Time is running out for 'Premier' Brown

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The caricature of Gordon Brown, a damaging portrait that his supporters as much as his enemies have contrived to paint, is that he spends every night bashing his forehead on the wall of Number 10 and howling: "It's my turn." I don't think it's quite accurate to say that he is consumed with a lust to become Prime Minister. Strutting the world stage has few allures for the son of the Manse. He famously loathes diplomatic schmoozing; he's not even much good at being polite to foreigners. The trippings and trappings that go with the premiership do not interest him.

What Mr Brown is truly obsessive about is power. Even some of his best friends concede that the Chancellor is the control freak's control freak. His suggestion at the weekend that he will take meaningful paternity leave when "Prudence" is born is greeted with dry laughter by anyone who knows the workaholic Chancellor. He wants to be Prime Minister not for the sake of the title, but because only with that doorplate comes total command untrammelled by interference from such lesser mortals as Tony Blair.

What politicians refuse to say is often more revealing than what they do say. Mr Brown's studied silence about whether there was a succession bargain speaks volumes. Mr Blair has always and emphatically denied that there ever was such a deal, notably to the Evening Standard's Andrew Billen during the election campaign. The Chancellor's striking refusal to concur has only one explanation that makes much sense. He believes that Mr Blair privately pledged to hand over the leadership after two elections - and that Mr Blair is now reneging on the promise. The Chancellor cannot say this in public without openly accusing the Prime Minister of being a liar and a cheat. Rocky as their relationship may be at the moment, neither man can afford to go that ballistic.

This does assume that the succession would automatically fall to Gordon Brown. One scenario is the unexpected emergency. Were Tony Blair to be knocked down by a bus, what would happen? Fervent Blairites reply that the bus driver would be arrested for murder - and the identity of the driver would turn out to be a 50-year-old Scotsman long known to have nurtured a burning grudge against the Prime Minister.

In the event that there was a sudden vacancy at the very top in the immediate future, Mr Brown would not command the backing of a majority of the Cabinet. It is the burden of Chancellors to be greatly resented by ministers who run the spending departments. This natural and inevitable tension has been greatly aggravated by Mr Brown's habit of trampling over his colleagues like a bull elephant.

Of the present Cabinet, I expect he could rely on the support of Andrew Smith, his deputy at the Treasury, and Alistair Darling, whose Work and Pensions department is essentially an outpost of the Brown Empire. Margaret Beckett and Clare Short would, I guess, vote for him. So might John Prescott, whom the Chancellor has been courting for some time. The majority of the Cabinet would be desperate for a candidate who was Anyone But Gordon, a position that is currently filled by David Blunkett.

Though influential, the Cabinet have only one actual vote each. The Chancellor is a charmer when he can be bothered to find the onswitch. He has been assiduously working backbenchers and trade union leaders, and he knows how to stroke the erogenous zones of party activists. He has been the principal author of some of the policies that have most aggravated Labour members, such as the 75p pension increase, the single mothers benefit cut, and the persistence with private finance schemes for hospitals and the London Underground.

Even so, Mr Brown has always had some success marketing himself as more Real Labour than Mr Blair. The new emphasis on more public spending is going down tremendously well with Labour activists. If there were a vacancy tomorrow, my best guess is that Gordon Brown would become Prime Minister, in spite of the fear and trepidation of so many senior colleagues. But the fact that no one would expect an uncontested coronation will trouble him.

Ever since being denied the leadership seven years ago, he has planned to look like such an inevitably natural successor that his party wouldn't even look at anyone else.

The much likelier scenario is that the restless Chancellor faces a nail-chompingly long wait. Tony Blair does a Margaret Thatcher by winning a third election victory. Unlike her, Mr Blair has the sense to retire after 10 years at Number 10.

That is still a very, very, very long time in politics - an agonising denial of his destiny to Gordon Brown. This is the stuff of nightmares for the Chancellor, which explains why he has been privately pressing Mr Blair to think about an earlier retirement date. Mr Brown must fear becoming Edward VII hanging on for the death of Victoria. It's bleaker in this case because the Prince of Wales is older than the reigning monarch and there are no guaranteed inheritances in politics.

A lot can go wrong for a player - even one as hugely talented as the Chancellor - in that time. After a decade at the top - even if it is not the absolute top - Mr Brown could be looking like yesterday's leader. Worse, his reputation may have been seriously compromised by a recession. Rivals will have established themselves. The Conservatives - incredible as this may currently seem - might have become a potent electoral threat again. The Labour Party, and the country, could very likely be looking for a style of leadership which is neither Tony Blair nor Gordon Brown.

I suspect this is what haunts him. This is the fear that gnaws at his nerve endings in the dark reaches of the night. The longer he is made to wait for what he regards as his rightful turn, the less likely it is that his turn will ever come.

? Andrew Rawnsley is chief political commentator of The Observer.