The world can have too much order, alas. Ah, here we are at last. Mind your manners and remember what I told you about how to eat with so much cutlery1 – which, I have to reiterate, I would rather you did not attempt to steal. I know you to be a well-intentioned young man, but occasionally you get a little mmm absent-minded around small light objects; please refrain from the habit of a lifetime, just for tonight, please?’
‘I’m not a thief!’ said Dodger. ‘I can’t help it if things are left lying around.’ Then he nudged Solomon’s arm and said, ‘Just kidding. I will be on my best behaviour and a credit to my wonderful unmentionables – I’ve never had a garment that fitted so well in the groin. If I’d known what it feels like to be among the gentry I would have applied for a ticket a long time ago!’
The driver stopped just short of their destination; private coaches and growlers were politely jostling to disgorge their passengers without their drivers having to swear at one another more than usual. They got out and walked up the steps of the very pleasant building Dodger had hardly noticed the night before. Solomon raised his hand to knock on the door and magically the door opened before he had touched it, to reveal Geoffrey the butler.
The important thing to do, Dodger thought, was to keep close to Solomon, who seemed to be entirely in his element. The guests were still coming in, and most of them knew one another, and they certainly knew where the drinks were, and therefore Dodger and Solomon were ignored right up until Charlie and Mister Disraeli returned together from wherever it was they had huddled to exchange current information.
Disraeli made a beeline for Solomon and said, ‘How nice it is to see you here!’ They shook hands, but Dodger read from their faces that here were two people who distrusted each other quite a lot. Then Disraeli, with a glint in his eye, turned to Dodger and said, ‘Oh, wonderful, the young tosher transmuted into a gentleman! Excellent!’
This slightly annoyed Dodger, though he couldn’t exactly figure out why, but he said, ‘Yes, sir, indeed, tonight I am a gentleman and tomorrow I might turn out to be a tosher again!’ As the words dropped into Dodger’s ears, his brain clicked again, telling him: This is the opportunity, don’t mess it up! And so, grinning, he added, ‘I can be a gentleman, and I can be a tosher; can you be a tosher, Mister Disraeli?’
For a moment, and probably entirely unnoticed by anyone else in the throng apart from the four of them, there was a moment when the world froze, and then thawed instantly the moment Mister Disraeli had decided what to do, which was to smile like the morning sun with a knife in its teeth. He said, ‘My dear boy, do you think I would make a tosher? Hardly a profession I had reason to contemplate, I must say!’
He had to pause because Charlie had slapped him on the back, saying, ‘It’s just scrambling in the mud to find the hidden treasure, my friend, and I might suggest it is remarkably like politics! If I was you I would take the opportunity to learn something very valuable about the world. I always do!’
Disraeli glanced at Dodger and said, ‘Well, now I come to think of it, quite possibly a reconnaissance of the underbelly of the city would be sensible at this time.’
‘And indeed,’ said Charlie, grinning like a man who has dropped a sixpence and picked up a crown, ‘it would show, do you not think, that you are being very careful of public opinion in the matter of drainage in this city, which is in fact antiquated and noisome, to say the least. A canny politician would, I am sure, like to show his concern for this scandalous state of affairs. Our friends in Punch magazine would certainly portray you as a forward-looking politician, careful of the city as a whole.’
For a moment Disraeli looked rather solemn, playing with his little goatee beard as if lost in thought, then he said, ‘Yes indeed, Charlie, I think you may have a point.’
It seemed to Dodger that the two men were each hatching plans of their own; he could smell the smell of a man who scents an opportunity and was deciding how to bend it to his own advantage, just like he