What the Dickens

In Competition No. 3178 you were invited to submit an extract from a Dickensian novel based around the name of someone in political life. Inspired titles, in a modestly sized but accomplished entry, included A Tale of Two Pritis (David Silverman and Joe Houlihan) and Paul A. Freeman’s Barnier Fudge. The winners below take £25 each, except Bill Greenwell who earns a bonus fiver.

Mr. Shapps, Sir. At your service, Mr. Shapps. Always a toothsome smile, a twinkle, a child in perpetuity. Mr. Shapps with his electric bicycle, his hair rising happily from his head. Mr. Shapps taking his turn on the platform, waving away the engine, his mouth ajar, happy in his work. Locomotion, he announces, is a necessary necessity. We must travel, Sir, from Q to Z, and in good time. A strategic travel corridor is what he craves, Sir. Mr. Shapps has enunciated as such. We must move cautiously, that is his watchword, as long as we move at speed.