Tuesday, 1 April – 30 days until Election Day

IT’S PISSING DOWN WHEN I leave the house. Usually, I trust my Gore-Tex outers to keep me dry enough on my bike, but since Clare’s accident I am less relaxed about cycling. Also, there is something to be said for arriving at my meeting not looking like a mutt who’s been locked out in a storm.

Outside my flat, on Highbury Fields, there’s a blue Peugeot 205, which I use so little that it costs me more in insurance than petrol. It’s filthy, the windscreen gummed with dirt and sap from the maple trees that fringe the street. I have to let the wipers run for five minutes before the windscreen’s clear enough.

As I sit in the driver’s seat, waiting, I look at the new notebook I have picked up from the FC’s stationery cupboard. The first few pages are already filled with scribbles about conversations I’ve had with contacts, some random, some specifically related to stories I’m chasing. A couple of pages from the back, I’ve created a separate section where I keep notes relating to Clare. It’s overkill hiding it there, because all the notes are scrawled in my peculiar variety of indecipherable shorthand that even GCHQ couldn’t crack (I too struggle to understand my own script). In more lucid moments, I tell myself I have no proof anyone stole my other notebook.

Even so, I’ve disguised my subjects. The page I’m looking at now is headed, simply, ‘Mole’, for Adrian Mole, my too obvious code for Jeremy. Underneath is a list of questions about his boss, the Chancellor, based on Ringer’s annoying hints.

Who did K speak to before dropping the policy?

Who is paying K’s bills?

Is K having an affair???

It’s a week since my lunch with Ringer and I have finally persuaded Jeremy to meet me. He kept putting me off with lame excuses about being too busy. Having been desperate to share his conspiracy theories with me, he’s become hesitant and anxious. Eventually I lost my patience and questioned whether he really cared about Clare. Stung, he’s agreed to meet me in St James’s Park, on the other side of the road from the Treasury.

Fifteen minutes later I am driving down Shaftesbury Avenue. The blue Nokia rings. I look over to where it’s lying on the passenger seat. Jess. I wedge the phone under my chin.

‘Hiya, boss.’

‘What’s up?’

‘Haven’t you heard?’

‘Heard what?’

‘Media Corp announced an agreed bid for Capital TV this morning. Both boards recommended. Two and a half billion pounds, all in Media Corp shares, 40 per cent premium to yesterday’s price.’

‘Shit, shit, shit!’ I think of Alex Elliott’s cast-iron denial in The Groucho, two weeks ago. ‘Elliott’s a mendacious toerag. You must be fuming.’