James grabbed hold of my hand, his palms damp. ‘Ready for this?’ he asked me, pointlessly, as Rav was opening the door and I was starting to smile.
The smile of a politician’s wife is pretty easy to master after just a few months in the game. You don’t ever show too many teeth and you squint your eyes, ever so slightly. Your eyebrows go up, again only a small amount. A cross between pleasantly surprised and wanting to help out, that’s the look you’re aiming for. Luckily I could do this without corrugating my forehead too much, so no lines. I’d never faced a press scrum so large. It’s the foreign press that makes the difference, they double the number of flashes.
‘How does it feel to be the First Lady of England, Ellie?’ This in a laconic drawl from an American reporter woman I’d not seen before. No sign of Liz Brickman outside our house, though. She would be waiting in Downing Street, probably doing a running commentary on the images being captured by the helicopter hovering above us.
We walked down the two steps from the door slowly, down the little pathway in the front garden and stood there for what felt like a minute for the photographers and cameras. Then, after James had inwardly decided they’d had enough, we got into the car for the hour-long drive to the palace.
Briefly the country was in total interregnum. The King had been out of sight for more than a year; shut away from the world in grief, the official line. Rumours abound of course, but very few people knew how ill he really was; the country seemed uninterested at his apparent deletion from public life, seeing as though his son had more than made up for his absence. But convention dictated, and there were still some things that could only be done by the King, including the formal ceremony for new prime ministers.
‘Maybe you really should kiss his hand just to see how he reacts,’ I said, trying to introduce some levity as we arrived in central London. We’d both been silent almost all the way from Eppingham.
‘Do you think he’d like that?’ James turned in from the window, smiling but not for me. ‘I’d rather not kiss that withered old claw, thanks all the same.’
‘Maybe it’d be nice to start up some old traditions again,’ I said, wondering if the flashes from the cameras at the roadside were capturing anything meaningful. I kept the smile up, just in case.
A few people had turned out to watch the car as it drove slowly down the Mall toward the palace. James had been worried someone would throw an egg at the car. Even from inside we could hear the helicopter following us. Through the gates of Buckingham Palace we drove, under the stone archway at the front of the building and into the courtyard. As we walked through the fusty, portrait-lined corridors on the way to meet the King, I wondered how Drake had felt three years ago, when he’d been making the same journey. He must have known he was walking into the most god-awful mess. Why had he wanted it? For the same reasons James wanted it, of course.
Rav outlined the procedure, James would go in first, do his not-kissing of hands, then I’d come in for a brief chat. When the King’s private secretary opened the doors to the study he calmly intoned, ‘Mr. Weeks, His Majesty is ready for you, now,’
I tried to think of something witty or comforting to say to James. Good luck, break a leg, didn’t seem appropriate, so I ended up just saying, ‘See you in a bit, then.’ I thought I’d only be sitting outside for a few minutes but as the ornate mantelpiece clock ticked by, ten, then fifteen, then twenty minutes, I started to wonder if something was wrong. Had the King demanded a general election, in a moment of either delusion or clarity?
Finally the doors swung open and the private secretary was there again, neutrally declaring that the King had requested my presence. I followed him into the large study, where the curtains were all drawn, just a shaft of light running down the plush carpet, making it possible to see the King sitting in his wheelchair, staring not at James standing beside him, but into space.
His hair had almost all fallen out since I’d last seen him; a few scraggly wisps still clung to his scalp, which was the colour of an egg that hadn’t been poached for quite long enough. Only the eyes were the same, though they seemed cloudy and troubled. He was hooked up to a machine which was pumping a clear liquid through translucent tubes, snaking through his pyjama-shirt to his abdomen and trailing up around his neck and into his nostrils.
I bowed my head slightly to the King, whom I initially suspected had no idea what was going on. But his eyes focused on me has I drew near. ‘Mrs Weeks,’ he croaked. ‘I Hope you find your time in Downing Street productive, it seems to me the role of the prime minister’s wife is one,’ He paused, licked his lips. ‘Is one of great opportunity, one where one writes one’s own job description, perhaps?’ His breathing was shallow. Speaking to me was clearly a monumental effort.
‘Well sir, it’s come to us quite suddenly, as you can imagine,’ I said, far more assertively than I’d expected to sound. ‘But I’ve had some thoughts about the causes I’d like to champion.’ That was a lie. I told the King a lie. Good on you, Ellie, I imagined Lottie saying as I tried to hold eyes with him.
‘Very good,’ he muttered. His eyes closed and didn’t re-open for a few seconds. ‘Very good indeed. But you’ll remember, of course, that your husband will need your support foremost, in this most important of roles?’
I couldn’t quite believe he was asking me this as a question.
‘Oh it’s quite astonishing, the amount Ellie manages to cram in,’ replied James, for me. ‘Sometimes I think she’d be the right person for the job.’ He laughed nervously.
The King didn’t reply. His eyes had closed again. He tried to say something but only slurring and drooling came out. I’m sure one of the words he was trying to say was ‘lonely’.
That was our cue. ‘Prime Minister, if you’d like to follow me,’ said the permanent secretary, to my left. It was unsettling to hear James referred to by his new title.
‘Surely he’s in no fit state to be King?’ I whispered as we walked quite quickly back down the sumptuous corridors to the courtyard. ‘I had no idea things were so bad. There needs to be a Regency Act, surely.’ I added the second part very quickly.
‘Never been a top priority,’ said James in a low voice. The permanent secretary was walking three feet ahead of us.
I looked up at the sky as we emerged into the courtyard, the sun was trying to burn a hole in the clouds which now looked more like smoke. The helicopter continued to keep watch but the noise of it had lowered to a purr, at least in my head. The PM’s car was waiting for us right outside the door, so the camera attached to the chopper would have only seen the tops of our heads for the briefest moment.
Our first time in that car, and could I smell the previous occupant’s perfume? Heading to Downing Street I wondered what she and her husband were doing at that very moment. Getting back to their old house, one they hadn’t lived in for years? I imagined it ossified, festooned with cobwebs, the furniture enveloped in some kind of sheeting. Hazy shafts of light coming through gaps in long-closed curtains.
The helicopter followed us on the short journey from the palace. There were quite a few protestors, both in Trafalgar Square and along Whitehall. We drove quite fast so it was sometimes hard to make out what was on their placards. TORY SCUM; so hackneyed but fitting comfortably onto a poster, at least. Others alluded to the brownouts; IN THE DARK, read one. But the protests were only scattered, possibly because there hadn’t been time to mobilise the Tories’ opponents to London, given it had all happened so fast. Also it was still technically summer-time, not that you’d have thought so from the weather. People were on holidays and London seemed largely empty. I remembered when I was student how the capital had thronged with tourists; they’d understandably given the city a wide berth since the power had become unreliable.
There was quite a crowd on Whitehall, which grew larger and more boisterous the closer we drew to the gate protecting Downing Street. The cameras were everywhere, their flashbulbs like a violent electrical storm. James was smilin
g out the window at the crowds. There seemed to be quite a mixture of supporters and opponents, all being held back by police. The car slowed down – something was preventing the gates from opening. An egg splatted against the window on James’s side. It had been a good shot, landing right in the centre of the glass. I was glad because it made it almost impossible for us to be seen.
Then we were moving again, the gates slid back and we were passing into Downing Street, small and gloomy, immediately feeling like a compound. James realised he was sitting on the wrong side of the car – he’d want to get out on the side facing the cameras.
‘We need to swap, Ellie.’ His voice was tight. He reached over me and hauled himself across me as I slid to the right. Even though he’d only showered about an hour before, he smelled very lightly of sweat as we swapped sides. It was the closest our bodies had been for months.
Fortunately the egged window was now facing away from the TV crews assembled opposite the door to Number Ten. Someone opened the door for James and he stepped out of the car. All I could see was his backside as he was waving to the crowds at the end of the street.
My eggy door was opened for me by Rav, who must’ve been waiting for us inside Number Ten. I got out and walked slowly toward the black door. It had all been rehearsed a bit - ‘recced,’ as Rav had called it – the day before, but only talked through. I stood just slightly to the left of the step leading up to the door. I put my heels together, clasped my little purse in both hands in front of me. Initially I could barely see James in the glare and flash of the press pack, perhaps they stopped flashing so quickly or maybe my eyes got used to it.
I watched the whole thing back the next day. It had looked pretty flawless, actually. This is not the impression I’d had during the event, I’d been worried holding my bag in the way I had would look defensive, like I was hiding something. As it turned out I sort of blended into the background. A couple of shots had focused on me but only briefly. I’d been standing in just the right direction so my stomach looked flat but my bum wasn’t too on-show. I’d come across as the perfect wife, staring dutifully at my husband with calm admiration as James spoke into the microphone that’d been placed in the middle of the street.
‘This is a moment for us to reflect on the huge and lasting contribution Oliver Drake has made to the future of this country,’ James was saying. ‘And to wish both him and his wife Arabella the very best for the future, whatever it may hold for them.’
Oh yes, I thought, a future hastily re-ordered after my husband and his cronies stabbed them not in the back, but square-on in the chest.
‘And to reassure the country,’ James paused. ‘That the programme of securing our energy requirements and reform and restoring our place in the world will continue.’
I imagined a collective groan going out from millions of houses across the land.
‘But this government, this new government,’ James’s voice was rising, ‘It will listen to the concerns of those who feel politics has lost its way. It will learn from the mistakes of the past, while taking forward the best of those achievements and ideas which have seen the Conservative party triumph under Oliver Drake.’
It was difficult to make out what James was saying because the jeering was getting louder from outside, coalescing into a chant of ‘Tories out’.
‘I pledge to you, today, that programme of listening and learning, building and growing, it will start from the very moment I walk through that door behind me,’ James concluded. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s a lot of work to do and I’m going to crack on with it. Thankyou.’
And with that James turned from the microphone, walked toward me and we kissed. Such a ridiculous, pointless kiss, but necessary. James’s lips were damp with sweat. He took my hand and raised it and his up high – ill-advised, I thought, since he hadn’t really won anything so far, save for a nasty leadership contest.
After standing there for just a few seconds longer we turned and walked through the door of Number Ten. It closed behind us and James let go of my hand. We walked through the small antechamber where visitors are made to surrender their phones, entering the main vestibule. Around fifty staffers were there, standing against the walls and clapping. It was a perfunctory applause – many of these folk had just said goodbye to the Drakes and weren’t sure about us, the invaders.
James and I were introduced to Number 10’s head of operations, along with a few of the staffers who’d be helping with the transition. In the months and years to come I’d end up speaking to them far more than James, who always channelled everything he wanted doing through Rosie. Although she hadn’t been given her job formally I knew she’d become a constant fixture. Rav, of course, became chief of staff.
‘Right, I’m going to the office to make a few calls,’ James said to me after the initial hellos and shaking of hands. ‘I’ll probably be a few hours, if that’s okay?’
I have no idea how James would have responded if I’d suddenly said it wasn’t okay, but instead I said, ‘Sure, Rosie brought the kids here through the back door. I expect they’ll be upstairs.’
‘Okay,’ said James, as we walked up the staircase for the first time. ‘Why don’t you go and make yourself at home?’
Of course I’d been in Downing Street before, countless times. Still it felt different, knowing I’d not be leaving. I took the lift up to the top floor, then the little staircase up to the flat. People had tried to spruce the place up over the years, but the topmost floor had a faded look to it. Very few people ever went up there.
The kids were waiting for me, Bobby old enough to realise the practical constraints almost immediately. ‘Are we going to all live in here?’ He’d already seen the size of his bedroom and was nonplussed.
‘Not all the time,’ I said. ‘We’ll be staying at Chequers, too. That’s a big house in the countryside with lovely gardens for you two to play in.’ During the course of the evening our boxes were brought upstairs, luckily the kids’ toys came in one of the earliest deliveries. It dawned on me very quickly that there wasn’t nearly enough storage for everything, even though I’d been warned quarters were close and that much of our stuff would have to remain elsewhere. Another of the early boxes contained a painting of Lottie’s, one of her earlier renditions of Naviras Bay as viewed from the top of Casa Amanhã. She must’ve painted it from the balcony of Room Seven. I hung it on the wall of the flat above the staircase. That delivery also contained my box of nicknacks. I didn’t open it, instead placing it on the topmost of a set of shelves by the kitchen area, pushing it right to the back against the wall.
It was past midnight when James finally came up, I was already in bed but not asleep. I’d been thinking about how two different people had slept in that bed only 24 hours before, feeling like I’d checked into a grotty hotel. I heard him sit down in the living room, then Rosie’s heels on the stairs. She didn’t stay long, they exchanged only the shortest conversation. Then her heels on the stairs again, the door to the landing closing behind her. I got up, put on my dressing gown and walked into the living room. James was sitting on the little sofa, a champagne flute and his computer on the coffee table in front of him. He was playing back the speech he’d given outside earlier, but when he saw me open the door he put something small and black into the breast pocket of his shirt.
‘All settled in? There’s some champagne in the fridge if you fancy a glass.’
‘What was that?’
‘What was what?’
‘The thing you just put away.’
‘Oh,’ he looked a bit sheepish, a look I hadn’t seen on his face for many years. ‘Well, you might as well know,’ he reached into his pocket again and pulled the thing back out. It was a memory card. ‘It’s the full footage.’
‘Of the Chancellor.’
‘Yup. I’m going to destroy it.’
‘You leaked the video.’
‘Well not me, as such, but yeah. It was a collaboration of efforts.’ He took a sip of ch
ampagne. ‘Camera never lies.’
‘You disgust me sometimes, James, really you do,’ is exactly what I wanted to say, but didn’t. I said precisely nothing, instead turning around and going back into the bedroom. I didn’t slam the door as hard as I could, I let it click quietly into place.
Ocean
‘I’m disappointed in you, Ellie,’ says Bill loudly over the sounds of the waves, standing with his legs apart as I step up from the beach bar path. ‘It would’ve been so much easier if you’d just trusted us. Now we’re not going to be able to save you, I’m afraid.’
‘None of this is real,’ I shout. ‘You’re not real, none of those people were.’
‘Oh, but they are,’ replies Jean. ‘They’re all still there.’
‘They’re not still there, they’ve all gone,’ I gesture behind me.
Jean tuts. ‘No, Eleanor, it’s you who’s moved, I’m afraid. It was better for everyone’s sake, you were causing disruption.’
‘Is that what happened to Morgan? Was she disrupting things for you? Is that why you punished her with those things?’
Bill hesitates, then gives a small shrug. ‘I’m afraid Morgan didn’t quite take to things the way we’d hoped. She’s going to have to stay here for quite a while, until she understands that.’
I hear them before I see them. The same buzzing noise, muffled at first. Jean hears them, too. She’s turned her head slightly to look at the cliffs. ‘I’m sorry it’s come to this, Ellie. We had high hopes for you, really we did. But once this is over you’ll be back on track, I promise.’
They come around the side of the cliff, all four of them, flying a few feet above the surface of the ocean. They must be a hundred feet out, but even in the darkness I can see their mandibles, their black legs tucked in underneath their furry bodies as their wings propel them forward. They don’t head towards us at first, instead crossing the bay, keeping out to sea just above the waterline like they’re parading themselves. Then they turn left, hurtling towards the beach. As they grow larger I begin to make out their black eyes.
Weeks in Naviras Page 24