Fic: Loose Ends (or Five Times Pieces of Silver Changed Hands)
Through this week I rapidly approached (and have now passed) the Awefull moment where I would finish The Power Game and not have anything else to watch where people are likely to accuse one another of clinging on like a neurotic limpet with a peeping tom complex. Naturally, I pulled out my 500 Prompts list to find the one Persiflage had so kindly left for just such an occasion. Me: "Hmm, betrayal, that could fit everyone..." *writes five times fic that is a series of (hopefully not too) incomprehensible conversations* What can I say? Sadly, the sarcasm is lagging a long way behind the show.
In other news, I managed to get a solitary blue and white bran flake in my pack of otherwise-normal Bran Flakes this week. I get the white frosting, but I didn't think we had blue breakfast cereal in the UK. Where did the blue come from? Is it an alien plot?
Title: Loose Ends (or Five Times Pieces of Silver Changed Hands)
Author: lost_spook
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1952
Characters/Pairings: Don Henderson & Pamela Wilder, Susan Weldon & Colin Townley, Lincoln Dowling/Pamela Wilder, Kenneth Bligh/Justine Bligh, John Wilder.
Notes/Warnings: Spoilers; mentions of character death; wilful obscurity.
Summary: ”Have you heard it said that power is a Dead Sea fruit?” Five conversations between the players of the game - five small moments of betrayal (or business as usual).
For persiflage_1 in the 500 Prompts Meme: #50 - Betrayal - The Power Game.
***
1. Mistress & Loyal Hound
“Yes, I know,” said Pamela, halting her complaints at Don’s lack of response, “you can’t say anything against your master, can you?”
Don gave her a reproachful look. “There’s no need to put it quite like that, thank you.”
Pamela leant back into the sofa, her legs curled under her as she nursed a glass of brandy. She’d been abandoned by her husband for the night and very likely the weekend - again - but she was not alone, since John had kindly sent her his assistant, or whatever it was Don Henderson technically was at the moment. (Some sort of manager or director, or managing director. The titles changed, but not the fundamentals of his role.)
“Well, what else is it? Any other rational human being would have to agree that John is behaving abominably, but not you. It puts you in an impossible position.” She shot him a measuring look from under her lashes. “You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’d be worse.”
“Eh?” said Don, starting in his armchair. “Worse than what?”
She frowned at him. “Pay attention, Donald. Worse than John! You’d have me on a pedestal.”
“No I shouldn’t. Sounds far too uncomfortable, if you ask me.”
Pamela laughed and leant her head against the sofa. “Don! But, you know, I do feel rather like that now, and it isn’t very me. Whoever me is anymore.”
“I don’t know if it’s the brandy, me, or you, but I’m not following half this conversation.”
She sighed. “It isn’t that difficult. On a pedestal - or no, I mean a monument, don’t I? Patience on a monument turning all shades of green and yellow melancholy. How the hell did that happen?”
“Well, if you don’t know, I don’t,” said Don, unhelpfully, and finished his drink.
*
He halted in the doorway on his way out, later. “That was damned insulting, by the way, Pamela. I’ll have you know that if it were me, which it isn’t, the last thing I’d do with you is put you on a pedestal. Or a monument.”
She leaned against the wall. “I’m almost curious enough to ask,” she said, and then laughed. “But only almost. And you’re right, Don. It was insulting. Thoughtless, at any rate.”
“As long as you’re suitably penitent, I don’t mind,” said Don, and gave her a grin before leaving.
Pamela pulled a face to herself. “Not all that much I’m not,” she said, and then turned back into the empty room with a sigh.
She did like Old Faithful - very much so - but she couldn’t trust him. He was, now and always, John’s man, and not hers. The loyal hound not only kept his mistress company; naturally, he was also a watch dog.
2. Civil Servants
“Mr Townley,” said Susan Weldon, when they met at the restaurant. It was at his request, though she wasn’t sorry to see him again - she hadn’t, not since he’d been transferred away from his position as Under Secretary to the National Export Board back to some lesser-frequented corner of the Treasury. “It’s been a while.”
He waited for her to sit, and then took his own chair. “True. Not many people choose to visit the doghouse, do they?”
“If you’ve asked me here so that I can feel sorry for you again, I’ll have to leave,” she said, taking up her cigarette. “It has been fairly proved by now that it never ends well for at least one of us.”
Colin laughed. “No, no. Nothing of the sort. I’ll feel sorry for you, if you like. I imagine working for Caswell Bligh - let’s say it can’t be easy.”
“It would be improper of me to comment,” said Susan, but gave a smile. “As you very well know.”
Colin nodded. “But of course. I merely wondered if that was why - a difference of opinion, perhaps -?”
“No, you’ve lost me,” Susan said.
“A trifle oblique? Merely that I was curious as to whether it was somebody else’s manoeuvre or if you wanted an excuse to - shall we say, extricate yourself?”
“I’m still mystified, sorry,” said Susan. “You’ll have to spell it out.”
Colin looked at her over the top of the menu. “Your new secretary. The name I’ve heard mooted is Richard Langton.”
“What?” said Susan, staring back at him. She knew that Caswell Bligh was supposed to be pushing for her promotion rather than a new secretary to the Board (to replace Colin’s little-loved replacement), and the chances of someone else pulling in a different direction were high, but that was a new name on her. “Isn’t he the one who -?”
“Thinks the corridors of power will crumble if a woman so much as enters them while in search of the nearest exit?” said Colin. “Oh, yes. That was why I wondered. It would be an excuse to leave.”
Susan lowered her cigarette. “I couldn’t possibly work with Langton.”
“Not you, no,” said Colin. “There would be explosions at the NEB, I should think. Probably heard all over Whitehall.”
She frowned. “But who -?” Because whoever had suggested it was deliberately angling for her departure from the Board, and she didn’t know who that could be. Unless Caswell was lying, he was in her favour, and even if Wilder wanted her kept in her place, he wouldn’t want her to leave the NEB, not yet, as she knew only too well. Not as long as she was still useful to him there.
“I believe,” said Colin, looking amused, “that Charles Grainger has been taking an interest.”
“Charles Grainger?”
“Who is a friend of the Wilders,” he added, and then smiled. “Although I do believe he is chiefly a friend of Lady Wilder.”
Susan had to laugh. “Pamela! Well, you’ve got to hand it to her, haven’t you?”
“I may not have much influence in my current position,” said Colin, “but that was all I needed to know. If you’re not in favour of the appointment, I can ensure it doesn’t happen.”
She gave him a sidelong glance. “And how would you do that, Mr Townley?”
“I do have a passing acquaintance with Langton. Enough to ask if he’s really interested in taking up something that is rumoured to be something of a dead horse.”
“I hadn’t heard that,” said Susan. “Is it true?”
Colin shrugged. “It’s true that it’s a rumour. As to whether or not it’s a matter of fact, you’re better placed than I am to hear.”
“Caswell doesn’t think so.”
“And he should know,” said Colin. “So there we are, and we may now enjoy our lunch. We ought to do this again sometime, wouldn’t you say?”
Susan gave a wry smile. “We ought,” she said. “But we won’t, will we? One has to be so careful whom one makes a habit of lunching with.” She lunched to her own advantage: possible useful contacts for the future and a careful selection of thirty or forty-something divorcees from the Treasury in her efforts to distance herself from Wilder. Colin Townley didn’t come into any of those categories. And she, no doubt, had a reputation that wouldn’t do a married colleague any favours if he was repeatedly seen with her. It was all rather ironic, really, when she liked him as well as the others, if not better.
“I’d forgotten how blunt you can be,” said Colin with a wince. “Correct, nevertheless.”
Susan leant forward. “I am sorry. And I do appreciate your doing this. I’ll even risk feeling sorry for you now, if you want to unburden the sorrows of your current backwater appointment. It would only be fair.”
“I don’t think we need go that far,” said Colin, stiffly. “Besides, I wouldn’t quite say backwater, would you?”
She raised an eyebrow. “You were the one who said doghouse. Which is worse?”
“Mere hyperbole,” said Colin, retreating into his customary discretion. “There are challenges and opportunities there, as everywhere.”
Susan grinned. “Of course. Silly of me.”
3. Unsafe Associations
“You’re not nice to know,” Pamela had said to Lincoln Dowling not so long before. “You’re not safe to be with.” And he’d pointed out that nevertheless she kept on meeting him. He was John’s private secretary, so of course she had to see him. Neither of them could help it.
She let her glance slide across at him from the painting that was supposed to be holding her attention. He smiled instantly, already watching her.
“Lincoln,” said Pamela, sternly. “You must look at the art sometimes, you know.”
Lincoln only smiled again.
“Well, thank you for the compliment,” said Pamela, “but what will it do for the conversation when we go to lunch in a minute, and I say ‘Oh, Lincoln, what did you think of that fascinating piece, the terribly violent red one?’ And you won’t even know which one I mean. It’s charming of you, but not very considerate.”
Lincoln studied her further. “I daresay we’ll think of an alternative.” He paused, a flicker of amusement passing over his face. “Topic of conversation, that is.”
“Yes,” she said. “That’s what worries me.”
She’d also said, to him, and to herself, that it wasn’t even the betrayal of John she minded - that was only fair, when you came down to it - but she’d sworn to herself that this would never happen again, and it was such a lost feeling inside, betraying oneself.
Standing in front of the painting, their fingers tangled together.
4. Hopeless Causes
When Kenneth Bligh emerged from the Foreign Office, he found Justine waiting for him on the steps. She took his arm.
“Don’t say anything,” she said. “The car’s waiting - come back with us.”
Kenneth didn’t pull away but he hunched slightly. She could see that he was still close to tears. “This doesn’t change anything, you know,” he said. Ironically, there was something of his father’s bluster and pride underlying the words.
“I said, don’t say anything,” Justine told him. “The children want you. They’ve just lost their grandfather. For today, that’s all, Ken.”
Kenneth nodded.
“Good,” she said, and led him over to the car. Caswell’s death would inevitably change things, whatever he thought, but she wasn’t sure in what way, or whether it would be any use. Ken had always accused her of taking his father’s side against him, but for her there never had been any sides to take. She’d simply had the misfortune to love both her husband and her father-in-law, while Ken couldn’t see anything but treason in that fact. She knew how dreadful Caswell could be when he chose, but there was no other poison in their marriage.
And if the trouble was all in Ken’s mind, there was no guarantee the problem would die with Caswell. But that was all incidental for today. Today she was holding onto Ken, even if it was only for one last time.
5. Late Rivals
Sir John Wilder approached the desk, touching some of the abandoned papers with impatient, idle curiosity. The empty study hadn’t yet dispelled the ghost of its former occupant: there were papers and other oddments on the desk and the smell of Lord Bligh’s pipe tobacco lingered still.
“You old devil, Caswell,” said Wilder. “I’d have beaten you in the end, and you know it. I suppose that’s why you had to resort to cheating - your usual tactics.”
Dying was an illegal move in the game, an unfair gambit, but not, when you came down to it, much of a victory. Wilder experienced a brief, uncharacteristic impulse to take a souvenir from the desk (as what - a memento mori?), but then he gave a short bark of a laugh, turned on his heel and left.
***
Crossposted from Dreamwidth -- Comments there:
In other news, I managed to get a solitary blue and white bran flake in my pack of otherwise-normal Bran Flakes this week. I get the white frosting, but I didn't think we had blue breakfast cereal in the UK. Where did the blue come from? Is it an alien plot?
Title: Loose Ends (or Five Times Pieces of Silver Changed Hands)
Author: lost_spook
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1952
Characters/Pairings: Don Henderson & Pamela Wilder, Susan Weldon & Colin Townley, Lincoln Dowling/Pamela Wilder, Kenneth Bligh/Justine Bligh, John Wilder.
Notes/Warnings: Spoilers; mentions of character death; wilful obscurity.
Summary: ”Have you heard it said that power is a Dead Sea fruit?” Five conversations between the players of the game - five small moments of betrayal (or business as usual).
For persiflage_1 in the 500 Prompts Meme: #50 - Betrayal - The Power Game.
***
1. Mistress & Loyal Hound
“Yes, I know,” said Pamela, halting her complaints at Don’s lack of response, “you can’t say anything against your master, can you?”
Don gave her a reproachful look. “There’s no need to put it quite like that, thank you.”
Pamela leant back into the sofa, her legs curled under her as she nursed a glass of brandy. She’d been abandoned by her husband for the night and very likely the weekend - again - but she was not alone, since John had kindly sent her his assistant, or whatever it was Don Henderson technically was at the moment. (Some sort of manager or director, or managing director. The titles changed, but not the fundamentals of his role.)
“Well, what else is it? Any other rational human being would have to agree that John is behaving abominably, but not you. It puts you in an impossible position.” She shot him a measuring look from under her lashes. “You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’d be worse.”
“Eh?” said Don, starting in his armchair. “Worse than what?”
She frowned at him. “Pay attention, Donald. Worse than John! You’d have me on a pedestal.”
“No I shouldn’t. Sounds far too uncomfortable, if you ask me.”
Pamela laughed and leant her head against the sofa. “Don! But, you know, I do feel rather like that now, and it isn’t very me. Whoever me is anymore.”
“I don’t know if it’s the brandy, me, or you, but I’m not following half this conversation.”
She sighed. “It isn’t that difficult. On a pedestal - or no, I mean a monument, don’t I? Patience on a monument turning all shades of green and yellow melancholy. How the hell did that happen?”
“Well, if you don’t know, I don’t,” said Don, unhelpfully, and finished his drink.
*
He halted in the doorway on his way out, later. “That was damned insulting, by the way, Pamela. I’ll have you know that if it were me, which it isn’t, the last thing I’d do with you is put you on a pedestal. Or a monument.”
She leaned against the wall. “I’m almost curious enough to ask,” she said, and then laughed. “But only almost. And you’re right, Don. It was insulting. Thoughtless, at any rate.”
“As long as you’re suitably penitent, I don’t mind,” said Don, and gave her a grin before leaving.
Pamela pulled a face to herself. “Not all that much I’m not,” she said, and then turned back into the empty room with a sigh.
She did like Old Faithful - very much so - but she couldn’t trust him. He was, now and always, John’s man, and not hers. The loyal hound not only kept his mistress company; naturally, he was also a watch dog.
2. Civil Servants
“Mr Townley,” said Susan Weldon, when they met at the restaurant. It was at his request, though she wasn’t sorry to see him again - she hadn’t, not since he’d been transferred away from his position as Under Secretary to the National Export Board back to some lesser-frequented corner of the Treasury. “It’s been a while.”
He waited for her to sit, and then took his own chair. “True. Not many people choose to visit the doghouse, do they?”
“If you’ve asked me here so that I can feel sorry for you again, I’ll have to leave,” she said, taking up her cigarette. “It has been fairly proved by now that it never ends well for at least one of us.”
Colin laughed. “No, no. Nothing of the sort. I’ll feel sorry for you, if you like. I imagine working for Caswell Bligh - let’s say it can’t be easy.”
“It would be improper of me to comment,” said Susan, but gave a smile. “As you very well know.”
Colin nodded. “But of course. I merely wondered if that was why - a difference of opinion, perhaps -?”
“No, you’ve lost me,” Susan said.
“A trifle oblique? Merely that I was curious as to whether it was somebody else’s manoeuvre or if you wanted an excuse to - shall we say, extricate yourself?”
“I’m still mystified, sorry,” said Susan. “You’ll have to spell it out.”
Colin looked at her over the top of the menu. “Your new secretary. The name I’ve heard mooted is Richard Langton.”
“What?” said Susan, staring back at him. She knew that Caswell Bligh was supposed to be pushing for her promotion rather than a new secretary to the Board (to replace Colin’s little-loved replacement), and the chances of someone else pulling in a different direction were high, but that was a new name on her. “Isn’t he the one who -?”
“Thinks the corridors of power will crumble if a woman so much as enters them while in search of the nearest exit?” said Colin. “Oh, yes. That was why I wondered. It would be an excuse to leave.”
Susan lowered her cigarette. “I couldn’t possibly work with Langton.”
“Not you, no,” said Colin. “There would be explosions at the NEB, I should think. Probably heard all over Whitehall.”
She frowned. “But who -?” Because whoever had suggested it was deliberately angling for her departure from the Board, and she didn’t know who that could be. Unless Caswell was lying, he was in her favour, and even if Wilder wanted her kept in her place, he wouldn’t want her to leave the NEB, not yet, as she knew only too well. Not as long as she was still useful to him there.
“I believe,” said Colin, looking amused, “that Charles Grainger has been taking an interest.”
“Charles Grainger?”
“Who is a friend of the Wilders,” he added, and then smiled. “Although I do believe he is chiefly a friend of Lady Wilder.”
Susan had to laugh. “Pamela! Well, you’ve got to hand it to her, haven’t you?”
“I may not have much influence in my current position,” said Colin, “but that was all I needed to know. If you’re not in favour of the appointment, I can ensure it doesn’t happen.”
She gave him a sidelong glance. “And how would you do that, Mr Townley?”
“I do have a passing acquaintance with Langton. Enough to ask if he’s really interested in taking up something that is rumoured to be something of a dead horse.”
“I hadn’t heard that,” said Susan. “Is it true?”
Colin shrugged. “It’s true that it’s a rumour. As to whether or not it’s a matter of fact, you’re better placed than I am to hear.”
“Caswell doesn’t think so.”
“And he should know,” said Colin. “So there we are, and we may now enjoy our lunch. We ought to do this again sometime, wouldn’t you say?”
Susan gave a wry smile. “We ought,” she said. “But we won’t, will we? One has to be so careful whom one makes a habit of lunching with.” She lunched to her own advantage: possible useful contacts for the future and a careful selection of thirty or forty-something divorcees from the Treasury in her efforts to distance herself from Wilder. Colin Townley didn’t come into any of those categories. And she, no doubt, had a reputation that wouldn’t do a married colleague any favours if he was repeatedly seen with her. It was all rather ironic, really, when she liked him as well as the others, if not better.
“I’d forgotten how blunt you can be,” said Colin with a wince. “Correct, nevertheless.”
Susan leant forward. “I am sorry. And I do appreciate your doing this. I’ll even risk feeling sorry for you now, if you want to unburden the sorrows of your current backwater appointment. It would only be fair.”
“I don’t think we need go that far,” said Colin, stiffly. “Besides, I wouldn’t quite say backwater, would you?”
She raised an eyebrow. “You were the one who said doghouse. Which is worse?”
“Mere hyperbole,” said Colin, retreating into his customary discretion. “There are challenges and opportunities there, as everywhere.”
Susan grinned. “Of course. Silly of me.”
3. Unsafe Associations
“You’re not nice to know,” Pamela had said to Lincoln Dowling not so long before. “You’re not safe to be with.” And he’d pointed out that nevertheless she kept on meeting him. He was John’s private secretary, so of course she had to see him. Neither of them could help it.
She let her glance slide across at him from the painting that was supposed to be holding her attention. He smiled instantly, already watching her.
“Lincoln,” said Pamela, sternly. “You must look at the art sometimes, you know.”
Lincoln only smiled again.
“Well, thank you for the compliment,” said Pamela, “but what will it do for the conversation when we go to lunch in a minute, and I say ‘Oh, Lincoln, what did you think of that fascinating piece, the terribly violent red one?’ And you won’t even know which one I mean. It’s charming of you, but not very considerate.”
Lincoln studied her further. “I daresay we’ll think of an alternative.” He paused, a flicker of amusement passing over his face. “Topic of conversation, that is.”
“Yes,” she said. “That’s what worries me.”
She’d also said, to him, and to herself, that it wasn’t even the betrayal of John she minded - that was only fair, when you came down to it - but she’d sworn to herself that this would never happen again, and it was such a lost feeling inside, betraying oneself.
Standing in front of the painting, their fingers tangled together.
4. Hopeless Causes
When Kenneth Bligh emerged from the Foreign Office, he found Justine waiting for him on the steps. She took his arm.
“Don’t say anything,” she said. “The car’s waiting - come back with us.”
Kenneth didn’t pull away but he hunched slightly. She could see that he was still close to tears. “This doesn’t change anything, you know,” he said. Ironically, there was something of his father’s bluster and pride underlying the words.
“I said, don’t say anything,” Justine told him. “The children want you. They’ve just lost their grandfather. For today, that’s all, Ken.”
Kenneth nodded.
“Good,” she said, and led him over to the car. Caswell’s death would inevitably change things, whatever he thought, but she wasn’t sure in what way, or whether it would be any use. Ken had always accused her of taking his father’s side against him, but for her there never had been any sides to take. She’d simply had the misfortune to love both her husband and her father-in-law, while Ken couldn’t see anything but treason in that fact. She knew how dreadful Caswell could be when he chose, but there was no other poison in their marriage.
And if the trouble was all in Ken’s mind, there was no guarantee the problem would die with Caswell. But that was all incidental for today. Today she was holding onto Ken, even if it was only for one last time.
5. Late Rivals
Sir John Wilder approached the desk, touching some of the abandoned papers with impatient, idle curiosity. The empty study hadn’t yet dispelled the ghost of its former occupant: there were papers and other oddments on the desk and the smell of Lord Bligh’s pipe tobacco lingered still.
“You old devil, Caswell,” said Wilder. “I’d have beaten you in the end, and you know it. I suppose that’s why you had to resort to cheating - your usual tactics.”
Dying was an illegal move in the game, an unfair gambit, but not, when you came down to it, much of a victory. Wilder experienced a brief, uncharacteristic impulse to take a souvenir from the desk (as what - a memento mori?), but then he gave a short bark of a laugh, turned on his heel and left.
***
Crossposted from Dreamwidth -- Comments there: