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Five minutes later he was back in his own room and on the phone to Urquhart.
'Delivery made and dinner fixed.'
'Splendid, Roger. You've been most helpful. I hope the Foreign Secretary will be grateful too.'
'But I still don't see how you are going to get him to invite Penny to dinner. What's the point of all this?'
The point, dear Roger, is that he will not have to invite her to dinner at all. He is coming to my reception this evening. You will bring Penny, who you have established is more than willing to meet and spend some time with him. I shall introduce them over a glass of champagne or two, and see what develops. If I know Patrick Woolton - which as Chief Whip I do - it won't take more than twenty minutes before he's suggesting that they go to his room to discuss -how does Private Eye put it - Ugandan affairs?'
'Or French lessons,' muttered O'Neill. 'But I still don't see where that gets us.'
'Whatever happens, Roger, you and I will know about it. And knowledge is always useful.'
'I still don't see how.'
Trust me, Roger. You must trust me.'
'I do. I have to: I don't really get much choice, do I?'
That's right, Roger. Now you are beginning to see. Knowledge is power'
The phone went dead. O'Neill thought he understood but wasn't absolutely sure. He still often struggled to figure out whether he was Urquhart's partner or prisoner, but could never really decide. He rummaged in his bedside cabinet and took out a small carton. He swallowed a couple of sleeping pills and collapsed fully clothed on the bed.
'Patrick. Thanks for the time'
'You sounded quite serious on the phone. When Chief Whips say they want an urgent private word with you, they usually mean they've got the photographs under lock and key but unfortunately the News of the World has got the negatives!'
Urquhart smiled and slipped through the open door into the Foreign Secretary's room. He had not come far, indeed only a few yards from his own bungalow next door in what the local constabulary had named 'Overtime Alley' the row of luxury private bungalows in the grounds of the conference hotel which housed leading Ministers, all of whom had a 24-hour rota of police guards running up huge overtime bills for the hapless local ratepayers.
'Drink?' the genial Lancastrian offered.
Thanks, Patrick. Scotch.'
The Right Honourable Patrick Woolton, Her Majesty's Principal Secretary for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and one of Merseyside's many successful emigres, busied himself at a small drinks cabinet which quite obviously had already been used that afternoon, while Urquhart placed the Ministerial red box he was carrying in the corner of the room beside the four belonging to his overworked host. The brightly coloured leather-clad boxes are provided to all Ministers to house their official papers, speeches and other items which they require to keep secure. Red boxes go wherever Ministers go, even on holiday, and the Foreign Secretary was habitually followed around by a host of the small suitcase-sized containers carrying telexes and despatches, briefing papers and the other paraphernalia of diplomacy. The Chief Whip, with no conference speech to make and no foreign crises to handle, had arrived in Bournemouth with his box filled with three bottles of twelve-year-old malt whisky. Hotel drink prices are always staggering, he explained to his wife, even when you can find the brand you want.
He faced Woolton across a paper-strewn coffee table, and dispensed with the small talk.
'Patrick, I need to take your mind. In the strictest confidence. As far as I am concerned, this has to be one of those meetings which never took place.'
'Christ, you do have some photographs!' exclaimed Woolton, now only half joking. His eye for attractive young women was much discussed, but he was usually highly discreet, especially when he travelled abroad. Ten years earlier when he was just starting his Ministerial career, he had spent several painful hours answering questions from the Louisiana State Police about a weekend he had spent in a New Orleans motel with a young American girl who looked twenty, acted as if she were thirty and turned out to be just a few days over sixteen. The incident had been brushed over, but Woolton had never forgotten the tiny difference between a glittering political future and a charge of statutory rape.
'Something which could be rather more serious. I've been picking up some unhealthy vibrations in the last few weeks about Henry. You've sensed some of the irritation with him around the Cabinet table, and the media seem to be falling out of love with him in a very big way. There was no reason to expect an extended honeymoon after the election, but it's in danger of getting out of hand. I have just been approached by two of the most influential grass-roots party members saying that feeling at local level is getting very bad. We lost two more important local council by- elections last week in what should have been very safe seats, and we are going to lose quite a few more in the weeks ahead. Our majority in the Dorset by-election tomorrow is likely to be hit badly. To put no finer point on it, Patrick, the PM's unpopularity is dragging the whole Party down and we would have trouble winning an election for local dogcatcher at the moment. We seem to have blown it rather badly' Urquhart paused for a sip of whisky.
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