by Tim Heald
‘I wouldn’t say Trubshawe was “one of us”,’ said the PM.
‘Mushrooms,’ said the Balliol knight, ‘unfriendly mushrooms. Unfriendly to the late deceased. Which is why we have set up this enquiry. Where there is doubt, we need to ask questions. They must have taught you that at Apocrypha?’
The Master and His Voice spoke simultaneously. The effect was not productive. They drowned each other out and were, in so far as one was able to decipher the message, talking at cross-purposes.
Bognor was floundering, which was part of the intention.
‘And Lady Bognor?’ The Prime Minister put an undue amount of stress on the word ‘lady’, thus drawing attention to it, and managing to imply that Monica’s social elevation was down to him and intentional. Neither of which, as they all knew, was true.
‘She’s fine too. But Trubshawe isn’t. He’s dead. And my view is that it’s our fault.’
‘I do wish you wouldn’t keep going on about Trubshawe,’ said the Prime Minister. ‘We’ve instigated an investigation into the whole sorry business, and I have to say that until he passed away I simply wasn’t aware of him. What more do you expect?’
‘I think,’ said Edward, ‘that what the Prime Minister means is that the late Trubshawe did not loom large on his horizon. The Prime Minister is a very busy man. He can not concern himself with minutiae. If you like, he is dealing with the broad sweep of history. Oils, not watercolours. Big brushes, not fiddly nonsense.’
‘With respect,’ said Simon, dropping into the code, which meant more or less the opposite of what was exactly said, ‘Trubshawe was not any sort of minutiae. He was a human being, a subject of Her Majesty and as such he did not deserve to be brushed under a carpet. Much less murdered.’
‘But,’ said Edward, ‘he is not being brushed under a carpet. An investigation has been launched. In the highest possible circles. No stone will be left unturned in the search for the culprit, if culprit there was.’
‘Quite,’ echoed the notional boss. ‘Bloody lucky to get an enquiry. Not many people get a full-blown enquiry.’
‘And certainly not if they’re still alive. Unlike poor Trubshawe.’ Bognor spoke with feeling. ‘He’s dead.’
‘I understand he was a pretty nasty piece of work,’ said Edward, fastidiously.
‘That makes absolutely no difference,’ said Bognor. ‘He was a human being.’
‘Only up to a point,’ said Edward.
‘Not human in the accepted sense,’ said the Prime Minister, as if he were discussing a menu or an agenda. In other words, in a bloodless, polite small talk sort of way. It would have played well at an embassy party.
‘The trouble with you people,’ said Bognor, regretting his words as soon as he uttered them, ‘is that you have no respect for life.’
‘On the contrary,’ said Edward, ‘it is only by having an apparent disregard for the small, that one is able to devote one’s attention to the larger picture. Trubshawes are expendable. In fact, you could say that if we are to progress then we have to lose a few Trubshawes along the way. His is an essential sacrifice.’
‘Absolutely,’ said the PM. ‘Couldn’t have put it better myself.’
But Bognor had had enough. ‘That’s what Hitler said,’ he exploded. And then, gathering his up thoughts and his carefully arranged trouser legs, he said, ‘I’ll see myself out.’
Which he did, with protestations about meaningful enquiries ringing meaninglessly in his ears.
THIRTY
How did it go?’ asked Monica breathlessly. She was always breathless when genuinely interested. Despite being of a certain age this made her seem sexy and husky. ‘With the Prime Minister.’ Despite everything she was still impressed with the title and the office, if not with the holder.
Bognor, still seething, poured them both a stiffish Bells and said only, ‘I thought we might eat out this evening. There’s a new bistro which got goodish reviews the other day. I could do with an absolutely straightforward steak and frites and some decent Côtes du Rhône.’
Monica, who had already spent a small fortune on rump for two, did not demur. She knew her spouse too well. All had, obviously, not gone well.
‘So . . .’ she said at length, sipping amber liquid thoughtfully, ‘tell me about it.’
‘He’s a shit,’ said Bognor, ‘and so is that gorilla who keeps him in check. Edward something or other. Even more of a shit. Supershits the pair of them.’
‘Ah,’ said Monica. She was more thoughtful than ever. ‘We knew that already.’
‘Even so,’ said Bognor, ‘it’s one thing to know something in theory. Quite another to be confronted with the reality.’
Monica knew better than to argue. Instead, she said. ‘Should we book?’
Bognor nodded and she did so, then said, gently, ‘Tell me what happened.’
‘Nothing, nothing at all. I blew it. Let them run rings round me.’
Monica doubted this, but then she always did. That was one of the reasons Bognor found her so satisfactory. She backed him up, both in public, which was to be expected, and in private, which was not.
‘The PM is a prat,’ she said, ‘so is his minder, though not in quite the same way. You may be many things, but a prat you are not.’
‘I was this afternoon.’
‘Tell me.’
And so he did. He embellished a little but not much. Made the PM seem even more of an arrogant bastard than he actually was. Made himself seem even more of an also-ran than he was, too. He exaggerated. She knew this, and he knew this also. It was the way in which he always behaved. He had not, after all, liked Trubshawe, or the idea of Trubshawe any more than the Prime Minister or his alleged lackey. Possibly less. That wasn’t important. He, Bognor, did not think anyone was expendable. Be he ever so insignificant or downright unpleasant, Bognor believed they were innocent until proved guilty, and entitled to care and thought and consideration. The PM and his lackey thought otherwise. Such, in his jaundiced view, was life. It sucked. Always did. Always would.
He refuelled their drinks.
‘So you see,’ he said, ‘I was useless.’
‘I see nothing of the sort,’ she said loyally.
‘Well, you wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘That’s why I love you.’
Both were, in a manner of speaking, true. Theirs was a strange kind of affection, nurtured over the years, oddly endorsed by their lack of children, and solidified, in the end, by a grudging mutual respect. Bognor sometimes said that his wife was the only person he could imagine making a long car journey with and not feeling compelled to say anything for several hours. They were both surprisingly good in a crisis, less so, most of the rest of the time. This was tantamount to a crisis.
‘I hate power,’ he said. ‘Give me influence any day.’
‘I know,’ she said.
‘Why do the wrong people always have power?’ he wanted to know, though he had his answer ready and really only wanted reassurance.
‘The wrong people wield power because achieving a powerful position requires the wrong strategy. In other words, the means by which one gets into a powerful position are precisely the opposite necessary to wield power with precision and fairness.’
‘So random selection is more efficient than competition.’
‘I didn’t say that, but, yes, possibly.’
‘Which is an argument for heredity.’
‘If you believe heredity is random,’ she agreed. ‘But most breeders would disagree. Primogeniture has its roots in logic. Bloodlines count. Look at Hitler and the Nazis.’
‘You said it.’
‘Touché,’ she said. ‘Bad example. But the Prime Minister got where he is by methods which are ghastly when wielded by someone in his position. In other words, the travelling is essential but the accoutrements are worse than useless when one has actually arrived.’
‘You could put it like that.’
She smiled. ‘I just have,’ she said. ‘Now drink up. I’m star
ving. I could murder a steak.’
She could too, and almost did. They both had bavette and chips, and a tolerable Béarnaise in the new bistro, which had red and white check table clothes, accordion music and generally resembled the set of ’Allo ’Allo!. They split a bottle of Beaujolais Villages (Simon thought the Cotes du Rhône overpriced) and ended with coffee and Calva. Monica had the crème caramel and he, wishing to maintain the alliteration, had a wedge of Camembert. It was all very French in an English sort of way and reasonably priced.
‘The Prime Minister would hate this,’ said Bognor, as the squeezebox gave them a Piaf number, ill-disguised but reeking of pastiche.
‘He never pays for himself,’ said Monica, ‘and the Azerbaijanis and Kazakhs and the other third division football magnates, with whom he and the Duke of York consort, would only go to the sort of place where they like expense accounts. Big hotels, Gordon Ramsay, Michelin stars, all ponce and no taste.’
‘Always struck me as a shepherd’s pie and Bollinger person.’
‘Shepherd’s pie is cheap and the champagne would have fallen off the back of a lorry, or be the gift of some third division Kazakh football club owner. Like I said, he has what it takes to get to the top, but when he arrives he doesn’t know what to do, so he takes his cue from other newly arrivistes – preferably foreign.’
‘He obviously knew exactly who Jimmy Trubshawe was and who cooked his mushrooms. Just wouldn’t admit it.’
‘What do you expect?’
Monica, had, in a manner of speaking, been here before. Most of the other customers looked as if they might be paying their own bills. The proprietor called himself Gaston and had pointy moustaches, which almost certainly meant that he came from the East End of London.
‘I think Trubshawe is worth something,’ said Bognor. He was tipsy but not drunk. His wife also.
‘Was,’ she corrected. ‘James Trubshawe is no more. Let’s face it, we wouldn’t have liked him. He probably supported Brentford or Yeovil Town; liked pickled onions; shepherd’s pie, maybe, but give him a pint of ale and not some frog fizz. Know what I mean?’
‘You’re being snobbish. And Man U, not Brentford or Yeovil.’
‘Why Man U?’ she wanted to know.
‘Because,’ he said.
‘Now,’ she said, ‘you’re the one who’s being snobbish. Mind you, I still don’t really understand about Trubshawe and the PM.’
‘What’s to understand?’ asked Bognor. ‘The Prime Minister despises men such as Trubshawe but he needs them. It’s all part of the same game that you mentioned when you talked about the difference between arriving and travelling.’
‘Climbing is a better word than travelling. Greasy pole and all that. Many a slip. Social ditto. The point is that men like the PM believe that men like Trubshawe are expendable. Necessary, but you dump them when you have to, and if people like you protest, you set up a formal enquiry.’
‘Here’s to James Trubshawe, whoever he was,’ said Bognor. And he and his wife drank silently and thoughtfully to the man they never knew but whose corner they were posthumously fighting.
‘I wonder what Trubshawe would say if he were here,’ said Monica after a while.
‘Give me a pint and a pie and no foreign muck, I should think,’ said her husband, grinning.
‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘All right. He was a small-time crook and not very good at what he did. And he was in exile on some Costa or other, surrounded by a lot of similar spivs and con men. Do you imagine he was happy? Or fulfilled?’
‘I shouldn’t think so,’ said Bognor, ‘but who is? Happy and fulfilled. I’m certainly not. I think I’ve probably done my best. When St Peter stands with his clipboard at the Pearly Gates, I think I’ll be able to say that I made the most of my talents.’
‘You’ll be lucky to make the Pearly Gates,’ said Monica. She laughed. ‘You’ll be way below, boiling in oil with James Trubshawe, the PM and the saintly Edward.’
‘And I’m not drinking to Edward,’ she said. ‘Do you imagine you’re introduced? Do you think some Hieronymus Bosch creature takes a moment off stoking with his trident and says words to the effect of “I don’t think you’ve met your former Prime Minister. Prime Minister, I don’t believe you’ve met James Trubshawe.”’
‘And the blessed Edward will tell everyone what they really mean,’ said Simon. ‘I suppose that’s his role in life. Translator max. Always putting his own words into more important mouths.’
‘Do you imagine Trubshawe was middle class?’ asked Monica.
‘He would have said so because everyone now calls themselves middle class, even if they are really upper or lower. Very few people admit to belonging to any other class except middle. Fact of life. Distressing but true. Shall we call a cab?’
They called a cab. Gaston said it would take five minutes.
‘Cabbies are working class. By definition,’ said Bognor. ‘And members of the Marylebone Cricket Club are middle class. Yet most cabbies are members of MCC and many members of MCC are cabbies. So what class do you belong to if you are a cabbie and a member of MCC?’
‘Now who’s being silly!’ she said. ‘Trubshawe wasn’t a member of MCC and he never drove a cab.’
‘Prove it,’ said Bognor with an air of triumph. ‘Prove it! All right the Club will have records and they should be able to prove membership one way or another. But driving a cab is something else. And the only person who really knows about the cab is Trubshawe, and he’s dead.’
‘You could be right.’ Monica spoke grudgingly. ‘I always maintain that death is doubly deceitful. It’s not just that it destroys evidence and witnesses, but that it gives credence to the last one left standing. Last one alive gets the final word. So if Trubshawe hadn’t succumbed to the mushrooms, but had outlived the rest of us, he could have invented whatever he wanted and no one would have been able to contradict him.’
‘Which is why letters and diaries and written evidence is so historically important.’
‘Up to a point,’ said Monica, ‘but what are they worth without verbal corroboration. Not a lot in my view. Just because it’s written down doesn’t make it accurate. Trubshawe could have written “I am middle class” a million times but that wouldn’t make it accurate. We believe he was originally working for “us”, whoever we may be, and that he was murdered by “us” as well. The PM and others are doing their darnedest to prove otherwise and, who knows, they may even believe it. I doubt that, but I am a cynical old biddy. Bears out what I say, though. “Death, he taketh all away”.’
‘But them he cannot take,’ said Bognor, completing the quote. ‘I accept what you say but only up to a point.’
Their cab arrived. They got up. Bognor paid by credit card. Monica left a tip in cash. It was ever thus. Outside, the minicab was Japanese, small and the driver came originally from Beirut. He was a university professor fallen on hard times. Maybe that made him middle class going on working. Maybe it didn’t matter.
‘That’s part of your problem,’ said Monica. She sounded censorious but, actually, she was fond. ‘You only ever believe things up to a point.’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘up to a point.’
They laughed and squeezed hands.
In the driver’s seat their cabbie tried to remember his Euclid.