that rested close to his knees as he sat on the creaking chair.
‘Everything all right with you and Sam?’
Miles admired, as always, his father’s almost psychic intuition.
‘Not great.’
He would not have confessed it to his mother, because he tried not to fuel the constant cold war between Shirley and Samantha, in which he was both hostage and prize.
‘She doesn’t like the idea of me standing,’ Miles elaborated. Howard raised his fair eyebrows, his jowls wobbling as he chewed. ‘I don’t bloody know what’s got into her. She’s on one of her anti-Pagford kicks.’
Howard took his time swallowing. He dabbed at his mouth with a paper napkin and burped.
‘She’ll come round quickly enough once you’re in,’ he said. ‘The social side of it. Plenty for the wives. Functions at Sweetlove House. She’ll be in her element.’ He took another swig of ale and scratched his belly again.
‘I can’t picture this Price,’ said Miles, returning to the essential point, ‘but I’ve got a feeling he had a kid in Lexie’s class at St Thomas’s.’
‘Fields-born, though, that’s the thing,’ said Howard. ‘Fields-born, which could work to our advantage. Split the pro-Fields vote between him and Wall.’
‘Yeah,’ said Miles. ‘Makes sense.’
‘I haven’t heard of anyone else. It’s possible, once details hit the website, someone else’ll come forward. But I’m confident about our chances. I’m confident. Aubrey called,’ Howard added. There was always a touch of additional portentousness in Howard’s tone when he used Aubrey Fawley’s Christian name. ‘Right behind you, goes without saying. He’s back this evening. He’s been in town.’
Usually, when a Pagfordian said ‘in town’, they meant ‘in Yarvil’. Howard and Shirley used the phrase, in imitation of Aubrey Fawley, to mean ‘in London’.
‘He mentioned something about us all getting together for a chat. Maybe tomorrow. Might even invite us over to the house. Sam’d like that.’
Miles had just taken a large bite of soda bread and liver paté, but he conveyed his agreement with an emphatic nod. He liked the idea that Aubrey Fawley was ‘right behind’ him. Samantha might jeer at his parents’ thraldom to the Fawleys, but Miles noticed that on those rare occasions when Samantha came face to face with either Aubrey or Julia, her accent changed subtly and her demeanour became markedly more demure.
‘Something else,’ said Howard, scratching his belly again. ‘Got an email from the Yarvil and District Gazette this morning. Asking for my views on the Fields. As chair of the Parish Council.’
‘You’re kidding? I thought Fairbrother had stitched that one up—’
‘Backfired, didn’t it?’ said Howard, with immense satisfaction. ‘They’re going to run his article, and they want someone to argue against the following week. Give them the other side of the story. I’d appreciate a hand. Lawyer’s turn of phrase, and all that.’
‘No problem,’ said Miles. ‘We could talk about that bloody addiction clinic. That’d make the point.’
‘Yes — very good idea — excellent.’
In his enthusiasm, he had swallowed too much at once and Miles had to bang him on the back until his coughing had subsided. At last, dabbing his watering eyes with a napkin, Howard said breathlessly, ‘Aubrey’s recommending the District cuts funding from their end, and I’m going to put it to our lot that it’s time to terminate the lease on the building. It wouldn’t hurt to make the case in the press. How much time and money’s gone into that bloody place with nothing to show for it. I’ve got the figures.’ Howard burped sonorously. ‘Bloody disgraceful. Pardon me.’
III
Gavin cooked for Kay at his house that evening, opening tins and crushing garlic with a sense of ill-usage.
After a row, you had to say certain things to secure a truce: those were the rules, everyone knew that. Gavin had telephoned Kay from his car on the way back from Barry’s burial and told her that he wished she had been there, that the whole day had been horrible and that he hoped he could see her that night. He considered these humble admissions no more or less than the price he had to pay for an evening of undemanding companionship.
But Kay seemed to consider them more in the light of a down payment on a renegotiated contract. You missed me. You needed me when you were upset. You’re sorry we didn’t go as a couple. Well, let’s not make that mistake again. There had been a certain complacency about the way she had treated him since; a briskness, a sense of renewed expectation.
He was making spaghetti Bolognese tonight; he had