The Fortunes of Law
A story by PAT PRENTICE
Most of the baying crowd had gone now, to their trains or partners or more wine and rich meals and mundane family problems and sleep. The bell had rung and there were just a few stragglers; two pairs of indeterminate relationships and the dark mahogany-panelled bay in the far corner. On its table were two empty wine bottles standing, one rocking imperceptibly on its side, and one, being wielded clumsily and glugging the last of its contents into two well-used glasses.
It had been a long and very satisfying celebration.
Allegra Staunton QC sat beside, in front of, and at times almost in the lap of, Henry Highbrow QC. Their day at the first bar had been short, the second one, longer. She had lost her case and he had won, but both had made enough money for a very lavish cruise or another buy-to-let for their portfolio. Both had enjoyed the trial, each impressing the jury with their skill and erudition and confounding the witnesses with questions designed to achieve victory for their side of the law, regardless of natural justice. The judge had been impressed too, and would congratulate them both later, even if he had ruined Allegra's chances with his assassin's appraisal for the jury.
Either way, the wine was good, the oysters superb and Allegra had not until very recently realised how charming and generous Henry was. With her husband staying in town when he arrived back from his official trip and her heading for the country, why not spend a few hours with such a charmer?
*****
The PM's wife was well past her prime of desirability, even the brief one she had experienced. Her thighs were heavy with cellulite and her belly sagged with over-indulgence and the scars of two Caesarians. But she had been young once and passable enough to deploy her wit and fashionable so-called intellect to secure an understanding marriage to a man with a woman's nickname and ambition huge enough not to want to be recognised as homosexual. She would enjoy all the privileges and trappings and keep up the pretence as long as he would deviate from his preferences long enough to perform the necessary rituals of insemination. But there had been a flaw, although it had seemed rather less than that for several years.
The old judge had mentored her and she had been flattered by his attentions. As a young singleton ugly duckling —soon to be transformed into an equally ugly duck — she had responded to his attentions and willingly shared his pleasures. Later, when her husband had reached the pinnacle of his powers and before he had been so discredited, the old man had been a welcome diversion. Being neglected had not been to the liking of her ego and of late, she had noticed a surge in her libido. The old man had surprising staying power and the experience and technique of age.
What she hadn't quite appreciated was that he had also retained his fertility: a fact they had both neglected to consider in their regular intimate collusions. Now, the chick was threatening to come home to roost, and worse, perch for a very embarrassing tenure.
*****
Attila eased himself back in his first class seat as the stewardess eyed him sideways to check that his seatbelt had been fastened. He was lightly dreaming of his two favourite topics: how he would eventually secure power by toppling the party incumbent, and the high-heeled turn of ankle and hint of delight that this demure but perfectly poised member of the cabin staff was displaying as she stretched up to check that the overhead lockers were secured for the landing at Heathrow.
*****
It was known in the legal profession that Allegra was hot. Her sultry looks held promise which was not lost in delivery. The inner circles of the upper echelons knew that she and her partner enjoyed variety in their spice of life, and enough sensitive and powerful souls had shared it to ensure total unawareness among the lower orders. When she and Henry left the wine bar after finishing the last deluge cheek by jowl, it was no shock for them to realise they were both heading into the country on the same train, two stations apart, in the same first class compartment.
It would be a journey to remember. Though, alas, not entirely for the best reasons.
*****
Attila paused at the top of the gangway and the stewardess standing beside the open door smiled slightly. "Look here," he said gently, squeezing her arm, "that was a first class flight, metaphorically and literally. Yes..."
She beamed and he moved towards her, his thick black hair and dark eyes giving him the allure and gravitas of a modern Rasputin.
"I wonder... Could I repay the favour? Do something for you? My official car will be waiting. I could give you a ride. A lift. Yes."
She flushed and he could see she was impressed by the idea of being close to power. She could get very close if she wanted.
"That's it, then," he said. "Yes. Maurice will be standing by the car outside. I'll be inside.
"Pleasure. Pleasure."
It was a statement of intent more than a social nicety.
A large man standing behind Attila nodded graciously and clandestinely exchanged a glance with a thinner, snakelike man just behind him. Both wore dark suits and anyone equipped with the smallest calibre of sartorial knowledge might have noticed the sensitive tailoring that could disguise a small but extra measure of cloth on the left-hand side of each jacket that would be capable of disguising a bulge made by a holster.
Attila gave a saccharine smile and walked through the doorway, without a glance behind him.
*****
The first class door slammed and the door was drunkenly wedged shut with a legal briefcase. The platform disappeared behind Henry as he slumped down, pulling on the window blind, which he soon forgot as Allegra placed her arms around him. They had 20 minutes even before the train lurched away, but Allegra was not going to wait. As her buttocks became exposed and animated and Henry succumbed with delight, his aspirations were not the only things that began to rise.
Slowly and, to their preoccupied ears, silently, the blind next to the mid evening platform began gently to rise.
It was two post office workers who first noticed and then, as they stood smirking and wittily commenting from the orange shadows outside, a couple of City gents and a plumber possibly from Worthing with a large bag of what appeared to be pipes, also began loitering. It wasn't even the four nuns, or the unaccompanied scurrying, jaded priest fresh from an encounter with a rather rough young man in Soho, or the student on a day trip from Norwich, who voiced concern. It was the feminist lesbian and her trans partner fresh from a pan-gender sexual victimisation conference, who drew the attention of such enviable heterosexual bestiality to the platform attendant, who then alerted the British Rail Police.
*****
"Bugger!"
"Unfortunately, in this case, not so," said the old judge, displaying alongside his shock a sense of near pleasure at his achievement.
"The thing is," she quivered, "I want the bloody thing. It might be my last chance and you know how he has been lately with that bloody Arab. I didn't tell you until now, but it would be nice to see a little you running about. You've given me far more than that defective ever has."
He looked pensive for a moment then delivered a sound blow to her bottom. It rippled with a wobble, accompanied by a squeak of not-so grudging affection.
"Have the little bastard," he said. "He can't say anything. Wouldn't anyway. Can't risk any more exposure. No one will ever know except us and him. It'll be worth it just for that."
She stared at him for a long time and he held her gaze. Then she gave a hearty laugh.
"Yes. Let's do it. Sod him!"
The judge laughed as well and murmured: "Somebody always seems to, anyway."
*****
Allegra and Henry did not quite achieve the climax they had hoped for. What happened in the drunken jousting of bliss seemed later more like a confused crack of a door being forced open and a sturdy briefcase being dislodged as a blind was fractured and flew up from a door. Then there were two red-faced policemen and at some time later a young WPC who patiently helped Allegra back into her white lace-trimmed bright blue knickers and sober black legal attire. Then there was a crumpled and clearly frustrated Henry, being helped into the back of a police van and locked in behind a wire cage. The shame would emerge only hours later, to be quickly replaced by the survival reflex that only the truly privileged know.
For a moment and a short confusing road journey later, the incident was marked by the suppressed mirth of a station sergeant, who pointedly called Henry sir, and Allegra madam, as he, in turn, took down their particulars and confiscated their peppermints before they blearily stumbled to their cells for a night devoid of the comforts of their country spouses.
*****
Attila's apartment overlooked the Thames. Its large glass windows provided a view of Parliament and the barges lashed together plying the river below. He didn't try to hide the traces of Allegra and the stewardess did not even seem to notice. She seemed over-awed.
In this light, with the late evening sun highlighting her hair and the scurrying minnows on the river banks below, she seemed a conquest of tsarist achievement. It had taken a car journey of immeasurable restrained modesty, a trip in the lift with the two security men; a cursory wait for them to exchange trusting nods with a man at the door, and they were inside.
A tightly-gripped waggling fizz and pop from between his knees, a chink of two champagne glasses, a compliment or two, and they were gently entwined: her inhaling power, he savouring conquest.
A mutual aphrodisiac.
*****
For Henry and Allegra, the morning was far too blindingly bright, head-throbbingly cruel, and humiliating even for such conceited egos. The reverberating click of the freedom bestowing key echoed around their hollow brains so loudly that further imprisonment might even have been preferable. To both, the only goal was to get their respective taxis home to their country retreats, filling in the uncomfortable silent journeys with what to tell their partners.
*****
Their case went right up to the deputy commissioner.
Right up.
Hurried conversations in senior rooms were held and furtive calls were made on discreet disposable phones to people whose influence officially did not even exist. It was with a speed and efficiency that normally in legal and governmental circles would be applauded that Ms Staunton and Mr Highbrow accepted an official caution on the solemn pledge never to behave in such a lascivious and shameless manner in public again. They were handed back their belongings by Station Sergeant Hill, who a little later, as he finished assembling his end-of-shift report, suddenly noticed a certain detail among the names of the night's regulars, passing guests, innocents, police fit-ups, lowlifes, felons, lonely losers and drug addicts.
As they headed home with their excuses and guilt, Sergeant Hill hummed on his way home on a more modest train, mentally musing on what he had done with the business card of that young freelance journalist he had met in his local a couple of years before.
*****
At some point, Attila realised he was hungry, and that she was too. There were discreet deliveries, but she laughed and said there was enough to cook in the flat. He watched her, teasingly hardly clothed as she prepared spaghetti, occasionally checking her phone and sipping from the bubbles bottle.
Had he not been wearied by his flight and the diplomatic labyrinth of his official discussions, he might have remembered that iPhones also had cameras, but it didn't cross his ogling mind. Nor did he register much later as, sated and falling asleep, her leg draped over his chest, that her last, lovingly drowsy words to him were: "Laku noć."
*****
It was not the sound of an angry Attila that was so striking two days later when he returned to his country home, hoping there were no lipstick traces in sensitive places or red blotches on his skin to give away hints of infidelity. It was that Attila and anger were not natural bedfellows. He never got angry, or noticeably worried. He was everybody's friend; everybody's buffoon; everybody loved him. That was the point of him; what had brought him so close to his goal of power. It was that she had not thought of it. It was her betrayal of intellect, of thinking on her feet, not on her back; it was obvious: why hadn't she thought of it sooner?
She had, he told her, frowning like a menacing clown, to ring that station sergeant immediately and cry rape.
*****
She liked Attila. He was charming and clever and, she thought, super desirable. He also genuinely seemed to like her; well, women, anyway. He enjoyed giving her pleasure, which he certainly had, to exhaustion, almost as much as he clearly liked receiving it. She knew they had both hit the spot. She didn't mind that she had to leave the apartment early. She knew that if he called the number she gave him, she would return for anything he wanted. She could be discreet and after the life she'd had, she thought she deserved something more. She would enjoy this and record little details to remember when, as it must, it had to end.
*****
Sergeant "Snowy" Hill leant forward on his desk, his elbows taking his weight and one foot curled behind his other stretched leg.
"That's not what you said yesterday, treacle," he said, before remembering that times had changed. "But you accepted a caution," he smirked as he rolled his eyes aloft.
A lengthy silence followed from his end and he took the phone from his ear to gesture to a passing constable.
"Nevertheless, ma'am, you accepted a caution... Upset? Confused? Frightened?"
To his recollection, she had been upset when she reappeared after her night in the sobering cell, mascara eyes like pandas and make-up like flaking distemper, but the other two didn't ring any bells. In the old days he would have mentioned the witnesses and politely put the phone down, but times had changed. Discretion was no longer part of a copper's job. Any allegation of rape was now a fact. It had happened and procedures had to be followed.
"Very well, ma'am, just transferring you."
The call went through and as it did, so did the chances of his nice little earner, and he'd had to search all his jacket pockets for that bloody hack's card last night.
*****
Srdjan was waiting when the air hostess got home. He had been worried. She was his cousin and he watched over her. They had been lucky to get their visas and that their forged passports passed muster. His was nearly official anyway, bought in Albania. But hers had been another matter: purchased from a Nigerian in a Charlton pub and sent to her by post so she could also pretend to be an Albanian and travel to England through Eire and up through Belfast and a Ryanair hop to Luton.
She had done well to get the airline job. But then, she was smart and beautiful. The war had been bad. Her Croat boyfriend had been killed by a NATO bomb and her brother had been liquidated by one of the al-Qaeda units the Americans and Brits had secretly armed in an attempt to prevent a backlash from the Bosnian muslims, who were under an arms embargo. Her best friend had died in her field nurse's sleeping bag on Mount Igman, her throat cut in the al-Qaeda massacre of Serb women that was too embarrassing for the west to report.
But she persevered, blaming the madness of the Balkans, where there were, as the Yanks said, no good guys.
After 9/11, the al-Qaeda lot who had been given free Bosnian citizenship for their contribution to the Islamic freedom fight had been flown in secrecy to Guantanamo Bay. The thought of them now being tortured by Uncle Sam's female tormentors gave Srdjan much comfort.
He was not so forgiving.
*****
The PM's wife was not a beauty, so it was not until fairly late that the woman's editor at the Daily Best noticed that she was blooming. Nor was it long afterwards that the chief sub-editor playfully reminded the newly-promoted news editor poached from Murdoch that the wife was rumoured to be screwing the old judge.
"Why don't we fix the maternity unit and get some deoxyribonucleic acid from the placenta?"
For a moment the young news editor fumbled.
"What?" she hesitated.
"DNA; afterbirth, you gormless twat," the chief sub added, despairing of the internet generation of so-called journalists. He hadn't noticed the editor hovering behind, but wouldn't have cared anyway. His service was an unblemished mark on the record of the newspaper and his duties had saved the publication from many a legal fiscal disaster.
His pay-off was assured, not least by a few carefully collated documents that, technically, should still be in the company safe and not under a certain cardboard box in the attic of a monosyllabic sister in the countryside of Lincolnshire who still thought he was on the dole after working in the print before his greedy trade killed their golden goose.
The new editor was tall and imposing and wore designer spectacles and braces and was still trying to find a green eyeshade to look even more the part. A former government minister who had been persuaded to relinquish his seat because of his dalliance with a transvestite Russian Embassy employee, he had recently been appointed to his much-lauded post. He stalked off, important and heavy limbed, with his jaw thrust forward in his best Churchillian impersonation. He hoped the new Murdoch's girl news editor (not his illegitimate daughter as false rumours implied), had been humbled and intimidated by the chief sub's chiding; also that no-one else had noticed that he had no idea what deoxywhatever had meant either.
*****
The commissioner was in a quandary. He had to proceed carefully, as police parlance of old would have it.
Here was the dilemma: his old friend, Henry Highbrow QC was in trouble. Accused of raping the minister's wife. He had studied the reports and knew of her reputation, and didn't believe a word of it.
His new uniform suited Norman Sackville. He had waited and manoeuvred for a long time to achieve this goal and Henry had been a great ally. It was bad luck that Norman had given the instruction over an antiquated radio channel to shoot the suspected terrorist. The poor sod had been innocent, but that didn't help him as the expanding bullets ripped into the back of his head and, as per Israeli operations, eliminated any possibility of even the remotest twitch or spasm in case of triggering an explosive vest. Even members of the emergency services who boarded the train naively hoping to save a life, had initially mistaken the victim's head for a red-stained Chinese New Year lantern.
Henry had been a star. It had not been easy, but amid the fog of terror threats and public panic, after the first triumphant police announcement that a suicide bomber had been eliminated, he had advised how to slowly let the news filter out that there had been a tactical malfunction that regrettably incurred limited collateral damage. Luckily, the poor migrant worker was from a long way away and his family was not going to make any trouble. A contact of Norman's in their country's less sophisticated police force would make sure of that. Henry had also contrived to craftily shift the blame to Norman's deputy, a close rival for the top job, and the firearms officer who had done the dirty deed. He was on a charge and by the time he was acquitted and had recovered from the stress of being made a scapegoat, the public would have forgotten. By then there would be other terrorist attacks to anger them. He had to help Henry. It had only been recent fortune that his predecessor as commissioner had resigned, along with his deputy, after being accused of accepting holidays in Spain with prostitutes from London' largest crime gang.
Not the one operating out of Westminster, that is.
He had suddenly stepped into the commissioner's job.
But the minister's wife...
*****
Henry had been shocked and shouting when he found he would be named. He railed at Norman about justice and betrayal and how Allegra was exploiting a loophole in the law to ensure her anonymity for life, so as not to discredit fucking Attila Smith.
In fact, despite his temporary loss of cool logic, Henry had put his finger on the solution. Under the rape law, an alleged victim could not be named, even though the accused could. But, if the Crown Prosecution Service found that a conviction was unlikely or that there were insufficient grounds for prosecution and more inquiries were needed; or if a decision was delayed or pending or forgotten...
As it happened, the Director of Public Prosecutions was also in Norman's lodge. It wouldn't be totally painless, but after the furore of Henry being named, there was a possibility that the case could be conveniently delayed forever. It wouldn't help his prospects of legal advancement, and another shag with Allegra would be out of the question; but it would keep him out of jail.
A meeting with the minister would be necessary. Normally, it was just the type of thing Henry would do for him after a talk at their club or golf course or lodge, but this time, Norman would have to do it himself.
*****
The PM's wife gave a final bellow and heaved out the mewling mess. The nurse was very attentive and the privately-hired midwife Irish kindness herself as she fetched the red wrinkled form a smart smack and listened fondly to the ensuing fitful cries. The exclusive nursing home was besieged by photographers and reporters and TV cameras from the world of news entertainment. After a carefully timed wait to enhance the public interest, the PM left the private study away from the birth suite where he had been pawing over Foreign Office papers with a very attentive aide, to stand on the imposing steps at the entrance to the building. After his announcement, all modestly thrilled, the leader waited for questions.
"Who does he look like?" shouted the Daily Best royal correspondent who had been drafted in for the job. A ripple of irreverent mischievous mirth went round the English press pack who were in on the rumours, but a properly primed BBC placewoman headed off the query by asking how his wife was.
"They are both healthy and happy and I am, well, you know, very proud," said the disingenuously grinning PM, in his usual weasely self-righteous manner.
Then he turned under the barrage of TV lights and camera shutters and headed for his car.
At the same moment as the timid nurse was carefully extracting a small sample from the batch of placenta that had been sold dearly to the Swiss facecream manufacturer, the PM was idly gazing over his chauffeur's shoulder and somehow being molested by the uncomfortable feeling that his new son had briefly, like newborn boys sometimes can, reminded him of an old man. Even a little bit like his erstwhile friend and mentor, the judge.
*****
The Pall Mall gentleman's club probably entertained as many hookers as the average model's flat in Soho. But they were high-class and eventually, sometimes titled. Attila and Norman gazed down from the balcony at the exquisitely patterned floor and haughty beauties with their ageing escorts and cradled their brandies in their leather armchairs. The beef had been substantial and the spotted dick filled all the corners. Ostensibly, this was an informal exchange of information about the threat of drugs, policing, money laundering and terrorism. And when the moment arrived, it was a mere blink of an eyelid.
The commissioner became a fleeting commiserator and promised to pursue justice in this terribly traumatic matter. Attila sighed and said it was fortunate that his wife's anonymity could be protected, although a trial would be difficult for her.
"Sometimes I wonder if maybe it might not be easier for her if the whole thing could be forgotten," Attila Smith confided...
And so, in the manner of the powerful, an alternative nuance to the phrase "British justice" became clear.
*****
Hedy Lamarr has long been acknowledged as an inspiration for digital radio. It happened via a party, some admirers, a ubiquitous expert, and a conversation on how to create a secret guidance system for torpedoes. The digital idea, accompanied by fingers on a piano, developed into the radio system.
It was fitting, therefore, that the Daily Best's torpedo should be called Hedy. She was blonde, unlike Hedy, and not as clever or statuesque. But her allure and cunning were not without certain digital factors. She was a former fish gutter from Grimsby who, after a chance encounter with an estate agent in a BMW, several pints of lager and a scampi and chips supper, had graduated to become a much more socially elevated sauna masseuse, dancer, escort, and latterly, occasional guest at exclusive clubs. Readers of a certain newspaper might, if they knew her well, have recognised some of her features on the edges of blurred photographs in editions containing details of a number of accounts proving sordid sexual scandals among the rich and royals.
In newspaper legal parlance she was an independent, unbiased witness who proved the credibility of the story.
To the newsroom, she was Heady the Whore, a valuable agent who operated in highly bugged hotel rooms after luring the latest targets, often footballers, into her web.
To the hacks who handled her, she was the best. Primed by champagne and then coke in the bog of the Best's Highway pub, The Gutenberg, she could be relied upon for a quick blowjob before riding off on her charger to expose the shocking unsavoury hypocrisy of society's icons.
Such women were known in the trade as torpedoes.
*****
Srdjan had to be up for work early. He had been no less lucky to miss the war. It was only because he had an Albanian girlfriend that he had managed to get the passport. It was before the war, but it was obviously coming and her family had a plan. They wanted to leave the country farm near Tirana where they scratched out a living between feuding with their neighbours. All they had to do was wait until the bombing began over the border and put out to sea with an uncle and his Italian mafia colleagues. Instead of a speedboat trip to Sveti Stefan in Montenegro to deliver smuggled Italian cigarettes or guns, a quick trip to Bari and a pilgrims' bus to Naples and they would be reborn as Kosovan victims and certain of refuge.
It was Srdjan's luck that his girlfriend saw the prospect of working for a Naples pimp as more attractive than a life with him, now that they were leaving Belgrade. Still, he had his new passport with the Albanian name Fitore Hoxha, and after a ride in the back of a lorry that had just delivered a large consignment of cardboard coffins off an Italian ferry in Split, he became a refugee in England. His fare had been an hour between the driver and his girlfriend on the stained roll-bed in the front of the cab. Then it was Srdjan's turn to say goodbye. They parted on very good terms, with the promise to meet again one day, and the driver breezed through Customs for a weekend's sleep and then another consignment of coffins that the British end of NATO was secretly building up before the campaign.
*****
The old judge's phone had been hacked and the Best’s sleuths were already certain of his paternal responsibility, but an extra woman in the equation would be even better, and that suited the Editor. For reasons of slighted public egos, no one hated the PM's wife more than him - unless, of course, it was the Prime Monster himself.
The old judge had met Hedy before, and enjoyed her company, gratis. Naturally, somebody would pay, and tonight was special. Tonight, after dinner at his club, Hedy would take him home, and between frolics and cocaine, he would ejaculate enough information for the cameras and tapes to prove that the PM was a cuckold. He would also be fingered as Judge Rat for cheating only days after his secret son had been born to the PM's wife.
This was as good as it was going to get for the Editor. His boss loved political scandals and had hated the PM ever since the rumour that he had seduced the chief's eldest son. The Editor was a certain type of Fleet Street company supremo. He lived up to the maverick image his boss liked, made lots of money from sleaze, and licked arse when none of his subordinates was around to see.
He also advertised the idea that he had a standing offer to join the Murdoch regime.
*****
Srdjan was a little worried. He had promised the family he would look after his cousin and she was acting a tad too independently. Between his first job, which he loved, and his second, which he didn't, he had an hour or so. His first post was as a photographic assistant and his second was as a plongeur in the nightclub that his boss frequented. Peter Plumber was a fashion photographer and a nice guy. He had given Srdjan a chance and when he saw how hard he worked, had a word with his old friend Paul, who owned the club and could always use a diligent dishwasher.
Now Srdjan, aka Fitore Hoxha, was trusted, Peter didn't mind if he borrowed a camera occasionally. The boy had been through hard times, he sensed, and maybe because of that, had an eye for a moody picture. Some of the street shots he had captured showed real promise and it was always useful to have some atmospheric background shots in the library.
Srdjan would hang around his flat taking snapshots of anything interesting, or sometimes head to the river, if he had time.
Tonight he got home just in time to see the stewardess leaving. He was too far away to say hello, but was surprised to see a large black saloon pull up and the door swing open. For Srdjan, this was a prize. It was proof that he was looking after his cousin as promised, and he would send a picture back to his family in Belgrade to show them what style of life she was now living. He was lucky that the car drove slowly past him, although she didn't see him in the pavement crowd. But he got a lovely shot of her leaning over to put her arm round the neck and give a lingering kiss to a large man with very thick, black hair. The man had a minder in the front and a tough, wiry-looking chauffeur. Srdjan was impressed. He was obviously a footballer or a rock star. He would show the picture on his camera to Peter in the club when he had finished his work tonight and the staff were having their nightly drink when Paul let them join the trusted regulars.
*****
"Damn sturdy brat!" the old judge said, his buttocks still secretly smarting from Hedy's whip and his pleasurable intellectual recall still stimulated by the mutual eloquence of her head. He twirled the pewling, pink, angry gurner in his clammy, soft, fleshy paws, and then clumsily passed it back to the outstretched puffy wrists that supported the fat hands.
"Look, gal, he's mine and that's obvious. The little bugger looks like me."
The old judge nearly choked and spilt the very large port and brandy that could never possibly be mistaken for his first of the evening.
"Not that he will be a little bugger. Ha! Leave that for his dad, what? Weapons of muse destruction, eh?"
The PM's wife was still bruised and swollen, but nevertheless, willing to turn her welcome to something to her taste. Fortunately, probably for them both, the growler emitted from his scarlet silk long underpants into his pinstripe trousers allowed them to pause in anticipation of fresher times. Brown cords, or tweeds, should only be worn on Sundays.
*****
"You can tell it's closing time when you can hear the fridge."
It was Paul's mantra for the quiet time in the early hours when everyone had left the club, the lights were dimmed, the profits were safely stashed, and the staff and few favoured customers could relax and share their gossip.
Peter was there with a new model from one of his more successful agencies and Jim, his freelance reporter friend who made most of his money from diary pieces in the red top papers.
The reporter had been talking earnestly to the girl; collecting background from her for when he could see a way to get her some publicity. Maybe a picture with a gay footballer who was still in the closet, or one with a lesbian actress. Or even, nowadays, a trans or bi, or whatever the next fad would be. The reporter's wife and daughter had gerbils, a budgie and a St Bernard. The gerbil bit had already been done, but he still had hopes for the dog, or even the budgie. A marriage, perhaps, to an exiled foreign royal. Anything was possible.
The pair were eventually forced to join the rest of the crowd when the hilarity veered out of control.
It was Peter, and he was holding up a picture on his mobile phone. The mirth was deafening. Between gasps of laughter, he was explaining: "The station. In full view. The bloody blind had gone up and they hadn't noticed. I couldn't get the tripod and camera out, but I got this. It's a pretty good shot. God, she's ravishing him. Lucky he's not queer, cos he wouldn't stand a chance. She means it."
The journalist didn't know if it was the worst pain he'd ever had, or the funniest twist of fate he had ever been victim of. First, the upstanding desk sergeant had given him what he thought was the scoop of a lifetime. Then he'd called back and broken the news that the story, far from being on public record as a cautionable offence, had become forbidden fruit because it was a rape case...
*****
Photographers were notorious for not getting their captions right and sometimes not even knowing who they had taken pictures of. Certainly, a fashion snapper wouldn't be expected to recognise the wife of a government minister.
But the reporter did.
Now he had the proof, but, maddeningly, could do nothing with it.
He grabbed the phone and held it for several minutes while the bar staff looked and laughed. When the breathless humour had subsided to fitful titters, the reporter spoke: "You don't know what you've got there, Pete me old mate. But it won't do you any good.
"That rabid rapist is Attila Smith's wife. And she's the one crying rape."
Then he paused, as if caught out by a faux pas. "But don't any of you mention that I said that, or I'll be in the shit."
*****
Srdjan's chance to impress his bosses was lost for the night amid the ribaldry, so he did not circulate his picture to show how well his cousin was doing.
When he did, several days later during a quiet moment in the studio, the photographer was still musing on who the man in his own picture was, and how to conquer the negative aspects of the image.
When Srdjan finally proudly revealed to Peter the exposure he'd taken from the pavement, there was a spray of sloshed latte and Peter had shouted to his phone to call the reporter.
This time, even the fashion snapper could put a name to the caption.
It was some time later that Srdjan was let into the secret of who his cousin's rock star was.
That, however, was after the reporter had arrived in much haste and the photographer had mentioned a very large amount of money and the Daily Best.
And before thoughts of revenge for how this minister's government had bombed his country began to engage Srdjan.
xxx
The call to the old judge was a textbook illustration of what was right with British society.
Or not.
The irascible judge was not being bullied or intimidated. In such matters, the Establishment must stand firm and put these oiks from the proletariat in their place.
On one end of the telephone line was the Editor, two recording devices, two reporters, and an impeccably dressed and loudly wealthy lawyer.
On the other was a portly old gent in long scarlet underpants and vest and purple socks with garters. The case was put to him between his rants.
The baby, the DNA, the hooker, the coke, his betrayal of the PM.
Looking at him hopping in his socks at the end of a very old-fashioned phone and hearing the evidence, any observer would have been in no doubt that he didn't have a leg to stand on.
But as anyone who has covered a good trial in Britain will know, legal arguments can see-saw and be very persuasive one minute and upset like apple carts the next.
When it finally came, the response from the fuming, florid-faced old judge was a little unorthodox. Like a hand grenade at a jousting match, it was swift and to the point.
"Fuck off," he said. "Super-injunction, you arseholes. Haven't you heard of them?"
*****
"Damn them," the old judge said, as soon as the receiver had crashed down. "I'll get that bloody injunction even if I have to buy it like the rest of the bloody footballers and TV luvvies."
Like D Notices of old, Special Branch intimidation, blackmail, death threats, assassinations, simple bribes, or now American-imported political correctness, super-injunctions were very effective. But they did not specifically exist publicly. Nor was it likely that such a senior legal supremo would have to actually pay for one, like hoi polloi...
*****
"Ho! Ho!"
The PM's wife gave a slightly twisted grin and, tired but reassured, allowed a little sliver to aerate the space between her ever-fattening legs and the perfectly fragrant covers of her newly-maternal bed.
*****
The old judge was not rash enough to seek the injunction himself. That would surely contravene the high principles of justice. But it would be very swift and would beat any deadline that little prick of an Editor could impose. By the time their first edition was even near, the Best would be gagged and legally trussed and tied firmly to the bench. After all, the PM had known of his wife's relationship all along and so long as it was discreet and the leader could continue sodomising his aide and any other ambitious young candidate, there was no problem.
But the PM's reputation had to be protected and though he wasn't too keen to go down the super-injunction route, it was now a vital tool. It was a blunt instrument that could not even be mentioned.
Besides, the judge was well aware that the PM had been promised a great deal of money by a foreign power closely connected, as it turned out, to one of his former furtive conquests. The hoard was to be discreetly trousered a couple of years after he relinquished all public posts and after the bombing had been successful and forgotten. There was also a lucrative advisory seat on the board of a huge American conglomerate that, by coincidence, manufactured a wide range of armaments.
The PM would see things his way.
*****
Hedy, the newly-appointed assistant deputy consultant associate newspaper executive, tucked her cheque for legal expenses into her expensive front-loading new designer bra, tottered off on her equally fashionable, very high and expensive heels to the nightclub where her friend Paul would, no doubt, offer her a rum and lots of coke and if she was lucky, introduce her to a football star.
She could be naughty in her spare time, too.
*****
So that was it: no stories. Freedom of speech and information had been raped by the law, and certainly not for the first time.
A profitable scandal had been averted too, so it was not all good news.
Attila Smith was feeling very pleased with himself and very relaxed. This girl was a sweetie, even if she had to go soon. He would give her another twirl or two, and then...
*****
The PM was floundering and Attila could sense his opportunity. All it would take would be a sudden change in political fortune and he would be ready.
Often, political events were inspired by the scent of blood within the party and had nothing to do with the efficient running of the country. The PM's antics and lineage woes were well-known in the circles that mattered, and they weren't the ones that got their potted propaganda from TV.
So Attila would not mount a frontal attack with the mob and a scandal. It would be an inside job.
*****
When it came, it was from an unexpected quarter. She had grown comfortable in the moments that Attila's wife was not there, finding bliss as she watched the river traffic glide by below. She had been careful not to lose an ear-ring or a tell-tale hair in the plughole and had only taken pictures of the little, personal details of his private life.
She had, of course, been unable to resists snaps and observations about Attila's wife that only another female would be capable of. If asked, she would be capable of supplying a resume of her rival's character that any Sunday paper woman's editor would die for.
Now it had to end.
Simple.
And Attila was hurt.
He was shocked.
His ego was destroyed.
He could have cried at the injustice.
It was he who should do this, not her.
All she had said was that she was going back home with her cousin to resume her old life. She did not tell him that it would not be quite like the old life because of a large, for her family, contribution from the Daily Best.
She broke it to him as they left the elegant building. Framed, carelessly in the doorway because of Attila's shock, she told him it was over, left him with a marathon kiss he would never be able to forget, took his arm to walk him outside and said, simply: "Idemo."
The shutter on Srdjan's camera should have been red hot. This time he knew who the star was - and his picture would be much clearer.
*****
The Editor's operation was simple and guaranteed to make his owner money. Srdjan collected the cheque, placed it in his account and his boss shared another payment from the journalist, who had briefly forgotten his St Bernard. Srdjan bought two tickets to Belgrade.
One way.
He thought of his countrymen cowering under NATO's bombs of American expansionism and how they would love to have drawn pictures on their T-shirts and tanks of the Brits cowering under a torrent of shit. He had a friend from Kosovo who was now living in a garage and cutting hair for a living in a suburb of Belgrade. He was very good at internet design and Srdjan had a very good one that was not enchained by the English legal system.
*****
The Editor's plan was textbook Fleet Street: a first edition with a big front page picture of the latest junk TV tottie and a splash that could be relegated to the inside on the second when his exclusive would appear, too late for the others to catch up. The call to the main target would not be made until the last moment and he could choose whether or not to comment.
Then the next day's story with its poignant parting picture and speculation over whether it meant that all would be forgiven by the minister's wife and their family life could resume.
*****
Srdjan's scheme, thanks to a gift from a man who had briefly been mistaken for a plumber at a railway station, was somewhat less orthodox.
*****
Attila had picked his moment and the chamber was packed. Forget the bread, it was circuses the baying rulers wanted today. The PM was about to be publicly ridiculed and the great unwashed, ogling at their TV sets later in the evening, would, inevitably, miss the irony.
Attila was to speak in a debate about curbs by those with vested interests on privacy, freedom, free speech, information, and the growing use of super-injunctions to cover the sins of the rich and spoilt. And he had the Commons privilege of unfettered loquacity to hint at unsavoury revelations.
The subject was of interest largely to human rights campaigners, council officials spying on people using the wrong bins, bent coppers, and lawyers worried about losing a slice of their substantial incomes.
He stood up and cleared his threat: necks craned and ears were cocked for innuendo and the sound of knives being sharpened for the long-prepared final push in the plot to snatch power from the already discredited PM...
*****
At the Night Editor's desk of the Best, the Editor OKd the second edition headline above a photograph carefully choreographed from a pavement: "Attila in secret tryst shocker"
*****
In Belgrade, and then rapidly flowing around the world - even to England before the barriers had time to be crashed down - an image appeared on the internet. It showed a sordid scene through the window of a railway carriage under a clickline: "Is this really rape?"
*****
Attila's phone had been safely turned off in his pocket so as not to intrude on his moment of ironic triumph. When he finally remembered to turn it on again, he was surrounded by admiring followers hanging on to his every word and anticipating shared political advancement, courtesy of a very public back-stabbing that only those in the know could see. He had always made a point of keeping its ring considerately on mute, but even so, now it immediately began an annoying, insistent and persistent buzzing.
THE END
© Pat Prentice
