Cub's fears about his employment prospects were confirmed when he completed his journey home. He lunched with Butler and saw Macmillan in Downing Street, but, as he delicately put it, “my political friends were, on the whole, more concerned with their own survival than with helping me”. The idea that he might return as a cabinet minister had been floated by the Manchester Guardian in November 1962, but only to prove to its anti-Conservative readers that Macmillan was desperately short of options – there were too many titled people in his government already. In one of Cub's obituaries it was claimed that he expected to be made Lord Chancellor on his return; evidently the source for this story was unacquainted with Cub's sense of humour. In 1963 no pension arrangements existed for ex-MPs, and Cub's unorthodox career allowed the CRO to refuse him the financial help due to diplomats after service overseas. A visit to the under-secretary responsible for public appointments was fruitless; his contacts in banking and business could do nothing either. He received one offer, from a subsidiary of the mining company Lonrho, which was buying influence and cheap assets in Central Africa while other investors fled from the area. Having disliked what he heard of the company's activities Cub rejected the idea; Duncan Sandys, Hastings Banda and even Roy Welensky proved to be less resistant to the blandishments of Tiny Rowland.