Page 202 - Bridget Jones's Diary - by Helen FIELDING

Horrible night. Kept waking up bathed in sweat, panicking about the difference

between the Ulster Unionists and SDLP and which of them Ian Paisley was
involved in.

Instead of being ushered into the office to meet the great Richard Finch, I was
left pouring sweat in reception for forty minutes thinking Oh my God who's the

Health Secretary? before being picked up by the singsong personal assistant -
Patchouli - who sported Lycra cycle shorts and a nose stud and blanched at my
Jigsaw suit, as if, in a hideously misjudged attempt to be formal, I had turned up
in a floor-length shot-silk Laura Ashley ball gown.

'Richard says to come to the conference, know what I'm sayin'?' she muttered,
powering off down a corridor while I scurried after her. She burst through a pink
door into a vast open_plan office strewn with piles of scripts, TV screens
suspended from the ceiling, charts all over the walls, and mountain bikes

propped against the desks. At the far end was a large oblong table where the
meeting was in progress. Everyone turned and stared as we approached.

A plump, middle_aged man with curly blond hair, a denim shirt and huge red

spectacles was jigging up and down at the end of the table.

'Come on! Come on!' he was saying, holding up his fists like a boxer. 'I'm
thinking Hugh Grant. I'm thinking Elizabeth Hurley. I'm thinking how come two

months on they're still together. I'm thinking how come he gets away with it.
That's it! How does a man with a girlfriend with looks like Elizabeth Hurley
have a blow job from a prostitute on a public highway and get away with it?
What happened to hell hath no fury?'

I couldn't believe this. What about the Shadow Cabinet? What about the Peace
Process? He was obviously trying to work out how he could get away with
sleeping with a prostitute himself. Suddenly, he was looking straight at me.

'Do you know?' The entire table of grunge youths stared. 'You. You must be
Bridget!' he shouted impatiently. 'How does a man with a beautiful girlfriend
manage to sleep with a prostitute, get found out and get away with it?'