Ghostwritten

 The meeting room where the Cabinet traditionally met was quiet except for the Minister’s breathing, which rose and fell like the tides of the sea.  He was sitting in the central chair of the long table on the side that looked across the room to the windows, which in turn looked out onto the remains of St James’s Palace, and turning the pages of a thick book that looked, at first glance, like a novel.  Every now and then he would murmur ‘hmm’ gently and at one point he sighed and carefully tore a page from the book, discarding it into the waste-paper bin.

The silence was broken by a knock at the door; a steady rat-a-tat-tat that gave no indication of how nervous the knocker might be.  The Minister, whose favour was mercurial and ephemeral, was certain that the visitor would be nervous, however.

“Come,” he called, aiming for imperious. His voice was stentorian and resounded off the walls and a picture trembled in its frame.  The door creaked open slowly, and his Aide came in followed by the Private Secretary.  He smiled at the Aide, who name he couldn’t remember, and frowned slightly at the Private Secretary as though he couldn’t remember who this woman was either.

“Minister,” said the Aide, smiling back.  She looked moderately uncomfortable, which the Minister felt was appropriate for her station and replaceability.

“Indeed,” he said, since he really couldn’t remember her name.  He was sure he’d known it at one point.  It wasn’t terribly important, just a nuisance that he couldn’t use it to let her know her place.  “I am thinking of a biography.”

The Aide looked at the book in front of him.  “Kissinger’s?” she asked.  “Although I thought that was a two-volume affair.”

“I can have two volumes?  Or… maybe more?”

“Usually it depends on how much of one’s life one has to write about,” said the Aide.  “Though there are so-called celebrities out there who seem to manage multiple volumes based on the same three sad stories.  Do I understand you to want to write your own biography?”

“I hardly think the Minister has time for that,” said the Private Secretary.  The Minister felt she sounded a touch indignant.  The woman was in her late fifties, a career civil servant, and was dressed like his memories of the Queen.

“I don’t,” he said.  “I’m not even sure I’d know how to go about writing a book.  There are people to do that already though, aren’t there?”

The Aide and the Private Secretary exchanged a look and the Minister wondered what was contained in it.  From where he was sat they both looked confused; but he’d been pretty clear with what he’d said.  Perhaps… perhaps it was time for them both to have a mandatory mental-health checkup.

“Do you mean authors?” asked the Private Secretary after a longer pause than the Minister liked.

“Or ghostwriters?” asked the Aide.  “They do similar, but slightly different jobs.  Like… doctors and nurses, say.”

“The one that writes it for me,” said the Minister.  “Are you always both this tiresome?”  He noticed with secret joy that they both straightened up just a little at this indication that his mood might be slipping.

“Ghostwriters then,” said the Private Secretary.  Was it the Minister’s imagination or did she sound disapproving?  “Do you have anyone specific in mind, Minister?”  Before he could answer she spoke again: “You can, of course, tender to the lower bidder, but if you particularly like someone’s writing style, or feel that a particular author would reflect your world-view in their own, you might prefer to approach them directly.”

“Stephen King, perhaps,” said the Aide, who was leafing through the torn pages from the bin.  The Private Secretary coughed.

“Who?” said the Minister.  “No, actually I… well, maybe.  Maybe.  You mentioned Kissinger, before, right?”

The Aide and the Private Secretary exchanged another look and the Minister decided to add a mandatory hearing test to their mental-health checkup.

“He’s nearly dead, Minister,” said the Aide.  She said it slowly as though she were choosing her words carefully.

“And perhaps his reputation might be considered?” asked the Private Secretary.  She sounded as though that were an order.  The Minister bristled slightly.

“He is a diplomat and a statesman,” he said.  “What else is there to consider?”

“Vietnam?” murmured the Aide, but the Private Secretary was already speaking.

“His age makes him quite likely to die before completing your biography, Minister, and even if he doesn’t he has made some derogatory statements concerning policies of yours.  Would it really be a good idea to let him have free reign to criticise you in your own book?”

“I get to edit it before it gets published!”

“Yes Minister, but will you?  Or will you delegate that to someone else as well?”

The Minister started to snarl a reply, but halted, resulting in just a growl.  He didn’t want to read his biography, he just wanted it written.  And who could he trust to get it right?

“I see,” he said.  “Who was that other guy you mentioned?  King?  Isn’t he a fiction writer?”

The Aide looked modestly surprised and the Private Secretary looked despondent.  The Minister decided that was a victory on both counts.

“Well Minister,” said the Aide, “were you intending to tell the truth throughout the whole book?  Or would it be useful if the… aha, real truth were brought to the fore?  The truth that is always there but is sometimes occluded by messy reality, as it were?  The aims behind the policies so that people’s failure to implement, aha, those policies can be emphasized?  The vision for the future that cannot be seen from the valley of the present?”

“Well,” said the Minister feeling rather pleased that the Aide was so understanding.  “That would be rather good, wouldn’t it?  A book that helps people in the here and now understand why we’re doing what we’re doing for them!  Capital idea!  Get me this King person and write me an autobiography!”