Immense thanks to Jo Liddiard, Head of Marketing, who has picked up the book and run with it, ensuring its image is perfectly honed and recognised in all manner of brilliant ways; to Becky Bader, Sales Director, who has, quite simply, ensured A Question of Trust is to be found in every shopping outlet in the land and indeed in space, if you count the internet; and Georgina Moore, Communications Director, who has sprinkled news of the book like fairy dust, in her inimitable way, into just about every facet of the media it could possibly be.
If you can judge a book by its cover, then A Question of Trust is the most glamorous, dazzling and beautiful ever; huge gratitude to Yeti Lambregts who designed it. It has left everyone who has seen it gasping.
I don’t think we’d have seen the book on the shelves for many a long moon, and certainly well past its proper date, without the calm, tireless efficiency of Amy Perkins, Editorial Assistant, who has somehow managed to see the manuscript in its various stages is always on time, wherever it’s supposed to be, when it’s supposed to be there.
A thousand thanks to my brilliant agent, Clare Alexander, who, apart from the more obvious agent-y gifts which she possesses in spades, has a kind of eighth sense that has her ringing me when I am a despairing, limp heap, and leaves me feeling lit up, freshly inspired and like a million dollars.
And finally, my four lovely, lovely daughters, Polly, Sophie, Emily and Claudia, who even after all these years and all these books, know how much I need cossetting and encouraging from time to time and in spite of all the other calls on their time and attention, like husbands, children and careers, never ever fail me.
Character List
Tom Knelston, a young left-wing solicitor, with political ambitions
Jack Knelston, his father, the postman in West Hilton, a small Hampshire village where Tom has grown up
Mary Knelston, his mother
Colin and Arthur Knelston, his brothers
Jess Knelston, his eldest sister
lsobel Parsons, Tom’s godmother
Alan Parsons, her husband and heir to Parsons, a large department store in Hilchester, the nearby town
Miss Rivers, Tom’s teacher at primary school
Tristram Sherrin, history master at the grammar school
Angela Smithers, Tom’s first girlfriend, a salesgirl at Parsons
Pemberton & Marchant, firm of solicitors where Tom works as a trainee
Gordon Pemberton and Basil Marchant, the two partners there
Nigel Pemberton, Gordon’s son, also a trainee
Betty Foxton, secretary to the two partners
Mr Roberts, chairman of the Hilchester branch of the Labour Party
Ted Moore, Labour Party member and Tom’s champion there
Laura Leonard, a teacher and staunch member of the Labour Party
Edith, her mother
Babs, her sister
Brigadier Sir Gerald Southcott, local grandee, living at West Hilton Manor
Caroline, his wife
Diana, their beautiful, spoilt daughter
Michael, their elder son, a medical student
Richard, their younger son
Ned Welles, a fellow medical student and friend of Michael Southcott
Sir James Welles, his surgeon father, a consultant at St Peter’s, Ned’s first hospital
Sir Neil Lawson, chairman of the board of governors of St Luke’s, Ned’s second hospital
Sir Digby Harrington, on the board of governors of St Luke’s
Phillip Harrington, his son and a registrar
Jennifer, Ned’s secretary at his private practice
Persephone Welles, Ned’s beautiful mother who ran away with an artist when Ned was very young
George Tilbury, a boyfriend of Persephone’s
Susan Mills, a young patient of Ned’s
The Hon Johnathan Gunning, who Diana marries
Jamie, their son
Sir Hilary and Lady Vanessa Gunning, his parents
Piers and Timothy Gunning, Johnathan’s brothers
Catherine, a girlfriend of Johnathan’s
Sir Harold Morton, Diana’s obstetrician
Hugh Harding, her solicitor
Wendelien Bellinger, a socialite and Diana’s best friend
Ian Bellinger, her husband
Ludo Manners, good friend to Ned Welles and part of the Bellingers’ set
Cecily Manners, his wife
Betsey Southcott, married to Michael after the war, also one of the Bellingers’ set
Donald Herbert, a rich and successful businessman, and important power behind the throne of the Labour Party
Christine Herbert, his long-suffering wife
Robert Herbert, his brother, Islington solicitor, and Tom’s employer
Colin Davidson, Tom’s constituency agent
Alice Miller, a young nurse at St Thomas’ Hospital
Alec and Jean Miller, her parents
Philip Jordan, a doctor, her boyfriend
Kit, Lucy and Charlie, Alice and Tom’s children
Mrs Hartley, Tom and Alice’s kindly neighbour
Dr Redmond, their GP
Jillie Curtis, Alice’s best friend at boarding school, and a medical student
Geraldine and Peter Curtis, her rich and well connected left-wing parents
William Curtis, her uncle, a prominent obstetrician
Mrs Hemmings, cook and housekeeper to Jillie’s parents
Eleanor (Nell) Henderson, a young novelist
Julius Noble, her fiancé
Seth Gilbert, editor at Eleanor’s publishers
Patrick Brownlow, suitor of Jillie’s
Harry Campbell, the editor of the Daily News Jarvis McIntyre, the proprietor
Clive Bedford, the political editor
Josh Curtis, his assistant and cousin of Jillie
Philippa Parry, the women’s editor
Blanche Ellis Brown, fashion editor of Style magazine
Esmé, Diana’s agent when she becomes a model
Freddie Bateman, an American photographer
Miss Dickens, the editor of American Fashion Ottilie, her fashion editor
Leo Bennett, the diary editor of the Dispatch newspaper
His brother Marcus, a garden designer
Mark Drummond, proprietor of the Dispatch
Fiona Jenkins, a journalist on the Dispatch Ricky Barnes, a keen young trainee reporter on the Daily Sketch newspaper
Christian Greenfell, a vicar
Chapter 1
1936
Tom Knelston was very fond of saying that the first time he met Diana Southcott he had been up to his waist in shit.
And it was literally true; he had indeed been standing waist deep in a blocked drain outside his parents’ cottage and she had come riding up the lane on the rather fine bay mare she had just acquired and was putting through her paces before taking her out next time she rode to hounds.
‘Oh,’ she said, pulling the mare up. ‘Hello. That looks fun.’
Tom had looked up, trying to muster a smile in response to what she undoubtedly thought was a joke, thinking at one and the same time how beautiful she was – and how enragingly pleased with herself – and said, ‘Yes, it is. Want to join me? I could do with some help.’
‘I’d love to, but unfortunately I’d be late for luncheon. Good luck with it, though.’ And she pressed her heels into the mare’s sides and trotted on up the lane.
Tom looked after her for a moment – at her gleaming dark hair tucked neatly under her riding hat, at her perfectly cut hacking jacket, at her long slender legs encased in cream jodhpurs which, despite being spattered with mud, looked somehow immaculate – and returned to the drain.