The Buddha of Brewer Street Read Online Free PDF Page B

of his private secretaries would scour the room, ensuring that the gift from the visitor’s country was on prominent display. Rather like pulling the photograph of mother-in-law out of the drawer. In their own turn the Chinese were rather more subtle. Visitors to Beijing were invited to the Pearl Room where a table would be laden with strings of raw pearls, all carefully sized. They were for purchase, but at very generous prices. Yet inevitably in the diplomatic marketplace there was a careful order of things. Goodfellowe had been shown which sizes of pearl had been selected by his French counterpart, and then he had been shown those chosen by his Whitehall superior, and with great Oriental deftness had been encouraged to go a little bit better than the first while not daring to go as far as the second.
    Characteristically, Goodfellowe had screwed up the system and bought nothing. Couldn’t afford it, not at any price, not nowadays. Anyway, Elinor no longer had an appreciation of such things. Of anything, come to that, in those weeks when she climbed into her pit of depression and pulled the roof in on herself. It affected Goodfellowe, too. Despair would snap at his heels like a Black Dog, determined to pursue him. He called them Black Dog days – Churchill’s expression, and so apt; the initial effect was like hearing a dog growl, from very close behind on a stormy night. And recently there had been more of them. That’s why he’d had to get out. Before he was pulled down in the same way as Elinor.
    He dragged his attention back into the room. Madame Lin was nearing the end of her homily. Something about her Government’s desire to ensure that the contents of this protest be communicated directly to the highest levels of the British Government. A matter of the most considerable significance. Her sadness that the Secretary of State himself was abroad, unavailable. The strong implication that she was deeply dissatisfied at being able to see only Goodfellowe. A mere Minister. Here today, a has-been tomorrow. She didn’t use those words, but the sense hung heavily in her tone.
    That hurt. Of course the snub of offering up only him to hear the complaint was deliberate, the British Government getting its retaliation in first, but it served to emphasize that already he was a man of overwhelming unimportance. Thomas Goodfellowe. A sensation when at the Home Office. The rising star of the FCO. A man who with fortune might eventually have gone all the way. But not any more. Politicians never came back. There were too many colleagues to trample on the fallen. It was over. He was nothing. She knew it and was making it part of her official complaint. And he had to sit there and take it.
    Then it was over and he was handed a formal copy of the complaint, like an irresponsible driver receiving a speeding ticket. A pity, he thought. She was new in her post and, on the couple of occasions they had met, Goodfellowe had warmed to Madame Lin. Sad to end on such a sour note.
    He didn’t waste much time with his official response; they both knew the script by heart; indeed the details had been discussed beforehand by their underlings and advisers. The Dalai Lama was visiting Britain privately, not in any official capacity. Any contact he had with Ministers was in his role as a religious leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner, not as a political figure. And platitudes about there being no intention of Her Majesty’s Government to interfere in China’s internal affairs. After all, thought Goodfellowe, they were making enough of a mess of it on their own; they scarcely needed Britain’s help to add to the chaos.
    And then it was over. Madame Lin rose, bowed and made for the door. His last formal visitor as Minister of State was leaving. He thought the occasion should have been marked in some way. A little ceremony, a short speech, a small dedication, even a bottle or two. But already his private office was preparing for a new master. The