Michael Dobbs - The Final Cut

'And crucify the bastards like Francis Urquhart who are betraying our island, selling us out to those Turkish poustides…'

The producer was second-generation, not familiar with all the colloquial Greek covering the various eccentricities of human anatomy, but the intonation was enough to cause him alarm, especially with licence renewal coming up. Uttering a prayer that no one from the Radio Authority was listening, he made a lunge for the fade control. And missed. The cup of stale coffee tipped everywhere, over notes, cigarettes, his new jeans. Havoc. Evanghelos Passolides, after an armistice of almost fifty years, was back at war. The French Ambassador had begun to feel a strong sense of kinship with General Custer. Since the elevation of Arthur Bollingbroke to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, business had degenerated into bloody war, waged by the Frenchman against insuperable odds and a foe who had dispensed with diplomatic trimming in favour of wholesale scalping. Monsieur Jean-Luc de Carmoy had no illusions about the fact that the Court of St James's had become distinctly hostile territory. The Ambassador preferred to pursue his campaign with strawberries and champagne rather than the.44 calibre Winchesters of the US cavalry but, like the blond American general, he had made the deeply personal decision that if he were going to die he would do so surrounded by friends. They milled about him as he stood directing manoeuvres from the lawn of his official residence overlooking Kensington Gardens. 'Enjoying the quiet life, Tom?'

Makepeace cast his eyes at the garden crowded with guests. 'As much as you.'

'Ah, but there are differences between our lives,' de Carmoy sighed, lifting his eyes in search of the sun which shone over his beloved Loire. 'I feel at times as though I have been sold into slavery, where every rebuke must be met with a smile and every insult with humility.' He paused as a butler with hands resembling black widow spiders supplied them with full glasses before taking Makepeace by the arm and leading him towards the seclusion of a nearby lime arbour. There were obviously things to discuss. 'I envy you, Tom.' 'The freedom of the wilderness. You envy that?' 'What would I not give at times to share with you the liberty to speak my mind.' 'About what in particular?' 'Your Mr Urquhart.' His face had the expression of a leaking milk carton. 'Scarcely my Mr Urquhart.' 'Then whose, pray?'

Around them the branches of the pleached limes twisted and entangled like a conspiracy. They were both aware that the Ambassador had crossed beyond the frontiers of diplomatic etiquette but, caught in the crossfire between Bollingbroke and the Quai d'Orsay, de Carmoy was in no mood for standing still.

'Tom, we've been friends for a long time now, ever since the day you summoned me to the Foreign Office to administer a formal mutilation' – the Frenchman brushed some invisible piece of lint from the sleeve of his jacket – 'after that confidential computer tape went missing from British Aerospace.' 'Along with two French exchange technicians.' 'Ah, you remember?'

'How could I forget? My first week at the Foreign Office.' 'You were frightfully severe.' 'I still suspect the clandestine hand of some official French agency behind the whole thing, Jean-Luc'

The shoulders of the Ambassador's well-cut suit heaved in a shrug of mock Gallic confusion. 'But when you'd finished you sat me down and plied me with drink. Sherry, you called it.'

'Standard Foreign Office issue. For use only on open wounds and Africans.'

'I think I tried to get Brussels to reclassify it as brush cleaner.'

'Didn't stop you finishing the whole damned decanter.'

'My friend, but I thought it was meant to be my punishment. I remember I was swaying like a wheatfield in an east wind by the time I returned home. My wife consoled me, thinking you'd been so offensive I'd had to get drunk.'

Like old campaigners they smiled and raised glasses to toast past times and dig over old battlefields. The Frenchman took out a cigarette case packed with Gauloises on one side and something more anodyne on the other; with a quiet curse Makepeace took the Gauloise. He'd started smoking again, along with all the other changes in his personal habits. God, he'd left her only an hour ago and knew that in spite of the after-shave he still reeked of her. Pleasure and pain. So much was crowding in on him that at times he had trouble finding space to breathe. Slowly the trickle of humour drained from his eyes and died. 'How is Miquelon?' he asked. 'Blossoming. And yours?'

'Teaching. In America.' He gave his own impression of the Gallic shrug, but without the enthusiasm to make it convincing. 'You sound troubled. Let me ask…' 'As Ambassador? Or as an old friend?'

'About politics. I have no right to pry into personal matters.' In any event, the Ambassador didn't have to. At the merest mention of his wife, Makepeace's face had said it all. He'd never make a diplomat, no inscrutability, all passion and principle. 'I hear many expressions that the era of Francis Urquhart is drawing to its close, that it is only a matter of time. And much discussion of who, and how. Many people tell me it should be you.' 'Which people?'

'Loyal Englishmen and women. Friends of yours. Many of the people here this afternoon.'

Makepeace glanced around. Amongst the throng was a goodly smattering of political correspondents and editors, politicians and other opinion-formers, few of whom were renowned as Urquhart loyalists. From a distance and from behind a tall glass, Annita Burke was staring straight at them, not attempting to hide her interest.

'You've been getting pressure,' de Carmoy stated, knowing it to be a fact.

'Nudges aplenty. I suppose I'm meant to be flattered by so much attention. Now's the moment, they say, step forward. But to be honest, I don't know whether I'm standing on the brink of history or the edge of a bloody cliff.'

'They are your friends, they respect you. Virtue may be a rare commodity in politics, it may speak quietly at times, but no less persuasively for that. It sets you apart from others.' 'Like Francis Urquhart.' 'As a diplomat I couldn't possibly comment.'

Makepeace was in too serious a mood to catch the irony. 'I've thought about it, Jean-Luc. Thinking about it still, to be precise. But did any of these friends of mine suggest to you how their… ambitions for me might be achieved? Or are these no more than slurpings through mouthfuls of Moet?'

'My assessment is that this is not idle talk. There's a desperate sense of longing for a change at the top. I've heard that not just within your party but from across the political spectrum.' 'And from Paris, too, no doubt.'

'Touche. But you can't deny there's a great moral vacuum in British politics. You could fill it. Many people would follow.'

Makepeace began running his index finger tentatively around the rim of his crystal glass as though he were tracing the cycles of life. 'For that I need a vehicle, a party. I might be able to grab at the wheel, force Urquhart off the road, but it would probably do so much damage that it'd take years to get it working again. The party's scarcely likely to offer the keys to the man who caused the accident.'

'Then create your own vehicle. One that's faster and better built than Urquhart's.'

'No, that's impossible,' Makepeace was responding, but they were interrupted by another guest, the Minister for Health who was seeking to bid farewell to his host. Felicitations and formal thanks were exchanged before the Minister turned to Makepeace.

'I've got only one thing to say to you, Tom.' He paused, weighing both his words and the company. 'For God's sake keep it up.' With that he was gone. 'You see, you have more friends than you realize,' the Ambassador encouraged. 'In his case not a friend, merely a rat hedging his bets.'