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THE Minister tended to get irritated with me when there was an issue which he had to settle but wished to go on pretending did not exist. His manner remained matey and unpretentious but, when I had to remind him that the Barford contract must be placed within a fortnight, that two major firms as well as Lufkin's were pressing for an answer, Bevill looked at me as though I had made a remark in bad taste.
‘First things first,' he said mysteriously, as though drawing on fifty years of political wisdom, the more mysteriously since in the coming fortnight he had nothing else to do.