Eminence Grise
A Thursday Prompt story
©2023 by Walter Reimer

Prompt: The invisible lord flowers near a continuous moron.



The reporter stormed into the office at his newspaper, threw his notepad on his desk and growled, “The Prime Minister is an idiot.” The canine stamped off to get a cup of coffee, muttering to himself. Returning to his desk with a steaming mug (two sugars, cream) he sat and grumbled, “Confounded idiot.”

Another reporter, a terrier, glanced across his own desk at his fellow employee. “Are you saying that because she’s – “ He used both paws to pantomime a series of curves.

“No, I’m not,” the reporter growled. He took a gulp of his coffee, grimaced, and set the mug aside before picking up his pad. “Worst economy since the Depression hit, and she can’t understand why her budget caused so much trouble when she took it to the Parliament. Seriously, the last thing you do is cut social services when people are hurting!” He flipped a few pages on his pad and read aloud, “In reply to the question, ‘What do you say to those people who would have been hurt by your budget?’ the Prime Minister said, ‘I think that the budget was the right direction for the country, and the decision to withdraw it was clearly the wrong decision.’” The canine said, “And she was the one who withdrew it, after firing the Treasurer!”

“Yeah, it does sound like she doesn’t know which way is up,” the terrier conceded.

“Summerlord willing, we won’t see her around much longer,” the reporter said. “It almost makes you wonder if someone’s pulling the strings – you know, behind the curtain.”

“If she’s as dumb as you say, maybe so,” the terrier conceded, “but who?”

The canine took another deep drink of his coffee as a young whitetail buck walked past. The copy boy laid the midday edition of the paper, the Highpoint News, on his desk before moving on to place copies at each of the other desks in the newsroom. The canine glanced at the photograph on the front page and pointed at a tall wolf in the picture, standing several steps behind the Prime Minister as the roe doe faced a battery of radio microphones. “Him, maybe.”

“Who?” The terrier craned his neck and consulted his own copy. “That’s one of the Cabinet under-secretaries - I think.” He looked up. “Why would he do it?”

“Dunno,” the canine said, “but I think I’ll talk to the editor and see if I can look a little further.”


***


The whitetail buck glanced at his daughter as the doe paused the movie. “Father?”

“Yes, Electra?”

The heiress to the kingdom said, “I read about the crisis back in ’49 that caused Prime Minister Miller to quit, but there was a conspiracy?”

Herbert IV nodded. “It’s not generally known, at least not in the history books. It was the first time this century that the King had to dissolve Parliament and order Members arrested, but the real reasons were a little deeper and darker. Kervina had seen enough trouble, and there was no need to drag this out.”

“So she was under that fellow’s influence?”

The older buck nodded. “He was setting her up while he very carefully dug up enough dirt on her and the rest of the Cabinet to topple the Government and put himself forward.” His wife Ariadne nodded. “Obviously the movie has him under a different name and there’s a pointless romance between him and Miller.”

“And the reporter?”

“He was real,” Ariadne said. “The paper refused to believe him.”


Electra thought for a moment, gazing at the frozen image on the scene. “So, he went to the Royal Guard?”

Herbert smiled and nodded. “It was Captain Bach’s father, Hazyur, who collected enough information to convince the King to act.” He reached a paw out to the remote control and paused. “Do you want to see how this ends?”

“Oh, yes,” Electra said, and she sat back as the stream resumed.



end