High society by Ben Elton Page A

lunch with the Party Chairman. I think they’re beginning to realize that I’m not going to back off and that I may be on to something.’
    ‘D’you still think there’s any danger of their withdrawing the whip? Chucking you out, even?’
    ‘I doubt it, but it’s possible. My line is that this has to be a conscience issue and that the government and the party should allow a free vote. The Chairman’s line, of course, is that I’m a dangerous, crazy drug-pusher, which actually I don’t mind at all. Churchill was a maverick. You have to be a stirrer if you want to get on.’
    ‘Oh, so suddenly you’re Churchill already?’
    Peter Paget got into bed beside his wife. It was two thirty. Knowing that Angela would be awake, he had taken the Viagra while driving home. One hour. Perfect, better get a move on. Even before Peter had begun his affair with Samantha he had been finding it increasingly difficult to maintain an acceptable level of sexual activity with his wife. Since Samantha had begun to satisfy him so regularly it had become nearly impossible. Viagra had saved him. He still found Angela attractive in a sort of a way, and the little blue pills gave him just enough edge to muster a performance. Once a week was quite enough, though, and, Brits or no Brits, tonight was the night.

THE PRIORY CLINIC
    M y name is Emily and I am a cocaine addict…’
    Emily reviewed the circle of faces, a mixed group, of screw-ups. Druggies, alkies, eating disorders and even a sex addict — a compulsive masturbator to be precise. Emily knew one or two of them slightly — the supermodel and the American actress. Not, she was glad to note, the masturbator.
    ‘…So I’d got to where Tommy kicked me out of the cab, hadn’t I? I suppose I should be grateful to him. In fact I am grateful to him, because it wasn’t until I found myself sitting in the gutter on Brixton High Street that I realized how mightily I was ruining my life. Well, if I’m honest, the realization was not immediate. Brixton High Street wasn’t quite the road to Damascus, but it would eventually turn out to be the road to recovery of sorts. The road to here. Of course, as the lights turned green and Tommy’s limo pulled away I was absolutely transfixed with terror. I’m not going to lie to you and say it wasn’t about colour, because it was. I’ve met very few black people in my life, and when I have it’s been mainly abroad — servants and hotel staff in Africa and the Caribbean, you know the sort of thing. There were two black girls at my school. One was royalty and the other a president’s daughter. They seemed like nice enough girls, but I never really spoke to them, and I’m ashamed to confess that we called them the Coco Pops. They said they didn’t mind, that they thought it was funny, but I doubt they did. Anyway, there I was in the gutter, and suddenly almost every face I could see was either black or brown and there were plenty of them because, let’s face it, when a girl in a tiny little Gucci number falls out of a stretch limo and rolls into the gutter, flashing her G-string and shrieking obscenities, you’re going to stare, aren’t you? I had no money, no cards and no phone and that alone would be enough to make me feel utterly naked (which I practically was anyway), but on top of that I felt like I had been parachuted into an entirely alien land. I was suddenly in my own private chapter of Bonfire of the Vanities. I was terrified, absolutely shitting myself. Of course, the fact that my system was saturated with cocaine was not helping my state of mind. It makes you paranoid, you know. Well, I expect most of you know that.
    Anyway, a few people, kids mainly, were sniggering and laughing, but mostly people seemed surprised. I don’t blame them. After all, I was the alien, not them. Anyway, I must have sat there for as long as a minute before a big man with dreadlocks leant down and reached out his hand to me, but instead of taking it I