evening, but not quite so much fun. And the Liberal Democrats have these terrible dinners where everybody wears woolly pullovers and rather shabby dresses. And as for the SNP, well, everybody’s usually tight at their events, rolling all over the floor.
Ghastly. No, we don’t do too badly, I’m telling you!”
“Even with . . . how many is it?”
Todd consulted his list. “I make it six,” he said. “You, me, Lizzie, that young man from the office, and Ramsey and Betty Dunbarton. They’ve confirmed, so that’s six.”
Sasha picked up her coffee and took a sip. “We could have just one table, then,” she said. “We could all sit together.”
This idea did not appeal to Todd. “No,” he said. “I think we should have two tables. Table One and Table Two. This is because it would look rather odd just to have one table, and then I’m not sure if we want to spend the whole evening with the Dunbartons, charming company though they undoubtedly are. It’s just that he’s such a bore. And I’m sorry, but I can’t stand her. So, no.
Let’s have two tables. We’ll be at Table One, and they can be at Table Two.”
Sasha accepted the reasoning behind this, and moved on to raise the issue of the band and the dances. “I’ve spoken to the man who runs it,” she said. “They come from Penicuik, I think, or somewhere out that way. I’ve told him that we want middle-of-the-road dance music to begin with and then something suitable for reels. He said that’s fine. He said they could do anything.”
125
Todd nodded his agreement and was about to go on to another matter, but stopped. “Reels?” he asked. “Eightsomes and the like?”
“Yes,” said Sasha. “People love that.”
“But there are only going to be six of us,” Todd pointed out.
“How will we be able to do an eightsome if there are only six people there? And Ramsey Dunbarton is pretty frail these days.
I can’t imagine him doing an eightsome. The old boy would probably drop down stone dead. Then there’d only be five of us.”
“There are other dances,” said Sasha quickly. “A Gay Tories, for example, I mean a Gay Gordons! You only need two for that.
And there’s the Dashing White Sergeant. That needs three for each set, so there could be two sets.”
Todd thought for a moment. “But don’t you go in opposite directions with the Dashing White Sergeant, and then meet up? If three of us went off in one direction and three in another
– always assuming that Ramsey Dunbarton is up to it – then we would only meet once we’ve danced round the whole room. The band would have to adapt. They’d have to play on and on until we got all the way round the room and met up on the other side.
Wouldn’t that be a bit odd?”
“Some of these bands are rather good,” said Sasha.
Todd left Sasha in the house while he went off to play golf. His golf partner had declined to buy a ticket for the ball, and Todd intended to reproach him for this, although he knew that there was no possibility of his relenting. He was reconciled now to the idea of a ball of six, which was, in his view, quorate. Even two would have been enough; had he and Sasha been the only people there, they would have persisted and danced in the face of adversity. That was the only way in politics. A ball with six people one year could be a ball with sixty the next year, and then six hundred the year after that. Political fortunes shifted, and 126
it was no good throwing in the towel because of temporary set-backs. The Scottish Conservative Party would rise again and be the great force that it once had been in the affairs of the nation; it was only a question of time. And then people would be clamouring for tickets to the South Edinburgh Conservative Ball and he, Todd, would take great pleasure in turning them away.
After her husband had left for the Luffness Golf Club (Gullane, but not Muirfield), Sasha made her way into the dining room, where the prizes for the tombola were laid out on and around the large, four-leaf table. The members of the local party association had been generous, even if they had declined to attend the ball, and there were at least forty prizes waiting to be listed.
Sasha sat down at the head of the table and began to compile a catalogue and assign a number to each prize. These numbers would then be put into a hat, and those at the ball – and those alone – would then be permitted to buy the tickets.
She dealt first with the items on the table. There was a Thomas Pink shirt, in candy stripes, with a collar size of nineteen and a half.
Now this was a fine shirt, well-made and with double cuffs, but the collar size was rather large. Todd took size seventeen, and even that was sometimes a bit large for him; he was a big man and presumably this shirt would fit an extremely well-built man. Was there anybody in the Conservative Party quite that large? There was Mr Soames, of course, but he was probably the sort of man who had enough shirts already. So this might not be the most useful of prizes.
She assigned the shirt a number and turned to the next prize.
This was a set of six fish knives and forks, made by Hamilton and Inches, and a very handsome prize for somebody. This would be popular at a Conservative function, but would be useless at a Labour Party event. They had no idea, she believed, of the use MALCOLM RIFKIND & LORD JAMES: Sir Malcolm Rifkind (born 1946) is a prominent Conservative politician, living in Edinburgh, who served as Foreign Secretary in the government of Margaret Thatcher, later to become Secretary of State for Scotland. Lord James Douglas-Hamilton, after serving in the same government as a Member of Parliament at Westminster, is now a member of the devolved Scottish
