rejoined, with the condescension she might show a layabout student, ‘those risks will never be resolved. To get the bill through is one thing, to live with it as law is a risk far greater.’
‘The Business Secretary, Prime Minister.’
Jason Malahide grinned. ‘David, it’s your baby, I’m sure you know all too well how much work needs doing to sort the mess out. And if your department’s mutinous I’m sure you can rough them up.’
Blaylock gave Malahide a long look, irritated by this show of support clearly meant to undermine, and by how much Malahide seemed to know about his department.
‘We will resolve the difficulties, and this bill will move forward.’
‘You say that, Home Secretary,’ Francis Vernon persisted, ‘but the perception is that it’s being put off and off while we struggle to work out how to do it. Meaning there’s a case we should just pull it.’
Now Blaylock was lost for words. The silence extended. The room then looked to the Prime Minister, the only man who could ‘pull’ a bill, and thus banish it to the boneyard forever – the onlyman from whom ‘ Sort the mess out! ’ was truly an imperative.
Finally, the Captain pronounced. ‘Let’s be clear. We know the Home Secretary is doing what he believes in. I believe in it, too. If it were just the two of us who believed, that would be enough.’ With that he shut his folder, seeking no further comment. ‘So, I expect to see you all at the Carlton on Thursday night, a big gathering of our clan, show of strength, all that.’
Blaylock checked his watch – forty-four minutes. It was remarkable. To be precise, it was leadership.
4
Andy Grieve stood waiting by the Downing Street gates, where Blaylock advised they would walk back to Shovell Street. Andy conferred with police, the route was briskly agreed and Blaylock strode out, stiff from the morning’s exertion and his cramped seat at the Cabinet table. He was irked, too, by some of what he had heard.
Malahide was right: it was ‘a Tory government’, but by a gnat’s whisker and no more, propped up by deals cut with Ulstermen, and it was silly to pretend such a thin mandate permitted high ideological posturing from commanding heights. The party was comforted and emboldened overmuch by Labour having elected a new leader from its most pharisaical wind-bagging tradition. Still, the odds of Vaughan losing the next election to such a figure could not be discounted. The Captain, for all his wiles, had earned no laurels on which to rest. The pollsters said he was not seen as ‘popular in the country’, nor as ‘tough and no-nonsense’, nor even as ‘basically decent’ – much less ‘the choice of a new generation’. But the job, if thankless, had been keenly sought, and to Blaylock’s mind there was no use moaning about it.
Reaching into his jacket for his phone, Blaylock felt instead the envelope he had snatched from his hall table, and he seized the moment to part the seal and read. The letter was from Tamara Sahbaz, his old interpreter in Bosnia: she sent news that her son had begun college.
Tamara had informed him shyly of her pregnancy on the day Blaylock’s company departed Bosnia. Nine months later, in the week he resigned his commission, she had written to say sheand her husband had named the boy Davilo. ‘ And that is from gratitude to you, David .’ A photo was enclosed. Davilo was dark-haired and dark-eyed like his mother, though he towered over her. Blaylock felt something in his chest, some offshoot of the pride in one’s own, and a gladness that the boy was growing up with such promise.
It disturbed him, still, to think of how easily this might never have happened – by a hair’s breadth, a hair-trigger. Stari Vitez had been a vulnerable outpost. If the Croats felt they were losing ground elsewhere in the war, it was simple redress for their snipers to take it out on the villagers of Stari Vitez, who tended to stay indoors lest they offer a
‘The Business Secretary, Prime Minister.’
Jason Malahide grinned. ‘David, it’s your baby, I’m sure you know all too well how much work needs doing to sort the mess out. And if your department’s mutinous I’m sure you can rough them up.’
Blaylock gave Malahide a long look, irritated by this show of support clearly meant to undermine, and by how much Malahide seemed to know about his department.
‘We will resolve the difficulties, and this bill will move forward.’
‘You say that, Home Secretary,’ Francis Vernon persisted, ‘but the perception is that it’s being put off and off while we struggle to work out how to do it. Meaning there’s a case we should just pull it.’
Now Blaylock was lost for words. The silence extended. The room then looked to the Prime Minister, the only man who could ‘pull’ a bill, and thus banish it to the boneyard forever – the onlyman from whom ‘ Sort the mess out! ’ was truly an imperative.
Finally, the Captain pronounced. ‘Let’s be clear. We know the Home Secretary is doing what he believes in. I believe in it, too. If it were just the two of us who believed, that would be enough.’ With that he shut his folder, seeking no further comment. ‘So, I expect to see you all at the Carlton on Thursday night, a big gathering of our clan, show of strength, all that.’
Blaylock checked his watch – forty-four minutes. It was remarkable. To be precise, it was leadership.
4
Andy Grieve stood waiting by the Downing Street gates, where Blaylock advised they would walk back to Shovell Street. Andy conferred with police, the route was briskly agreed and Blaylock strode out, stiff from the morning’s exertion and his cramped seat at the Cabinet table. He was irked, too, by some of what he had heard.
Malahide was right: it was ‘a Tory government’, but by a gnat’s whisker and no more, propped up by deals cut with Ulstermen, and it was silly to pretend such a thin mandate permitted high ideological posturing from commanding heights. The party was comforted and emboldened overmuch by Labour having elected a new leader from its most pharisaical wind-bagging tradition. Still, the odds of Vaughan losing the next election to such a figure could not be discounted. The Captain, for all his wiles, had earned no laurels on which to rest. The pollsters said he was not seen as ‘popular in the country’, nor as ‘tough and no-nonsense’, nor even as ‘basically decent’ – much less ‘the choice of a new generation’. But the job, if thankless, had been keenly sought, and to Blaylock’s mind there was no use moaning about it.
Reaching into his jacket for his phone, Blaylock felt instead the envelope he had snatched from his hall table, and he seized the moment to part the seal and read. The letter was from Tamara Sahbaz, his old interpreter in Bosnia: she sent news that her son had begun college.
Tamara had informed him shyly of her pregnancy on the day Blaylock’s company departed Bosnia. Nine months later, in the week he resigned his commission, she had written to say sheand her husband had named the boy Davilo. ‘ And that is from gratitude to you, David .’ A photo was enclosed. Davilo was dark-haired and dark-eyed like his mother, though he towered over her. Blaylock felt something in his chest, some offshoot of the pride in one’s own, and a gladness that the boy was growing up with such promise.
It disturbed him, still, to think of how easily this might never have happened – by a hair’s breadth, a hair-trigger. Stari Vitez had been a vulnerable outpost. If the Croats felt they were losing ground elsewhere in the war, it was simple redress for their snipers to take it out on the villagers of Stari Vitez, who tended to stay indoors lest they offer a
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