Funny Girl(82)

‘Well, it seems silly that whenever you’ve shown Jim at work, his office is in a BBC studio. But he works here, at Number Ten. So what I was wondering was, would you like to film somewhere in here?’

‘Gosh,’ said Dennis.

‘I don’t mean every week,’ said Marcia. ‘Worse luck. I’d like it, but Harold would probably start grumbling.’

They laughed politely.

‘But I’m sure we could manage something as a one-off.’

‘Golly,’ said Clive.

‘And we’d like to do it quite soon,’ said Marcia.

‘Oh,’ said Dennis.

‘The thing is, everyone says this election is really boring, and Harold’s going to win easily, and we’re desperately trying to think of ways to pep it up a bit,’ said Marcia. ‘Otherwise it’s all a terrible grind, and the turnout goes down, and if we do win, it’ll start off with a bit of a whimper, rather than a bang.’

There was a lot of smiling and nodding, but still nobody said anything.

‘We wouldn’t ask you to take sides, of course,’ said Marcia. ‘The BBC wouldn’t have that. But an amusing debate about the issues between Barbara and Jim would do so much more than party political broadcasts. People love the programme so much.’

‘That’s very kind of you to say so,’ said Bill.

Sophie wondered whether everyone else had gone mad except her. The Prime Minister’s secretary was asking them whether they wanted to film in Number Ten and all anyone said was ‘gosh’ and ‘golly’.

‘We’d love to,’ said Sophie.

‘Good,’ said Marcia, and she beamed at them all.

Dennis, Tony and Bill looked at Sophie as if she had spoken out of turn.

‘But I’m not sure that …’ said Dennis.

‘Here’s Harold,’ said Marcia, and there he was, the Prime Minister, sucking on a pipe as if nobody would recognize him without it.

They stood up and introduced themselves, except before Sophie could speak he stopped her.

‘And you must be Barbara,’ he said, and everyone laughed politely.

‘Yes,’ said Sophie. ‘Sophie.’

He looked perplexed for a moment.

‘I’m Barbara in the programme,’ she said.

‘Of course you are,’ said Harold. ‘I’ve seen it. Very good.’

They had been led to believe that at eight o’clock every Thursday night, Harold shucked off the awful responsibilities of his position, lit his pipe, sat down with his wife and chuckled away for thirty minutes. Now he was telling them that he was not unfamiliar with the show. Perhaps her perception was being warped by professional oversensitivity, but it seemed to her that there was a difference.

‘And where do you come from? I’m detecting a scent of red rose.’

‘That’s right. I’m from Blackpool, Mr Wilson.’

‘Oh-ho. I’ll bet you’re keeping that from the BBC, aren’t you? They never usually give northerners much of a look-in over there. Still too many Home Counties public-school boys for my liking.’

There were a lot of looks flying around under the Prime Minister’s radar now. Tony and Bill both caught Sophie’s eye, and Marcia caught Tony and Bill looking at Sophie. Dennis was still laughing politely, as Home Counties public-school boys were wont to do, but the laugh was now all form and no content.

‘You are daft, Harold,’ said Marcia, and the moment she said it, Sophie knew what was going on between them. Marcia’s not-quite-affectionate exasperation was that of a daughter talking to her father. There was no affair, she was sure of it. ‘You know very well that Barbara’s from Blackpool.’

Harold looked confused again.

‘I thought she was Sophie?’

‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ said Marcia, and shook her head. ‘Barbara in the show is from Blackpool,’ said Marcia. ‘As well.’

‘Of course she is,’ said Harold. He didn’t seem at all concerned that he’d inadvertently owned up to never having seen five minutes of the series. Perhaps he had other things to worry about. ‘What do you think of Marcia’s idea, anyway?’ the Prime Minister said. ‘Would you like to set an episode inside Number Ten?’

‘I told Dennis here how you wished you had someone as clever as Jim working for you in real life,’ said Marcia.