First Among Equals Read online

  Another bluff, thought Andrew. He flicked back the cover. It was true: exactly as he had suspected, Ricky Hodge had never been arrested or charged. He turned the page. “Rome, child prostitution; Marseilles, narcotics; Paris, blackmail.” Page after page, ending in Turkey, where Hodge had been found in possession of four pounds of heroin which he had been selling in small packets on the black market. In his twenty-nine years Ricky Hodge had spent eleven of the last fourteen in foreign jails.

  Andrew closed the file and could feel the sweat on his forehead. It was some moments before he spoke. “I apologize, Foreign Secretary,” he said. “I have made a fool of myself.”

  “When I was a young man,” said Sir Alec, “I made a similar mistake on behalf of a constituent. Ernie Bevin was Foreign Secretary at the time. He could have crucified me in the House with the knowledge he had. Instead he revealed everything over a drink in this room. I sometimes wish the public could see members in their quiet moments as well as in their rowdy ones.”

  Andrew thanked Sir Alec and walked thoughtfully back to the House. The Evening Standard poster outside the Commons caught his eye. “O’Halloran arrested again.” He bought a copy, stood by the railings, and began reading. Paddy O’Halloran had been detained in a Glasgow police station and charged with robbing the Bank of Scotland in Sauchichall Street. Andrew wondered if his friends would allege it was another “frame up” by the police until he read the next paragraph. “O’Halloran was arrested leaving the bank in possession of a shotgun and £25,000 in used notes. He said when apprehended by the police, ‘I’ve just been clearing my account.’”

  At home, Louise told him that Ricky Hodge had done him a favor.

  “How’s that possible?” asked Andrew.

  “You won’t take yourself so seriously in future.” She smiled.

  When Andrew conducted his next surgery in Edinburgh two weeks later he was surprised to see that Mrs. Bloxham had made an appointment.

  As he greeted her at the door he was even more surprised. She was wearing a bright crimplene dress and a new pair of squeaky brown leather shoes. She also looked as if “Our Blessed Lady” might have to wait a few more years to receive her after all. Andrew motioned her to a seat.

  “I came to thank you, Mr. Fraser,” she said, once she was settled.

  “What for?” asked Andrew.

  “For sending that nice young man round from Christie’s. They auctioned great-grandma’s table for me. I couldn’t believe my luck—it fetched £1,400.” Andrew smiled. “So it don’t matter about the stain on the dress any more.” She paused. “It even made up for having to eat off the floor for three months.”

  Simon steered the new Boundary Commission recommendations unspectacularly through the House as an order in Council, and suddenly he had lost his own constituency. His colleagues in Coventry were understanding, and nursed those wards that would become theirs at the next election in order that he might spend more time searching for a new seat.

  Seven seats became available during the year but Simon was only interviewed for two of them. Both were almost on the Scottish border and both put him in second place. He began to appreciate what it must feel like for an Olympic favorite to be awarded the silver medal.

  Ronnie Nethercote’s monthly board reports began to paint an increasingly somber picture, thus reflecting in real life what the politicians were decreeing in Parliament. Ronnie had decided to postpone going public until the climate was more advantageous. Simon couldn’t disagree with the judgment, but when he checked his special overdraft facility the interest on his loans had pushed the figure in red to over £90,000.

  When unemployment first passed the million mark and Ted Heath ordered a pay and prices freeze strikes broke out all over the country.

  The new parliamentary session in the autumn was dominated by the issue of a Prices and Incomes policy. Charles Seymour became involved in putting the case for the Government. While he didn’t always win every argument, he was now so well briefed on his subject that he no longer feared making a fool of himself at the dispatch box. Raymond Gould and Andrew Fraser both made passionate speeches on behalf of the unions, but the Conservative majority beat them again and again.

  However, the Prime Minister was moving inexorably toward a head-on clash with the unions and an early general election.

  When all three party conferences were over members returned to the Commons aware that it was likely to be their last session before the general election. It was openly being said in the corridors that all the Prime Minister was waiting for was a catalyst. The miners provided it. In the middle of a bleak winter they called an all-out strike for more pay in defiance of the Government’s new trade union legislation.

  In a television interview the Prime Minister told the nation that with unemployment at an unprecedented 2,294,448 and the country on a three-day week he had to call an election to ensure that the rule of law be maintained. The inner Cabinet advised Heath to plump for 28 February 1974.

  “Who runs the country?” became the Tory theme but seemed only to emphasize class differences, rather than uniting the country as Edward Heath had hoped.

  Andrew Fraser had his doubts but he faced a different threat in his own constituency, where the Scottish Nationalists were using the quarrel between the two major parties to promote their own cause. He returned to Scotland, to be warned by his father that the Scottish Nationalists were no longer a joke and that he would be facing a hard campaign against the robust local candidate, Jock McPherson.

  Raymond Gould traveled back to Leeds, confident that the northeast industrial area would not tolerate Heath’s high-handedness.

  Charles felt sure that the people would back any party which had shown the courage to stand up to the unions, although the left wing, led vociferously by Tom Carson, made a great play of the “two nations” issue, insisting that the Government were out to crush the Labour movement once and for all.

  Charles drove down to Sussex to find his supporters glad of the chance to put those “lazy trade unionists” in their place.

  Simon, with no seat to fight, worked on in the Home Office right up to the day of the election, convinced that his career was facing only a temporary setback.

  “I’ll fight the first by-election that comes up,” he promised Elizabeth.

  “Even if it’s a mining seat in South Wales,?” she replied.

  Many months had passed before Charles had found it possible even to sustain a conversation with Fiona for any length of time. Neither wanted a divorce, both citing the ailing Earl of Bridgwater as their reason, although inconvenience and loss of face were nearer the truth. In public it would have been hard to detect the change in their relationship since they had never been given to overt affection.

  Charles gradually became aware that it was possible for marriages to have been over for years without outsiders knowing it. Certainly the old earl never found out, because even on his deathbed he told Fiona to hurry up and produce an heir.

  “Do you think you’ll ever forgive me?” Fiona once asked her husband.

  “Never,” he replied, with a finality that encouraged no further discourse.

  During the three-week election campaign in Sussex they both went about their duties with a professionalism that masked their true feelings.

  “How is your husband bearing up?” someone would inquire.

  “Much enjoying the campaign and looking forward to returning to Government,” was Fiona’s stock reply.

  “And how is dear Lady Fiona?” Charles was continuously asked.

  “Never better than when she’s helping in the constituency,” was his.

  On Sundays, at one church after another, he read the lesson with confidence while she sang “Fight the good fight” in a clear contralto.

  The demands of a rural constituency are considerably different from those of a city. Every village, however small, expects the member to visit them and to recall the local chairmen’s names. Subtle changes were taking place: Fi