All in the Mind (25 page)

‘It’s hard for me to remember. I was so shocked at first, but then I was glad, and I had this vision of a wonderful life bringing up David on my own, not having to worry about his dad and what his moods might bring home with him. And sometimes it’s been great, you know. And lots of times, it’s been like today.’

As Sturrock lay in bed, Mrs Temple’s words – ‘lots of times, it’s been like today’ – ran round and round his head. He tried to tell
himself
he had so much more going for him in life than David, or many of the other patients he treated. He tried to list the good things in his life, but they were quickly drowned out as the same old concerns came crowding in.

Then he could hear Stella walking up the stairs.

‘Are you up, Martin?’ she shouted from the floor below.

‘Nearly,’ he said.

‘Jack will be here soon.’

‘OK.’

He looked through the drawers of his bedside table, found a rubber band, and slipped it over his wrist.

23

Ralph Hall woke up on Sunday morning in a strange bed. His first thought, as his eyes blinked open, was that he felt even more ill than yesterday morning. He felt tired too. Tired and ill. No, ill and tired, in that order. He needed to be sick, but he wasn’t sure he had the strength to get out of the strange bed and drag himself to the toilet, wherever that may be. He needed to find out where he was before he could face the day. This was not his own house, the little three-bedroomed semi he had bought when he first went for the seat to satisfy his local party that he intended to ‘live locally’. It wasn’t a hotel either. It was too lived-in for that. So he assumed he must have been taken here by a friend last night, when he knew he’d had way too much to drink. But which one?

He’d spent the day running around the constituency. He did eleven visits in all, and managed a drink at five of them. Then he had a double Scotch at home while he changed into black tie for the dinner at the local Chamber of Commerce. He needed it to calm down. Sandie had phoned to say her flight had been delayed so there wasn’t time for her to get up to Newcastle for the dinner. She’d see him at home in London tomorrow. He was furious. It was the only thing he’d asked her to do in weeks and she’d let him down.

He’d been called on to say a few words at the dinner. Conscious of having had too much to drink already, he spoke briefly, telling one joke and making a couple of points about the state of the economy before hurrying off the platform. He couldn’t remember what the two points were. He remembered the joke – or vaguely funny story at least – which was about the time he was mistaken on a train for
one
of the characters in
Emmerdale Farm
. It usually got a laugh, but he couldn’t remember if it got a laugh last night. He could remember that he had been sitting next to David Marchant from the Bank of Scotland who was complaining about a proposal in the new Enterprise Bill. He could remember the MC saying the formal proceedings were now over but the bar was open till 1 a.m. and he could remember shouting ‘Amen to that’ and then heading off to get a whisky. He’d had three or four large single malts and also, accidentally on purpose, a couple of other people’s drinks from the bar. One was a pretty tired-looking champagne. The other tasted like gin and tonic. He could remember thinking that it wouldn’t matter so much if he was drunk tonight because he was among his own people, away from the London limelight, most of the killjoys had left and everyone else was drunk or close to it.

Then he remembered the woman in the long lime-green dress, with swimmer’s shoulders and a sexy laugh. Did she really take his hand and say she was going to take him to paradise, or did he dream that? He sat up and saw his jacket on the floor.

‘Oh no. Oh God, please tell me no, please tell me I didn’t. Please tell me this is not the bed of the woman in the green dress. Did I? Oh Christ, I think I did.’ He now had a pumping heart to add to the sore head and parched throat. He sat up, threw back the sheets and jumped out of bed. He thought if he moved fast enough, and panicked enough, he would wake up and find it was that awful panic you get in the last few seconds of dreams so scary they wake you up. He thought he might wake up and find he was actually at home in his own bed and this was just a nice dream with a bad ending. But as he looked around the room for clues as to where he was, he saw the red chesterfield sofa in the window and draped across it the lime-green dress. On the floor beside it was a black lace basque. He suddenly remembered helping the lady in the lime-green dress to take it off, and then she became the lady in the black silk basque and he helped her to take that off too, which was the cause of a lot of laughter and a lot of fiddling with little hooks that increased the laughter. Where was she?

‘Hello?’ he shouted.

No reply.

‘Hello?’

He worked out that the frosted-glass door in the corner must lead to the bathroom. The after-effects of last night’s alcohol and the electric panic he was now feeling combined to make him vomit as soon as he reached the toilet. As he waited for the next heave, staring at the red, brown and yellow mess that swam around in the bowl, he found space within the heaving to ask himself how his life had come to this. He had been a rising star. Though some said he lacked charisma – clearly not the lady in the lime-green dress – nobody ever questioned his judgement or competence. He had a good marriage and a good family. He still thought he might one day be Prime Minister. And yet here he was, stark naked, his belly hanging down, his knees cold on the linoleum floor as he chundered into a toilet bowl and tried to remember who it was he screwed last night. If a line-up of eight moderately attractive women in their mid-thirties was brought in now, like some kind of identity parade, he would struggle to pick her out. Whereas her perfume … he remembered that. The thought of it brought on the next heave.

As his vomiting cleared away some of the debris from his body, his mind started to throw up details of his encounter. She had bumped into him in the foyer as he arrived, late. She’d said hello and showed him where to go. Later, after he’d made his little speech, she’d come to see him at his table. She said she was getting more interested in politics, she was sick of all the cynicism and she would like to join the party and help in the next election campaign. He mumbled something about how they needed all the help they could get and gave her the number of his constituency office. As he wrote the number on the back of a menu, he was conscious of people looking at him, asking themselves who this attractive woman was he was giving his number to. But he was more conscious of how close she was standing to him and how nice her perfume was. She stayed close as she said how he had always inspired her.

He was then surrounded by some of the black-tie great and good
who
wanted their little bit of attention from the minister, and though she stood there for a while, she eventually returned to her table. He was pleased when he spotted her in the bar later. He went to talk to her, found she was the marketing manager of a travel agency, separated, looking for a new challenge in life. Again, they were disturbed by men in dark suits and bow ties. But as he was fetching his coat from the cloakroom, he met her again. She stopped him, slid her hand into his, and asked if she could give him a lift home.

He had been driven around all day by a local party supporter who had irritated Ralph by asking him if he was all right more and more frequently as the afternoon wore on and Ralph became increasingly tipsy. It was 1 a.m. and the driver was still waiting outside. Ralph called him, apologised for being so late and said he was going to stay a little longer but a friend would take him home. Ten minutes later, having said goodbye to the organisers, he was being shepherded to the door by the lady in the lime-green dress. On their way out, they were stopped by a young couple who asked if they could have their picture taken with the minister. He felt rather puffed up as their friend snapped away, and his shapely companion hung back a couple of feet from his side.

He asked her to stop at an all-night off-licence where he bought a bottle of champagne and a carton of orange juice. He opened neither. The moment they were inside her house, he was helping her undress. At one point, as he was on top of her, trying to enter her, he somehow rolled over and fell off the bed, then made a joke about needing a sexual satnav.

‘You are close to your destination but no longer on your planned route,’ he said, as he climbed back on to the bed, and they laughed even more than when he was trying to undo all the hooks on her basque. They had sex once then he crashed out.

He had finished being sick. Picking out the newest-looking toothbrush from the cup by the sink, he gave his teeth a vigorous brush. He needed to shave but there were no razors in sight. Putting on his black suit and frilly white shirt, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and winced. He stuffed his bow tie into his pocket and then
looked
around the house. Three bedrooms. A study without books. Downstairs a big kitchen and a small lounge. A dining room with a table but no chairs. And no people. He drank from the tap at the sink. He picked up the carton of orange juice. He walked to the front door and opened it. It was sunny but cold outside. It was when he saw a photographer and reporter on the doorstep that he realised the extent of the calamity he had brought upon himself.

‘Mr Hall, what were you doing here at 65 Westmoreland Terrace with Davina Owens?’

So that was her name … It was a question both difficult and easy to answer. He narrowed his eyes against the glare of the sun and recognised the photographer busy snapping him as the man who had taken the photograph of him with the young couple the night before. He realised the whole thing had been a set-up. What was more, there was a camera crew filming from across the road.

‘Don’t worry,’ said the reporter, ‘they’re with us.’ How that was meant to stop him worrying was not entirely clear. He didn’t have a clue where Westmoreland Terrace was. He was not even sure what town he was in. He began to walk towards what looked like a main road with road signs in green and blue, which meant taxis might come by. He was followed by the reporter, the camera in the van, and the photographer walking backwards and still snapping. His best picture was of Ralph hurling the orange-juice carton at the reporter. ‘Not clever,’ whispered the snapper. ‘Really not very clever, Ralphie.’

The reporter was now in full flow. ‘Can you confirm you are Ralph Hall, the Secretary of State for Health? Can you confirm you have just left the house behind us where last night you had sex with Davina Owens? Will you confirm, as Ms Owens has told us this very morning, that you met her at a Chamber of Commerce dinner, that you told her your driver had gone, and asked if she would give you a lift?’

‘That is not true,’ shouted Ralph.

‘Well, tell us what is then.’

‘I am saying nothing till I have spoken to my office.’

‘Oh, don’t worry. Number Ten should have told them by now. We’ve asked them for a comment.’

Ralph pulled his mobile out of his pocket. Seven missed calls. Oh shit. Why did he have it on mute?

‘Go on, Ralph, answer,’ said the snapper. ‘Put the phone to your ear. Need a shot of you getting the call from the boss to ask what the hell you’ve been up to.’

‘Fuck off.’

But he was discovering there was no point saying anything. The reporter pretended to be filing a story on his mobile.

‘Health Secretary Ralph Hall launched into a foul-mouthed tirade as he was confronted over his sordid sex romps with gorgeous single mum Davina Owens yesterday … Owens told how the wannabe PM forced himself upon her after she invited him for a cup of coffee to discuss joining the party … But the drunken minister, a married father of two, insisted on plying her with champagne and having his evil way with her … Last night devastated Davina said, “I feel used. I wanted to talk about politics and he was just after one thing. He abused his authority and now I will have to pick up the pieces. He is not fit to be in Parliament if you ask me.”’

As the photographer leered and the reporter laughed at his own wit, Ralph knew he was finished. He knew that it didn’t matter if the details were false, because the basic story was true. He got drunk. He got laid. He couldn’t deny it. ‘Davina’ could say what she liked, and if they didn’t like how she said it, they could make her say more.

‘She says you only wanted one thing,’ said the reporter. ‘How do you react to that?’

‘Nothing to say.’

‘She said you slagged off your Cabinet colleagues, including the PM. What do you say to that?’

‘Rubbish.’

‘So you deny slagging off your colleagues but you don’t deny shagging Davina Owens. Can you confirm that?’

He was sweating heavily, and could feel his guts churning and raging. He was desperate to go to the toilet and throw up. Finally he saw a yellow light coming his way and ran towards it, chased by the photographer.

He got into the cab. ‘Anywhere,’ he said. ‘Anywhere away from those bastards.’

‘How’s it going now, Mr Hall?’ said the cabby. ‘You havin’ a bit of a bad time with them then?’

He got to his house. Another photographer and reporter waiting for him. He knew his career was over. He wished his life was. He felt it might as well be. When he was inside, he shut the door, leaned against it, slid to the floor and started crying. He didn’t know what to do, who to call, who to reach out to.

24

There were at least two points of connection between Emily Parks and the small, tidy woman kneeling in prayer at the end of the pew. One was the obvious: they had both walked into the same church. The other, though neither knew it, was Professor Sturrock. The small, tidy woman was Mrs Temple, who was praying for the Professor, praying that he continue to find the strength to help David, who had accompanied her to church this morning, and was now waiting outside for her.

Emily was attending Mass for the first time since she’d left school. Though she’d gone to a Catholic girls’ school, she remembered their visits to church more for the laughter and the larking around on the way there. God and Jesus were like names in a book, or lyrics in a song, and she did love to sing along. But she’d listened to the Mass every week without it ever meaning as much as it seemed to mean to other girls. She was not from a very religious family. Her parents were irregular churchgoers, though since the fire, her father had taken to going more often, especially during the week when nobody else was there, to pray for Emily. She’d hated the idea of him doing this – wasting his breath on a God who perhaps didn’t even exist. But now, as she watched a queue of worshippers shuffling forward to take communion, she felt she understood her father better. She felt calm, at peace within herself.