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dirty towel was slung over each shoulder. This, Lenox saw, was Mr. Crook.
    “Shall we have a bite?” Lenox asked with barely concealed yearning.
    “Best ask Mr. Crook,” said Hilary sympathetically. “We’ve much work to do.”
    “Yes, yes.”
    They approached the bar, a wide, immaculately clean slab of slate, with glasses hanging above it and gleaming brass fixtures at either end. Like the outside of the house, the pub’s inside seemed the province of a fastidious, clean, and honest man.
    “Gentlemen,” he said in a heavy northern voice. “Here for dinner?”
    “I’m Hilary, actually. I sent word of our arrival. This is Charles Lenox, your candidate.”
    Crook gave them both an evaluating look. “Very pleased to meet you, Mr. Lenox,” he said. “I promise nothing, let me say from the start.”
    “I understand.”
    “Still, we shall do our best, and I daresay by the end we’ll see you through, and before long you can return to London and forget all about us. Johnson, another pint of mild?”
    Before Lenox had a chance to deny Crook’s prediction, the tender was already sliding a pint glass of foamy, rich brown ale down the bar. It looked lifesaving to Lenox’s eye.
    “Thank you for your help,” said Lenox.
    “Well—and you look solid enough.” This Crook said rather glumly. “It will be difficult.”
    “Do we have time to sit for a moment and eat?”
    “No,” said Crook. “Lucy!” he shouted. “Bring a couple of roasted beef sandwiches.”
    The pretty girl raised her hand in brief acknowledgment.
    “You two must go—with money, mind—straight to the printers. We need handbills, flyers, posters, all that sort of thing—we need ’em before the end of the day. I’ve designed it all, but run your eyes over what he has. Lucy!”
    The girl returned with two sandwiches. Without either of the two Londoners noticing, Crook had poured two half-pints of mild and pushed them across the bar. “You look peaky,” he said. “Drink these off and eat on your way. Six doors down, to your left. Make sure you bring cash. The stables have your bags? Good, I’ve got two rooms for 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

    C
    rook, 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