Roly's Constituency Chairwoman, Vice-chairman and Treasurer.
Don't you worry, I can handle half a dozen close friends for supper. I'm cheating anyway.
I've had a caterer send in a huge shepherd's pie and a big glitzy gateau.'
`Fine, but what's it all about?'
It's just something I felt I had to do, in the circumstances. Go on, Alison, pour yourself a drink and relax. What would you like?'
Higgins shook her head. 'Ach well, as long as it keeps you occupied. Got any Swan Light?'
Leona laughed. 'The Sheila's Pint?' she said, mimicking an Australian accent. 'Of course I have, with you coming. Get yourself one, then give me a hand to set the table. They'll be here soon.'
‘Where's Mark?' asked her friend, as she reached into the fridge’.
‘He's at his grandpa's for the night. I thought it might do the fellow some good to have him around. My son's an amazingly resilient wee chap, isn't he?'
`So's his mother, by the looks of things.'
The two women had barely finished setting the table went when the doorbell rang. Alison, in the hallway at the time, went to answer it, to find all four guests on the doorstep.
`Hello Marsh,' she said to the agent. 'All together, I see.' `Yes, I thought it made sense for me to pick everyone up in the Rover.'
She smiled at him. Higgins had developed a secret attraction to Marshall Elliot. 'Tory staff still under orders to buy British, then?' she said lightly.
He returned her grin. 'If that was the case, my dear, we'd all be driving TVRs or Morgans or some such!'
His three companions smiled nervously. Alison thought that the Chairwoman looked particularly ill at ease.
`How is Leona tonight?' Elliot asked quietly as they entered the hall. 'I wasn't sure about this, but she insisted.'
`She's fine,' said Higgins, to the three constituency officers rather than to him. 'You have to remember that while she's been widowed, her son survived by some miracle. At the moment the relief seems to be outweighing the loss. This evening will do her good too. I know that it's important to her. So please — try not to feel ill at ease in her company.'
She opened a door off the hall and led the way into the living room, where Leona McGrath was waiting. Inside, Marsh Elliot completed the formal introductions of his three companions to Alison, who was meeting them for the first time.
Elizabeth Marks, the Constituency Chairman, as she insisted on being described, was a stout, tweed-clad woman in her early fifties, with severe iron-grey hair. Her husband Jeremy was the local Party Treasurer. He was a small mousy man, an inevitable seconder, Higgins imagined, of his wife's proposals in Committee. His main distinguishing feature was an incipient strawberry nose, which suggested that he and alcohol were frequent companions.
John Torrance, the Vice-chairman seemed the most assured and friendly of the trio. He was tall and slim, in his early forties, clad in a dark blue suit, with a cut which suggested private tailoring. Higgins knew him by reputation and by word of mouth from Leona, as a self-made millionaire with no desire for office, but with a clear vision of the way his country should be run.
`Superintendent,' said Torrance, with genuine interest as he shook her hand. 'Tell me, what's the word on Bob Skinner? I know him a little through the New Club. That was a terrible business the other night.'
`The news is fairly good,' she replied. 'He's conscious and the surgery has been effective.
He's still in Intensive Care, in case of unforeseen complications, but he should be all right.'
He turned to Leona. And you, my dear. How are you?'
The little woman nodded her head, a touch nervously, Higgins thought, bouncing her brown curls. I'm fine, John. It was too much to take in at first, Roland's death and our child's survival. It was Bob Skinner who rescued him from the cockpit, you know,' she added, as an aside to Mr and Mrs Marks.
`You just have to come to terms with things. I have. Roly could have had a heart attack, cancer, been knocked down by a bus, anything. I couldn't have done anything about it.
Whatever the cause, he's gone. I'll miss him for ever, but I'll do my crying in the dark.
During the day I have to look forward, not back, for everyone's sake, for my son's most of all. I think I've found a way forward:
She paused. 'First things first, though. What would you like to drink?'
She poured white wine for John Torrance, a Coca-Cola for Marsh Elliot and whisky for the two Marks, who closed in on he with their private condolences.
`How's the investigation going, Superintendent?' Torrance asked as he and Marsh Elliot, flanking Higgins, gave them their moment.
It's early days yet,' said Higgins. 'It's a difficult one altogether. I'm not heavily involved, but my Deputy is, and from what he's reporting back, there are a number of possibilities.'
`Presumably you're looking for international terrorists,' said Marsh Elliot.
`That's a natural assumption, but the fact is we're looking everywhere.'
`But Davey or Massey — or both — must have been the target, surely?'
Higgins, feeling cornered, shrugged 'You can draw that conclusion if you like, Marsh. But you mustn't expect me to comment on it.'
Leona McGrath, seeing her friend's predicament, moved in to end the interrogation by summoning her guests to supper.
The Marks continued to surround their hostess during the meal, with elaborate Presbyterian concern which seemed as genuine as the Constituency Chairman's pearl necklace. Apart from the occasional glance to reassure herself that her friend was enduring the experience, Alison was left to enjoy the company and the attention of two attractive men, even if each was wearing a gold band on his left hand. The subjects of Bob Skinner's injury and the investigation were declared, tacitly, off limits; instead their conversation centred around sailing. Torrance revealed that he owned and sailed an ocean-going yacht, while Higgins confessed that her favourite recreation was crewing her brother's somewhat smaller vessel on the Firth of Clyde. Marshall Elliot registered his interest by admitting that before becoming a Conservative Agent, he had spent fifteen years as an officer in the Royal Marines.
At the other end of the table, far from being borne down by the droning Marks, whose only interest in life seemed to be their small accountancy practice, Leona McGrath seemed to be revelling in her surroundings, smiling and putting her guests at their ease. It seemed almost as if she had reversed the roles and was consoling them.
At last, she tapped her glass, interrupting, politely, John Torrance's account of a voyage around the Canaries, 'In the wake of Captain Bob,' as he put it.
`Friends,' she said. 'There are just a few formal things that I'd like to say to you. The first is to thank you all, especially you, Alison, and you, Marsh, for the tremendous support which you've given me since Roland's death. I hope that at the funeral you will all join the family in the reserved rows at the front of the church. The Prime Minister will sit beside Mark and me, and the family. I'd like you all to sit immediately behind us in the second row; with your wives of course, John and Marsh.'
All five guests nodded, heads bowed.
`Gentlemen,' she went on, looking in turn at Marks, Torrance and Elliot, her face showing strain for the first time that evening. For the burial, I would like each of you to take a cord at the graveside. Roly's father will be at the head of the coffin, with his brothers. Marsh, would you take the cord facing him, with Jeremy and John on either side of you. There are eight cords in all. I intend to ask Andrew Hardy and Sir James Proud to take the others.
Would you all do that for me?'
Of course, Leona,' said Elliot. Torrance and Marks nodded, mumbling thanks.
She glanced apologetically at Mrs Marks. 'Ladies, traditionally this is a man's task at a funeral. Roly's dad is very much a traditionalist and I wouldn't upset him.'
I understand completely, dear,' said Mrs Marks.
`Good. Now to the last thing I have to say.
The three things in life which my husband loved were his son, his Parliamentary seat and his Party.' Alison Higgins flashed a quick glance around the table, but none of the other guests reacted to her obvious omission.
