Snow Job Read Online Free Page B

after a Bloc Québécois member gave her his spot. Julien Chambleau, Iberville-Chambly.
    “Ah, Julien — I believe he has taken a fancy to Ms. Blake. But not to worry.”
    Worry? Why should Arthur worry? He’d gotten over all those petty jealousies, a bad habit induced by decades of playing the spineless cuckold to his first wife. It bothered him not at all thatMargaret was regularly surrounded by charming men at cocktail events. Her only affair was with politics.
    “And what issue has she chosen?”
    “Bhashyistan.”
    “She must use care duelling with Lafayette.”
    Arthur continued on up to the Members’ Gallery, settled near the front, with a full view of Opposition desks. Including Margaret’s, tucked behind the Liberal backbenchers. It was rare she got a shot at Question Period. It happened maybe once a month.
    The Opposition leader and prime minister in waiting, Claude McRory — known by all as Cloudy — was in his seat glaring at nothing in particular, a short morose man of pensionable age with a caustic manner and a deficient sense of humour.
    The tribal rituals of the House were under way, Orders of the Day, bills introduced, the welcoming of constituents in the gallery. Today’s lot included a championship Saguenay bowling team, a young woman from Southern Ontario who’d rescued twelve cows from a burning barn, and the winner of the Prince Edward Island Monster Potato Contest.
    Here came Margaret, bending the ear of … yes, that must be the
separatiste
Chambleau, young and dapper, a ring in his ear. Arthur could remember when that used to mean gay, but these days it was anybody’s guess. A Green sympathizer,
très vert
.
    Question Period opened with Opposition Leader McRory rising to a standing ovation from his members: a form of silliness that both sides of the House engaged in for the TV cameras. Arthur was constantly amazed at the puerility on display here; it reinforced his disdain for politics.
    McRory seemed unable to frame a question, contenting himself with a blustery speech about “an exponential rise” in home foreclosures. Clara Gracey had numbers at her fingertips and taunted the Liberal chief for relying on an aberrant statistic — in fact, foreclosures had held steady in the last quarter and were projected to fall. Tory backbenchers rose like marionettes in furious applause.
    She and Lafayette were the bright lights of a lustreless cabinet, a patchwork group chosen more for regional interest than keen intellect. Arthur found the Liberal Opposition no more impressive, while the smaller parties of the moderate left, the New Democrats and the Bloc Québécois, were relegated to the role of irritants. The country was in a sorry state.
    A question from the NDP leader about a stalled bill to control gasoline prices was quickly parried by Prime Minister Finnerty. “I recognize that the honourable member has a serious problem with gas …” The rest was drowned out by laughter, shouts of derision, applause, table pounding.
    Awaiting her call, Margaret looked serene and confident in a smart tailored suit. Arthur was finding it hard to bring back a picture of her in muddy jeans pitching hay at Blunder Bay. Constant in her vows, committed to her ideals, quick as a whip — how unlike his first wife, Annabelle, from whose perfidy he’d found escape in a bottle.
    “Recognize the member for Cowichan and the Islands.”
    “Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Honourable Minister of Foreign Affairs inform the House why he is proposing an exchange of ambassadors with the so-called Democratic Republic of Bhashyistan, a tyrannical regime whose jails are bursting with dissidents, people of faith, and homosexuals, and which makes virtual slaves of half its remaining population — those unfortunate enough not to have been born with penises?”
    Gerard Lafayette, who had been conferring with the prime minister, looked up, seemingly startled at the bold mention of the male reproductive organ. There was a