Free Whispers of Betrayal by Michael Dobbs

forward to refill their glasses. ‘You know as well as anybody that we’re not all prehistoric like Battersby. But we all have to move on, Tom. I’m running a parliamentary party, not a dog pound.’
    ‘Aren’t we allowed the occasional bark?’
    ‘I haven’t got time to waste on rounding up stray mongrels,’ Rankin retorted. ‘In your case, some would argue that it was bettersimply to have you put down. Including, so I’ve heard, some in your own constituency party.’
    So, the ripples on the Marshwood pond had reached as far as the Chief Whip’s lair. Goodfellowe ran his finger around the rim of his glass. An average blend, not a single malt. Unmistakable evidence that this was serious rather than social.
    ‘Look at it from my point of view, Tom. If you were standing in my socks, what would you be saying?’
    Goodfellowe stifled a sarcastic response – this wasn’t the moment for cheap lines – and gazed around the panelled room with its dark window and conspiratorial atmosphere. On Rankin’s desk lay a small pile of folders. Personnel files. Files from the safe, the armoury where the Whips stored most of their weapons, those little secrets and shames that were committed to paper and locked away, to be brought out and brandished whenever one of the dogs started barking. (No computer files here, too easy to copy, only the handwritten daily notes torn from the Whips’ Book, along with a few press cuttings and unpaid invoices. Perhaps even a couple of charge sheets, too.)
    There were some secrets that even the Whips were unwilling to commit to paper, matters so sensitive they were confined only to that collective memory that bound together the brotherhood. Such as the whereabouts of the Foreign Secretary’s first wife, whom he had inconveniently forgotten to divorce before marrying the second. Her bank account number, too, although a slip of paper recorded details of the regular payments. There was also the identity of the MP’s daughter who fed her drug habit by prostitution and by playing the Stock Market with exceptional good fortune following her occasional visits to a Junior Minister for Industry. Nestling alongside the other secrets was the identity of the Whip, one of their own, who’d had a heart attack in his room, tied to his chair with underwear around his ankles. Women’s underwear. No need for a paper record. They would for ever remember him as Little Miss Naughty, baby pink, extra large. For a moment Goodfellowe wondered whether Rankin had been running through his own file, and what might be in it.
    ‘If, as you say, I were standing in your socks, Eddie,’ he responded, picking up the Chief Whip’s challenge, ‘I would say here was amongrel of some talent. Awkward sometimes, to be sure. The sort of dog who waits until you’ve built the kennel around him, driven home the last nail, then jumps over the bloody gate. But a dog who’s looking for a new …’ – he took a deep breath while he hunted for the right word – ‘adventure.’
    ‘Adventure? I prefer the quiet life. No surprises.’ Yet curiosity drew him on. ‘What sort of adventure?’
    ‘One that doesn’t require me to cycle in the rain around Westminster and get caught up in the crowd.’
    ‘You want money?’
    ‘No, you Scottish
teuchter
!’ His voice rang unnaturally jocular in his own ear, too loud, trying too hard. He sipped his whisky, finding it difficult to plead. ‘I want to be back with the team, Eddie. It’s a tough game in this place and I’m tired of trying to score goals all on my own.’
    ‘This is a new Goodfellowe,’ the Whip responded wryly. ‘Why the sudden change?’
    ‘I’ve got new interests, new friends …’
    ‘I’d heard.’
    ‘New enthusiasms,’ Goodfellowe continued, now certain that Rankin had undoubtedly reviewed his file, and that Elizabeth was on it.
    ‘You want back on the inside of the tent?’
    ‘It would be more comfortable than staying on the outside. For you, too. I’m