you. Nice to meet you, Mr. Lenox. Mr. Hilary. All will turn out well if you trust me. Clark, one more pint of bitter before you go back to work?”
With that their introduction to Edward Crook was over, and the two men looked at each other, shrugged, and turned away, both taking ravenous bites of their sandwiches before they left.
“What do you think?” asked Hilary as they walked down the street.
“He seems competent.”
“Fearfully so, I should have said.”
“The sort of chap we want on our side, rather than the other,” Lenox added.
“Yes, absolutely. By God, these sandwiches aren’t half bad, are they? Look, this must be the printer.”
CHAPTER SIX
Crook, it emerged, was a gloomy, blunt, and practical man; Lenox took to him straightaway. He was honest and fair and had a straightforward way of speaking that engendered in his listeners an instant trust. When that evening he introduced Lenox to the small circle of businessmen and shopkeepers who formed the local party committee, he didn’t heap praise on the detective’s head. He merely said that he thought they had a candidate who could ably replace Stoke, a candidate with sufficient funds to have his voice heard, a candidate willing to work hard, and a candidate who would be — beyond any doubt — a better representative of Stirrington’s interests in Parliament than Robert Roodle, the brewer and Conservative.
After they had returned from the printers that afternoon, Crook had described the situation. “Roodle’s not well liked here, and that’s what will matter most. There’re no strong feelings about you either way, but Roodle has alienated people in a number of ways. As soon as his brewery grew, he moved it out of Stirrington; he has a farm outside town and has been in a long legal battle with both of his neighbors; and whether it’s fair or not his father was known as the most tightfisted, intemperate sod in the county. He used to beat his horses and drove his wife like a donkey. Be that as it may, there’s no mistaking Roodle’s success. Half of Durham’s pubs are Roodle pubs. He also has one other great point, in local terms.”
“What’s that?” asked Hilary with some alarm.
“He’s from here. In the north we value our own, you see.”
Indeed, as they had walked that day about town Hilary and Lenox had seen numerous flyers on that subject. “Two weeks in Stirrington, or a lifetime? Who knows you better? Vote Roodle,” read one. “Vote your own — vote Roodle,” said another.
Lenox saw the fairness of the point. It was a strange political system that led to Hilary representing Liverpool, while the Liberal Party’s current leader in the House, William Gladstone, had grown up in Liverpool but for a long time represented Oxford, of all places. Still, he also believed that his platform would genuinely help the people of Stirrington more than Roodle’s, and he resented the negative, attacking nature of Roodle’s campaign. He was ready to fight.
Lenox’s own campaign handbills were, he thought, singularly effective; they advertised what they called his “Five Promises.” Crook had written it up, and Hilary (who was invaluable for this sort of task) had revised it. The only promise that both the printer and Crook had absolutely insisted upon keeping was for a lower tax on beer. This wasn’t self-interest, Crook rather defensively assured them, but the most important issue to many Stirringtonians.
Better still, Roodle was in a bind over the beer tax. He had vocally supported a lower beer tax for many years (as a brewer interested in selling as many pints as possible), but now he found himself on the wrong side of his party, and rather than alienate the aid he received from London he had switched positions. Crook felt this hypocrisy was important, if only to show how weak willed Roodle would be if elected.
At the committee meeting there was a great deal of detailed talk about Lenox’s schedule for the next several days; by this time he was faint with fatigue, however — Hilary was still impressively spry, but he was younger — and only half heard the plan for a series of speeches, a debate, a meeting with county officials, and visits to several dances, balls, and livestock auctions. The idea was to make Lenox as visible as possible to compensate for the short time he had in which to present his platform. Through all of this conversation Crook was a gentle but forceful guide. His authority was obvious.
At last Lenox was allowed to go to sleep. In his plain, quite clean room, which had a small warm grate near the bed, he drifted off into a grateful rest, so tired that he only for a passing moment worried about McConnell and Toto.
In the morning, to Lenox’s surprise, his coffee appeared via a familiar bearer; it was Graham.
“Thank goodness you’re here, Graham.”
“I arrived late last night, sir.”
“You’re not exhausted, I hope?”
“I slept very well, sir. May I ask how things have progressed here?”
“Very well, I think, though I’m pulled in five different directions at once.”
“Such is the nature of campaign life, sir, or so I have heard.”
“Indeed it is, Graham.” Lenox took a sip of coffee and instantly felt livelier. “Well, I’m prepared for the battle.”
“Excellent, sir.”
“I say, though, was there any news about those two gentlemen — about Pierce and Carruthers?”
“I brought yesterday evening’s papers with me, sir,” said Graham.
Lenox noticed a bundle under the butler’s arm. “Cheers.”
“I am afraid there is no new information, however. Mr. Hiram Smalls is still in custody. Inspector Exeter is widely quoted in the paper as saying the case is over.”
“Is he now? Insufferable, isn’t it,” he murmured as he glanced at the headlines.
“Will you eat breakfast here, sir?” Graham asked.
“Is the pub open?”
“Yes, sir. I ate there earlier and can heartily recommend the poached eggs.”
“Put in an order for me, would you? I’ll be down in twenty minutes. Plenty more of this, too,” said Lenox and raised his coffee cup.
“Yes, sir. May I draw your attention to the two letters on your nightstand, sir?”
There were a pair of white envelopes next to Lenox’s book. “Thanks,” he said.
“Thank you, sir,” said Graham and left.
Good to have him here, thought Lenox. It will make life much easier.
He took the first envelope, which he recognized as being on the heavy, cream-colored stationery of Lord John Dallington. The second, however, caught his eye, and he discarded Dallington’s note for it; inside was white paper ringed with pale blue. It was from Lady Jane.
Dear Charles,
I pray this finds you well. Thank you for your kind note, and Godspeed in Stirrington. I sit here at Toto’s side; under sedation she has lost all her good cheer and effervescence, and their absence does what their presence could not and makes me realize how much I had come to rely on them. Thomas handles himself badly, I’m afraid; and as I would only say to you. His concern for Toto is patent, and he harries the doctors with questions when they come in, but he has also been drinking. Toto instructs me during her coherent moments to bar him from the room, and he’s half mad at the exclusion, persuaded that these sorry circumstances are his fault. I try to mediate between them when I tactfully can, to soften words, but there is much I cannot do.
Charles, my mind is so full of doubt! Would that you were here beside me; then I might be at ease for twenty minutes together. I know we are hoping to marry in the summer, six months from now, but witnessing our two friends’ difficulties I wonder whether we might delay our union? Do we know that we won’t fall into the same traps? If there were days when I couldn’t stand the sight of you I don’t know that I could go on living.
I can hear your wise words from across England: that Toto and Thomas rushed into marriage; that we have
