A Scandalous Man. Gavin Esler
by a foot the other side.
‘Triangulation,’ I said.
‘Eh?’
‘Like artillery.’
The third horseshoe rang around the pole. Beginner’s luck.
‘Bullseye!’ Hickox yelled and then thumped me on the back again. If I had false teeth, the force of the blow would have knocked them out. I coughed and tried to smile.
‘Tell me something, Director…’
‘David. Or you can call me Wild Bill, like the press here do. It helps with the image if the Soviets think I am borderline crazy.’
After witnessing the push-ups, it wasn’t just the Soviets who thought he was borderline crazy, but I knew better than to show it. Besides, Hickox had his own charm, which I was slowly warming to. There was – how should I say it? – an honesty about his ruthlessness which I found refreshing. In Britain, it is necessary to hide such things.
‘Tell me, David, just straight here between us, you do know how important retaking the Falklands is to the British government?’
He nodded, then picked up the horseshoes and began throwing again.
‘An existential crisis,’ he muttered. ‘You lose the war, you’re gone. You win the war, you’re back, big time. Maybe for another ten years. We want you to win the war.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘I hoped you would say that. Then given the seriousness of the matter, we will, as I suggested to you a moment ago, be grateful for anything – anything – you or other US agencies come across which would be of interest. Very grateful.’
He said nothing. Threw a horseshoe. Missed. He collected the horseshoes and came back and stood in front of me.
‘I’m all ears,’ he said.
‘Beyond what I said about the Soviet Union, what is it that keeps you awake at night?’
Without missing a beat Hickox spoke softly, just one word.
‘Iran.’
He pronounced it ‘Eye-ran’. Jack Heriot had been right.
‘So,’ I said, riding a surge of thankfulness. ‘So, is there anything we can do about Iran that would help you sleep more easily?’
Hickox threw another horseshoe then stood up straight and looked at me.
‘Matter of fact, Robin,’ he said, putting a big arm round my shoulder, ‘I do believe there is.’
Now it really was Mission Accomplished, I told myself. Hickox squeezed me tightly. I could smell the barbecue sauce on his fingers. We both grinned.
The trip to Washington was judged a success. Even better, it really was a success. Reality matched perception, which in British politics is quite unusual. The Lady went out of her way to praise me. She had heard from the Ministry of Defence that naval and intelligence cooperation had never been better. No complaints. GCHQ were delighted with assistance they had received from the US National Security Agency, their electronic eavesdropping and signals intelligence people, and the RAF were pleased with something from the National Reconnaissance Office. I never found out what all this was about, and I didn’t ask. I didn’t need to know. All I needed to know was that it was a triumph and that, apparently, was put down to me.
‘We were sure you were the right man for the job, Robin,’ the Lady told me, clapping her hands together in pleasure late one night over the customary whisky and soda at Number Ten. By this time the Marines had landed on the Falklands and were yomping to victory. The Gurkhas had also landed. Argentine conscripts were falling over themselves to surrender. It had been put about that the Gurkhas liked to cut the ears off the bodies of those they killed. We denied this story at every opportunity. There is nothing which promotes an outrageous story more effectively than a firm government denial. Of course, there had also been setbacks. HMS Sheffield. The terrible damage caused by the Exocet missiles supplied to the Argentines by our good friends, the French. But from that point onwards there was no doubt about the final result, no doubt the Argentine junta would collapse, and no doubt either that the Lady would call an election and we’d be back in power for another five years. Ten, I thought. Fifteen, as it turned out. I called David Hickox to thank him.
‘Congratulations,’ he said. ‘I hear it’s gone real well.’
‘Yes. But it would not have gone so well without your personal help. Thank you. I owe you.’
‘Indeed you do. The Lady gonna go for an election?’
‘Next spring,’ I replied. ‘Most likely. And we will win. Thank you for that, too.’
Hickox laughed.
‘You think we wouldn’t bale you out? And let Labour back in? Jeez, Robin, no way.’
Hickox was correct, of course. The Labour party was in one of its self-destructive phases, hijacked by the Impossibilist Left, the ones who preferred keeping their ideological purity to getting elected. They wanted to abandon nuclear weapons. The Falklands victory and their own catalogue of stupidity meant they’d be unelectable for years.
‘We’ll talk,’ Hickox said.
‘I’ll look forward to it.’
Well, well. An accidental Argentinian tango had taken us from defeat to victory in a few easy steps. Almost at the very end of the conflict, a few days after British troops had finally re-taken Port Stanley, I was invited to a Foreign Office drinks party. It was not officially a celebration. That would have been premature and a bit un-British. But the Foreign Office mandarins – with their usual ability to sniff political careers the way dogs sniff each other’s bottoms – had decided – sniff, sniff – that I might – sniff, sniff – make Foreign Secretary one day. My ascent had taken me ahead of Jack Heriot, and he was graceful enough to admit it.
‘Well done, Robin,’ a card from Heriot read. ‘Primus inter pares.’
First among equals, the usual description of the Prime Minister.
Looking back on it, I think that the FCO party was the moment when I was at the very top of my game. My reputation at the Treasury was high. The civil servants there understood what we were doing to liberate the economy. And now at the MoD and the Foreign Office they had begun to treat me with something close to respect. Three of the top four ministries in HMG had something good to say about me. The Lady noticed. The Americans noticed. Everybody noticed.
I made sure my press secretary gave a couple of briefings – off-the-record, of course – outlining the key role I had played with the Reagan administration, without giving away too many details. When the press asked me to confirm my role I was shocked – shocked – that anyone had leaked such a sensitive matter. I thundered that one should never comment on matters affecting national security. Loose lips sink ships. What fun! My conceit and arrogance expanded to fill the available space. I was asked to help draft the manifesto for the 1983 election. I was asked to prepare my plans for selling off state-run industries. I was asked to address party gatherings all over the country. I was applauded in Cardiff and Perth, in Manchester and Leeds. I was offered a top speaking slot at the autumn party conference. I was on Newsnight so often, one of the presenters joked I made more appearances on BBC television than he did. I think that all of this helps explain – though it does not excuse – what happened when I met Leila again, and this time learned her name. I thought I could do no wrong. Or if I did, that no one would ever find out.
There was to be no escape, for either of us.
The Foreign Office drinks party was in the Locarno Suite. It’s one of the greatest function rooms in Whitehall, a magnificent old-fashioned barn big enough to stage an opera, or from which to govern an Empire.