“The Hughes revelation is the gaggle of mad weasels in the chicken coop,” Caius continued. “I think he goes down badly, unless Hughes completely faked his data, and fooled our friends outside Parliament. They are hard to fool. And Hughes has now put up a considerable series of these transactions, all illegal.”

“Thank you,”DeWitt said. “I agree that Drummond-McLaren is doomed. That’s my sense of Parliament, which agrees with your brilliant nose counting. As the largest opposition party, we get to nominate a caretaker government, unless we can cobble together a majority. Can we do that?”

“Tricky,” Caius answered. “Assuming the National Renaissance Party goes into opposition, less whatever Hughes leads out of their wreckage, we are not close to a majority. We need to reach out both ways, to the Union Democrats, the Popular Democrats, and someone else. Most other parties would choke on joining a government that contained the National Front. Radicals are against coalitions.”

“The National Front,” DeWitt said, “has several sensible policy proposals…yes, accidents do happen. National Technical Universities, not our plank but something with support in lots of places, comes to mind. That also brings in, I suspect, Glorious Day Alberg and his faction of the NRP.”

“First things first!” Ricardo Sanchez shouted. “Three cheers for Elektra, and for Aston Hughes!”
Cheers followed.

The Committee broke into song.

“For she’s a jolly good fellow,
For she’s a jolly good fellow!
She kicked him in the…” The next word was obscured by the meeting gong.
And booted him through the walls!
For she’s a jolly good fellow,
For she’s a jolly good fellow!”

A standing ovation was followed by shouts “Speech! Speech!”