He glared at me, then shouted, ‘Who the hell are you?’
‘I have to go,’ I told Amanda quietly, pocketing my phone as I stood.
‘Who’s asking?’ I retorted. ‘The office manager?’
‘Don’t get clever with me, chum,’ he barked, advancing on me, chin jutting out. I gave a moment’s thought to hanging one on it, but contented myself with putting a hand on his chest, then slowly pushing him back on his heels.
‘Take a seat,’ I ordered him, ‘and quieten down. My name’s Bob Skinner and in this room, I ask the questions today. The first one being . . . who the hell are you?’
He peered at me. ‘So you’re the famous Skinner,’ he exclaimed. ‘Emily told me about you, and the trouble she had with you when she was Home Seccy.’
‘Sit down,’ I repeated.
‘If you insist.’ He planted his bulk on the chair that Hamblin had vacated. ‘She told me you’re a rough sod.’
‘I wouldn’t quite put it that way,’ I said. ‘I’m a perfectly affable guy, with people that I like. Now,’ I added, although by that time I had guessed the answer, ‘level the playing field. You are?’
‘Grover Bryant, PMOS. If you weren’t a hick from up north, you’d have known that.’
I stared at him, poker faced. ‘Are you telling me that the Prime Minister trusts you to take her message to the media?’ I exclaimed. ‘That makes me worry about her judgement, on the basis of what you’ve shown me so far. Now, tell me, with no further bluster, how you came to burst in here. How did you know that anyone was in this room?’
‘Sources.’
‘Who?’
‘Can’t say,’ he murmured.
‘Won’t say,’ I countered. ‘If I could be bothered, I could find out in a couple of minutes, just by calling Norman Hamblin. Obviously he wasn’t your informant or you wouldn’t have had to ask who I was, but only his office staff know I’m here. Ergo . . .’
I smiled. ‘But as I say, I can’t be arsed, for now. Maybe I should, though. If I was in Hamblin’s chair, I’d want to know I could trust everyone around me.’ I nodded. ‘Yes, at some point, I will deal with it. I’m temporarily an MI5 officer, so I suppose I have to. You have a very small window to have your friend transferred out of here, if you can.’
‘That’s noted,’ Bryant snapped, ‘but please, Mr Skinner, don’t try to blow smoke up my arse. I want to know what’s going on. My . . . informant told me that Hamblin was summoned to Emily’s office in the Commons, not by her, but by Kramer. Not long afterwards we had this cock and fucking bull story about Emily being hit by a tropical disease, and then Hamblin arrived back here and instructed that this room be prepared for you and a colleague.
‘I’m not an idiot, man. I was on that African trip; everywhere we went was completely fucking sanitised, so no way did she contract Ebola, or schistosomiasis or dengue fever or anything else. Nor was she displaying symptoms of anything the last time I saw her, which was little more than three hours ago. So what the hell has happened?’
‘How much do you know about the business of the day?’ I asked him.
His eyes narrowed. ‘What business?’
‘The defence statement this afternoon. The one that’s been cancelled because of the Prime Minister’s absence.’
‘I know nothing about it. I asked her but she said she wasn’t ready to tell me.’
‘Why do I have trouble believing that?’
‘I don’t give two fucks whether you believe it or not. What is wrong with her?’ A look of pain came into his eyes. ‘Mr Skinner, she’s my half-sister; we came out of the same womb. I’m her closest living relative after her father. I have a right to know.’
Fat, bombastic arsehole or not, he had a point.
‘You said you saw her this morning,’ I continued, quietly. ‘When?’
‘I took a ride in her car across to the Commons. We went in through the side entrance and up to her office. I carried the Red Box; heavier than they look, those things. I dropped her off there then went up to the tea room. I’d arranged to meet a couple of the tamer lobby correspondents, to mark their cards about some of this week’s government business.’
‘How long did you spend in her office?’
‘A couple of minutes, no more. I made her a coffee, but didn’t have one myself.’
‘Why did she go there, at that time of day? Is that normal?’
‘There is no normal with Em,’ he chuckled. ‘If she wants to get away from Downing Street, sometimes she’ll go over there just to hide out. This morning she said she wanted to prepare herself in private for the defence statement.’
‘But she didn’t tell you what was in it?’
‘No, she didn’t. Obviously I asked her, but she told me that it would be better for both of us if I didn’t know. Whatever it is, it’s strictly embargoed. By not telling me she was removing the possibility that I might let something slip. I confess I have made a couple of errors of judgement in briefing people I thought I could trust.’
I nodded; I’d spent only two minutes with the bloke, but that was enough for me to understand her caution.
‘Do you know if she was expecting visitors over there?’
Bryant frowned. ‘No. The opposite, in fact; she went over there early so she could be alone. Mickey Satchell has access to her when she’s there, and Kramer too, I suppose, and I know she invites the Chancellor in for a coffee sometimes, because he’s one of her sounding boards . . .’
‘One of?’ I queried. ‘Who are the others?’
He stared at me. ‘There’s me, for a start; even more so since she got rid of Murdoch, that pillock of a husband of hers. When she wants a woman’s perspective, she might talk to Valerie Radley, the Foreign Secretary’s wife. Not that they’re friends as such; oh no, Ems doesn’t have friends who are remotely political.’ He paused, and smiled. ‘Apart from young Nick of course, Nicholas Wheeler, the Defence Secretary. He has very blue eyes where she’s concerned.’
‘What about Siuriña Kramer? Would she talk to her?’
‘Whoa,’ he boomed, in a great exhalation. ‘Not a chance of that happening, not even if they were the last two people on earth. They can’t stand each other.’
‘Hold on, doesn’t the leader, the Prime Minister, appoint the party chair?’
‘Yes, she does, but Siuriña was put there by the last regime, by George Locheil. Emily would have fired her when she took over, but I persuaded her that doing so would have made things tricky with her husband, and that she should be seen to be magnanimous. So she’s still there, although Emily did revoke her automatic access to Cabinet meetings. Get it?’
‘Got it.’
‘Right. The thing is, Siuriña’s power crazy. She believes that Roland should be PM, not Emily. During the leadership campaign she did a lot of whispering, about her and about Murdoch, suggesting that she used MI5 while she was Home Secretary to catch him playing away games, so she could get him out of the way while covering up her own marital misdemeanours.’ Bryant wrinkled his nose. ‘Maybe she did. I wouldn’t put it past her.’
‘She didn’t,’ I said, firmly, for I know who did fix Lord Forgrave. ‘Were there any?’ I asked. ‘Marital misdemeanours?’
‘Not that I know of,’ he replied immediately. ‘Emily is a very smart woman; she knows that sleaze will finish you in politics, faster than a speeding bullet, and sleaze involves one or both of two things, basically: sex and money. Also, she did love the idiot, in her way. I think she only got rid of him because he’d become a liability.’
‘Are they still in touch?’
‘Occasionally. Their paths cross in parliament, for he’s still a Tory peer. He hopes she’ll bring him back into government. She won’t, but if he goes back to the Bar and keeps his nose clean, he might well wind up on the Supreme Court bench o
ne day.’
He glowered at me again. ‘Now,’ he rumbled, ‘if you have no more questions, will you answer mine. What’s wrong with my sister?’
‘I do have one more question, although it will seem very odd. When you were in the Prime Minister’s office this morning, did you use the lavatory?’
‘Odd?’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s almost bloody offensive. No, I did not.’
‘You certain?’
‘Absolutely. I went into her bathroom for water to fill her coffee machine, but that’s all.’
‘Was the seat up or down?’
He stared at me as if I was crazy. I couldn’t blame him; it was an odd question in any circumstances.
But he replied. ‘Down, definitely. I know this because I had the coffee capsules in one hand and the jug in the other. I put the capsules down on the lid to turn on the tap. Does that actually help you in some way?’
I nodded. ‘It does. Now, to your question. I’m going to answer it, but the truth stays between us. That is not a request, it’s an order, and you can take it as coming from the acting Prime Minister himself.’
He leaned forward in his chair. ‘Acting PM? Who do you mean?’
‘Kramer.’
‘Does that mean . . .’ His eyes had a glazed dazed look.
I held up a hand. ‘The Cabinet Secretary was called across to the Commons because your sister was found by her PPS, slumped across her desk. It was apparent that she had been attacked. Initially, Dr Satchell believed that she was dead. Without waiting for Hamblin to arrive, she went to the Home Secretary, who had just returned from an engagement.’
Colour was draining from Bryant’s florid face. ‘Kramer took command,’ I continued, quickly, before he could recover himself and intervene, ‘and called in Amanda Dennis, the head of the Security Service. Without going into detail about the content of the defence announcement, their concern was that it might have a connection with the attack. Kramer’s view was that it was a national security matter. Therefore, even when the PM was believed to be dead, he decided to conceal the fact, to allow an immediate and urgent investigation.’
‘Hence the tropical disease story?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And that’s where you come in?’
‘Yes. I was around, Mrs Dennis knew it and seconded me; in fact she pretty much conscripted me.’
He leaned closer. ‘But Ems isn’t dead?’ he whispered.
‘No, she isn’t. But don’t get your hopes up,’ I warned. ‘She has a severe brain injury, and her surgeon isn’t able to give a positive prognosis.’
The big fellow leaned back, his shirt sticking to folds of belly. ‘Do you have any idea,’ he murmured, ‘what the media would do with this story?’
‘I’m a director of a newspaper group, Mr Bryant,’ I replied. ‘I know exactly what they’d do with it.’
‘Do you know what the Opposition would do with it?’
‘Probably twice as much as the media would.’
‘Exactly. Merlin Brady would call this a coup d’état, and he wouldn’t be too far off the mark either. How long have you got for your investigation?’
‘Forty-eight hours, Kramer said.’
‘Can you catch the attacker in that time?’
‘If I can’t catch him in twenty-four hours,’ I confessed, ‘I’m probably not going to catch him. On the other hand, if I can rule out any connection with the defence announcement, I’ll expect Kramer to call in the police at that point.’
‘Do you have a suspect?’
I frowned. ‘To be honest, you’re as close to a suspect as I have.’
‘Me!’ he spluttered. ‘You can’t be serious.’
‘I don’t do flippant,’ I retorted. ‘You’re the only person I know to have been in there this morning, until Satchell found her.’
‘The journos I met in the tea room. They’ll vouch for me.’
‘I’m sure they will,’ I agreed, ‘but that wouldn’t eliminate you. The only person who could do that is lying unconscious in the Royal Free Hospital.’
‘You can’t . . .’ he repeated.
‘I can, but . . . until I can figure out a way for you to have covered yourself by making three calls from her mobile between a quarter past ten and ten to eleven, then getting it back into her office without being seen on the CCTV, I’m not going to take you too seriously as a would-be killer.’ I picked up a plastic ballpoint pen from my temporary desk and tossed it to him. Automatically, he caught it, with his right hand.
‘That too,’ I said.
‘Eh?’ he squeaked, puzzled.
‘Never mind. So, Mr Bryant,’ I continued. ‘What’s it going to be? Are you going to let me get on with the job of finding your sister’s attacker, or are you going to get in the way?’
‘Put that way, what choice do I have?’
‘You can do whatever you like,’ I assured him. ‘I’m not going to try to detain you, or coerce you. I’m following Kramer’s brief at the moment. I don’t have any option, because he was clever enough to tell me exactly what your sister was due to announce this afternoon, thereby wrapping me up tight in the Official Secrets Act, which I am duty bound to respect. But I haven’t told you about it, have I? All you know is the truth about what happened to your sister, and that is not a state secret as such, but an unreported crime.’
‘If I go public, will it harm Emily?’
‘No, but it will destabilise the government you serve, through her. What would she want you to do?’
He nodded. ‘She’d tell me to go back out of that door and pretend I’d never met you. And that’s what I’m going to do, Mr Skinner, for those twenty-four hours you mentioned. After that, we’ll see.’
He heaved himself out of the chair. ‘Can I visit her?’ he asked.
‘Of course. In fact you should; it would look bloody odd if you didn’t, would it not? But just one thing,’ I added. ‘Her protection officers are there just now, standing guard over an unconscious woman like a couple of Greyfriars Bobbys. If they found out what really happened to her, the outcome would be unpredictable, and nobody needs that complication, least of all your sister.’
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I’ll say quiet.’ He paused in the doorway. ‘This defence announcement: was it the cause of what’s happened to her?’
‘I fucking hope not,’ I growled, ‘otherwise I’m going to have to add the people in the White House and the Kremlin to the suspect list.’
Thirteen
As soon as Bryant had gone, I walked along to Hamblin’s room and told him about his visit.
‘Will he behave himself?’ the Cabinet Secretary asked, gazing up at me anxiously from behind his desk.
‘I hope so,’ I replied. ‘I think so. We had a difficult beginning, but by the end we’d reached a meeting of minds.’ I frowned. ‘Tell me something,’ I said. ‘Why is it that everyone here is so bloody rude? You, Kramer, the man Bryant; I’d barely been introduced to the three of you before we were locking horns.’
‘Physician,’ he murmured.
‘Excuse me?’
He smiled. ‘Physician heal thyself. If I may say so, you also have an abrasive side, Mr Skinner.’
‘I’d prefer to say that I don’t take shit from anyone, regardless of rank or status.’
‘Same thing,’ he countered. ‘But I respect it. I admit that I also recognise your description of us. In this world, we live inside a glass bubble, visible to those outside but for most of the time untouchable by them. The three of us you have encountered so far are all, make no mistake, very important people in the great scheme of things, and we are treated as such. The entire Civil Service defers to me, and I defer to Roland Kramer. But at the same time they do not, and I do not. Forelocks are not touched to us as individuals, but to the office
s at we hold.
‘As for Bryant, most people find him a distasteful man, as clearly you did, but he attracts cautious deference too, not necessarily because of his place in our world, but because he is closer to the Prime Minister than any of us, she being the bestower of rank and privilege.
‘Living as we do, and treated as we are, it is all too easy for us to become self-important. Inevitably, most of us do, and frankly, it is good for us to be challenged. It happens to me every day.’
I felt my eyebrows rise. ‘In here?’
‘God no,’ he laughed. ‘At home, by my sister, every evening after dinner. She throws me an apron, and a look that says “the dishes won’t wash themselves”. Every time I suggest that we buy a dishwasher, she says, “Why? I already have one.” Often I have barely hung up my coat before she hands me a list of tasks, about the house or in the garden. She insists that having grime under my nails will make me a better person.’
‘Does it?’
‘No. I’m still the same autocratic shit that I’ve always been. I don’t simply respect the great offices of my political bosses, I respect my own.’ He sighed. ‘All very different from your world, I imagine.’
‘I don’t know what my world is any more,’ I confessed. ‘I’ve drawn a line under one career but I’m not sure yet what my next one will be.’
‘If Mrs Dennis has her way you’ve already begun it.’
‘I wasn’t asked,’ I told him, ‘and I didn’t volunteer. In fact I tried to walk away, but Kramer told me that I didn’t have that option. He even gave me a demonstration of power, through one of his attack dogs, the man Daffyd I told you about earlier. That’s something he and I are going to discuss when this investigation is over.’
‘Indeed?’ Hamblin murmured. ‘Be careful of that man Daffyd. He failed SAS training because of excessive zeal. That was one of the things that commended him to our Mr Kramer.’
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