right.’
‘I suppose tomorrow you’ll tackle the garden. That’s always the worst part of coming back when you’ve been away. The garden takes on a life of its own.’
‘Actually, I’ve been
thinking about redesigning it. Making it easier to maintain. But I won’t bore you with that now. Cheers.’
Matt raised his glass a little warily.
‘Here goes,’ he said. ‘Welcome home.’
They sat there in the gathering dusk, swatting away the midges, separately staring at the sky.
Jenny suddenly jumped up and came to perch on the arm of his chair. Putting her arm round his shoulders, she kissed him affectionately on the cheek, as old friends might do, in all innocence. Despite himself and without taking a conscious decision, he felt a barely discernible tremor around his ribcage, and instinctively recoiled from her by no more than a millimetre. Jenny must have felt it, for she immediately took her arm away and went back to her chair.
‘Please stay for supper,’ she said, a little too giddily. ‘Please, Matt, just this once. Surely it’s not too much to ask.’
He really didn’t want to appear as if he was rejecting her invitation, but he couldn’t see any other way out.
‘It’s very kind of you, but I told you I can’t. In twenty minutes from now, I’m supposed to be at a meeting. Thanks for asking me round - it’s been great to see Sophie and Jack again. Let’s stay in touch.’
He felt Jenny’s eyes boring into him. Her expression had hardened.
‘In that case, there’s something I want to tell you. Come inside for a moment – this won’t take long.’
They sat down in the living room, Matt on the sofa and Jenny two yards in front of him in an armchair, legs crossed and arms folded.
She observed him, looking him over, apparently not liking what she saw. Her earlier reasonableness had vanished. He wondered where the first poisoned dart would land.
‘You’ve got to decide, Matt. Either you give up politics or I’ll make sure you never see Sophie and Jack again.’