Southampton Row Page 3

“You can’t help me anyway,” Pitt countered dryly. “Except with information about the issues, and the odd warning about tactics. I wish I had paid more attention to politics in the past.”

  Jack grinned suddenly, but it was not without self-mockery. “When I think how narrow our majority is going to be, so do I!”

  Pitt wanted to ask about the safety of Jack’s own seat, but it would be better to find out from someone else. “Do you know Aubrey Serracold?” he asked instead.

  Jack looked surprised. “Yes, actually I know him moderately well. His wife is a friend of Emily’s.” He frowned. “Why, Thomas? I’d stake a great deal he’s a decent man—honest, intelligent and going into politics to serve his country. He has no need of money and no desire to wield power for itself.”

  Pitt should have been comforted, but instead he saw a man in danger from something he would never see until it was too late; he might well not recognize an enemy even then, because his nature was outside Serracold’s understanding.

  Was Jack right, and in not telling him the truth was Pitt throwing away perhaps the only weapon he possessed? Narraway had given him a task that seemed impossible as it stood. It was not detecting as he was used to it; he was seeking not to solve a crime but to prevent a sin, one which was against the moral law but probably not the law of the land. It was not that Voisey should have the power—he had as much right as any other candidate—it was what he would do with it in perhaps two or three years, or even five or ten, that was wrong. And you cannot punish a man for what you believe he may do, no matter how evil.

  Jack leaned forward across his desk. “Thomas, Serracold is a friend of mine. If he is in some kind of danger, any kind, let me know!” He made no threats and produced no arguments, which was oddly more persuasive than if he had. “I would protect my friends, just as you would yours. Personal loyalty means something, and the day it doesn’t I want no part of politics anymore.”

  Even when Pitt had feared Jack courted Emily for her money—and he had feared it—he had still found him impossible to dislike. There was a warmth in him, an ability to mock himself and yet keep the directness which was the essence of his charm. Pitt had no chance of success without taking risks, because there was no safe way even to begin, let alone to conclude, a fight against Voisey.

  “Not physical danger, so far as I know,” he replied, hoping he was right in his decision to defy Narraway and confide at least some portion of the truth in Jack. Please heaven it did not come back and betray them both! “Danger of being cheated out of his seat.”

  Jack waited as if he knew that was not all.

  “And perhaps of being ruined in reputation,” Pitt added.

  “By whom?”

  “If I knew that I would be in a far better position to guard against it.”

  “You mean you can’t tell me?”

  “I mean I don’t know.”

  “Then why? You know something, or you wouldn’t be here.”

  “For political gain, of course.”

  “Then it is his opponent. Who else?”

  “Those behind him.”

  Jack started to argue, then stopped. “I suppose everybody has someone behind him. The ones you can see are the least worry.” He stood up slowly. He was almost the same height as Pitt, but as elegant as Pitt was untidy. He had natural grace, and was still as meticulously dressed and groomed as in the days when he made his way on his charm. “I’ll be happy to continue this conversation, but I have a meeting in an hour, and I haven’t had a decent meal today. Will you join me?”

  “I’ll be happy to,” Pitt accepted immediately, rising also.

  “Be my guest in the members’ dining room,” Jack suggested, opening the door for Pitt. He hesitated a moment, as if worrying over Pitt’s clean collar but crooked tie and slightly bulging pockets. He sighed and gave up.

  Pitt followed him and took his place at one of the tables. He was fascinated. He hardly tasted his food he was so busy trying to watch the other diners without appearing to do so. He saw face after face he had seen in the newspapers, many whose names he knew, others familiar but he could not place them. He kept hoping he might see Gladstone himself.

  Jack sat smiling, considerably entertained.

  They were halfway through a dessert of hot treacle pudding and custard when a large man with thinning fair hair stopped by. Jack introduced him as Finch, the Honorable Member for one of the Birmingham constituencies, and Pitt as his brother-in-law, without stating any occupation.

  “How do you do,” Finch said civilly, then looked at Jack. “Hey, Radley, have you heard that this fellow Hardie is actually going to stand? And in West Ham South, not even in Scotland!”

  “Hardie?” Jack frowned.

  “Keir Hardie!” Finch said impatiently, ignoring Pitt. “Fellow’s been down the mines since he was ten years old. God knows if he even can read or write, and he’s standing for Parliament! Labor Party, he says . . . whatever that is.” He spread his hands in a sharp gesture. “It’s no good, Radley! That’s our territory . . . trades unions, and all that. He won’t get in, of course—not a cat’s chance. But we can’t afford to lose any support this time.” He lowered his voice. “It’s going to be a tight thing! Too damned tight. We can’t give in on the working week, we’d be crippled. It would ruin us in months. But I wish to the devil the Old Man would forget Home Rule for a while. He’ll bring us down!”

  “A majority’s a majority,” Jack replied. “Twenty or thirty is still workable.”

  Finch grunted. “No it isn’t! Not for long. We need fifty at least. Nice to have met you . . . Pitt? Pitt, did you say? Good Tory name. Not a Tory, are you?”

  Pitt smiled. “Shouldn’t I be?”

  Finch looked at him, his light blue eyes suddenly very direct. “No, sir, you shouldn’t. You should look towards the future and steady, wise reform. No self-interested conservatism that will alter nothing, remain fixed in the past as if it were stone. And no harebrained socialism that would alter everything, good and bad alike, as if it were all written in water and the past meant nothing. This is the greatest nation on earth, sir, but we still need much wisdom at the helm if we are to keep it so in these changing times.”

  “In that at least I can agree with you,” Pitt replied, keeping his voice light.

  Finch hesitated a moment, then bade him good-bye and left, walking briskly, his shoulders hunched as if he were fighting his way through a crowd, although in fact he passed only a waiter with a tray.

  Pitt was following Jack out of the dining room when they all but bumped into the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, on his way in. He was dressed in a pinstriped suit, his long, rather sad face full-bearded, but almost bald to the crown of his head. Pitt was so fascinated that it was a moment before he looked fully at the man a step behind him, but obviously in his company. His features were strong, intelligent, his nose a trifle crooked, his skin pale. For an instant their eyes met and Pitt was frozen by the power of hatred he saw looking back at him, as if they were the only two in the room. All the noise of talk, laughter, clink of glass and crockery vanished. Time was suspended. There was nothing but the will to hurt, to destroy.

  Then the present rolled back like a wave, human, busy, argumentative, self-absorbed. Salisbury and his companion went in; Pitt and Jack Radley went out. They were twenty yards down the corridor before Jack spoke.

  “Who was that with Salisbury?” he asked. “You know him?”

  “Sir Charles Voisey,” Pitt replied, startled to hear how his voice rasped. “Prospective Parliamentary candidate for Lambeth South.”

  Jack stopped. “That’s Serracold’s constituency!”

  “Yes,” Pitt replied steadily. “Yes . . . I know that.”

  Jack let out his breath very slowly; understanding filled his face, and the beginning of fear.

  CHAPTER

  TWO

  Pitt found the house uniquely lonely without Charlotte and the children. He missed the warmth, the sound of laughter, excite-ment,
even the occasional quarreling. There was no clatter of Gracie’s heels on the floor, or her wry comments, only the two cats, Archie and Angus, curled up asleep in the patches of sun that came through the kitchen windows.

  But when he remembered the hatred in Voisey’s eyes, relief washed over him with an intensity that caught his breath that they were out of London, far away where neither Voisey nor any of the Inner Circle would find them. A small cottage in a country hamlet on the edge of Dartmoor was as safe as anywhere possible. That knowledge left him free to do all he could to stop Voisey from winning the seat and beginning the climb to a power which would corrupt the conscience of the land.

  Although as he sat at the kitchen table over breakfast of toast he had definitely scorched, homemade marmalade and a large pot of tea, he was daunted by a task so nebulous, so uncertain. There was no mystery to solve, no explanation to unravel, and too little specific to seek. His only weapon was knowledge. The seat Voisey was contesting had been Liberal for years. Whose vote did he hope to sway? He was standing for the Tories, the only alternative to the Liberals with any chance of forming a government, even though the majority opinion was that this time Mr. Gladstone would win, even if his administration did not last long.

  He took another piece of toast from the rack where he had set it, and spread it with butter. He spooned out a very good helping of marmalade. He liked the pungent taste of it, sharp enough to feel as if it filled his head.

  Did Voisey intend somehow to win the middle ground and so enlarge his share of the vote? Or to disenchant the poorer men and drive them towards socialism, and so split the left-wing support? Had he some weapon, as yet undisclosed, with which to damage Aubrey Serracold and so cripple his campaign? He could not openly do all three. But then with the Inner Circle behind him, he did not need to be open. No one outside the very top of its power, perhaps no one but Voisey himself, knew the names or positions of all its members, or even how many there were.

  He finished the toast, drank the last of the tea, and left the dishes where they were. Mrs. Brody would wash up when she came, and no doubt feed Archie and Angus again. It was eight o’clock in the morning, and time he began to acquire more knowledge of Voisey’s platform, the issues he was making the core of his appeal, who his open supporters were, and where he was going to speak. Pitt already knew from Jack the bare outline of these things regarding Serracold, but it was not enough.

  It was late June and the city was hot, dusty and crammed with traffic of every sort—trade, business and pleasure. Street peddlers cried their wares on almost every pavement corner, open carriages held ladies who were out to see the sights, keeping the sun from their faces with an array of parasols in pretty colors like enormous overblown flowers. There were heavy wagons carrying bales of goods, vegetable and milk carts, omnibuses and the usual hordes of hansom cabs. Even the footpaths were crowded, and Pitt had to weave his way in and out. The noise was an assault on the ears and the mind, chatter, street cries of vendors of a hundred different articles for sale, the rattle of wheels on cobbles, the jingle of harness, shouts of frustrated drivers, the sharp clip of horses’ hooves.

  He would prefer Voisey to be as little aware of him as possible, although after their meeting in the House of Commons it could no longer be secret that Pitt was watching the campaign. He regretted that, but it could not be undone, and perhaps it was inevitable; it just would have been better delayed, even a short while. Voisey might have been sufficiently absorbed in his political battles and the exhilaration of the campaign not to have noticed one more person’s interest in him.

  By five o’clock Pitt knew the names of those backing Voisey’s candidacy, both publicly and privately, at least those of record. He also knew that the issues Voisey had espoused were the traditional mainstream Tory values of trade and Empire. It was obvious how these would appeal to the property owners, the manufacturers and shipping barons, but now the vote had extended to the ordinary man who possessed nothing more than his house or rented rooms worth above ten pounds a year, and surely they were natural supporters of trades unions, and so of the Liberal Party?

  The fact that it seemed an impossible seat for Voisey to win worried Pitt far more than had he seen some opening, some weakness that could be exploited. It meant that the attack was coming from an angle he had no idea how to protect, and he did not even know where the vulnerability lay.

  He made his way south of the river towards the docks and factories in the shadow of the London Bridge Railway Terminal, with the intention of joining the crowd of workers at the first of Voisey’s public speeches. He was intensely curious to see both how Voisey behaved and what kind of reception he would receive.

  He stopped at one of the public houses and had a pork pie and a glass of cider, keeping his ear to the conversations at the tables around him. There was a good deal of laughter, but underneath it an unmistakably bitter note as well. He heard only one reference to the Irish, or the vexed question of Home Rule, and even that was treated half jokingly. But the matter of hours to the working day aroused hot feelings, and some considerable support for the Socialists, even though hardly anyone seemed to know the names of any of them. Certainly Pitt did not hear Sidney Webb or William Morris mentioned, nor the eloquent and vociferous playwright Shaw.

  By seven o’clock he was standing in the open outside one of the factory gates, the gray, flat sides of the buildings soaring up into the smoke-filled air above him. The clang of machinery beat a steady rhythm in the distance, and the smell of coke fumes and acids caught his throat. Around him were five or six score men in uniform browns and grays, color worn out of the fabric, patched and repatched, frayed at the cuffs, worn at the elbows and knees. Many of them had cloth caps on, even though the evening was mild and, far more unusually, there was no chill blowing up from the river. The cap was habit, almost a part of identity.

  Pitt passed unnoticed among them, his natural scruffiness a perfect disguise. He listened to their laughter, their rowdy, often cruel jokes, and heard the note of despair underneath. And the longer he listened the less could he imagine how Voisey, with his money, his privilege, his polished manner, and now his title as well, could win over a single one of them, let alone the bulk. Voisey stood for everything that oppressed them and which they perceived, correctly or not, to be exploiting their labor and stealing their rewards. It frightened him because he knew far better than to believe Voisey was a dreamer, trusting to any kind of luck.

  The crowd was just beginning to get restive and speak of leaving, when a hansom, not a carriage, came to a stop about twenty yards away and Pitt saw the tall figure of Voisey get out and walk towards them. It gave Pitt an odd shiver of apprehension, as if even in all this crowd Voisey could see him and the hatred could burn across the air and find him.

  “Come after all, ‘ave yer?” a voice called out, for a moment breaking the spell.

  “Of course I have come!” Voisey called back, turning to face them, his head high, his expression half amused, Pitt invisible, one anonymous face among the hundred or so men. “You have votes, don’t you?”

  Half a dozen men laughed.

  “At least ’e in’t pretending as ’e gives a damn about us!” someone said a few yards to Pitt’s left. “I’d rather ’ave a bastard wot’s ’onest than one wot ain’t.”

  Voisey walked over to the wagon which had been left as a makeshift platform, and with an easy movement climbed up into it.

  There was a rustle of attention, but it was hostile, waiting for the opportunity to criticize, challenge and abuse. Voisey seemed to be alone, but Pitt noticed the two or three policemen standing well back, and half a dozen or more newly arrived men, all watching the crowd, burly men in quiet, drab clothing, but with a fluidity of movement and a restlessness quite unlike the weariness of the factory workers.

  “You’ve come to look at me,” Voisey began, “because you are curious to see what I am going to say, and if I can come up with anything at all to justify your voting for me, and not f
or the Liberal candidate, Mr. Serracold, whose party has represented you as far back as you can remember. And perhaps you expect a little entertainment at my expense.”

  There was a rumble of laughter and one or two catcalls.

  “Well, what do you want from government?” Voisey asked, and before he could answer himself he was shouted down.

  “Less taxes!” someone yelled, to accompanying jeers.

  “Shorter hours! A decent working week, no longer than yours!”

  More laughter, but sharp-edged, angry.

  “Decent pay! ’Ouses wot don’t leak. Drains!”

  “Good! So do I,” Voisey agreed, his voice carrying well in spite of the fact he did not seem to be raising it. “I would also like a job for every man who wants to work, and every woman, too. I’d like peace, good foreign trade, less crime, more certain justice, responsible police without corruption, cheap food, bread for everyone, clothes and boots for everyone. I’d like good weather as well, but . . .”

  The rest of his words were lost in a roar of laughter.

  “But you wouldn’t believe me if I told you I could do that!” he finished.

  “Don’t believe yer anyway!” a voice shouted back, to more jeers and calls of agreement.

  Voisey smiled, but the angle of his body was stiff. “But you’re going to listen to me, because that’s what you’ve come for! You’re curious what I’m going to say, and you’re fair.”

  This time there were no catcalls. Pitt could feel the difference in the air, as if a storm had passed by without breaking.

  “Do most of you work in these factories?” Voisey waved his arm. “And these docks?”

  There was a murmur of assent.

  “Making goods to ship all over the world?” he went on.

  Again the assent, and a slight impatience. They did not understand the reason why he asked. Pitt did, as if he had already heard the words.

  “Clothes made from Egyptian cotton?” Voisey asked, his voice lifting, his eyes searching their faces, the language of their bodies, the boredom or the quickening of understanding. “Brocades from Persia and the old Silk Road east to China and India?” he continued. “Linen from Ireland? Timber from Africa, rubber from Burma . . . I could go on and on. But you probably know the list as well as I do. They are the products of the Empire. That’s why we are the biggest trading nation in the world, why Britain rules the seas, a quarter of the earth speaks our language, and soldiers of the Queen guard the peace over land and sea in every quarter of the globe.”