In High Places by Arthur Hailey Page A

Christmas Eve.'
    'I hadn't forgotten. But this is too important to stand over.'
    When she had hung up she checked the time from the tiny leather travelling clock which stood beside the telephone and resisted a temptation to return to bed. Instead she closed the open window, then crossed to the tiny kitchenette and put on coffee. After that, returning to the living-room, she switched on a portable radio. The coffee was beginning to perk when the 6.30 radio news carried the official announcement of the Prime Minister's forthcoming talks in Washington.
    Half an hour later, still in pyjamas, but this time with the old moccasins on her feet, she began to call the five committee members at their homes.
    The Minister of External Affairs was first. Arthur Lexington responded cheerfully, 'Sure thing, Milly. I've been at meetings all night, what's another more or less? By the way, did you hear the announcement?'
    'Yes,' Milly said. 'It was just on the radio.'
    'Fancy a trip to Washington?'
    'All I ever get to see on trips,' Milly said, 'is the keyboard of a typewriter.'
    'You must come on one of mine,' Lexington said. 'Never need a typewriter. All my speeches are on the backs of cigarette packets.'
    Milly said, "They sound better than most that aren't.'
    'That's because I never worry.' The External Affairs Minister chuckled. 'I start with the assumption that nothing I say can make the situation worse.'
    She laughed.
    'I must go now,' Lexington said, 'it's a big occasion in our house - I'm having breakfast with my children. They want to sec how much I've changed since last time I was home.'
    She smiled as she wondered just what breakfast would be like this morning in the Lexington household. Bordering on bedlam probably. Susan Lexington, who had been her husband's secretary years before, was a notoriously poor housekeeper, but the family seemed close-knit when doing things together while the Minister was home in Ottawa. Thinking of Susan Lexington, Milly was reminded of something she had once been told: different secretaries go different ways; some get laid and married, others old and harried. So far, she thought, I've half a point each way. I'm not old, or married either.
    She might have been married, of course, if her life had been less oriented to the life of James McCallum Howden...
    A dozen years or so ago, when Howden had been merely a backbench MP, though a forceful, rising figure in the party, Milly, his young, part-time secretary, had fallen blindly and blissfully in love with him to the point where she longed for each new day and the delight of their physical closeness. She had been in her twenties then, away from her home in Toronto for the first time, and Ottawa had proved a virile and exciting world.
    It seemed even more virile on the night that James Howden, having guessed her feelings, had made love to her for the first time. Even now, ten years later, she remembered the way it had been: early evening; the House of Commons adjourned for dinner; herself sorting letters in Howden's parliamentary office when he had come in quietly. Without speaking he had locked the door and, taking Milly by the shoulders, turned her towards him. Both knew that the other MP who shared the office with Howden was away from Ottawa. '
    He kissed her and she responded ardently, without pretence or reserve, and later he had taken her to the leather office couch. Her awakening, bursting passion, and a total lack of inhibition surprised even herself.
    It was the beginning of a time equalled in joy by no other part of Milly's life, before or since. Day after day, week after week, their clandestine meetings were contrived, excuses minted, minutes snatched ... At times their affair took on the pattern of a game of skill. At other moments it seemed as if life and love were geared for their devouring.
    Milly's adoration of James Howden was deep and consuming. She was less certain of his feelings for her, even though he frequently declared them to be