Best Kept Secret (The Clifton Chronicles, #3)(30)

‘Good afternoon, sir. My name is Giles Barrington and I hope I can count on your support next Thursday at the general election.’

‘I don’t live in this constituency, mate, I’m down from Birmingham for the day.’



On the day of the election, Giles’s agent, Griff Haskins, told the candidate he felt confident the voters of Bristol Docklands would keep faith with their member and send him back to represent them in the House of Commons, even if it was with a slightly reduced majority. However, he was not convinced that the Labour Party would hold on to power.

Griff turned out to be right on both counts, because at three o’clock on the morning of 27 October 1951, the returning officer announced that after three recounts, Sir Giles Barrington was duly elected as the Member of Parliament for Bristol Docklands, with a majority of 414 votes.

Once all the results across the nation had come in, the Conservative Party ended up with an overall majority of 17 seats, and Winston Churchill once again found himself residing at No.10 Downing Street. The first election he’d won as Conservative leader.

The following Monday, Giles drove up to London and took his seat in the House of Commons. The chatter in the corridors was that as the Tories only had a majority of 17, it wouldn’t be long before another election had to be called.

Giles knew that whenever that took place, with a majority of only 414, he would be fighting for his political life, and if he didn’t win it could well be the end of his career as an MP.





11


THE BUTLER HANDED Sir Giles his post on a silver tray. Giles flicked quickly through it, as he did every morning, separating the long, thin, brown envelopes, which he placed to one side, from the white, square ones which he would open immediately. Among the envelopes that caught his attention that morning was a long, thin white one that bore a Bristol postmark. He tore it open.

He pulled out a single sheet of paper addressed To Whom It May Concern. Once he’d read it, he looked up and smiled at Virginia, who had joined him for a late breakfast.

‘It will all be done and dusted next Wednesday,’ he announced.

Virginia didn’t look up from her copy of the Daily Express. She always began the morning with a cup of black coffee and William Hickey, so she could find out what her friends were up to, and which debutantes were hoping to be presented at court that year, and which had no chance.

‘What will be done and dusted?’ she asked, still not looking up.

‘Mama’s will.’

Virginia forgot all about hopeful debutantes, folded her newspaper and smiled sweetly at Giles. ‘Tell me more, my darling.’

‘The reading of the will is to take place in Bristol next Wednesday. We could drive down on Tuesday afternoon, spend the night at the Hall, and attend the reading the next day.’

‘What time will it be read?’

Giles glanced at the letter once again. ‘Eleven o’clock, in the offices of Marshall, Baker and Siddons.’

‘Would you mind terribly, Bunny, if we drove down early on the Wednesday morning? I don’t think I can face another evening being nice to your chippy sister.’

Giles was about to say something, but changed his mind. ‘Of course, my love.’

‘Stop calling me “my love”, Bunny, it’s dreadfully common.’

‘What sort of day have you got ahead of you, my darling?’

‘Hectic, as usual. I never seem to stop nowadays. Another dress fitting this morning, lunch with the bridesmaids, and then this afternoon I have an appointment with the caterers, who are pressing me on numbers.’

‘What’s the latest?’ asked Giles.

‘Just over two hundred from my side, and another hundred and thirty from yours. I was rather hoping to send out the invitations next week.’

‘That’s fine by me,’ said Giles. ‘Which reminds me,’ he added, ‘the speaker has granted my request to use the Commons’ terrace for the reception, so perhaps we ought to invite him as well.’

‘Of course, Bunny. After all, he is a Conservative.’

‘And possibly Mr Attlee,’ suggested Giles tentatively.

‘I’m not sure how Papa would feel about the leader of the Labour Party attending his only daughter’s wedding. Perhaps I could ask him to invite Mr Churchill.’



The following Wednesday, Giles drove his Jaguar over to Cadogan Gardens and parked outside Virginia’s flat. He rang the front doorbell, expecting to join his fiancée for breakfast.

‘Lady Virginia has not come down yet, sir,’ said the butler. ‘But if you’d care to wait in the drawing room, I can bring you a cup of coffee and the morning papers.’

‘Thank you, Mason,’ Giles said to the butler, who had once confessed to him privately that he voted Labour.

Giles settled down in a comfortable chair, and was offered a choice of the Express or the Telegraph. He settled on the Telegraph, because the headline on the front page caught his attention: Eisenhower announces he will stand for president. The decision didn’t surprise Giles, although he was interested to learn that the general would be standing as a Republican, because until recently no one seemed quite sure which party he supported, after both the Democrats and the Republicans had made overtures to him.

Giles glanced at his watch every few minutes, but there was no sign of Virginia. When the clock on the mantelpiece struck the half hour, he turned his attention to an article on page seven, which suggested Britain was considering building its first motorway. The stalemate in the Korean War was covered on the parliamentary pages, and Giles’s speech on a forty-eight-hour week for all workers and every hour beyond that being treated as overtime was quoted at length, with an editorial condemning his views. He smiled. After all, it was the Telegraph. Giles was reading an announcement in the court circular that Princess Elizabeth would be embarking on a tour of Africa in January, when Virginia burst into the room.