A Stranger in Mayfair

Chapter Seven

The next morning Lenox woke feeling for the first time as if he were truly back in London. It put him in a happy mood, and he traipsed downstairs softly whistling. A little while later he sipped his morning coffee, standing with his cup by the second-floor windows and gazing out over the gray, blustery day, wearing his familiar old blue slippers and crimson dressing gown. For a fleeting moment his absence from home felt almost like a dream. Had it really been he who walked across Austrian heaths and Paris boulevards? Had it really been he who got married in that chapel three months ago? The displacement from his old life was jarring-and wonderful. He thought with a smile of Jane, still sleeping upstairs.

He was up earlier than she because it was an important day for him. In six days exactly he would attend his maiden session at the House of Commons, taking a seat for the first time along the green baize benches of that hallowed chamber. Today he had to move into his new offices, which were tucked into an obscure upper hallway of Parliament. He felt like a boy going to his new school.

It had always been his dream to sit in the Commons, though it was still, for all its modernizations, an exceedingly idiosyncratic institution. For one thing, different seats varied wildly in how they were won; most were fair and democratic, but some were almost insanely corrupt. Since the reforms of 1832 there was no longer any place as bad as Old Sarum (the town that had infamously elected two Members despite the notable handicap of having only eleven voters) or Dunwich (whose own two Members remained in the House for many years even after the town had literally fallen into the sea), but there were plenty of rotten and pocket boroughs that could be dispensed without so much as a single vote being cast. Ludo Starling held one of these, in fact.

Another strange thing about Parliament was that, though being an MP was one of the most prestigious and important jobs in the empire, it was entirely unpaid. Only men with cabinet assignments received any stipend, and as a result there was fierce competition for the undersecretaryships of obscure departments in government (Welsh affairs, municipal corporations). Lenox was fortunate, like many of the people who would be his colleagues now, in having private means, but there were also valuable and good gentlemen who were forced to quit Parliament when they couldn’t pay for their own lodgings or food. Generally these men were found decent sinecures by the friends they had made, but what charm did supervising a distant Scottish county have compared to being in the House of Commons?

It was the scullery maid who had brought Lenox his coffee in the parlor, but now Graham entered.

“Good morning, sir,” he said.

“Good morning. I say, you’re dressed for a day in London. Why have you got your city togs on?”

“With your permission, I intend to go to your new office in Parliament shortly, sir.”

For an instant Lenox was puzzled, and then with delight he cried out, “Graham! You’ll do the job!”

“Yes, sir, with the provision that you understand my grave doubts ab-”

“Never mind that, never mind that! This is terrific news. Yes, head over there. Or would you rather wait for me?”

“I think it would be advisable were I to precede you there, sir, and begin cleaning and preparing the office.”

“Cleaning? Leave that to someone else. I need you to take over my appointment book, for one thing. It’s been driving me mad. You’ll need to register with the guards. I believe you can go in through the Members’ Entrance, or if not then you can get in through that garden to the west of the buildings. This is wonderful news, Graham.”

“Shall we call it a probationary assignment, sir, pending our joint approval?”

“Call it whatever you like. Have you told Kirk?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Excellent.” Then Lenox’s brow furrowed. “Mind you, he’s not what I call an ideal butler. Still, the trade is more than worth it. I’m going upstairs to tell Jane that you’ve accepted. Are you pleased at least?”

The butler-former butler now-allowed himself a smile. “Yes, sir. Very,” he said.

“Good. I’ll see you at our new office, Graham.”

An hour later, after Lenox had done a few chores, the two men stood in the empty office, looking at it. A tiny window in one corner provided a very little light, but it was a dim set of two rooms, one, slightly larger than the other, with a fireplace, bookshelves, and a large desk. This would be Lenox’s. The outer room, through which all traffic would arrive, had two desks that faced each other. These would be for Graham and a new clerk, whom he would soon have to hire.

“Here we are,” said Lenox. “Let’s go over the appointment book.”

For twenty minutes they sorted through various notes asking Lenox to attend meetings of businessmen, railway chiefs, committees from the House of Lords (from which the Commons had truly begun to wrest power in the last thirty years), and a hundred other bodies of men. Graham promised to categorize the notes and respond to them, which lifted a weight off of Lenox’s shoulders.

“But first you have your tour,” said Graham.

“Have I?”

“A Mr. Bigham will be by shortly to give it to you, sir. He’s the assistant to the parliamentary historian and generally guides new Members through the House when they arrive. Since you were elected at a by-election, however”-that is to say, a special, one-off election-“you will be the only person on the tour.”

“We all have our trials.”

There was a rap at the door, and a cheerful face, similar to Lenox’s but slightly fatter and jollier, perhaps less pensive, popped through the crack. It was not the tour guide but Sir Edmund Chichester Lenox, 11th Baronet of Markethouse and Member of Parliament for the town of the same name. Charles’s older brother.

Edmund was a genial soul, happier at Lenox House in the country than in town, but he was also an important and reliable member of his party, who took his duties seriously and refused credit for much of his work-to the extent that his importance in the House had been unknown to his own brother until two years before.

“Charles!” said Edmund. “I wondered whether you might be here. My God, they gave you the worst office in the entire place. Young Michaelson had it, but he traded out like a shot when he got the chance. I hope you don’t die of a draft. But come: Has it really been ten weeks? Shake my hand. I stopped in earlier, and Graham told me you were to have a tour, but come have lunch at Bellamy’s afterward, will you?”

This was the famous Members’ restaurant at Parliament.

“Of course,” said Lenox.

“Excellent. In that case, I’ll take my leave and see you then.” Edmund put on his hat, which had been in his hand, and left, whistling down the hallway.

Mr. Bigham, who arrived a few minutes later, proved to be a plump, small man, with big owlish glasses and a dry manner of speech. He sat in front of Lenox’s desk for some twenty minutes and lectured him on various matters of protocol and procedure.

“As you know,” he began, “the House meets at a quarter to four in the afternoon, except on Wednesdays, when we convene at noon. Each sitting begins with a religious service from which the public is barred, but as soon as that ends strangers come into the galleries. Here’s a funny fact, Mr. Lenox: Although there are six hundred and seventy Members of Parliament, only about three hundred and fifty people can fit into the House of Commons! Remarkable, isn’t it? For an important vote we might just cram four hundred in, but not more than that.”

“I suppose many Members don’t come to the sittings?”

“Oh, there are a hundred men who only come to London once a year but find it convenient or pleasurable to hold a seat. Another hundred live in London but still come to the House only once a year. In the end only two hundred or so attend regularly. There are always empty spots on the benches.”

“I shall be part of that two hundred,” said Lenox.

“Shall you?” Mr. Bigham smiled, his jowly face lit up. “I’ve heard that before, I can promise. Now, business. In any given session of the House, you’ll first handle private business-anything of an essentially local nature and any vote pushed through by one of several important companies, including the railroads and the water works. Public business covers pretty much everything else you can imagine…”

Eventually the lecture was over and they were walking through a labyrinth of alternating small and vast hallways, some dim and low-ceilinged, others imposing and portrait-lined. Bigham kept up a steady prattle about the history of the building. A few times Lenox bumped into men he knew and stopped to say hello. It was all starting to feel real; he was here.

That feeling truly took hold of him when they entered the Commons. He had sat in the visitors’ galleries, of course-had from them often watched his own father speak-but to be on the floor, so near the chair of the Speaker of the House…it was a remarkable thing. The room was tiny, ornate, and as hushed as a cathedral.

Mr. Bigham whispered reverently, “To think-from this chamber a group of six hundred and seventy men rule an empire of tens of millions of souls. Once you write your name in the Members’ book, it will remain there forever as part of the history of this time. How lucky you are, Mr. Lenox!”

“I am,” said Lenox. There was a strange hollow place in his chest. “I am,” he repeated. “I know I am.”