Charles Finch - A Stranger in Mayfair

It was a system that in the eighteenth century was already antiquated, and by William the Fourth’s reign embarrassingly so. Thus it was in 1826 that the Exchequer-that branch of government that manages the empire’s funds-decided to change it. This left one problem, however: two massive cartloads of old tally sticks of which to dispose. The Clerk of Works (unfortunate soul) took it upon himself to burn them in two stoves in the basement that reached below the House of Lords. The next afternoon (October 16, 1834) visitors to the Lords complained of how hot the floor felt. Soon there was smoke.

Then came the fatal mistake. A caretaker of the place, Mrs. Wright, believed she had solved the problem when she turned off the furnaces. She left work. An hour later, the entire group of buildings was almost wholly in flames. The conflagration, even though citizens of London fought it valiantly, consumed almost all of the old Palace of Westminster.

The new Parliament was spectacular. It contained three miles of corridors, more than a thousand rooms, and more than a hundred staircases. As he walked into the Members’ Entrance to go to work, all of this rich history crossed Lenox’s mind. He was a part of it now, too. Slowly but surely a serious burden, an intimidating sort of expectation, had settled on his shoulders.

It made him wonder: What if this position for which he had so long yearned and which he had won at so high a cost was in fact wrong for him? A bad fit? It nearly broke his heart to think so. His brother and his father, both his grandfathers, had served long, distinguished years in the Houses of Parliament. It would be almost unbearable if he were the one to let them down.

Still, still-he couldn’t stop thinking about Ludo Starling’s strange behavior, about the notes slipped under the door for Frederick Clarke, and about whether he had already discovered a truer vocation than politics could ever be.

Graham was sitting at an upwardly sloped clerk’s desk in their cramped office, but stood when Lenox entered.

“Good afternoon, sir.”

“Hello, Graham.”

“If I may be so bold as to ask, sir-”

“You know what, I don’t think clerks here are quite so deferential as butlers,” said Lenox, smiling. “You can speak less formally if you like.”

“As you please, sir.”

Lenox laughed. “That’s a poor start. But what were you going to ask?”

“Has Dr. McConnell’s child been born?”

“Oh, that! Yes, it’s a girl, and you’ll be pleased to hear she’s quite healthy. They’re calling her George.”

Graham frowned. “Indeed, sir?”

“You find it eccentric? Her name is Grace, really-George is more of a nickname, if that improves it.”

“It would hardly be my place, sir-”

“As I said, I think these young political chaps are extremely brusque with their employers. Get used to treating me like a sheep to herd from appointment to appointment. And on that subject, I believe we have to discuss your pay. Your current salary is…is it a hundred pounds a year?”

Graham tilted his chin forward very slightly in assent.

“We must bump you up. Let me ask my brother what he thinks would be a suitable wage.”

“Thank you, sir, but as you will recall these weeks were intended to be the probationary period of our new arrangement, and it seems premature to-”

“I think it’s working out wonderfully. Probation lifted.”

Graham sighed the mournful sigh of a man afflicted with a frivolous interlocutor just when he most wants serious conversation. “Yes, sir.”

“What’s on today?”

“You have lunch with various Members from Durham, to discuss your regional interests.”

“I’m going as the man from Stirrington, then?” This was Lenox’s constituency, which was quite near the cathedral city of Durham. It was the rather unorthodox way of the English system that a man standing for Parliament did not need to have any prior affiliation with or residency in the place he hoped to represent.

“Precisely, sir.”

“Who are the other fellows?”

“The only one whose name you will know is Mr. Fripp, sir, who has made a great deal of noise on the other side of the aisle on behalf of the navy. Otherwise they are a range of backbenchers with primarily parochial interests. Here is a dossier.”

Lenox took the sheet of paper. “What am I supposed to get out of this luncheon?”

“Sir?”

“Do I have any aim, or is it merely an amicable gathering?”

“From what I gather from the other Members’ secretaries, it has in years past been primarily a friendly occasion, always held just now, before the new session begins.”

“Pointless,” Lenox muttered. “What’s after that?”

“You have several individual meetings with Members of the House of Lords, as you see on the dossier, and a meeting of the committee for the railway system.”

Lenox sighed, moving to the window. He held the list of his day’s events at his side. “I’m glad it’s soon that the session begins. All of this feels unhelpful.”

“The alliances and friendships you make now will serve you when you begin to ascend within the party, sir, or if there’s some piece of law you would like to see passed.”

Half-smiling, the detective answered, “You’ve taken to this much more readily than I have, I think. Friends with Percy Field, planning for me to be Prime Minister. All I can think about is old cases. I read the papers in the morning a bit too eagerly, I find, searching out the crimes that have confounded Scotland Yard. It’s a melancholy feeling.”

“It has been an abrupt transition.”

Unusually close though they were, Lenox would never have given utterance to the thought that passed his mind then-that it had been an abrupt transition into marriage, too, and not always an easy one. Instead he said, “My hope is that when the ball is truly in play, when people are giving speeches and defending their words and acting, that then it will all fall into place for me.”

“I dearly wish it, sir.”

“There’s nothing worse than going to work with that slight feeling of dread, is there, Graham?”

“If I may be so bold-”

Lenox smiled. “You must be quite to the point, remember, quite rude!”

“Very well. Then I would say that this feeling will pass, and soon you will remember that you came to Parliament not only for yourself but for others. You do, in fact, represent the people you met in Stirrington. Perhaps that knowledge will lift your spirits.”

“You’re right.”

There was a pause. “And, sir, one last meeting, which isn’t on the list.”

“Oh?”

“It may ease the pressure, sir. Mrs. Elizabeth Starling sent a note, asking if you would care to take dinner there.”

Lenox grinned. “Did she? Please, write back and tell her I would.”

Ludo, standing in his drawing room, looked miserable as he greeted Dallington and Lenox that night. Collingwood had brought them in (they shared a swift, questioning glance as he turned to lead them down the front corridor) and announced them, all in a mood that was both scrupulously polite and somehow obliquely dismissive. Perhaps he didn’t think of a detective as a suitable dinner guest at the house, or perhaps he had something to hide and regretted their presence so nearby. And there was one last possibility: that he was still jarred by the violent death of someone with whom he had worked in close proximity, and so not quite himself.

One thing was sure. It had been six days since the murder, and if they didn’t make a breakthrough soon the trail might well run cold.

Starling, perhaps for that reason, looked alternately flushed and pale.

“Oh, ah, Lenox,” he said. “Good of you to come, quite good of you. And Mr.-er, Mr. Dallington, I believe. How do you do? You both received my wife’s invitations?”