'You have to play the aces you're given.'

'Not five aces,' I said.

'What?'

'He would think it cheating.'

The volunteer raised his eyes to heaven but changed his approach. 'You see that thin man standing near your father, writing in a notebook?'

'Do you mean the one in a pink jogging suit and a baseball hat on backwards?'

'I do indeed. He's called Usher Rudd. He writes for the Hoopwestern Gazette Hoopwestern Gazette and his column is also syndicated to the and his column is also syndicated to the Quindle Diary Quindle Diary. It's he who wrote the personal attacks on Paul Bethune. He's been following Bethune around ever since his party chose him as their candidate. Rudd's a highly professional siever of mud. Never, never never trust him.' trust him.'

I said in apprehension, 'Does my father know who he is?'

'I told George that Usher Rudd would be bound to turn up again, but he doesn't always look the same. The pink overalls and baseball cap are new.'

'Usher Rudd's an unusual name.'

The volunteer laughed. 'He's really young Bobby Rudd, always a menace. His mother was Gracie Usher before she married a Rudd. The Rudd family have a string of repair garages, for anything from bicycles to combine harvesters, but fixing cars isn't to young Bobby's taste. He calls himself an investigative journalist. More like a muck-raker, I'd say.'

I said tentatively, 'Was he at the dinner last night?'

'That big do at the Sleeping Dragon? He would have been for a certainty. He'll be furious that the gunshot and all that happened was too late for today's Gazette Gazette. The Gazette Gazette is only twenty-four pages long, mostly advertisements, sports results, local news and re-hashed world events. Everyone buys it for the dirt Rudd digs up. He was a rotten peeping tom as a little boy, always had his snotty nose glued to people's windows, and he hasn't got better with time. If you want to have sex with the vicar, don't do it in Quindle.' is only twenty-four pages long, mostly advertisements, sports results, local news and re-hashed world events. Everyone buys it for the dirt Rudd digs up. He was a rotten peeping tom as a little boy, always had his snotty nose glued to people's windows, and he hasn't got better with time. If you want to have sex with the vicar, don't do it in Quindle.'

I said dryly, 'Thanks for the advice.'

He laughed. 'Beware of Bobby Rudd, that's all.'

With the present crowd listening to my galvanic father with devouring eyes as much as persuadable ears, I slowly strolled round to guard his back; I was some poor sort of guardian to my parent, I thought with self-condemnation, if I left him wide open to repeat bullets or other jokers.

I did my best to look purposeless, but clearly failed with that message as Usher Rudd, also as if guileless, came to stand casually beside me. His baseball cap advertised vigorous sports goods, as did his footwear, and he wore between, from neck to ankle, a soft rose-pink loose exercise suit of nylon-like fabric which, instead of hiding the thinness of his body inside, gave an impression that the arms and legs functioned on a system of articulated rods. I, in my jeans and T-shirt, looked almost invisibly ordinary.

'Hello,' he said. 'Where is the Juliard battle-wagon?'

Puzzled, I answered, 'We came in a different car.'

'I'm Usher Rudd.'

His accent was unreconstructed Dorset, his manner confident to arrogant. He had unexcited blue eyes, sandy lashes and dry freckled skin: the small-boy menace who had peeped through windows still lived close to the surface and made me for once feel older than my years.

'What's your name?' he demanded, as I made no response.

'Benedict,' I said.

'Ben,' he asserted, nodding his recognition, 'Ben Juliard.'

'That's right.'

'How old are you?' He was abrupt, as if he had a right to the information.

'Seventeen,' I said without offence. 'How old are you you?'

'That's none of your business.'

I gazed at him with a perplexity that was at least half genuine. Why should he think he could ask questions that he himself would not answer? I had a lot to learn, as my father had said; but I instinctively didn't like him.

Close behind my back my father was answering the sort of questions it was proper he should be asked: where did he stand on education, foreign policy, taxes, the dis-united kingdom and the inability of bishops to uphold the ten commandments? 'Shouldn't sins be modernised?' someone shouted. Moses was out of date.

My father, who certainly lived by 'thou shalt not' rather than by 'what can I get away with?' replied with humour, 'By all means pension off Moses if you would like your neighbour to covet your ox and your ass and carry off your wife and your lawn mower...'

The end of his sentence drowned in laughter and cheers, and for fifteen more minutes he had them spellbound, feeding them political nuggets in nourishing soup, producing a performance without microphone or footlights that they would never forget. All my life people would say to me, 'I heard your father speak in Quindle,' as if it had been a revelation in their existence: and it wasn't altogether what what he said that mattered, I reckoned, but his whole, honest, joyous, vigorous presentation. he said that mattered, I reckoned, but his whole, honest, joyous, vigorous presentation.

Against the final applause, Usher Rudd said to me, 'Birthday?'

'What?'

'Your birthday?'

'Yes,' I said.

'Yes, what?'

'Yes, I do have a birthday.'

He thought me dim. 'What's your mother's name?' he said.

'Sarah.'

'Her last name?'

'Yes. She's dead.'

His expression changed. His gaze grew thoughtful and flicked downward to the Quindle Diary Quindle Diary that I held rolled in my hand. I saw him understand the obtuseness of my answers. that I held rolled in my hand. I saw him understand the obtuseness of my answers.

'Bethune deserves it,' he said sharply.

'I don't know anything about him,' I said.

'Then read my column.'

'Even then...'

'Everyone has secrets,' he declared with relish. 'I just find them out. I enjoy doing it. They deserve it.'

'The public has a right to know?' I asked.

'Of course they do. If someone is setting themselves up to make our laws and rule our lives they shouldn't sleaze it off with dirty sex on the side, should they?'

'I haven't thought about it.'

'If old George is hiding dirty secrets, I'll find them out. What's your mother's name?'

'Sarah. She's dead.'

He gave me a bitter antagonistic glare.

'I'm sure you do a good detective job,' I said mildly. 'My mother's name was Sarah Juliard. Married. Dead. Sorry about that.'

'I'll find out,' he threatened.

'Be my guest.'

My father disengaged himself from eager clutching voters and turned to say he was ready for his lunch engagement: a volunteers' gathering in a pub.

'This,' I said, indicating the inhabitant of the pink tracksuit and the energetic shoes and baseball hat, 'is Usher Rudd.'

'Nice to know you,' my father said, automatically ready to shake hands. 'Do you work for the party, er... Usher?'

'He writes for newspapers,' I said. I unrolled the Quindle Diary Quindle Diary so he could see the front page. 'He wrote this. He wants me to tell him my mother's name.' so he could see the front page. 'He wrote this. He wants me to tell him my mother's name.'

I was getting to know my father. Twenty-four hours earlier I wouldn't have been aware that a tiny tensing of muscles and a beat of silence meant a fizzingly fast assessment of unwelcome facts. Not only powerful but dauntingly rapid: not only analytical but an instant calculator of down-the-line consequences. Some brain.

He smiled politely at Usher Rudd. 'My wife's name was Sarah. Unfortunately she died.'

'What of?' Usher Rudd, disconcerted by my father's pleasant frankness, sounded aggressively rude.

'It was a long time ago.' My father remained civil. 'Come on, Ben, or we'll be late.'

We turned away and walked three paces; and Bobby Usher Rudd, darting round and wheeling in the running shoes, came to a halt facing us, standing in our way.

His voice was thin, malicious and triumphant. 'I'll get you de-selected. Orinda Nagle will have her rights.'

'Ah.' My father packed all the understanding in the world into one syllable. 'So you rubbished Paul Bethune to give her a clear run, is that it?'

Usher Rudd was furious. 'She's worth ten of you.'

'She's a lucky woman to have so many fans.'

'You'll lose.' Usher Rudd almost danced with rage. 'She would have won.'

'Well...' My father detoured past him with me at his heels, and Usher Rudd behind us yelled the question I would never have asked but wanted like crazy to know the answer to. 'If your wife died long ago, what do you do for sex?'

My father certainly heard but there wasn't a falter in his step. I risked a flick of a glance at his face but learned nothing: he showed no embarrassment or anxiety, only, if anything, amusement amusement.

The lunch in the pub was up-beat, the volunteers all intoxicated with the speech stops of the morning. In the afternoon we toured a furniture factory and then a paint factory, where the candidate (leaning on his walking stick) listened intently to local problems and promised remedies if he were elected. He shook countless hands and signed countless autographs, and left behind an atmosphere of hope.

When Mervyn Teck had made his plans he had expected it to be Orinda who charmed the woodworkers and the colour mixers, and there had been resistance in parts of the factories to the one seen as a usurper. My father defused criticism by praising Orinda steadfastly without apologising for having been chosen to take her place.

'A natural-born politician,' one of the lady volunteers said in my ear. 'The way the country's leaning, we'd lose this marginal seat with Orinda, though she doesn't believe that, of course. With your father we've a better chance, but voters are unpredictable and can often be downright vindictive, and they mostly vote for party, not for individuals, and the sleaze accusations won't hurt Paul Bethune much, especially with male voters who privately don't think a spot of adultery too much of a big deal, and will think "good luck to him". And you'd fancy women wouldn't vote for adulterers, but they do.'

'Doesn't Usher Rudd shift the Xs from one slot to another?'

'Not as much as he believes, the little weasel. It's not the locals that pay attention to him as much as the big noises in Westminster. They're all shit-scared of him digging into their pasts, and the higher they climb the more they hate him. Haven't you noticed that when an MP screws up his or her reputation, it's their own party that dumps them quickest?'

The correct answer was no, I hadn't noticed, because I hadn't been looking.

On our way back to Hoopwestern I asked my father what he thought of Usher Rudd but he yawned, said he was flaked out and his ankle hurt, and promptly went to sleep. I drove carefully, still not instinctive in traffic, and woke the candidate by a jerking halt at a red light at a crossroads.

'Usher Rudd,' he said without preamble, as if twenty minutes hadn't passed between question and answer, 'will burn his fingers on privacy laws.'

I said, 'I didn't know there were any privacy laws.'

'There will be.'

'Oh.'

'Usher Rudd has red hair under that baseball cap.'

'How do you know?'

'He came to the meeting after last night's dinner. Polly pointed him out to me. He wore a black tracksuit and black trainers. Didn't you see him?'

'I don't remember him.'

'Find out if he can shoot.'

I opened my mouth to say 'Wow' or 'How?' and thought better of both. My father glanced at me sideways, and I felt him smile.

'I don't think it was him,' I said.

'Why not?'

'His bullets of choice are acid ink.'

'Are you sure you want to be a mathematician? Why don't you try writing?'

'I want to be a jockey.' Might as well walk on the moon.

'Exeter University required to know where you would spend your gap year before they offered you a deferred entry: that is to say, you're going there not this October, but next year. They weren't enthusiastic about racecourses.'

'There's an Exeter racecourse.'

'You know damned well what they mean.'

'I don't like politics.' Change the subject.

'Politics are the oil of the world.'