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O'Neill wasn't absolutely sure what Urquhart was going on about; to be sure he had been a little unwell but his befuddled brain still refused to accept there was a major problem which he couldn't handle. Why fill one's life with doubts, especially about oneself? He could cope with it, particularly with a little help... Still, a few days more to realise all his ambitions, to get the public recognition he deserved, to wipe the condescending smiles off their faces, would be worth a little extra effort.
He had got back into the office to be told that Mattie had been looking for him, that she was asking questions about the Paddington accommodation address.
'Don't worry, Pen. I'll deal with it.' He fell back on the swaggering confidence of years of salesmanship, of persuading people to buy ideas and arguments, not because they were all particularly good but because his audiences found themselves captivated by his energy and enthusiasm. In a world full of cynicism, they wanted to put their trust in a man who seemed to believe so passionately in what he was offering.
When Mattie arrived in his office after lunch, he was bright, alert, those strange eyes of his still amazingly animated but seeming very anxious to help.
'Just a stomach upset' he explained. 'Sorry I had to stand you up.'
Mattie acknowledged that his smile was full of charm; it was difficult not to want to believe him.
'I understand you were asking about Mr Collingridge's accommodation address?'
'Sounds as if you are admitting that it was Charles Collingridge's address?' she enquired.
'Well, if you want something on the record, you know I have to say that Mr Collingridge's personal affairs are his own, and no one here is going to comment one way or the other on any speculation.' He trotted out the Downing Street line with accomplished ease. 'But may I talk to you off the record, not for reporting?'
He made strong eye contact with her as if to establish his sincerity, rising from behind his desk to come and sit alongside Mattie in one of the informal chairs which littered his office.
'Even off the record, Mattie, there's a limit to how much I can say, but you know how unwell Charles has been. He's not been fully responsible for his actions, and it would be a terrible pity if we were to go out of our way to punish him still further. His life is in ruins. Whatever he has done wrong, hasn't he suffered enough already?'
Mattie felt angry as she watched the loading of guilt onto the shoulders of the absent Charles. The whole world is to blame, Roger, except for you.
'Are you denying that Charles Collingridge himself asked you to open that address?'
'So long as this is not for reporting but for your background information, I'm not going to deny it, but what good will it do anyone to re-open such old wounds? Give him a chance to rebuild his life' he pleaded.
'OK, Roger. I see no point in trying to subject him to farther harassment. So let me turn to a different point. There have been lots of accusations about how party headquarters has been very careless in allowing damaging ma-, terial to leak out in recent months. The Prime Minister issupposed to blame Smith Square very directly for much of his troubles'
'I doubt whether that is fair, but it is no secret that relations between him and the Party Chairman have been very strained'
'Strained enough for that opinion poll we published during party conference week to have been leaked deliberately from party headquarters?'
Mattie had to look very hard to detect the faint glimmer of surprise behind his flashing eyes before he sped into his explanation.
'I think that assumption is very difficult to justify. There are only - what, five people in this building who are circulated with copies of that material apart from the Party Chairman. I'm one of those five, and I can tell you how seriously we take the confidentiality of such material.' He lit a Gauloise. Time to think. 'But it also gets sent to every Cabinet Minister, all twenty-two of them, either at the House of Commons where it would be opened by one of those gossipy secretaries, or to their Departments where it would be opened by a civil servant, many of whom have no love for this Government. Any leak is much more likely to have come from there.'
'But the papers were leaked at the headquarters hotel in Bournemouth. House of Commons secretaries or unfriendly civil servants don't go to the party conference or roam around the headquarters hotel'
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