Almost before he knew it their bodies were pressing up against each other, their tongues searching, his fingers, too, through the buttons of her fur coat and on her breast, but she drew away. Suddenly he was gripped by shame. He heard his mother whispering in his ear, tormenting him, accusing him of being no better than a prowling dog, and he wanted to scream at himself for being such a fool. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he mumbled, preparing to flee, but she held him.
‘Bendy, no – it’s me that’s sorry. I’m so very fond of you,’ she whispered. ‘It’s just that – I’ve got too much Irish and Catholic in me, it makes me feel so, so – guilty. You wouldn’t understand.’
Understand? He could write the entire encyclopaedia. Of course he understood. Unlike hers, his Irish Catholic upbringing was entirely authentic. A mud-roofed hut in Tipperary rather than a New England mansion. With dirt floors instead of marble, and only one room. Lying awake, listening to his parents behind the curtain surrounding their bed, his father’s ferocious grunts, her pleas for him to be quieter, and more gentle. And always afterwards, while his father snored, his mother prayed, begged that she would have no more children and be released from the hell of her life. Guilt? His very existence was a matter of guilt, of sin, of suffering, and the lesson had been beaten into him every day at seminary school until he had run away from it at the age of fifteen. But it always came back to him, every time he heard a woman pray, or every time he thought of sex.
So, yes, Anna Maria, he knew all about guilt.
Which was why he didn’t want anything more to do with the Irish, why he’d tried by all sorts of invention to scrub any lingering bit of Irishness from his voice and his soul, one of the many reasons why he hated Bernard Shaw. Yet Anna Maria reminded him of Ireland every time he looked into her pale green eyes. He didn’t even like women – at least, not the hairy, scratchy, unpleasant women who were the sum total of his sexual experience, who smelt so strange and who demanded more money afterwards – yet he was already counting the moments before he could see this woman again. For Bracken, image was everything, yet here he was standing under a tree in a public park with a handful of nipple and a girl almost young enough to be his daughter. He’d never wanted to share his life with any woman, largely because his life was such a fabrication that it wouldn’t stand up to any sustained scrutiny, yet suddenly he was breaking every rule in his book.
That’s when he came to the conclusion he had fallen in love.
‘You’ve gone too far this time. Too wretchedly, damnably far!’
And they had thought they were bringing him the best news of the day.
As soon as they had knocked on the door of the Cabinet Room, Ball and Wilson sensed that their own feelings of elation were misplaced. ‘What do you want?’ Chamberlain had demanded imperiously, not taking his eyes from the letter he was writing.
Another of those endless missives to his sisters, they decided. He wrote to them in astonishing detail, not only of the facts of his Government but of his ambitions and aspirations, and also of his fears. For him these letters were a cleansing process, like the bleedings insisted upon by a mediaeval physician, except that in his letters he bled feelings and soul. Sometimes the sisters knew more than even Ball and Wilson, and always more than his wife.
‘News from the front, Neville,’ Ball exclaimed, moving into the room.
‘Which of the many fronts that seem to engage my attentions?’ the Prime Minister responded. He was always like this when he was tired: overbearing, sarcastic, short. They had learned to ignore it.
‘In their manifold and great mercy, our friends in the frozen north have decided not to retain the Duchess as their candidate at the next election,’ Ball continued.
Still Chamberlain did not look up. There were livid red spots high on his cheeks. He had just been told that the furniture he and his wife had ordered for the new residence at the top of Number Ten would not be arriving for another two months. Delay upon delay. The incompetence was scarcely believable. How was he supposed to secure the peace of Europe when he hadn’t got anywhere to store his clean shirts? He was going to visit Signor Mussolini, who normally appeared in public covered in gold braid. Would the British Prime Minister have to arrive looking like some agricultural worker? ‘If this is democracy, I sometimes wonder why we bother,’ he muttered.
‘Neville, this is a triumph of democracy,’ Ball protested.
‘What is?’
‘The damned Duchess. She’s out.’
At last he gave them his attention. ‘She’s out?’
‘Constituency’s disowned her.’
‘Ah, about time.’ He relaxed a little, leaning back in his chair. ‘And I suppose if I examined the matter closely I would find your fingerprints somewhere on the death warrant.’
‘The lightest of dabs, perhaps.’ And they almost tumbled over themselves in their enthusiasm to offer him the details. ‘Seems it was quite a lynch mob.’ – ‘She didn’t stand a chance.’ – ‘The motion was put to the meeting that they should seek a candidate who’d support your position on Europe.’ – ‘It was overwhelming.’ – ‘273 votes to 167.’ – ‘The agent says he’s never known such a turnout.’ There was laughter. ‘And the best bit’s yet to come. The poor Duchess was so distressed she’s resigned her seat. Flown off in a fit.’ – ‘Intends to stand as an Independent, would you believe?’ – ‘Yes, there’s going to be a by-election.’
‘What?’ Chamberlain sprang to his feet. The pen he was using clattered to the table, spraying the letter with wet slugs of ink. ‘What?’ he demanded again. His entire face had now coloured and his hand was clasping his temples. ‘How could you? You fools!’
‘Steady on, Neville.’ Both men turned momentarily to stone. Something had gone dramatically wrong, this wasn’t the script they had brought with them. ‘What’s the problem? She’s turned her back on the peace, now she’s turned her back on the party. She’s done for.’
‘But a by-election. Don’t you see what that means?’
Wilson and Ball looked at each other in bewilderment.
‘The voters will have to choose.’
‘Some choice,’ Ball snorted. ‘Between war and peace.’
‘Between her – and me.’ Chamberlain leaned for support on the white marble fireplace, both arms outstretched, gazing into the empty grate, as if faith itself were draining from him. ‘You’ve gone too far this time. Too wretchedly, damnably far!’
‘No,’ Wilson objected. ‘How?’
Chamberlain turned, his voice grown tight, enunciating every word with care. ‘But what if she wins?’
‘She can’t bloody win,’ Ball insisted. ‘She doesn’t have a friend who isn’t a Bolshie or can’t be made to look one.’
‘You’re almost as popular as God out there.’ Wilson waved a hand in the general direction of the windows.
‘The Lord giveth. And He taketh, Sir Horace.’ Chamberlain was breathing heavily, struggling to control his mood. ‘Something’s been going on – out there. I don’t know what, perhaps all this nonsense with the Jews, but it’s all wobbling.’ He picked up a cardboard folder that had lain beside his blotter and threw it down the table. ‘Hitler’s pogroms have made him look like a criminal. And us like conspirators and accomplices.’
‘You can’t possibly believe the stupid Duchess will win,’ Ball protested.
‘The News Chronicle has just got hold of an opinion poll that suggests she might.’
‘Those polls?’ Ball snorted. ‘It’s a bit of a rebound, nothing more. Like the bride coming back from her honeymoon to find a pile of washing.’ He chewed