December is a fitting month for political conspiracies and intrigues in London — they blend nicely with the damp, chill air and leaden skies.
And the storied St. Ermin’s Hotel is just the place for plotting. As I made my way to the St. Ermin’s, all that was missing to complete the tableau was what Londoners used to call a “London particular” or a pea-souper, the thick, yellowish smog that’s an artifact of the past thanks to clean-air legislation.
When the French conspire to oust a party leader, they do it with a bombastic flourish. The British are so much more discrete.
Or so they think.
They repair for high tea or a meal to plot their schemes, but they always go to well-established restaurants or pubs generally a brisk walk from the House of Commons. The conspirators are easy to spot.
And so what better place to glimpse off-camera parliamentary intrigue than to take afternoon high tea at St. Ermin’s, a brisk walk from a parliament that’s in uproar over Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit plans?
As a cub reporter in the 1980s, I’d hang around St.Ermin’s, a grand apartment block built in the 19th century for the rich, hoping to engage with trade union leaders and moderate Labour Party pols seeking to stop Trotskyites from seizing control of the “people’s party.” Heading for beer and sandwiches they gave me little notice — and, alas, few nuggets to spin a story.
Now the various Conservative Party factions have their favorite venues to recruit and cajole. St. Ermin’s — or rather its restaurant, the Caxton Grill — is the hangout for one faction of pro-European Union Conservative Cabinet members and former ministers.
Europe has played a significant role in St. Ermin’s 20th-century history — as has intrigue. During the Second World War it was an annex for Britain’s Special Operations Executive, a derring-do espionage outfit tasked with conducting sabotage behind enemy lines in Nazi-occupied Europe, mainly France. SOE stored explosives in the basement.
Former Prime Minister Winston Churchill used to drink in the bar. MI6 officers continued to socialize in the hotel after the war, including traitor Kim Philby and his comrades in the Cambridge spy circle, among them Guy Burgess, who recklessly used to meet his Russian handler in the Caxton Grill, enjoying especially lethal bloody marys.
What he would make of the elegant grill boasting “locally sourced fare for a modern European menu” is anyone’s guess, but it would seem appropriate for Europhiles.
When I saunter into the lobby and spot the Division Bell, which links St. Ermin’s to Parliament and is electronically rung to announce a vote giving lawmakers time to scramble back to cast theirs, I feel at home.
Sort of.
St. Ermin’s is now owned by Marriott and a few years back was given a $40 million face-lift. Conde Nast Traveler described the new look as “a theatrical mise-en-scene, opening with a delicious confection of a lobby devised by a Victorian set designer — rococo plaster ceiling, grand staircase, sparkling chandeliers, and marble floors and fireplaces.”
In other words, totally faux — despite the hotel’s promotional literature inviting you to “venture into history.” In my youth, the hotel had the dusty patina and dowdiness for the kind of intrigue Somerset Maugham wrote about. There weren’t then any reproduction botanical prints or “tactile fabrics.” And the lobby, where I pile double cream on a scone, was never described — as it is today — as an “inspirational space.”
Looking around, I ask one of the lobby staff if they have spotted any coup-plotting ministers — only to learn, alas, that they met hours earlier for breakfast of bacon and eggs. Oh well, they probably wouldn’t have divulged anything … and the scone is delicious.
