Come tomorrow morning, Tory thoughts will likely turn to the question of Michael Howard's defenestration. Should he go now? Should he hang on until a young pretender, untainted by the Thatcher or Major regimes, emerges? Or should he stay until the next election, when he will probably have turned 67 and might have a decent chance of wrapping up the pensioners' vote?
The heirs are far from apparent. Ladbrokes has David Davis on 5-2 to be the next Tory leader. He has reportedly ordered his supporters to stay silent over the weekend, but he is a profoundly ambitious man. Liam Fox is at 6-1, David Cameron at 9-1 and - rather unexpectedly, since the health spokesman arguably has a profile lower than Hades - Andrew Lansley at 10-1. William Hague is at 20-1 and Boris Johnson 66-1, just above John Redwood, Michael Portillo and the Quiet Man (100-1).
Fighting Mr Howard's corner in the Spectator, Simon Heffer launches a smash-and-grab raid on the so-called "Notting Hill set" of Tory pretenders. "Mr David Cameron may one day lead the Tory party," writes Heffer. "However, he and his pals will have to grow up first, and learn something about life outside W11, before they have a prayer of connecting with the mass of the British people." Ouch. "There needs to be calm and reflection," he says, "and then there needs to be a gradual change in policy and rhetoric." We can be sure of one thing: if the Tories do badly tonight, a certain Lynton Crosby will be catching the next flight out of Heathrow.
