Treating myself to the craven indulgence of a second candle, I step up to the mirror of my sleeping chamber, and try again.

“Wife!” I call.“Wife! Am I close?”, Sarah steps from the bed and pads across the bare floorboards.

“Hush now, sire!” she says, laying a hand on my back. “You shall wake the bairn!”, “But wife!” I hiss, softly. “Am I close?”, She studies my face in the mirror, and sighs.

“No, husband,” she says, sadly. "You are not. There remains an excess of teeth. The gums maintain an aspect of menace. And the eyes! Oh, the eyes! I am sorry, Gordon. You have not yet learned how to smile.”

“Curses!” I say, and I extinguish the second light.

I had best not be seen today.

Tuesday

A pox on this inability! It confines me like a leper, gurning in my seclusion.

Meanwhile, the pressure mounts on Tony. A leaked memo this morning, outlining plans for his departure. Blue Peter, Songs of Praise, the Chris Evans show. Happy things. So easy for him, so hard for me.

On the Today programme this morning, I hear David Miliband, predicting that Tony will be gone within 12 months. I wait until he is off air, and then I call him.

“It might not take me that long,” I tell him, fingering the contours of my face, in the dusty gloom of my office.

I can hear the disdain in his voice. “Are you even grinning yet?” he says.

I slam down the telephone.

Wednesday

A wave of resignations. We sup on broth and dry bread. Then, under cover of darkness, I slip next door for conference with Tony. He is tetchy.

“For God’s sake,” he snaps, indicating the burning faggot in my hand.

“Put that thing out. We do have electricity on this side, you know.”

I hand it to a flunky. “This must cease,” I tell Tony. “You are jeopardising our agreement.”

This vexes him.“No Gordon!” he shouts. “You are! Peter and Alistair drew up a detailed plan! A twinkle in the eye by last November, a smirk by February, a chuckle by May and a smile by July! Where are you, Gordon? Where?”, I just glower at him. We both know I am sometime in last October.

I am unaccustomed to failure. I don’t know what to do.

Thursday

I can hide away no longer. Out, finally, into the light, for a speaking engagement at a leisure centre in Glasgow. Tony was giving a speech at a school in North London. Part of me wishes that I was at a school in North London, also. Although my wife does tell me that I am not quite ready for schools.

A strange thing happened, as I was leaving the school. I was in the back of my car. Reporters were shouting about Tony in crisis, and about how I could be Prime Minister in a few months. And then ... I lack the terms to describe it. Forces pulling at my cheeks. A twitch in my lips. I clamped a hand over my mouth, and called my wife.

“Wife!” I cried.“My face! It seems possessed. Is it a demon?”, “Och, husband!” said my wife, who had been watching on our black and white television. “I saw. I was so proud I felt my heart could break! It is a smile. Your first, real smile!”, Can this be so?

Friday

And now, somehow, I am under attack. From Charles Clarke, who has a face like the turnips my wife mashes for gruel.

“Gordon is not where he should be at the moment,” he told the press. “He is talented and brilliant but there are these little incidents, like the grin in the car, that build up a terrible picture.”

A terrible picture? My first ever smile? Will these accursed people never make up their minds?

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