A Stranger in Mayfair - Charles Finch [8]
“Oh?”
Ludo’s face flushed, and his tone became confidential. “In truth I wouldn’t mind it quietly handled, and I know I can count on your discretion. Quite between you and me, there has been some talk of a title.”
“A title for you?” asked Lenox, surprised. A title usually capped a career. Ludo was still young, or at least middle-aged.
“I’ve been a guest at the palace quite often recently, and play whist with one of the royals almost every night. I won’t say his name. But apparently my service in Parliament has been observed and may be commended.”
“I congratulate you.”
“It would please me immensely, I don’t mind saying. It always rather rankled in our family that the old King didn’t hand us something in that line. God bless him,” he added as an afterthought.
This was puzzlingly intimate, thought Lenox, and then asked, “Why must it be quiet? Surely there’s no implication that you killed the boy?”
“I? Never!” Ludo laughed. “Besides having no reason on earth to do it, I was sat firmly at the card table for ten hours last night, with Frank Derbyshire and a whole host of others.”
“Of course. I didn’t mean—”
“It’s only that the slightest breath of scandal or infelicity can shake this sort of thing. It’s all so fragile, you know.”
“The title?”
“Yes, exactly. Also, as I say, Eliza is quite upset—most upset—and asked me to come.”
Lenox was puzzled by Ludo’s behavior. Did he care about this lad, Frederick Clarke? Why not let the Yard handle it? And why was he bursting with all this information about his prospects for an elevation to the House of Lords? It seemed in awfully poor taste. Then it occurred to Lenox that perhaps Ludo couldn’t share any of this potential good fortune with his friends, or even his family, lest it fall through and make him look like a liar or a fool. It might be that he needed an audience, someone who would listen with appropriate gravity to the news but who would keep it to himself. Yes, Lenox decided, it was because the man had run over the tantalizing facts so often in his mind and needed to blurt them out to stay sane. Had been bursting with the news. Strange indeed, though, to deliver it as he simultaneously delivered news of a murder.
He was terribly restless. “Here, sit,” said Lenox. At last Ludo settled into the armchair Graham had only recently occupied, opposite Lenox and in front of the cold hearth.
“Thanks, thanks,” he said. “Now—may I bring you back with me? My carriage is outside.”
“I’m honored that you came to me, but it’s the worst possible moment for me to take on any new responsibilities.”
“You mean you can’t come look?”
“I wish I could, but I cannot. The leaders of our party have made allowances because of my marriage, but as you well know the House reconvenes in a little more than a week’s time, and there are meetings for me to attend hour after hour before then.”
“If it’s about money…?”
Shocked, Lenox drew himself up in his chair and said, “No, it isn’t.”
Ludo saw straightaway that he had made a blunder. “I’m so terribly sorry. Of course it isn’t about money. Forgive me.”
“As I say, my responsibilities at the moment scarcely permit me any return to my old field. You of all people can understand how daunting it is to be a new Member.”
“Yes, of course.”
“The Yard is competent in these matters, I promise.”
Ludo, still agitated, said, “Are you sure you couldn’t come and have a quick look?”
In fact Lenox was sorely tempted to do it. He missed his old work and, excited though he was about his new career, contemplated with mute dread the idea of giving detection up forever. Even while he had been on the Continent, absorbed by Jane and the local life, his mind had often turned back to old cases. Still, he said, “No, I’m afraid—”
“Oh, please, Lenox—if only for my wife. She has no peace of mind at all just now.”
“But—”
“We must look out for each other, Members of the Commons. I wouldn’t ask if I weren’t distressed.”
Lenox relented.