House of Cards (6 page)

Once upstairs in the relative safety of Lord Williams' suite, the signs of strain which had been so well hidden all evening began to appear for the first time on the Prime Minister's face. The television set in the comer was just announcing that the computer was predicting a still lower majority, and Collingridge let out a long, low sigh. His eyes wandered slowly round the room.

'Has Charles been around this evening?' he asked quietly. Charles Collingridge was nowhere to be seen.
The
Prime Minister's eyes met those of the Chairman.

Tm sorry,' the older man replied.

Sorry for what?
’
thought Collingridge. The fact that my brother's a drunk? Sorry that I seem almost to have thrown away our parliamentary majority? Sorry that you will have to carry the can along with me? But anyway, thanks for caring.

He was suddenly feeling desperately tired as the adrenalin ceased to flow. After weeks of being hemmed in on all sides by people and without a single private moment to himself, he felt an overwhelming need to be on
his
own and he turned away to find somewhere a little quieter and a little more private. Instead he found his way blocked by Urquhart who was standing right by his shoulder. The Chief Whip was thrusting an envelope at him.

I've been giving some thought to the reshuffle
’
he said. 'While this is hardly the time, I know you will be
thinking
about it over the weekend so I have prepared some suggestions. I know you prefer some positive ideas rather than a blank sheet of paper, so I hope you find this of use.'

Collingridge looked at the envelope and raised his exhausted eyes to Urquha
rt. ‘Y
ou're right. This is scarcely the time. Perhaps we should be thinking about securing our majority before we start sacking our colleagues
’

The sarcasm cut deep into Urquhart, deeper than the Prime Minister had intended, and he realised he had gone too far.

I'm sorry, Francis. I'm afraid I am a little tired. Of course you're quite right to think ahead. Look, I would like you and Teddy to come round on Sunday afternoon to discuss it. Perhaps you would be kind enough to let Teddy have a copy of your letter now, and send one round to me at Downing Street tomorrow - rather, later this morning
’

Urquhart stood rigid with embarrassment at the semi-public rebuke he had received. He realised that he had been all too anxious about the reshuffle, and cursed himself for his folly. His natural assurance seemed to desert him when it came to Collingridge, a grammar school product who in social terms would have had trouble gaining membership of his club. The role reversal in Government unnerved him, unsettled him, and he found himself acting out of character when he was in the other man's presence. He was frustrated with his inadequacy, and quietly loathed Collingridge and all his kind for undermining his position. But now was not the time, and he retreated into affability.

'Of course, Prime Minister. I will let Teddy have a copy straight away.'

'Better copy it yourself. Wouldn't do to have that list getting around here tonight,' smiled Collingridge as he tried to bring Urquhart back into the conspiracy of power which always hovers around Downing Street. In any event, I think it's time for me to depart. The BBC will want me bright and sparkling in four hours' time, so I shall wait for the rest of the results in Downing Street
’

He turned to Williams. 'By the way, what is the computer predicting now?'

It's been stuck on 24 for about half an hour now. I think that's it.' There was no sign of pleasure or sense of victory in his voice. He had just presided over the Party's worst election result in nearly two decades.

'Never mind, Teddy. A majority is a majority. And it will give the Chief Whip something to do instead of sitting idly around with a majority of over a hundred. Eh, Francis?' And with that he strode out of the room, leaving Urquhart clutching his envelope.

With the Prime Minister's departure the crowds both inside and outside the building began perceptibly to melt, and Urquhart made his way to the back of the first floor where he knew the nearest photocopier could be found.

Room 132A was not an office at all, but a windowless closet barely six feet across which was kept for supplies and confidential photocopying. As Urquhart opened the door the smell hit
him
before he had time to find the light switch. Slumped on the floor by the narrow metal storage shelves was Charles Collingridge, who had soiled his clothes even as he slept. There was no glass or bottle anywhere to be seen, but the smell of whisky was heavy in the air. He had crawled away to find the least embarrassing place to collapse.

Urquhart coughed as his nostrils rebelled at the stench, and he reached for his handkerchief and held it to his face. He stepped over to the body and turned it on its back. A shake of the shoulders did little other than disrupt still further the fitful heavy breathing. A firmer shake gave nothing more, and a gentle slap across the cheeks produced equally little result.

He gazed with disgust at what he saw. Suddenly Urquhart's body stiffened as his contempt mingled with the lingering humiliation he had suffered at the Prime Minister's hands and welded into a craving for revenge. He turned cold and the hairs on the nape of his neck tingled as he stood-over the stupefied body. Slowly, powerfully, Urquhart's hand swung
down and began to slap Colling
ridge's face and, as his signet ring began to rake across the flesh of the cheeks, the whole head whipped from side to side until blood began to seep from the mouth and the body coughed and retched. Urquhart bent over the other man, staring closely as if to see that the body still breathed. He remained motionless for several minutes, like a cat at its prey, his muscles tense and expression contorted until he straightened with a start, towering over the drunk.

'And your brother's no damned better,' he hissed.

He turned to the photocopier, took the letter out of his pocket, made one copy and left without looking back.

SUNDAY 13
th
JUNE

It was the Sunday after the election. At 3.50 p.m. Urquhart's official car turned from Whitehall into Downing Street to be gree
ted by a policeman's starched
salute and a hundred exploding flashguns. The press were gathered behind the barriers which cordoned them off across the road from the world's most famous front door. It stood wide open as the car drew up - like a political black hole, Urquhart thought, into which new Prime Ministers disappeared and rarely if ever emerged without being surrounded and suffocated by the protective hordes of civil servants. Somehow the building seemed to suck all political vitality out of some leaders.

He had made sure to travel on the left-hand side of the car's rear seat that day in order that his exit in front of Number Ten would provide an unimpeded view of himself for the TV and press cameras, and as he climbed out and stretched himself to his full height he was greeted by a chorus of shouted questions from across the road, providing him with a good excuse to walk over for a few quick words amidst the jungle of notepads and microphones. He spotted Charles Goodman, the legendary Press Association figure, firmly planted under his battered trilby and conveniently wedged between ITN and BBC news camera crews.

'Hello, Charles. Did you have any money on the result?' he enquired, but Goodman was already into his first question as his colleagues pressed around him.

'Are you here to advise the Prime Minister with the reshuffle, Mr Urquhart, or has he called you to give you a new job?'

'Well, I'm here to discuss a number of things, but I suppose the reshuffle might come into it
’
Urquhart responded coyly.

It's rumoured that you are expecting a major new post.'

'Can't comment on rumours, Charles, and anyway you know that's one for the PM to decide. I'm here at this stage solely to give him some moral support.'

‘Y
ou
’
ll be going to advise the PM along with Lord Williams, will you then?'

'Lord Williams, has he arrived yet?' Urquhart tried to hide any suggestion of surprise.

'About 2.30. We were wondering whether someone else was going to turn up.'

Urquhart hoped that they hadn't noticed the steel which he felt entering his eyes as he realised that the Prime Minister and Party Chairman had been working on the reshuffle without him for an hour and a half. Then I must go. Can't keep them waiting,' he smiled. He turned smartly and strode back across the road and over the threshold. He was annoyed, and it smothered the sense of excitement which he still felt whenever he passed that way.

The Prime Minister's youthful political secretary was waiting at the end of the corridor which led away from the front door towards the Cabinet Room at the rear of the building. As Urquhart approached, he sensed that the young man was uneasy.

The PM is expecting you, Chief Whip
’
he said quite unnecessarily. 'He's in the study upstairs.
I’ll
let
him
know you have arrived,' and bounded off up the stairs.

It was a full twelve minutes before he reappeared, leaving Urquhart to stare for the hundredth time at the portraits of previous Prime Ministers which adorned the famous staircase. He could never get over the feeling of how inconsequential so many of the recent holders of the office had been. Uninspiring and unfitted for the task. Times had changed, and for the worse. The likes of Lloyd George and Churchill had been magnificent natural leaders, but one had been promiscuous and the other arrogant and often drunk, and neither would have been tolerated by the modern media in the search for sensationalism. The media's prying and lack of charity had cast a blanket of mediocrity over most holders of the office since the war, stifling individualism and those with real inspiration. Collingridge, chosen largely for his television manner, typified how superficial much of modem politics had become, he thought. He yearned for the grand old days when politicians made their own rules rather than cowering before the rules laid down by the media.

The return of the political secretary interrupted his thoughts. 'Sorry to keep you waiting, Chief Whip. He's ready for you now.'

As Urquhart entered the room traditionally used by modern Prime Ministers as their study he could see that, in spite of efforts to tidy up the desk, there had been much shuffling of paper and scribbling of notes in the previous hour and a half. An empty bottle of claret stared out of the waste paper bin, and plates covered with crumbs and a withered leaf of lettuce lurked on the windowsill. The Party Chairman sat to the right of the P
rime Minister's desk, his notes
spilled over the green leather top. Beside them stood a large pile of MPs' biographies supplied by party headquarters.

Urquhart brought up a chair and sat in front of the other two, who were silhouetted against the sun as it shone in through the windows overlooking Horse Guards Parade. He squinted into the light, balancing his own folder of notes uneasily on his knee.

Without ceremony, Collingridge got straight down to business. 'Francis, you were kind enough to let me have some thoughts on the reshuffle. I am very grateful; you know how useful such suggestions are in stimulating my own thoughts, and you have obviously put a lot of work into them. Now before we get down to the specific details, I thought it would be sensible just to chat about the broad objectives first. You've suggested - well, what shall I call it? - a rather radical reshuffle with six new members being brought into the Cabinet and some extensive swapping of portfolios amongst the rest. Tell me why you would prefer an extensive reshuffle and what you think it would achieve.'

Urquhart did not care for this. He had expected some inevitable discussion of individual appointments, but he was being asked to justify the strategy behind the reshuffle proposals before he had any chance to sniff out the Prime Minister's own views. He knew that it was not healthy for a Chief Whip to fail to read his Prime Minister's mind correctly, and he wondered whether he was being set up.

As he peered into the sunlight streaming in from behind the Prime Minister, he could read nothing of the expression on Collingridge's face. He desperately wished now that he had not committed all his thoughts to paper instead of talking them through, but it was too late for regrets.

'Of course, they are only suggestions, indications really of what you might be able to do. I thought in general that it might be better to undertake more rather than fewer changes, simply to indicate that you are firmly in charge of the Government and that you are expecting a lot of new ideas and new thinking from your Ministers. And a chance to retire just a few of our older colleagues; regrettable, but necessary if you are to bring in some new blood and bring on those Junior Ministers who have shown most promise.'

Dammit, he thought suddenly, that was a stupid thing to say with that ancient bastard Williams sitting on the PM's right hand. He knew he should have been more careful, and now he had a knot in the pit of his stomach. Collingridge had never seemed to be a Prime Minister with grip, one who enjoyed making decisions, and Urquhart had felt sure that most if not all of his proposals would be favourably received. All of his suggested promotions were men of talent which few would deny. He hoped that even fewer would realise that most were also men who owed him.