Jonathan Lee - High Dive

John Redwood was seated next to one of two dozen flower arrangements purchased at stupendous expense. Redwood touched his chin and nodded as a young guy in a polka-dot bow tie talked to him about a ‘small idea I have’. On Redwood’s face was a frown of amused concern.

‘The Lady’s view,’ Redwood said eventually, and Moose missed a few words as someone thanked him for a canapé, ‘… do not need that, those things, to help them find work. A great myth!’ When Redwood was happy he looked like Spock from Star Trek . In other moods he was Liza Minnelli.

Conversations mixing with other conversations.

‘Secondary issue.’

‘Well, that I’d agree on.’

‘Probable cause.’

‘More or less exactly it.’

‘Two hundred thousand, though, is not enough for contempt of court.’

‘Pass the …?’

‘I just can’t get excited about Durham.’

‘Would you …?’

There was the clinking of fragile glass. Earrings as elegant as the chandeliers overhead. Pockets of choking cigar smoke through which Moose held his breath. He tried not to cough because coughs, when they came, still detonated pain: overlapping, pouncing jolts of it. There were a lot of polished skill-sets around. A lot of firm handshakes and air-kisses. Smiles too big to be fake, too bright to be true — which made them what? Full lips. Empty eyes. He tried to ignore the momentary sense that it was all a vicious pantomime.

At the end of the bar five important men had been in conversation for perhaps an hour. Geoffrey Howe, the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, was among them. He seemed to be talking about the differences between humans and animals. He broke off to throw a fishcake down his throat.

Dinner jackets identical but for the width of the lapels. White shirts with studs instead of buttons. One or two maroon cummerbunds and shoes of uniform shine.

Some further food disappeared from Moose’s platter, some napkins from his hand, and one of the group told Mr Howe that the distinction between humans and beasts was our ability to be coolly rational.

‘No no,’ another said. ‘Our deep capacity to — well, to feel , yes?’

‘No,’ Howe said, ‘you’re right.’

A young aide Moose had earlier seen sweating in the restaurant now dropped a canapé on the floor. ‘I am so s-s-sorry,’ he said.

Moose walked over to John and Freya. Freya was still opting for silence. Fine, be that way. He clutched John’s shoulder, a ball of muscle.

‘When the Key VIP arrives, John, alert me immediately.’

‘The Key VIP?’

‘MT.’

‘MT?’

‘Jesus, John, is there anything going on in there?’ He tapped John’s forehead with his finger. He did so much harder than he’d meant to. ‘The Prime Minister.’

John yawned and said sure no problem.

Babble at the edge of a dream. Breastbone pain. He’d have to keep slow and calm, look after his heart. Tiredness was already coming for him, trying to steal away the night’s opportunities.

Sir Anthony Berry was talking to an aide. Moose quietly interjected and asked if everything was all right with the room. Berry had been due to stay at the Metropole, but after a last-minute cancellation Marina had squeezed him in.

‘Oh, absolutely,’ said Berry. He was the ideal guest, polite to a fault, hair carefully combed. ‘Happy a space became available. Thanks for all your help.’

A simple thank-you: it could mean so much. The smallest acts of appreciation were magnified tenfold tonight.

Staff who were awaiting the allocation of further tasks had been told to stand with their hands behind their backs, but he saw from his new vantage point behind the bar that one or two still had their fists sunk into their pockets. The slumped ones tended to cluster together. The Poor Posture Club. When managing a large staff you had to keep an eye on all the factions; you couldn’t let the peripheral groups get disgruntled. Some of the waiters’ shirt collars looked wrinkled, and this was irritating. He’d supplied everyone with a little spray gun of starch, bought at his own expense from the Blue Door Launderette.

Plain-clothes Special Branch men stood motionless at the edges of the room. They had brisk, assertive eyes and when they spoke Moose thought only of right angles. So tall and solid-looking you felt a hundred gut-punches wouldn’t move them. Another eight or nine of them had, he’d noticed, been dispatched to the car-park area. Others were posted on the first-, second-and third-floor landings. It seemed an embarrassingly comprehensive security effort given the only halfway-visible threat was the presence, outside the front entrance, of six or seven student types in itchy-looking clothing. Was one of them Susie, Freya’s friend? Was that why Freya was in a murderous mood? Beyond the window these skinny probable-vegans rocked on the balls of their feet and chanted, ‘Stop the rot, stop the rot,’ without ever quite clarifying what the rot was, or how to stop it. He wondered what it would be like to be one of them, a person who devoted their days to the pursuit of major change. It occurred to him that his own life had been devoted to the opposite activity: the attempt to mould capriciousness into something respectably firm. He ate a blini.

A couple of top-tier journalists had arrived, a BBC guy and someone with a column in the Telegraph , and in their faces Moose found the closest mirror for his own tensely contained excitement. They ducked in and out of various groups, leaned onto tiptoes every time the revolving door whirred. Tomorrow’s dinner in the Empress Suite would be journalist-free. He needed to check with the External Events Manager that all was running to plan. He couldn’t see her. He sought out Marina instead. Marina usually had the answers.

She was bending to retrieve a napkin someone had dropped behind one of the gooseneck high-backed chairs. The napkins were conference blue, ordered especially from a supplier who’d seemed to understand Moose’s obsession with shades and textures in a way his own staff never had. As Marina got to her feet he moved to stand beside her and she said, ‘It’s not so beautiful when it’s full, is it?’ There was something a little mournful in her voice. They watched the twitch and throb of the party, women throwing their heads back in laughter, pearls strung around their elegant necks.

‘The bar?’ he said.

She shrugged. ‘The hotel.’

‘Not you as well.’

She frowned.

‘Freya,’ he said. ‘The people that I — that I care about, they’re depressed. Accommodating people is what we do, Mari.’

‘Were you always such a functional man, M oo se?’

Functional. The word conjured up the big joyless filing cabinet in his office. ‘There’s nothing wrong with something fulfilling its purpose, if that’s what you mean.’

Her eyes went bright. She seemed about to laugh. Something malicious he hadn’t seen before? ‘What is your purpose, do you think?’ she said.

‘My purpose?’

‘I am curious.’

‘Well, today it’s about keeping Thatcher happy, isn’t it?’

‘And Freya?’

‘What about her?’

‘She seems miserable, you said. I agree.’

‘I don’t know what it’s about. If you know, I’d appreciate knowing.’

Marina twirled the napkin she’d retrieved from the floor. Several dots of red wine were sunk into the stitching. If this were Viv, she would be holding it further from her body. Viv would have it pinched between forefinger and thumb, at arm’s length.

‘If you know something,’ he repeated.

‘No. I don’t know what she’s feeling.’

Behind her, through the window glass, a greenish night took shape. ‘Maybe she’s got a boyfriend,’ he said. ‘She’s been out a lot. Maybe it’s boyfriend trouble. There was a kid called Tom who used to hang around a lot.’