Kompromat

by Stanley Johnson

  ‘What about the cash for policy aspect?’ Holly Percy asked. ‘I remember there was stuff in the dossier about huge cash transfers into Conservative Party funds in exchange for the Referendum commitment? Ten or twelve million pounds, as I recall. Were those documents genuine too? That was lethal, surely?’

  Mabel Killick kicked her shoes off (why did the press have such a fixation about her shoes?) and tucked her long, shapely legs beneath her on the sofa.

  ‘Please don’t imagine I wasn’t aware of the implications,’ she said. ‘But remember the timing too. We were days away from one of the most important votes in this country’s history.’

  ‘Prime Minister, I think you should be very careful about how you handle this one. You could lay yourself open to all kinds of accusations.’ If Giles Mortimer sounded portentous, he meant to. ‘From what you have just said, it sounds as though you were complicit in covering up a crime, or at the very least in failing to report your suspicions.’

  Mabel Killick sighed.

  ‘I had it out with Jeremy Hartley the day after the vote,’ she said. ‘He had gone out into Downing Street that morning to announce to all the journalists that he had lost and that he was going to step down. But as you recall, he was pretty vague about the timing. It sounded as though he wanted to stay on at least until the party conference in October. So I said to myself: “This won’t do. This won’t do at all”. I asked to see him urgently at No. 10. Remember, I knew about the Referendum dossier, but the PM didn’t know I knew. We met privately in this very room. I told him that the experts were convinced that every single document in the dossier was genuine, and that included the additions in his own handwriting to the draft of his Bloomberg speech, back in January 2013, when he wrote: “That is why I am in favour of a Referendum’’.’

  ‘What about the money?’ Mortimer asked. ‘What did he say about the money?’

  ‘I told him we hadn’t been able to trace the £10 million or £12 million paid by persons unknown in exchange for this Referendum commitment. We suspected it came from Russia but we couldn’t be sure. But the fact we couldn’t trace it didn’t mean the transaction never occurred. We were confident the Crown Prosecution Service would take the same view.’

  ‘Oh my God!’ Holly Percy exclaimed. ‘That must have been some meeting. There’s Hartley trying to adjust to the most humiliating defeat in his political career and you’re sitting there, threatening to put him behind bars. What did he say? Did he make a clean breast of it?’

  ‘On the contrary, he insisted he never asked anyone for money and no money was ever paid,’ he said. ‘The record of those financial exchanges was a crucial part of the Referendum dossier, but they were faked, in the sense that even though the correspondence bore his signature, no money ever changed hands.’

  For the next few minutes, Mabel Killick explained to her two aides Jeremy Harley’s motivation as far as she understood it: how at heart he had always been a Leaver, how he needed to persuade Edward Barnard to lead the Leave campaign, and how the dossier was a crucial part of that.

  ‘As I say, Hartley strenuously denied receiving any money for the Conservative Party,’ Mrs Killick continued, ‘but he undoubtedly passed the dossier to the Russians so that they in turn could give it to Barnard. A brilliant move, actually, in terms of human psychology. Hartley read his man perfectly and recruited him without Barnard ever realizing what was happening. If Hartley hadn’t gone in to politics, he could have joined MI6.’

  ‘Not too late, I imagine,’ Giles Mortimer said. ‘I hear he’s looking for a job.’

  They all laughed. ‘Let’s have some champagne now, anyway,’ the PM said.

  Holly Percy’s eye fell on the PM’s copy of the Brexit dossier. ‘I’m not sure you ought still to have that, Prime Minister. That’s a numbered copy. We all turned our copies in after that COBRA meeting. That’s the instruction you gave us at the time.’

  Holly put out a hand to pick up the file. ‘Please leave it, Holly. I think I’ll take it home tonight and store it in my scarf drawer. Might come in handy one day.’

  There was mischievous look in the PM’s eye which Holly Percy had never noticed before.

  ‘Imagine our negotiations with our EU partners go terribly wrong,’ the prime minister speculated, ‘and we don’t get the deal we’re hoping for. Imagine that we face the prospect of being confronted by tariff and non-tariff barriers on all sides and at every turn. Imagine that the City of London is going into meltdown as key firms shift to Brussels, Frankfurt or Paris with all the implications that has for the tax base. Imagine that the United Kingdom itself looks like going down the drain because the Scots prefer to stay in Europe and maybe Northern Ireland prefers to throw its lot in with the South, rather than face all the turmoil a new hard border between Northern Ireland and Eire would create.’

  Her two aides nodded their heads in unison. ‘Yes, Prime Minister, we are imagining all that.’

  ‘Well, then?’ the PM challenged, ‘what would we do?’

  Giles Mortimer fell back on the standard response, beloved of politicians throughout the ages.

  ‘Well, obviously, we’re not going to answer hypothetical questions.’

  ‘Oh, come now, Giles,’ the PM reprimanded him. ‘You’re not on University Challenge. Do you need a few minutes to think about it? Shall I go and put the kettle on?’

  The PM’s sarcasm was palpable.

  Giles Mortimer was beginning to see what the prime minister was getting at.

  ‘What you’re saying, Prime Minister, is that it’s possible this whole Brexit business may be a total cock-up and there really isn’t any good option out there for us, there are no broad sunlit uplands waiting for us, and if that situation does arise, say eighteen months from now, we must just conceivably want to reconsider our decision to leave the European Union.’

  Mabel Killick nodded. ‘Something along those lines, perhaps.’

  Mortimer shook his head. ‘But that won’t work, Prime Minister, I can assure you. Parliament will never vote to withdraw our application to leave the European Union without a mandate, without the clear instruction of the people, and that would mean a second Referendum. And you’ve already ruled out a second Referendum. Categorically.’

  Mabel Killick was not out to be deterred.

  ‘Just imagine,’ she said, ‘that the Electoral Commission had sight of that Brexit dossier. Over in the United States half a dozen Committees of Enquiry are looking into possible interference with the electoral process in the run-up to last year’s presidential election. If the Americans can raise all these issues, then why can’t we? I am sure the Electoral Commission, once fully apprised of the situation, would feel it had to look into the conduct of last year’s Referendum, and then who knows what might happen? Or what about some brilliantly enterprising individual, like Tina Moller, for instance, who won such a victory in the Supreme Court last year over Article 50? Damn nuisance, from our point of view. But you have to hand it to her – she had us running for cover. Imagine the situation if the redoubtable Tina Moller gets hold of that Referendum dossier and goes back to the Supreme Court to ask them to declare the first Referendum null and void.

  ‘Which way do you think the Supreme Court would rule? Don’t you think they might order, not a second Referendum, but a re-run of the first? I’d put money on it.’

  The two aides were gobsmacked. They had long admired Mabel Killick’s nifty footwork, with or without the kitten heels. But this was something else again.

  Holly Percy raised the obvious objection. ‘But how on earth would the Electoral Commission or some Tina Moller figure ever get to hear about the existence of the dossier? After all, there’s only one copy left in circulation and you’re taking it home with you, to hide in it your scarf drawer.’

  ‘How would Tina Moller ever get to hear about the Referendum dossier?’ the PM mused. ‘Well, I suppose someone would have to tell her? Or else there could be a break-in at my home. We’d have to make sure the po
lice weren’t on duty. We do have break-ins, you know, from time to time, even in leafy Surrey.’

  As her aides made ready to leave, Mabel Killick asked Holly Percy to stay behind for a second.

  ‘My scarves are in the chest of drawers in the dressing room,’ she said. ‘Third drawer down.’

  Holly made a note on her pad. ‘Scarves. Third drawer down.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  It wasn’t President Igor Popov’s first visit to Australia. He had been to Sydney in 2005 and Brisbane in 2014. But that had been official G20 business. They might have kicked Russia out of the G8, but they could hardly expel her from the G20!

  But this visit, in the early summer of 2017 (late autumn ‘down under’), was different. Popov was on holiday. He flew into Kununurra in Western Australia in the presidential plane, the sleek, dark Ilyushin Il-96, with Galina Aslanova in the co-pilot’s seat.

  ‘I’ve sacked Pavel Golov. Useless fuck,’ Popov had told her on their way south. ‘Golov couldn’t see what was going on in St Petersburg. It wasn’t just our good friend Fyodor Stephanov. The FSB office there was rotten through and through. As the new director of the FSB, you’ll have to clear things up there. That will be one of your first priorities. Still, a few days’ break won’t hurt either of us.’

  Mickey Selkirk had sent a helicopter to Kununurra airport.

  When Popov and Galina Aslanova landed at the Lazy-T ranch thirty minutes later, both Mickey and Melanie Selkirk came out to the helipad to meet them. The Selkirks had invited plenty of distinguished guests to the Lazy-T ranch in their time but it wasn’t every day they entertained the president of the Russian Federation.

  ‘Please don’t keep calling me “Mr President’’,’ Popov insisted, as they sat down to dinner that evening beneath the stars. ‘I’m here as a private citizen. We’re on holiday.’

  He leant forward to sniff the aroma of the fine, red wine the Selkirk were serving that night.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s a Grange Hermitage, 1952, the year you were born. Penfold’s vineyard, just outside Adelaide. One of the oldest wineries in the country. Your good health!’ Mickey Selkirk raised his glass.

  He had really pushed the boat out that evening. If you were lucky enough to find one, a 1952 Grange Hermitage would cost you at auction around $AUS16,000, that was about around $US14,500. But, hell, Selkirk thought, better hung for a sheep than a lamb.

  He drained his glass.

  ‘Igor,’ he began, taking Popov at his word, ‘I can’t tell you how glad Melanie and I are to welcome you and Galina to our humble home. We’ve only got a million acres here at Lazy-T and I know that’s nothing when you consider the size of your vast country. But still it’s a real privilege to have you both here as our guests. Tomorrow we are going to do some mustering. Can you fly an R22?’

  ‘I can fly anything!’ Popov said.

  He too drained his glass. Selkirk’s Chinese manservant, Ching Ze-Gong, refilled it. As this rate, he reckoned, he’d have to open a second bottle even before the main course had been served. Selkirk must really want something from this guy, he thought. He made sure he kept as close to the table as he could.

  Mickey Selkirk, he noticed, had been a bit cool since his return from New York to the Lazy-T ranch.

  ‘I gather the police paid you a visit while I was gone,’ his boss had said. ‘Anything I need to know?’

  ‘Just checking papers, sir,’ Ching had replied. ‘All in order. Illegal immigrants – big problem now.’

  ‘You can say that again,’ Selkirk said. ‘Ron Craig’s building a wall to keep them out. Like the Great Wall of China. You guys thought of it first, didn’t you?’

  Truth to tell, both Ching and Fung had been alarmed by that visit from the constabulary. It was clear the authorities were looking for something, but whatever it was they didn’t find it.

  Since then, things had settled down nicely. He was still filing his reports to Hu Wong-Fu, the owner of the Kimberley Asian Cuisine restaurant in Kununurra. There might be something to report on tonight, he thought.

  Ching Ze-Gong was right about that.

  ‘We’ve got elections next year,’ Popov said, as Ching served the dessert. ‘I’m thinking about whether to stand again for president of the Russian Federation. Maybe the time has come to make way for a younger man. I’ve been around a long time.’

  ‘Oh, come on! Born in 1952. You’re just a stripling!’ Selkirk protested.

  The old man was suddenly serious.

  ‘The reason I invited you down here this weekend, Igor,’ he said, ‘is because I’ve got a proposition to put to you. I don’t want to influence your decision about your political future. That’s entirely your business, but if you did decide to step down at or even before the end of your current term of office, I would like you to consider taking over from me as president of Selkirk Global. With you as the leader and inspiration, Selkirk Global will span the world. I hope you will think about it, at least.’

  Popov had already thought about it, of course. As soon as he had received Selkirk’s invitation, he had guessed what the old man had in mind. The Russian economy nowadays was about the same size as California’s. Being president of Russia wasn’t really such a big deal.

  To run Selkirk Global, with a whole world still to conquer, that was something else again. He could take over the BBC for starters.

  ‘Yes, I’ll definitely think about it,’ President Popov said.

  Next day, while Mickey Selkirk, game as ever, took his guests on a five-mile hike up the rugged Kimberley Gorge, with the Pentecost River cascading through the rocks, President Popov reported for duty at the helipad.

  Jim Jackson, the pilot on duty that morning, was already waiting for him. Two R22s were parked side-by-side, ready to go.

  Jackson pointed to the nearest machine. ‘This one’s yours,’ he said. ‘Jack Varese flew it when he was here. The left skid’s a bit bent. He was using the skids to herd the cattle. But it’s quite safe.’

  Popov gazed admiringly at the little R22 helicopter. ‘I’ve herded reindeer in Siberia with one of these,’ he said. ‘Piece of cake.’

  The mustering went well. Popov had seldom enjoyed himself more. He nipped in and out of the trees, turning the cattle this way and that, until he had massed a bunch and they really started to move, throwing up clouds of dust.

  ‘This is the life,’ Popov thought. If he took up Selkirk’s offer of the top job at Selkirk Global, maybe he’d move the headquarters back to Australia from New York. That would be one in the eye for the Yanks. And the Aussies would love it.

  They brought upwards of a thousand head to the holding area, and were going back for more, when Jim Jackson received a message on the RT.

  ‘The old man has slipped on some rocks five miles up the gorge,’ he told Popov. ‘Hurt his leg. He can’t walk. We’ll have to pick him up. Could be tricky. The gorge is steep and narrow and there can be a hell of a wind. Depends where he is, but in some places you’ve only got a few feet clearance on either side, so you’ve got to keep dead centre otherwise you’re done for.’

  They took off together, flying about 1000 feet above ground level. Below them they could see the gorge and the foaming river.

  ‘There they are!’ Jackson caught sight of Selkirk’s party far below, waving hats and handkerchiefs.

  ‘Why don’t you hover here?’ Jackson said. ‘Call into base and tell them what’s happening. I’ll go down. Looks pretty tight but I think I’ll make it.’

  ‘No, I’ll go,’ Popov said.

  Before Jackson could countermand him, Popov dropped into the sheer chasm. Jackson was bloody right, he thought. There were, literally, only inches to spare at either side and the wind was totally unpredictable. Blowing a blast one minute, and then dropping completely. If the rotor blade clipped the rocks, that would be it. Kaput. Finito. Game over.

  Sweating with concentration, Popov landed by a rock pool. He left the rotors turning.

/>   ‘Room for one,’ he shouted. ‘The rest will have to hike back.’

  Mickey Selkirk tried to put some weight on his leg, but couldn’t manage it, so they manhandled him on board.

  ‘Thanks, Igor!’ he shouted above the noise of the engine. ‘You’ve saved my bacon.’

  Getting out of the gorge was as hard as getting in. Popov gritted his teeth, hand on the joy-stick, eyes gauging the distance between the heli’s blades and the jagged rock face.

  ‘Great piece of flying,’ Jackson congratulated him over the RT as Popov’s little heli finally emerged from the deep chasm, like Venus rising from the waves.

  That evening they switched to Margaret River wines. ‘Western Australia’s finest,’ Selkirk assured his guests.

  Melanie Selkirk tactfully took Galina for a post prandial coffee by the pool.

  ‘Can’t tell you how grateful I am, old boy,’ Selkirk said, when the two men were alone.

  He kneaded his bandaged knee. ‘I’m not sure how I would have got out of there. That’s a rugged climb at the best of times, even with two sound legs to walk on. How you managed not to smash into the sides of that gorge, I will never know.’

  Selkirk paused. He thought about his father, that great man – yes, that great Australian – who had first sown the seeds of the Selkirk empire. Of course he could pass the whole thing on to his own kids, but did they really have what it took? Selkirk Global had the chance to make a quantum leap into the future. Igor Popov was the man to make that future happen.

  ‘Did you think about what I said last night?’ Selkirk asked.

  Popov took his time. Historians would later describe the moment as one of the most important moments in his life. The moment of decision. So much would turn on it.

  ‘It’s a very interesting proposition, Mickey,’ he said. ‘Very interesting indeed. And very timely too.’