|
The announcement caused a flurry of activity at Renox Chemicals. A press conference for the medical and scientific press was called for the following day, the Marketing Director pressed the button on a pre-planned mail shot to every single general practitioner throughout the country, and the company's broker informed the Stock Exchange of the new licence.
The response was immediate. Shares in the Renox Chemical Company PLC jumped from 244p to 295p. The 20,000 ordinary shares purchased two days before by the Union Bank of Turkey's brokers were now worth exactly ?59,000.
Shortly before noon the next day, a telephone call instructed the bank to sell the shares and credit the amount to the appropriate account. The caller also explained that regrettably the hotel venture in Antalya was not proceeding, and the account holder was returning to Kenya. Would the bank be kind enough to close the account, and expect a visit from the account holder later that afternoon?
Just before the bank closed at 3 p.m. the same bespectacled man in the hat and sports jacket walked into the branch on Seven Sisters Road and collected ?58,962 which he placed in bundles of ? 20 notes in the bottom of his brown corduroy bag. He bridled at the ?750 in charges which the bank had levied on his short-lived and simple account but, as the deputy manager had suspected, he chose not to make a fuss. He asked for a closing statement to be sent to him at his address in Paddington, and thanked the clerk for his courtesy.
The following morning and less than one week after Firdaus Jhabwala had met with Urquhart, the Chief Whip delivered ?50,000 in cash to the party treasurers. Substantial payments in cash were not unique, and the treasurers expressed delight at discovering a new source of funds. Urquhart suggested that the treasurers office make the usual arrangements to ensure that the donor and his wife were invited to a charity reception or two at Downing Street, and asked to lie informed when this happened so that he could make a specific arrangement with the Prime Minister's political secretary to ensure that Mr and Mrs Jhabwala had ten minutes alone with the Prime Minister beforehand. One of the party treasurers made a careful note of the donor's address, said that he would write an immediate cryptic letter of thanks, and locked the money in a safe.
Probably uniquely amongst Cabinet Ministers, Urquhart left for holiday that night feeling utterly relaxed.
Part Two
THE CUT
AUGUST
The newspapers during August were dreadful. With politicians and the main political correspondents all away, second string lobby correspondents struggled to fill the vacuum and develop any story they could which would get their by-line on the front page. So they clutched at whispers and rumour. What was on Tuesday only a minor piece of speculation on page five of the Guardian had become by Friday a hard news story on the front page of the Daily Mail. This was the chance for the junior correspondents to make their mark, and the mark they chose to make was all too frequently on the reputation of Henry Collingridge. Minor backbenchers who were too self-promoting even to take a break during the holiday season were honoured with significant pieces quoting 'senior party spokesmen', putting forward their views as to where the Government was going wrong and how a new sense of direction had to be imposed. Rumours about the Prime Minister's dissatisfaction with and distrust of his Cabinet colleagues abounded, and since there was no one around authoritatively to deny the rumours, the silence was taken as authoritative consent. So the speculation fed on itself and ran riot. The early August rumours about an 'official inquisition' into Cabinet leaks had, by later in the month, grown into predictions that there would after all be a reshuffle in the autumn. The word around Westminster had it that Henry Collingridge's temper was getting increasingly erratic, even though he was in fact enjoying a secluded holiday on a private estate many hundreds of miles away near Cannes.
The Prime Minister's brother also became the subject of a spate of press stories, mostly in the gossip columns, and the Downing Street press office was repeatedly called upon to comment on suggestions that the Prime Minister was bailing out 'dear old Charlie' from the increasingly close attentions of his creditors, including the Inland Revenue. But Downing Street would not comment - it was personal, not official - so the formal 'no comment' which was given to the most fanciful of accusations was recorded in the news coverage, usually in the most damaging light.
38/134 首页 上一页 36 37 38 39 40 41 下一页 尾页
|
