Cometh the Hour (The Clifton Chronicles 6)

“Well, if you won’t, I’ll have to do it myself.”

“You can’t—”

But Emma was already halfway across the road. Once she was on the other side, she walked straight up to the secretary of state for education and science and thrust out her hand.

“Good morning, Mrs. Thatcher. I’m the sister of Sir Giles—”

“And more important, Mrs. Clifton, you were the first woman to chair a public company.”

Emma smiled.

“Women should never have been given the vote!” shouted a man, shaking his fist from a passing car.

Mrs. Thatcher waved and gave him a magnanimous smile.

“I don’t know how you cope with it,” said Emma.

“In my case, I’ve never wanted to do anything else,” said Thatcher. “Although I confess that a dictatorship might make one’s job a little easier.” Emma laughed, but Mrs. Thatcher didn’t. “By the way,” she said, glancing across the road, “your brother was a first-class MP as well as a highly respected minister both at home and abroad. He’s sadly missed in the House—but don’t tell him I said so.”

“Why not?” said Emma.

“Because it doesn’t fit in with his image of me and I’m not sure he’d believe it.”

“I wish I could tell him. He’s rather low at the moment.”

“Don’t worry, he’ll be back in one house or the other soon enough. It’s in his blood. But what about you? Have you ever considered going into politics, Mrs. Clifton? You have all the right credentials.”

“Never, never, never,” said Emma vehemently. “I couldn’t handle the pressure.”

“You handled it well enough during your recent trial, and I suspect pressure doesn’t worry you when it comes to facing up to your fellow directors.”

“That’s a different kind of pressure,” said Emma. “And in any case—”

“I’m sorry to interrupt you, Secretary of State,” said an agitated minder, “but the candidate seems to be in a spot of trouble.”

Mrs. Thatcher looked up to see an old woman jabbing a finger at the Tory candidate. “That’s not a spot of trouble. That lady probably remembers this street being bombed by the Germans—now that’s what I call a spot of trouble.” She turned back to Emma. “I’ll have to leave you, Mrs. Clifton, but I do hope we’ll meet again, perhaps in more relaxed circumstances.”

“Secretary of State?”

“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” said Mrs. Thatcher. “If he can’t handle one old lady without me having to hold his hand, how’s he ever going to cope with the baying opposition in the Commons?” she added before hurrying away.

Emma smiled and walked back across the road to rejoin her brother, who was telling a military-looking gentleman the sanitized version of why he wasn’t standing in the by-election.

“So what did you think of her?” asked Giles once he’d broken away.

“Remarkable,” said Emma. “Quite remarkable.”

“I agree,” said Giles. “But don’t ever tell her I said so.”

* * *

The call came when he least expected it. Giles turned on the light by the side of his bed to find it was a few minutes after five, and wondered who could possibly be phoning him at that time in the morning.

“Sorry to ring you so early, Giles, but this is not a call I can make from my office.”

“I understand,” said Giles, suddenly wide awake.

“If you can be in Berlin on May twenty-second,” said Walter, “I may be able to deliver your package.”