Fen felt whatever principles he had slipping finally and irretrievably into limbo before Captain Watkyn’s determined and far-reaching doctrines of expediency.
‘Is that the lot?’ he asked weakly.
‘There are still the professional people, upper middle class and so forth. Not many of them, but they tend to vote.’
‘And what tale do I spin them?’
Captain Watkyn seemed hurt.
‘Look here, old boy, don’t you go getting any wrong ideas about me. I know as well as you do what a grand thing democracy is. But the way I look at it is this. You’re obviously the sort of clever, high-minded chap who ought to be in Parliament. Very well, then. But how are you going to get there? Answer: you’ve got to be elected.
‘Now, these Sanford people don’t know you as well as I do,’ Captain Watkyn pursued, with a confidence which their quarter-hour acquaintance did not seem to Fen entirely to justify, ‘and since they’re mostly chronic imbeciles they’re quite likely to elect some scoundrelly nitwit who’ll help send the country to the dogs. Therefore, they’ve got to be jollied along a bit – for their own good, d’you see?’
‘As Plato remarked.’
‘As whatsit remarked, yes. Once you’re elected, then your principles and so forth come into play. See what I mean?’
Fen, on the point of drawing attention to the well-known fact that means determine ends, came abruptly to the conclusion that the moment was inopportune and subsided again.
‘Yes, I see what you mean,’ he said reservedly.
‘Then we’re all set,’ said Captain Watkyn. ‘Now, today’s Saturday. My idea is to concentrate all your meetings as close to Polling Day as possible. This afternoon, of course, there’s the nomination business in Sanford Morvel. Then tomorrow evening I’ve arranged for you to hold a kick-off meeting there after church hours. On Monday morning you’re going hunting—’
‘I’m what?’
‘Hunting, old boy. Cubbing, actually. There’s a very keen hunt in these parts. Get you a lot of votes if you turn up.’
‘But I’ve never hunted in my life,’ said Fen. His knowledge of the subject was derived almost exclusively from Surtees and the Irish Resident Magistrate.
‘That’s all right,’ said Captain Watkyn easily. ‘You can ride, can’t you?’
‘In a way.’
‘Then don’t worry, old boy. I’ll be there to give you moral support. And I can easily get the loan of a couple of quiet nags.’
‘No,’ said Fen.
‘If you went,’ Captain Watkyn urged, ‘it’d give you a lot of pull with a certain sort of people, because neither of the other candidates will be there. The Conservative man can’t ride, and the Labour man daren’t, for fear of offending The New Statesman… Just think it over.’
‘No.’
Unlike Oxford, Captain Watkyn had no time to waste on lost causes. ‘All right, then,’ he said regretfully, ‘we’ll cut that out… Now, let’s see. Most of the rest of the week you’ll have to spend touring about to God-awful places like Peek, and talking at street corners. But, of course, we’ll hold a slap-up final meeting on the evening before Polling Day.’
‘That sounds satisfactory,’ Fen agreed. ‘And are there any people who are going to canvass for me?’
‘Well, not yet,’ said Captain Watkyn. ‘There aren’t actually any such people yet. Matter of fact, I tried to rope in the chaps who are nominating you, but they turned a bit nasty. Still, I shall find someone, never fear.’
‘And have I got a loudspeaker van?’
‘Well, yes. It doesn’t work very well, because it’s rather an old one, but there’s an electrician johnny in Sanford Morvel trying to fix it up.’
‘And a car?’
‘I’ve seen to that, too,’ said Captain Watkyn. ‘We’ll pick it up after the nomination.’
‘And do we need a committee room? I dare say I could get a room here if necessary.’
‘Well, we haven’t got a committee, have we, old boy? No, I think we’ll dispense with that for the time being. No point in burdening ourselves with unnecessary expenses – the law only allows us a certain amount of money to play about with, you know… Now, is there anything else, I wonder?’
‘What are the other candidates like?’
‘Oh, they’re not much,’ said Captain Watkyn with contempt. ‘The Conservative – chap called Strode – is a farm-labourer who’s been to night classes. And Wither, the Labour man, is a big industrial magnate from somewhere up north. They’ve been chosen that way to try and make an appeal to the sort of people who aren’t normally expected to vote for their Parties. Of course, it won’t make the slightest difference in the end, but it gives Party H.Q. the illusion of being-up-to-the-minute.’
‘Do you think I’ve got a chance of getting in?’ Fen asked.
‘Not a doubt of it, old boy,’ said Captain Waytkn heartily. ‘Think success: talk success. That’s my motto, and always will be.’
Fen eyed him rather coldly. ‘But apart from sales talk, I mean.’
Captain Watkyn’s cheerfulness abated slightly.
‘Well, I don’t know,’ he said. ‘In the normal way, to be quite candid, I should say you hadn’t got a chance in a million. But politics are funny. They’re like racing. Hundred-to-one outsiders romp home and leave all the experts gaping. So you needn’t despair,’ said Captain Watkyn, resuming his more specious manner. ‘No need for despair at all. Now, I tell you what: we’ll drive into Sanford Morvel for lunch, and then there’ll be the nomination business, and after that you can come back here to’ – he gestured vaguely – ‘to prepare your mind and so forth… How about one for the road?’
So they had one for the road and, after Captain Watkyn had ascertained that Fen was provided with the cheque for his deposit, left the inn. Captain Watkyn’s car proved to be a rather old Bugatti sports model, and in it they set off for Sanford Morvel. The journey was without incident except when Captain Watkyn stopped beside a seedy-looking man who was shuffling along the road, gave him two pound notes, murmured: ‘Assyrian Lancer, Newmarket, 3.30,’ and drove on again. ‘Damn silly names these horses have,’ he observed to Fen.
Sanford Morvel looked as if it were trying to be a gracious, peaceful country town and failing very badly. Its main street was wide but vacant-seeming; its Town Hall was old but ugly; its shops and pubs and houses had uniformly succeeded in missing the great periods of English domestic architecture; its church was squat and sullen. Fen and Captain Watkyn lunched on ill-cooked meat and tepid vegetables at the ‘White Lion’, a pretentious but comfortless hotel in the Market Square. Afterwards they went to the Town Hall, where the deposit and nomination papers were given with due form to the Sheriff, and where Fen shook hands with Strode and Wither, neither of whom (since the occasion was not a public one) evinced much cordiality to him or to each other.
Following this ceremony, Fen was introduced by Captain Watkyn to the car he was to use, a lumbering old Morris no longer capable of doing more than twenty miles an hour. In it, having received a promise that Captain Watkyn would