Chapter 1: The Other Minister
It was nearing midnight and the Prime Minister was sitting alone in his
office, reading a long memo that was slipping through his brain without
leaving the slightest trace of meaning behind. He was waiting for a call from
the President of a far distant country, and between wondering when the
wretched man would telephone, and trying to suppress unpleasant memories
of what had been a very long, tiring, and difficult week, there was not much
space in his head for anything else. The more he attempted to focus on the
print on the page before him, the more clearly the Prime Minister could see
the gloating face of one of his political opponents. This particular opponent
had appeared on the news that very day, not only to enumerate all the
terrible things that had happened in the last week (as though anyone needed
reminding) but also to explain why each and every one of them was the
government's fault.
The Prime Minister's pulse quickened at the very thought of these
accusations, for they were neither fair nor true. How on earth was his
government supposed to have stopped that bridge collapsing? It was
outrageous for anybody to suggest that they were not spending enough on
bridges. The bridge was fewer than ten years old, and the best experts were
at a loss to explain why it had snapped cleanly in two, sending a dozen cars
into the watery depths of the river below. And how dare anyone suggest that
it was lack of policemen that had resulted in those two very nasty and well-
publicized murders? Or that the government should have somehow foreseen
the freak hurricane in the West Country that had caused so much damage to
both people and property? And was it his fault that one of his Junior7